At 05:40 09/06/2008, Evan Leibovitch wrote:
I do not intend to say "keep the status quo" at all, but while AtLarge or ALAC is under the review now, I think it might be good to take some old lessons from the past to create the new future.
I agree completely.
Dear Evan and Izumie, Our experience in France is as follows. 1) we numbered a few candidates on the BoD in 2000 (approx. 10?) but far fewer voters than in Germany where the BoD Member was elected. 2) I created france@large with most of the other candidates (we had a good relationship during the campaign, which was exclusively private - in some other countries Govs interfered). 3) we invited the German BoD Member to the French Parliament, had dinner with AFNIC (ccTLD), had a meeting with DNSO/BC, etc. 4) there were two of us, which funded themselves, in the ICANN meeting where the first @large reps were sited (and the first new TLD created), along with two others with their organization's money. 5) we extensively answered the questionnaire on the @large evolution and found out afterward that: - ICANN wanted to kill the @large representation - our ideas went along well with the WSIS under preparation, so we modified and confirmed our strategy: - we considered the network as a people centric common property that we had to co-operate together with for our mutual benefit. - france@large was efficient as a competent dedicated secretariat + active projects serving the @large community of the Internet lead users. - answer was good when we we started protecting our common interests at the roots (DNS, intelligence leaks, privacy, IETF standards, ISO, ITU, and ISOC). - and focused on the preparation of the WSIS and most certainly influenced it. 6) as such, when we accepted to help welcome ICANN in Paris and we requested to be accredited, in which we learned (from the English text we do not understand that the Staff has priorities other than to officially translate in French) that we both did not exist and ... were too big (?) 7) the resulting dispute over ALAC, ICANN, etc. and the need for proper Internet At Large free exchanges that are out of the Control of anyone, led to identify what our problems with the public were: - people know nothing about the Internet itself. They are familiar with the web and email, but not how they actually work. But they are quick learners if interested - they feel that they are manipulated by Google, etc. For example, when they are told about Rumsfeld's I/O Road Map they are not upset, just relieved to learn that there is a mechanical logic to the US influence on the Internet, and they ask "what next" to protect themselves against it. - they feel that there is a big change coming ahead, without knowing what it may be. When digital convergence and semantic evolution are explained to them, they understand it all. Most feel it is too much for them to care right now, but they hope we will take the job. A significant minority gets excited and very interested by the convergence with other sciences/technologies that they may so happen to be involved in. This leds us to change our tactic for the Paris meeting. We wanted to document needs and problems, and make propositions. We understood that people grasp the problems we face, but did not yet have the knowledge in order to explain these problem in a way that ICANN can understand (ICANN does not even understand that we exist :-)). Therefore, we are going to publish a simple yet comprehensive explanation (FAQ) on the Internet, along with its governance, evolution, and the way that we want it to happen. And to ask people to go and see for themselves. To observe that ICANN talks and print but does not bite nor make much. We will run debriefings (on June 27, 28, and 29 at different places with different people), and confirm, detail, and publish a strategy. Most already accept it, but they will then be able to better understand, and (key point) to also understand as to how and why it can succeed to everyone's benefit. Eventually, on the 2nd of July we will start working/acting with two exploration meetings on ethitechnics and multilinguistics, which are the two technical/normative/documentation priorities that we identified (to build technology with an ethical equilibrium; to technically support equal linguistic diversity). 8) our position is, therefore, vey dubitative concerning ICANN. We fear that the transition from an American Internet towards an international Internet, which we do need and that we believed that we agreed upon in Tunis will not be as smooth as we planned. ICANN has to be helped throughout the transition (and ALAC is the proper place for Civil Society, but we have observed that ICANN seems to oppose that transition. It may have some short term vision for that, but it may also just not understand where we feel we are. I hope this helps. jfc