Thank you so much. Hi everyone. It's so nice to meet you all and I don't want to thank the
Devroom facilitators to bring everyone together. I hear that last year and there's a
much smaller room. So we're going up in the world. We've got a bigger room this year. So I'm here
to talk to you a bit about the nominette DNS fund. It's very much got my learning hat on coming
to you with humility because I really want to hear from you about what you think and how we can
improve because we're very, very early days. So forgive our bumps and mistakes but that's what
we're here for, right? It's to learn and improve and say what we haven't got right. So I work for
nominette. We run the dot UK registry and a number of other TLD's top level domains. And as
part of that we are a public benefit company. So it's part of our articles of association that we
can't make profit in a traditional way. And that means that we give a lot of our excess from selling
domains to public benefit causes. Now traditionally my rollers looked at things like digital
skills online safety but we've been really trying to listen to our community and this year for
the up to last year 2025 for the first time we were really delighted to enter a new space and start
funding open source DNS projects. So as I say it's relatively new for us but it's it's quite
interesting to then think about you know where that's how that's come about and what our
personal incentives are as well. So where did we start with all of this? Well it tracks back to
even before I had my child who turned three last week and we did some research in 2022 with this
amazing organization called Demas. They're an awesome think tank in the UK and they set out to help us
craft the question. What is it that we're trying to influence? What is it that we're trying to do?
And it's really what should nominate focus our investment on to support the technology ecosystem
that underpins internet infrastructure and once we've got a hands-alone over that question and we've
got a bit of focus what funding model should we use. So we set out and ask this question of you can
tell a little bit of who ended up having a say in this. Our staff and our members and overwhelming
those people were saying look don't try and do lots of the shiny things don't do lots of new
and innovative things look at what's existing look at the maintenance of what is out there.
The other thing that they said and this this graph isn't stacked because it you could
answer multiple to this question. You can really see overwhelming our members in particular so
those are people that work with us that by domains and and resell domains in their own work.
They said work with open source communities and you can see a couple of quotes up there
that investing profits in open source with a focus on human rights seriously nothing else.
We also did a massive landscape map so we thought to really understand other funders,
government actors who in the DNS was was operating and what sort of projects we might expect
to go out there identifying different actors and players and where we might have a role and where
we might have a niche and I just absolutely love this quote which comes from an expert advisor
on how when we look at who is maintaining and who's paid to maintain open source. Often when
that's at the behest of profit the motivations are going to steer them towards those profit driven
motivations. So you know I think it's really powerful to think about those motivations and think
where there might be pots of funding or actors that could be looking at it with a different lens.
And where did that research kind of lead us? What were the main findings? And I'd love to hear
actually I'm going to ask you whether you think these are right or whether you think there's more to it
but this is from all of this mapping lots of interviews with staff members and those in the open
source community about the pre-existing funding in open source. So the first one being that the majority
of funding stems from corporate, not foundations and that can bias development. Second being single
source funding so you get one funder wants to just take credit for one project as opposed to
pooling funds and something that Nick Gates was talking about earlier with joining up lots of funds
and thirdly funding not being available for individuals only projects. That fact sound familiar
people nodding yeah oh yeah well do do shout out and I can repeat what you say if you think of anything
else but this is what it found. And I think it's interesting because we identified these problems
but I'm not going to say that automatically we were able to resolve them right because we weren't.
