Coping with active participation in At-Large during COVID-19
Dear At-Large Community In all our recent ICANN meetings, the Board and the senior staff have been very mindful of the difficulties that are being experienced by the volunteer community of At-Large during this pandemic and its impact on their ability to participate as regularly as they used to. During his intervention in the ALAC meeting on 28 April, the At-Large appointed Board member, Leon Sanchez, raised his ongoing concerns and asked the 70+ participants at the meeting how ICANN might be able to help volunteers to continue with their active involvement in the work of At-Large and contributing to the bigger picture work of ICANN. Because he has requested practical and constructive suggestions about how ICANN may be able to assist, I am putting this message out to those who also already attend online meetings and actively participate and engage, even under really trying personal circumstances. I am willing to pass on your suggestions to Leon, who will in turn take these to the Board for their consideration. *Please respond only to this thread* before 7 May, so that the full account can be passed on to Leon. I look forward to your thoughtful contributions to this matter. Regards Maureen ALAC Chair
Thanks Maureen As you know this is an issue I brought up in the ALT PLUS call a week before the ZOOM call this week with Leon, at that time I interfaced with Leon on the dire straits that some people are facing during this pandemic situation and that many folks are unwilling to step forward and publicly come to the table with a "cap in their hands" We are facing a 4% drop in the world economy and this means a depression much worse than the Great Depression. Also this Covid-19 may see a serious second and third wave resulting in many more deaths and economic disruption. ( shades of the 1918 pandemic that killed 100 million) I would surmise that we have in the ATLARGE community that many folks are unemployed or underemployed and facing tough times and seriously compounded in countries that don't have any safety net to protect them and help them over the difficult times. Since charity starts at home I suggest ICANN dig into its pockets as ISOC and Mozilla and many others and come up with a financial assistance to those that could really appreciate the support. I suggest that the stipend for the ICANN Meetings to be paid to the ATLARGE members which will cover their internet costs and food costs as they fully participate with the remote meetings. In the cases where people don't want or need this financial support they can simple not apply for the stipend and the financial costs would be reduced. It should be confidential and an optional application process. In a recent survey of Atlarge members we found a large number of African and small island states with very poor internet access and very high costs for their access to the Internet. This produces a digital divide that needs to be recognized and if not addressed we may loose more members from the community. As recommendations to join more online meetings and join ICANN LEARN webinars its an assumption that we all have fair and equal access and this inequality is enhanced with more reliance on remote participation Glenn McKnight ICANN NOMCOM 2019-2021 mcknight.glenn@gmail.com Curator for Internet Governance Hub Blog www.internetgovernancehub.blog <http://www.internetgovernancehub.blog> http://toronto.ieee.ca/ IEEE Toronto SIGHT Chair glenn.mcknight@ieee.org skype gmcknight twitter @Inkmedia 289-830 6259 . On Thu, Apr 30, 2020 at 3:59 PM Maureen Hilyard <maureen.hilyard@gmail.com> wrote:
Dear At-Large Community
In all our recent ICANN meetings, the Board and the senior staff have been very mindful of the difficulties that are being experienced by the volunteer community of At-Large during this pandemic and its impact on their ability to participate as regularly as they used to.
During his intervention in the ALAC meeting on 28 April, the At-Large appointed Board member, Leon Sanchez, raised his ongoing concerns and asked the 70+ participants at the meeting how ICANN might be able to help volunteers to continue with their active involvement in the work of At-Large and contributing to the bigger picture work of ICANN.
Because he has requested practical and constructive suggestions about how ICANN may be able to assist, I am putting this message out to those who also already attend online meetings and actively participate and engage, even under really trying personal circumstances. I am willing to pass on your suggestions to Leon, who will in turn take these to the Board for their consideration.
*Please respond only to this thread* before 7 May, so that the full account can be passed on to Leon. I look forward to your thoughtful contributions to this matter.
Regards Maureen ALAC Chair _______________________________________________ At-Large mailing list At-Large@atlarge-lists.icann.org https://atlarge-lists.icann.org/mailman/listinfo/at-large
At-Large Official Site: http://atlarge.icann.org _______________________________________________ By submitting your personal data, you consent to the processing of your personal data for purposes of subscribing to this mailing list accordance with the ICANN Privacy Policy (https://www.icann.org/privacy/policy) and the website Terms of Service (https://www.icann.org/privacy/tos). You can visit the Mailman link above to change your membership status or configuration, including unsubscribing, setting digest-style delivery or disabling delivery altogether (e.g., for a vacation), and so on.
