Evan, I will be the last person to defend what I believe was a very flawed process, and not just because of the outcome. But we need to be careful to get the facts correct, or we will be shot down for the wrong reasons. The final composition of the review team is 4 from the GNSO (an unbelievable increase from the original 1), 4 from Governments - not quite the same as the GAC since the IS DOC was ex officio included. The ccNSO has 2 not three (still a doubling of the original 1). Our count (like that of the ASO) did not get cut, since it was 1 in the original proposal - it did get cut from what we believed it would get changed to however. The loser was the SSAC/RSSAC which were to have shared 1 rep, and that slot disappeared. Lastly, it was not the Board that made this decision, but rather the Chair of the Board along with the Chair of the GAC. That doesn't make the outcome any more palatable in my mind, but based on a number of actions at the Nairobi Board meeting, the current board is showing some signs of redeeming itself, so I wouldn't want to blame the entire Board for what was an extremely untransparent and unaccountable lead-off to the review whose purpose is "Ensuring accountability, transparency and the interests of global Internet users". Not to belabour the point, but has anyone else noticed how the last phrase of the review title is conveniently omitted most of the time? Alan At 28/03/2010 04:07 PM, Evan Leibovitch wrote:
May be, but things have already been off to a rough start, regarding trust, as far as I'm concerned. Four committee members from GAC, four from GNSO, three from ccNSO, just one from ALAC. For all the private kind words and public bluster from the top about the value of At-Large, the Board still doesn't trust us as a full participant. The contracted parties (half of GNSO) have more representation at table than the organ that ICANN has itself entrusted to speak for the Internet user worldwide. Issues that At-Large has identified such as the secrecy of ICANN's regional meetings, are almost guaranteed to be shunted aside, as those within ICANN who benefit from the secrecy have double our voice.
This has happened too often to be a coincidence. Three times within the last year, (the At-Large board seat allocation, the STI trademark issues review and now this) the final allocation for ALAC on major committees has been half of what was originally proposed, without other constituencies being similarly cut down. Those looking for conspiracy theories have much from which to feed.