Alan, I don't think you and I are going to agree on the relative merits of the SIC/Staff and NCUC proposed charters, and as we move forward I don't think the NCUC draft matters much, at least not at the moment. I think the NCUC proposal superior, but that's a bit irrelevant as there's really only one draft charter put before us and that's from SIC, online <http://www.icann.org/en/public-comment/#stakeholder> and copy attached. There's been a lot of comment critical of the SIC, and given that I expect (hope) discussion will continue towards/in Seoul (and perhaps then the NCUC draft will come back into play.) But for now I think we would do well to start again and decide what it is we want from the Non-Commercial Stakeholder Group, where the SIC draft meets those needs and where it fails. ALAC's opinion on this will be valued, it's seen I think as an issue we should have competency on. We should make an effort to read the proposal and understand what's at issue. Some things I want from the eventual working NCSG: That the barriers to participation are low, new actors can join easily with minimum of obstacles and delay. Processes/structures follow the bottom-up stakeholder driven model, are consistent and transparent. Interested individual Internet users to have a voice in policy development and selection of GNSO council representatives. I agree with you about the need to protect against capture. Thanks, Adam At 7:55 PM -0400 7/30/09, Alan Greenberg wrote:
Adam, on the Euro-Discuss list, you had the following quote, and I think (but am not sure) that it is the one that you quoted during the ALAC meeting this week.
" We also may differ from some of the current constituencies on how the GNSO should evolve after the new structure is implemented. As noted in the BGC report, the process for forming new constituencies has been in the By-Laws as long as the GNSO has existed. But it has never happened, presumably due to the (real or perceived) heavy burden of ³self-forming² and then ongoing management. Within the new structure, it may be even more difficult, due to a potential for the existing constituencies to believe that they can represent all viewpoints, thus eliminating the need for new constituencies." And goes on to make comments about how constituencies can be created without the barriers we've seen in the past.
By summarizing the next part in one sentence eliminates some of the key issues. It says: So expecting a group to self-form and become a new GNSO constituency is expecting a lot. If it is to happen at all, there are several things that must facilitate this: . ICANN (and the stakeholder groups) will have to make it as easy as possible to create and operate new constituencies. The requirements they must meet must be reasonable and applied with consistency. . These new entities must feel comfortable that they will be able to participate in the Policy Development Process as discretely identifiable bodies, at a level comparable to (and not subservient to) the long-established players (of course factoring in size). Without that guarantee, there is little reason for them to make the considerable effort needed to enter into GNSO processes. . The new addition level of hierarchy moving from GNSO->¨Constituency to GNSO->¨Stakeholder Group¨Constituency (or as per the consensus proposal GNSO->¨House->¨Stakeholder Group->¨Constituency) must be managed to minimize the need for additional complexity and additional volunteer effort. Thin layers will be, in our opinion, absolutely mandatory. If the above can be accomplished within the new Non-commercial Stakeholders Group, the non-commercial rebirth envisioned in section 5.3 of the BGC report may actually happen.
The second bullet is crucial. In my mind (and I don't expect to alter your views or those of the NCUC folks who drafted it), the NCUC-proposed NCSG charter does not come close to satisfying the second bullet. I believe that charter sets too high a threshold to getting the views of a new constituency to be voiced on Council. The SIC-proposed charter addresses this by allowing the Board to select some Councillors until such time as the new players in the NCSG can participate in the drafting of the longer-term rules for selecting councillors. That is absolutely key to attracting those new people into the game. By having the flat model that was proposed by the NCUC, you have the need to a small new constituency (or interest group) to convince others that their ideas merit support, a potentially difficult thing to do it those ideas do not support the established thinking (and I am reminded on the radically differing views on Whois by those who advocate privacy and those who are looking at consumer protection issues).
The SIC proposal also removed the possibility of capture, and issue that did not arise until the early NCSG charter drafts (and one that is present in the CyberSecurity draft as well). I honestly don't know if that issue was raised in a formal ALAC statement (I haven't had the chance to check), but it was continually raised in public and private discussions with the NCUC.
In the end, once everyone is at the table, the final NCSG charter may look very similar to the NCUC proposal, and if some that is fine. As long as any new constituencies have had a chance to participate in the discussion.
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