Hi all. Greetings everyone from Sénégal. +1 @Glen who raised issues that i'm personaly facing in this sad pandemic moment. I Also approve the concrete proposals of Remmy. Most ALSes are certainly on these needs too. Much appreciate if ICANN could make as proposed. Warm regards Olévié Le jeu. 30 avr. 2020 à 20:23, Glenn McKnight <mcknight.glenn@gmail.com> a écrit :
Thanks Maureen As you know this is an issue I brought up in the ALT PLUS call a week before the ZOOM call this week with Leon, at that time I interfaced with Leon on the dire straits that some people are facing during this pandemic situation and that many folks are unwilling to step forward and publicly come to the table with a "cap in their hands" We are facing a 4% drop in the world economy and this means a depression much worse than the Great Depression. Also this Covid-19 may see a serious second and third wave resulting in many more deaths and economic disruption. ( shades of the 1918 pandemic that killed 100 million)
I would surmise that we have in the ATLARGE community that many folks are unemployed or underemployed and facing tough times and seriously compounded in countries that don't have any safety net to protect them and help them over the difficult times. Since charity starts at home I suggest ICANN dig into its pockets as ISOC and Mozilla and many others and come up with a financial assistance to those that could really appreciate the support. I suggest that the stipend for the ICANN Meetings to be paid to the ATLARGE members which will cover their internet costs and food costs as they fully participate with the remote meetings. In the cases where people don't want or need this financial support they can simple not apply for the stipend and the financial costs would be reduced. It should be confidential and an optional application process. In a recent survey of Atlarge members we found a large number of African and small island states with very poor internet access and very high costs for their access to the Internet. This produces a digital divide that needs to be recognized and if not addressed we may loose more members from the community. As recommendations to join more online meetings and join ICANN LEARN webinars its an assumption that we all have fair and equal access and this inequality is enhanced with more reliance on remote participation
Glenn McKnight ICANN NOMCOM 2019-2021 mcknight.glenn@gmail.com Curator for Internet Governance Hub Blog www.internetgovernancehub.blog <http://www.internetgovernancehub.blog> http://toronto.ieee.ca/ IEEE Toronto SIGHT Chair glenn.mcknight@ieee.org skype gmcknight twitter @Inkmedia 289-830 6259 .
On Thu, Apr 30, 2020 at 3:59 PM Maureen Hilyard <maureen.hilyard@gmail.com> wrote:
Dear At-Large Community
In all our recent ICANN meetings, the Board and the senior staff have been very mindful of the difficulties that are being experienced by the volunteer community of At-Large during this pandemic and its impact on their ability to participate as regularly as they used to.
During his intervention in the ALAC meeting on 28 April, the At-Large appointed Board member, Leon Sanchez, raised his ongoing concerns and asked the 70+ participants at the meeting how ICANN might be able to help volunteers to continue with their active involvement in the work of At-Large and contributing to the bigger picture work of ICANN.
Because he has requested practical and constructive suggestions about how ICANN may be able to assist, I am putting this message out to those who also already attend online meetings and actively participate and engage, even under really trying personal circumstances. I am willing to pass on your suggestions to Leon, who will in turn take these to the Board for their consideration.
*Please respond only to this thread* before 7 May, so that the full account can be passed on to Leon. I look forward to your thoughtful contributions to this matter.
Regards Maureen ALAC Chair _______________________________________________ At-Large mailing list At-Large@atlarge-lists.icann.org https://atlarge-lists.icann.org/mailman/listinfo/at-large
At-Large Official Site: http://atlarge.icann.org _______________________________________________ By submitting your personal data, you consent to the processing of your personal data for purposes of subscribing to this mailing list accordance with the ICANN Privacy Policy (https://www.icann.org/privacy/policy) and the website Terms of Service (https://www.icann.org/privacy/tos). You can visit the Mailman link above to change your membership status or configuration, including unsubscribing, setting digest-style delivery or disabling delivery altogether (e.g., for a vacation), and so on.
