At 24/04/2008 05:39 AM, Evan Leibovitch wrote:
<snip> The GNSO does not propose individual universities, IP lawyers, or registrars being represented -- why ALSs? If ALAC has no business having representation on GNSO, then it really has no business existing at all. The irony of a document backed by ALAC that explicitly recommends its own disenfranchisement is, to me, astounding. <snip>
I am in Africa with only sporadic connectivity, very limited bandwidth and even less time. As such I have only read a fraction of this thread. I have thoughts on a number of issues, but for the moment, will confine myself to comments on the above thought. The terms "At-Large" and "ALAC" are typically used interchangeably by much of ICANN. The original document from the Business Constituency did in fact reference "ALAC". I am afraid that I am the devil that caused it to change to "At-Large". My reasoning was that the ALAC is a properly constituted Board Advisory Committee within ICANN. Perhaps the lawyers and organization-gurus among us would have no problem with an Advisory body within ICANN being represented on a Supporting Organization Council. But I did. I thought that this simply confused the relationships between the various bodies. So I suggested that references to ALAC be changed to At-Large. Now since At-Large can formally speak and act solely through the RALOs and the ALAC, Presumably these bodies or their designates will play a significant role in selecting who is representing At-Large as members of an "At-Large Constituency" within the User stakeholder group (and thus affecting who sits on the GNSO council for that stakeholder group. My intention was not to disenfranchise ALAC or At-Large, but rather to reserve for them the ability to influence the GNSO through representatives, but at the same time to NOT muddy the already complex ICANN organization chart. Alan