We've made mistakes, we've got problems and we've got challenges to each in these. So the second
project problem here in particular about having one funder one project we have tried to reach
out to other funders and combine and work but it's not always easy and sometimes when you do work
for an organization like mine they do want to have their name associated with it so that they
can sort of celebrate and say what they're doing. This third problem in particular has been a real
challenge for us and I'm just going to share a little anecdote about taking this finding back
into our organization. So as you can imagine we had to set up lots of conversations with our lawyers,
with our financial controllers to think about what it looks like to actually fund not just
well established large organizations but some of those smaller individuals that are just the
unsung heroes of keeping the internet as we know it alive and it was really hard because actually
you know for financial tax audit reasons they were saying to me well no actually you've got to be
a registered entity you've got to have a name you've got to have a dress which can't just fund
Joe blog of the streets but I went through this process and actually there are there are two
in our portfolio that are individual maintainers and don't have an organization. We've been supporting
them to register and actually my financial controller said to me look Amy look at your portfolio
of the people you're funding actually you've got to make sure you get that balanced right you've
got to make sure that this is about funding those maintainers and those individuals so it will
really was a case of going back to the principles of what we were doing who was setting out to fund
and relying on this research to make sure that we were responding to that need so where did we end
up what did we do last year now I feel a little bit embarrassed honestly to share the amount of money here
it's a 370k in pounds which is about 430 euro thousand euros so it really isn't about a lot
of money that we're talking about here but we're seeing this as somewhat of a pilot we want to see
how it lands how it lands amongst you the community with our members with our stakeholders what the
perceptions are of a fund like this and certainly we're hoping to at least double this in the next
year one of the big things coming out of the research was longevity of funds so I would love to
imagine being able to award three year funding which we've been able to do with previous
grants in our country on nine harms portfolio but at the moment we've just been giving these one
off fundings but that if that's you know strong feedback that that is about relying on that
that fund moving forward then I think that that is something important for us to make the case
for our board to get three years worth of sign off not just one and really we landed on something
that felt right in terms of the fund itself and what we were setting out to achieve so it's all
about funding and improving the security sustainability and resilience of DNS open source projects
and that's been really critical because when we looked at all the applications it was something
we did come back to had to be open source and had to be in the development of DNS not just using
DNS and that's helped us stay really true and transparent to what we set out on our objectives
and so how did we do this well firstly yes of course we have some expertise but we have our own biases
as a nominate we have our own preferences of different platforms we have our own technical experts
so while the panel that we formed was designed to make sure we were really listening to the experts
that had a better horizon scan and a map of the community we we made sure that we were bringing
in our knowledge but also really listening externally so you can recognize two of these amazing
panelists who are set on the front row over here so we've got Caleb and Mirko
who really were fantastic in just bringing your knowledge and steering us in the right way not just
not just whom we selected but also in how we set up the fund to try to realise what it means to be
transparent and how we could really understand what's needed I think something I'm very conscious of
is this uncomfortable realisation of power who has power who makes decisions how those decisions get
made so one mitigating step you can do I think is to build an advisory panel like this and we
took a lot of learning from the soft and tech agency from that perspective as well and we also
tried to be really principles focused so be transparent in what we were looking for what questions
we'd be asking how we would be making those selections and sharing those out there so actually I'm
going to pause for a moment and invite you to have a little read so we've got five main criteria
about public benefit it's about securing critical infrastructure and what impact that would have
on society if it broke down the need that it represents in terms of resilient operation of the global
DNS we were really looking for proof and use this is really important to us that we weren't
setting out to fund shining new infrastructure it was actually about things that maintainers that are
already doing the work that are already underfunded that are already in the ecosystem and have a
proven reputation so we wanted to see that in what we were selecting and indeed the right people
are those people the people that have the skills experience and understanding and in fact some
some some teams we looked at were sorry some application we looked at weren't part of teams
they were individuals so that's quite interesting too you could be the best individual in the world
but if that project isn't necessarily sustainable you don't have lots of contributors you
haven't thought of that that's something in the system that we're looking at in terms of sustainability
and value so I'd just like you to turn to the person next to you if you're next to someone
or if you don't want to you could just think about it in your own time um but just tell like have
a little chat just a couple of minutes do you feel like these are right for our first round in
terms of principles have we got it right is there something that you would add to that or do
differently and then if anyone's willing to give me a little bit of feedback we're really really keen
to learn so I'm just going to give you a couple of minutes just to turn to person next to you
okay how am I for time
see you again
okay thank you so much
I've got my listening hat on, I keep being really tempted to step.