_______________________________________________ At-Large mailing list At-Large@atlarge-lists.icann.org https://atlarge-lists.icann.org/mailman/listinfo/at-large
At-Large Official Site: http://atlarge.icann.org _______________________________________________ By submitting your personal data, you consent to the processing of your personal data for purposes of subscribing to this mailing list accordance with the ICANN Privacy Policy (https://www.icann.org/privacy/policy) and the website Terms of Service (https://www.icann.org/privacy/tos). You can visit the Mailman link above to change your membership status or configuration, including unsubscribing, setting digest-style delivery or disabling delivery altogether (e.g., for a vacation), and so on.
Thanks Maureen, This is very thoughtful both of ICANN, ALAC and Leon. For me, the best possible way to encourage participation should have been: 1. To have data palliative, but it looks cumbersome from ICANN end down to the local service providers. 2. An alternative is to have an aggregated sum approved for e.g. 4 months = USD600; to be given to participants to cushion their data effect paid directly to them (both mobile device and laptop). Thereby easing off at ICANN end and also encouraging participant to optimise the resource to their most essential needs including more data, because some may have purchased data ahead, say two months in a row. I hope this helps. ____ REMMY NWEKE, mNGE, Lead Consulting Strategist/Group Executive Editor, DigitalSENSE Africa Media [*Multiple-award winning medium*] (DigitalSENSE Business News <http://www.digitalsenseafrica.com.ng/businessnews>; ITREALMS <http://www.itrealms.com.ng>, NaijaAgroNet <http://www.naijaagronet.com.ng>) Block F1, Shop 133 Moyosore Aboderin Plaza, Bolade Junction, Oshodi-Lagos M: 234-8033592762, 8023122558, 8051000475, T: @ITRealms <http://www.twitter.com/ITRealms> Author: A Decade of ICT Reportage in Nigeria <https://www.facebook.com/adecadeofictreportageinnigeria%E2%80%8E> *2020 Nigeria DigitalSENSE Forum on IG4D & Nigeria IPv6 Roundtable <http://www.digitalsenseafrica.com.ng>* JOIN us!! *Vice President, African Civil Society on the Information Society (ACSIS <http://www.acsis-scasi.org/en/>) _________________________________________________________________ *Confidentiality Notice:* The information in this document and attachments are confidential and may also be privileged information. It is intended only for the use of the named recipient. Remmy Nweke does not accept legal responsibility for the contents of this e-mail. If you are not the intended recipient, please notify me immediately, then delete this document and do not disclose the contents of this document to any other person, nor make any copies. Violators may face court persecution. On Thu, Apr 30, 2020 at 8:59 PM Maureen Hilyard <maureen.hilyard@gmail.com> wrote:
Dear At-Large Community
In all our recent ICANN meetings, the Board and the senior staff have been very mindful of the difficulties that are being experienced by the volunteer community of At-Large during this pandemic and its impact on their ability to participate as regularly as they used to.
During his intervention in the ALAC meeting on 28 April, the At-Large appointed Board member, Leon Sanchez, raised his ongoing concerns and asked the 70+ participants at the meeting how ICANN might be able to help volunteers to continue with their active involvement in the work of At-Large and contributing to the bigger picture work of ICANN.
Because he has requested practical and constructive suggestions about how ICANN may be able to assist, I am putting this message out to those who also already attend online meetings and actively participate and engage, even under really trying personal circumstances. I am willing to pass on your suggestions to Leon, who will in turn take these to the Board for their consideration.
*Please respond only to this thread* before 7 May, so that the full account can be passed on to Leon. I look forward to your thoughtful contributions to this matter.
Regards Maureen ALAC Chair _______________________________________________ At-Large mailing list At-Large@atlarge-lists.icann.org https://atlarge-lists.icann.org/mailman/listinfo/at-large
At-Large Official Site: http://atlarge.icann.org _______________________________________________ By submitting your personal data, you consent to the processing of your personal data for purposes of subscribing to this mailing list accordance with the ICANN Privacy Policy (https://www.icann.org/privacy/policy) and the website Terms of Service (https://www.icann.org/privacy/tos). You can visit the Mailman link above to change your membership status or configuration, including unsubscribing, setting digest-style delivery or disabling delivery altogether (e.g., for a vacation), and so on.
