I do understand how hard it is to get people actively interested in this industry, I am constantly struggling (so far not very successfully) to find ways to engage folks here in Colorado with the Internet Society. Although I did not state it explicitly in this post, my plea is directed much more to the community and to those members who did not cast ballots than to ARIN itself. It must be heard by ARIN as well though (as your response shows it has), since that is where the buck ultimately stops.

Although the percentage of ballots cast is disappointing to me, what is more surprising is the disparity with registration levels. I assume that we can attribute this at least in part to the fact that DMR registration is permanent (as opposed to annual). Requiring an annual (or bi-annual) DMR registration may raise awareness more than a reminder to update existing DMR info. It would most likely result in less members having DMRs but it would hopefully also cause more of the ones who do register each year to actually cast ballots – a net win.

There are a couple other half formed ideas rattling around in my head – I will try and find some time to document them more concretely in the not too distant future.

On another tack, we can look at the US Presidential election and ask how they get such a high turn-out. The answer of course is not that the responsible organization performs great outreach but that the candidates do. If the major parties did not launch massive campaigns, turnout would be much lower. Perhaps candidates for seats with ARIN should shoulder more of this responsibility and work harder to make people aware of what is going on, what they want to do, and thus get more of the members to vote. In fact it is in their best interest; if you drive someone to the polls yourself, I am willing to bet that they are pretty likely to vote for you. The best part about this approach is that once one candidate starts doing it well, it pushes the others to do the same…

I couldn’t agree more… community participation requires an active xcommunity! Any thoughts that people have to improve voter turnout are more than appreciated. From checking with other industry associations, 16% is not surprising – it’s very difficult to get people interested (particularly in the IT industry where everyone has overflowing responsibilities) on something which seems as mundane as voting in an association election. We’ve done quite a bit of work at ARIN in maintain an active electorate, but again, any and all advice is welcome.

/John
President and CEO
ARIN