I have to stand between these bits so I'm not allowed to move out to you.
But I've got my pen and paper ready and I'm really keen to learn.
So I said, no, I've got any feedback to these feel right.
Is there anything you would add if you were in my shoes?
Would you do differently?
I can be using the mic, is that okay?
There's a guy at the back there.
Thanks, all of these make sense.
The only one I would maybe tweak with the point number three,
Proven use, because actually since you're providing grants
and you have people that have identified a problem,
maybe that problem has not been solved yet.
So actually it might be the case that there are no current solution
to that problem.
It would be risky for you to firm them, obviously,
because they have not yet demonstrated a proven solution.
But it sometimes makes sense to take that risk
if the identified need on point two is really serious in your eyes
if you see what I mean.
That's really helpful feedback, thank you.
Anyone out?
There's the side over here.
Hi, welcome, don't worry, just come in.
We're just discussing these other principles that we set up as part of our DNS fund.
It was our pilot rounds, but I'm really keen to learn.
So just getting a bit of feedback from people about whether it feels right.
Thank you.
Hi, thank you for this particular session.
It's rare that we get an opportunity to talk to the people next to us.
Ruth raised a very important concern about the third one.
Is this project successful and is it been used at scale?
And she talked a bit about how sometimes it's successful,
but what's the definition of success?
And what does that look like?
It might be successful, but not at scale yet.
It could be mutually exclusive.
And that's really resonated with me because I was looking at the fourth point.
The second part where it says, do they have a track record of getting similar things done?
So speaking from personal experience, I run a project where we're trying to get more research coming
out of Africa by offering an open source curriculum to teach research in Africa.
That's impact that's high need, but we're not at scale.
Or as he mentioned, we haven't solved the problem yet, but we don't look fondable yet.
This is the core idea behind my talk tomorrow about how impact is usually needed for funding,
but to get impact, you do need the funding, so it's a crazy paradox.
It's interesting to hear others share that as well.
I totally hear that. Thank you so much for your feedback. It's really helpful.
We've got Kaylin at the front here.
It's for the live stream as well.
Thank you.
So I'm Kaylin with Hano and Mirko.
So Mirko and I are on the expert advisory panel.
And we're discussing how the first one, others too, in particular the first one.
It can be a bit subjective when you're assessing and when we're assessing applications.
And Mirko made an important point that it's hard to eliminate the subjectivity.
And the most important thing is that you report your transparent about that and you report it,
transparently.
And I think we did that quite well and knew the team were very intentional about doing that well.
But yeah, so basically, Mirko's point is, you can't eliminate subjectivity in some of the assessment criteria.
Yeah, I really agree. And I think it is about just then being transparent about that.
So we haven't announced the successful applicants yet, but it really is our intent to tie the storytelling to these principles of why those have been successful.
But I think you're right that there are areas of subjectivity that we need to be just open and honest about in what our advisory panel are sharing with us.
And then ultimately we're making that judgment.
We've got one more bit of feedback here.
I think it's worth considering a spectrum of risk in products, like not everything should be safe and not everything should be super risky.
So there are always, there's always the possibility the next innovation, the greenfield idea may come from come through something like this,
if a fund like this doesn't take a spectrum of risk into account, then those things won't get funded and we'll just be sort of where we are now.
So I agree with the idea that funding shiny new things is not great, because there's a lot of stuff out there that exists and we depend on now that needs the funding.
But I think that the risk spectrum is possibly affected to add.
Thank you. Yeah, I love that idea of adding in more of a spectrum and so we can understand that.
Yeah, and I mean your point on innovation is very fair and it is something that the research came up with three potential models for us to look at and one of them was just an innovation fund.
We could look out for the next big thing that's going to radically shake up DNS and we could fund that and put big money into it.
Actually we settled on, let's start small and just look at what's happening at the moment where there's existing work and as we iterate and evolve, I could see potentially parts of that changing and shifting.