* Icann agrees with the Internet community * In a decision ending an alleged and never-consulted sale of the .org to a for-profit company, Icann announced that it will not allow such a transaction. Finally, the Internet community clearly realizes that in a multi-stakeholder governance system, even the highest corporate employees cannot act alone in making decisions that run counter to the spirit of the Internet Society. A lesson that the staff must assimilate at all levels. Employees of the Internet Society work for, must consult with, the community and serve its interests. Icann's decision implies, as Andrew Sullivan, President & CEO, of the Internet Society rightly says, "... that the transaction cannot and will not continue" Icann's decision here: https://www.icann.org/news/blog/icann-board-withholds-consent-for-a-change-o... #GovernanceIsCommunity Carlos Vera Ecuador
El 30 abr. 2020, a la(s) 16:45, carlosraul@gutierrez.se escribió:
Thank you Maureen and Léon !
1. We in LACRALO have already adapted our meeting hours to avoid conflicts with working hours as far as possible. Thanks to our Brazilian and Uruguayan friends that's stay up late, the westerners in Mexico in Costa Rica have meeting only after 4pm or so. REQUEST; 1. Can't we do choose two convenient blocks of time over the day so that's global meetings only happen outside of sleeping hours? 2. Can we start using those blocks of time ASAP 3. Can we keep those Blocks for the Kuala Lumpur virtual meeting instead of the local time there? 4. If all of the above is not possible: can we spread the Kuala Lumpur meeting into 2-3 power weekend meetings online?
Seriously, if we are going to spend the next few months on virtual meetings, it makes no sense to use the planning frameworks and time blocks of Face to Face meetings.
Thanks! Carlos Raúl Gutiérrez
On Apr 30, 2020 13:58, Maureen Hilyard <maureen.hilyard@gmail.com> wrote: Dear At-Large Community
In all our recent ICANN meetings, the Board and the senior staff have been very mindful of the difficulties that are being experienced by the volunteer community of At-Large during this pandemic and its impact on their ability to participate as regularly as they used to.
During his intervention in the ALAC meeting on 28 April, the At-Large appointed Board member, Leon Sanchez, raised his ongoing concerns and asked the 70+ participants at the meeting how ICANN might be able to help volunteers to continue with their active involvement in the work of At-Large and contributing to the bigger picture work of ICANN.
Because he has requested practical and constructive suggestions about how ICANN may be able to assist, I am putting this message out to those who also already attend online meetings and actively participate and engage, even under really trying personal circumstances. I am willing to pass on your suggestions to Leon, who will in turn take these to the Board for their consideration.
Please respond only to this thread before 7 May, so that the full account can be passed on to Leon. I look forward to your thoughtful contributions to this matter.
Regards Maureen ALAC Chair
_______________________________________________ At-Large mailing list At-Large@atlarge-lists.icann.org https://atlarge-lists.icann.org/mailman/listinfo/at-large
At-Large Official Site: http://atlarge.icann.org _______________________________________________ By submitting your personal data, you consent to the processing of your personal data for purposes of subscribing to this mailing list accordance with the ICANN Privacy Policy (https://www.icann.org/privacy/policy) and the website Terms of Service (https://www.icann.org/privacy/tos). You can visit the Mailman link above to change your membership status or configuration, including unsubscribing, setting digest-style delivery or disabling delivery altogether (e.g., for a vacation), and so on.
Greetings Here is the draft response from* NARALO* . Note we are still working out the logistics of the ideas and its not final . I am sharing it for inspiration purpose. The bold and italic comments are excerpts from ICANN's comments direct from the ICANN page https://docs.google.com/document/d/1-_IO9vxnl2AUyrPE2zcL19UjyDPbl5DQHTLvWxX1... Supporting the Work of Our Global Community over the Next Few Months: Leveraging Remote Participation Link to document https://www.icann.org/news/blog/supporting-the-work-of-our-global-community-... Facts - All ICANN Face to Face meetings on hold to Sept 2020 Reality - The Pandemic will likely be worse in the fall according to the CDC comments and likely it will be into 2021. (1) and resulting in no Face to Face meetings during that year Item One: Remote Participation ICANN has always embraced remote participation. It is what makes our work accessible to a global community and enables us to get the work done between meetings. COVID-19 has made remote engagement even more crucial, and a very real and practical alternative Comment This is a practical solution to keep the community engaged but the devil is in the details. We have a serious digital divide which impacts the ATLARGE community. Since ICANN has Multistakeholderism baked into its DNA it is critical to provide communities with the tools to properly engage. In Canada, especially in the far- north, in the US tribal lands, as well as in rural areas(2), among students(3) and in poor urban communities(4) there is a serious digital divide that makes it next to impossible to participate fully in the meetings. In fact, if there are few participants in such areas, it is not because they don’t want to participate. They simply cannot participate unless their internet accessibility issues are addressed. Although ICANN cannot be responsible for all digital divide issues, it must recognize that these exist and perhaps look for alternative ways to deal with these -- create support groups, reach out locally with low tech methods, build partnerships with national, regional, and local organizations, etc.. Item Two; Leverage Participation Tools It is more important than ever that we leverage our remote participation tools to continue effectively engaging and supporting our community in the work that needs to be done; at the very least, over the next four months. Comments It is not just a matter of online tools ie. Zoom, Adobe, Bluejean etc or accessibility issues, but about the bandwidth required by any or all of them. Moreover, many within At Large have uneven connectivity speeds and others are burdened with very high Internet costs and extremely slow speeds. This combined with the loss of income by many of the participants due to COVID-19 making it harder for them to pay for the extra data needed to participate in the At Large or other ICANN related calls. Item Three Online Courses/ Webinars We are working with the community to ensure that high-priority topics for this period are being addressed and are creating new opportunities and training for our stakeholders within At Large to participate. As such, we are looking at facilitating these efforts and adding a variety of additional activities to build capacity, to attract new participants, and to educate, and engage these new participants. These activities will include informative webinars, ICANN Learn modules, lectures, and ICANN Public Meeting readouts. However, this strategy of engagement is only possible where high-speed Internet access is available and the end-user has the funds to pay for the extra service. We would be interested in learning about any surveys that ICANN LEARN staff have done on connectivity challenges of end-users. A recent informal ATLARGE survey, although having only twenty responses, shows that participants in developing countries have limited bandwidth especially in many parts of Africa and small island states combined with high Internet costs. General View In the short run, the participation in the first virtual meeting (Cancun) while having very high participation, should be looked at as a novelty, this will not be the new norm. We do expect that participation in future meetings will drop until the economy gets back on track. Participants do not have the available income to spend on the access needed to actively participate in online meetings. We are at a serious risk of losing valuable volunteers. At Large participants are volunteers and unlike other constituencies, they do this outside their paid jobs and often take a vacation to attend ICANN Meetings. Our community unlike the other the government or business community do not have the luxury of sponsorship to carry on their volunteerism. Our community has had to dig into their own pockets to pay to participate. If the economy does not pick up we can see a substantial loss of participants from locations we cannot afford to lose. We propose that ICANN recognize the value of these participants and create a special connectivity fund. The process and procedure could be worked out in a simple application and approval process. Recommendations - Provide the stipend to all elected ATLARGE community members - Provide an opportunity to ALS members to receive an Internet Connectivity voucher to offset their high Internet costs so they can participate. - ICANN LEARN should conduct a true connectivity survey of all users. - Improve upon the end-user survey at the end of all ICANN Public webinars to get feedback on participation and connectivity experiences ie. latency, quality etc Conclusion Under development Footnotes 1. https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/covid-data/forecasting-us.html 2. 60% of farmers in the US report very poor Broadband speeds https://api.unitedsoybean.org/uploads/documents/58546-1-ruralbroadband-white... 3. Students and digital divide https://internetgovernancehub.blog/2020/04/10/when-school-is-online-the-digi... 4. Poor and Digital Divide https://internetgovernancehub.blog/2020/04/29/digital-divide-isolates-and-en... 5. Broadband Infographic Glenn McKnight ICANN NOMCOM 2019-2021 mcknight.glenn@gmail.com Curator for Internet Governance Hub Blog www.internetgovernancehub.blog <http://www.internetgovernancehub.blog> http://toronto.ieee.ca/ IEEE Toronto SIGHT Chair glenn.mcknight@ieee.org skype gmcknight twitter @Inkmedia 289-830 6259 . On Thu, Apr 30, 2020 at 3:59 PM Maureen Hilyard <maureen.hilyard@gmail.com> wrote:
Dear At-Large Community
In all our recent ICANN meetings, the Board and the senior staff have been very mindful of the difficulties that are being experienced by the volunteer community of At-Large during this pandemic and its impact on their ability to participate as regularly as they used to.