So look, I've got three pages of many notes, I'm going to take those back, we will be launching our round two in the coming months, so watch this space and you know it's my full intent that your feedback will help us shape the learning of how that comes across.
So where did we get to? Are you saw that the fund was live in September? We made advisory panel, we had advisory panel meetings in November.
We've been busy working with the eight successful applicants that we've committed to fund on their contracting.
For those, these are just a sample of the types of things that we've got coming in around DNS path transparency, DNS resolvers, looking at tracking to reduce maintenance and admin issues.
We've got lots of ideas about libraries, DNS client and server libraries, test beds, testing environments, lots of things about monitoring availability and performance of DNS servers and monitoring DNS traffic as well.
So it was brilliant. There was quite an international spread in those that I expected 20 applicants, honestly, and we got 33, so I think that was really, really good.
And we're really delighted with the kind of feedback and reception that we've had. So yeah, I'm sorry not to have the slide that then says, and here are the people we're funding, but we just have to make sure that we're doing all our, or all our projects and it will be sort of live scenes.
So watch this space. There is a space on our website where you can sign up for updates and for more.
But otherwise, look, I'm really receptive to any general questions that you have. We've got about 10 minutes left.
You could tell me some of the things, I mean, you already have started to, but if you've got things that you think as a funder, I should stop doing what we should stop designing in.
Really, really all ears, but otherwise, if you've got any questions, be really delighted to hear anything that you've got.
There's a question in the middle here.
Hi, super interesting talk. You mentioned earlier one turn into your head was with contracting and engaging people or having them set up.
I was curious that you look into some like funding in the intermediaries, things like get up sponsors or open collective or things like that to not have this direct connection between.
Let's say while direct contract connection between your entity and the receiving parties.
Yeah, thanks.
I'd love to hear more about that because I think it's definitely pointing to we need some kind of intermediary because at the moment we've had these two individuals as part of the eight.
One of them successfully quickly rallied and set up a company and got all the accounting and legal staff and actually they've got a huge number of contributors.
So it was something that was going to happen anyway for that person, but the other person just like, look, I do this in my free time.
I'm not interested in setting up a company as much admin for me. I don't earn enough on this to pay tax.
We've said to them, you know, what can we do to pay a little bit more to help you with the setting up of that?
And it's just really, really problematic because my company is saying we can't just pay anyone.
So if there is something like GitHub sponsors that we could do an intermediary, that will be game changing for this fund.
And I think that we could really open it up because in one of our, you know, even though the research told us funding individuals on our first eligibility, it says you have to be an organization, right?
And that's just a, that's something we've got wrong and we're trying to make it right.
But if there's an, I'd love to connect with you and hear how that could work.
So actually my comment is along the same lines or question is along the same lines. We talk a lot about funding.
But we don't talk a lot about operationally managing that funding when it's received.
And this is a perfect example of an individual that really doesn't want to deal with any of the operational concerns of receiving money.
So if I'd like to suggest that that it might be possible for your company to actually set up like a research institute that can just employ the people at some level.
And take care of all the operational complexity because at the end of the day you really don't want developers doing this, they don't want to do it.
It will cost them and they will get it wrong and it is actually kind of counter to the way that we do open source, which is essentially sharing the work.
And if, if one entity can get set up and basically do the work of all that work for a bunch of people, it actually enables a lot of contribution without a lot of overhead for them.
That's a really good idea. Yeah, one idea we had was, and we're still exploring is like a DNS academy because the people interested in DNS is declining.
And but we know that there's still a lot of work to be done and the diversity in DNS, at least a lot to be desired.
So I think potentially something that could pair that into a workflow of saying you could then be employed to do this work independently.
I think we'll be a fabulous idea, so let me bring it back to my board and see what they say.
Okay, I think we've read very close to the end, but I'm really happy to hear any further feedback and there's my email.
You can find me on LinkedIn and things like that.
So thank you so much everyone for your contributions and for making this a really interactive and giving me some things to go back with.
So appreciate your time and have a good rest of your afternoon.
Thank you. Thank you.