During his intervention in the ALAC meeting on 28 April, the At-Large appointed Board member, Leon Sanchez, raised his ongoing concerns and asked the 70+ participants at the meeting how ICANN might be able to help volunteers to continue with their active involvement in the work of At-Large and contributing to the bigger picture work of ICANN.
Because he has requested practical and constructive suggestions about how ICANN may be able to assist, I am putting this message out to those who also already attend online meetings and actively participate and engage, even under really trying personal circumstances. I am willing to pass on your suggestions to Leon, who will in turn take these to the Board for their consideration.
*Please respond only to this thread* before 7 May, so that the full account can be passed on to Leon. I look forward to your thoughtful contributions to this matter.
Regards Maureen ALAC Chair _______________________________________________ At-Large mailing list At-Large@atlarge-lists.icann.org https://atlarge-lists.icann.org/mailman/listinfo/at-large
At-Large Official Site: http://atlarge.icann.org _______________________________________________ By submitting your personal data, you consent to the processing of your personal data for purposes of subscribing to this mailing list accordance with the ICANN Privacy Policy (https://www.icann.org/privacy/policy) and the website Terms of Service (https://www.icann.org/privacy/tos). You can visit the Mailman link above to change your membership status or configuration, including unsubscribing, setting digest-style delivery or disabling delivery altogether (e.g., for a vacation), and so on.
Hi Maureen, My humble and personal take to this is that similar to the fellowship program, we could consider support to community members who dedicate significant time and resources to ICANN's mission by contributing to the work of various supporting organizations and Advisory Commitees and the overall mission of ICANN. It is true engaging in SO/AC work costs valuable time for those whose day job may not necessarily be around the DNS ecosystem. Significant resources are incurred to get online and to have the right tools that can enable meaningful participation and contribution to ICANN's work. I welcome the idea of reimbursing some of the costs incurred on connectivity or any other aspect as may be determined through a suitable process considering the continuous nature of the work we are doing. Best Regards On Thu, Apr 30, 2020 at 10:59 PM Maureen Hilyard <maureen.hilyard@gmail.com> wrote:
Dear At-Large Community
In all our recent ICANN meetings, the Board and the senior staff have been very mindful of the difficulties that are being experienced by the volunteer community of At-Large during this pandemic and its impact on their ability to participate as regularly as they used to.
During his intervention in the ALAC meeting on 28 April, the At-Large appointed Board member, Leon Sanchez, raised his ongoing concerns and asked the 70+ participants at the meeting how ICANN might be able to help volunteers to continue with their active involvement in the work of At-Large and contributing to the bigger picture work of ICANN.
Because he has requested practical and constructive suggestions about how ICANN may be able to assist, I am putting this message out to those who also already attend online meetings and actively participate and engage, even under really trying personal circumstances. I am willing to pass on your suggestions to Leon, who will in turn take these to the Board for their consideration.
*Please respond only to this thread* before 7 May, so that the full account can be passed on to Leon. I look forward to your thoughtful contributions to this matter.
Regards Maureen ALAC Chair _______________________________________________ At-Large mailing list At-Large@atlarge-lists.icann.org https://atlarge-lists.icann.org/mailman/listinfo/at-large
At-Large Official Site: http://atlarge.icann.org _______________________________________________ By submitting your personal data, you consent to the processing of your personal data for purposes of subscribing to this mailing list accordance with the ICANN Privacy Policy (https://www.icann.org/privacy/policy) and the website Terms of Service (https://www.icann.org/privacy/tos). You can visit the Mailman link above to change your membership status or configuration, including unsubscribing, setting digest-style delivery or disabling delivery altogether (e.g., for a vacation), and so on.
-- Barrack O. Otieno +254721325277 +254733206359 Skype: barrack.otieno PGP ID: 0x2611D86A
participants (7)
-
Barrack Otieno -
Carlos Vera -
carlosraul＠gutierrez.se -
Glenn McKnight -
Maureen Hilyard -
Olivier Kouami -
Remmy Nweke