H CLO, Changing the subject line to reflect the content and copying the NCUC list, as the issues under discussion do not pertain just to the EURALO. I'm not sure which of the multiple ALAC lists would be best to forward this to, please advise. Of course, whether anyone anywhere will actually have the patience to plough through this epic I don't know, but it's good to say it the record. On your first point, the liaison question: On Sep 23, 2009, at 8:55 PM, Cheryl Langdon-Orr wrote:
Hi Bill, I'd like you, EURALO and the ALAC to be very aware of a single point of concern to me in the Blog reply /thread you made in the link provided below... specifically the following... PLease note that Robyn as Chair of NCUC wrote to me in email appointing you as the NCUC liaison (i.e. advising me of you offer) I replied to her message with copy to staff, copy to ExCom list (PUBLIC) within minutes of the receipt of this advice and announced at the following ExCom and then full ALAC Meeting(s) that a Liaison from NCUC was most welcome and that you in my opinion with your involvement with EURALO a perfect fit for the Job, and expected in fact that you would be well aware of this reply as well as would have attended (if available) or reviewed our meetings since then (you are already on the relevant lists get notices links to agenda's etc.,) where the ALAC has discussed that we will need to appoint a Liaison to the NCSG (with the existing NCUC being a constituent part of that under the current model were working with) or review later complaints to us from both our previous NCUC Liaisons did not motivate us to appoint a replacement to Beau for a month or so before this change would need to occur any way in our view...
I think I've correctly parsed this sentence and traced the trajectory of the disconnect. On 1 Sept. Robin wrote to you
On 01/09/2009, Robin Gross <robin@ipjustice.org> wrote:
Dear Cheryl, Alan, and Nick:
We are saddened by the recent breakdown in communication between members of NCUC and the At-Large community and hope we can work to resolve any differences through open dialogue and a shared commitment to improving civil society participation at ICANN.
Therefore we have appointed William Drake to serve as a liaison between NCUC and ALAC in the spirt of encouraging an open exchange of communication and an effort to prevent any future misunderstandings between the organizations....
To which you replied
From: Cheryl Langdon-Orr <langdonorr@gmail.com> Date: August 31, 2009 9:34:46 PM PDT To: Robin Gross <robin@ipjustice.org> Cc: Alan Greenberg <alan.greenberg@mcgill.ca>, Nick Ashton-Hart <Nick.Ashton-Hart@icann.org
, William Drake <william.drake@graduateinstitute.ch>, "Non- Commercial Users Constituency Executive Committee & GNSO Reps. Discussion" <ncu-exec@ipjustice.org>, ALAC Internal List <alac-internal@atlarge-lists.icann.org , ICANN AtLarge Staff <staff@atlarge.icann.org> Subject: Re: NCUC-ALAC Liaison to Encourage Open Communication
Robyn, thank you for asking the ALAC to consider accepting a Liaison from the existing Non Commercial Users Constituency (NCUC)...
This concept/ proposal is one which, whilst we have not ever discused either internaly in the ALAC, nor in any of our recent meetings with NCUC, is one I'm confident the ALAC, RALO's and wider At-Large will no doubt welcome, and Bill of course, seems to be a 'natural fit' for the task...
Of course all our meetings (with rare exceptions) are open so without any formal 'ALAC approval' or role creation he is of course *more than welcome* I will ask Staff to ensure he is subscribed to the relevant lists and that he gets notice of our meetings, briefings etc,. Of course as a EURALO Board Member he should be familiar with the ALAC's ROP's etc,. but I'll also get staff to see if he wishes a briefing call with us to discuss anything re these or other matters.
So I said On Sep 1, 2009, at 2:36 PM, William Drake wrote:
Hi,
Thanks, Cheryl and Robin. I'd be happy to try and help increase the level of information flow and mutual understanding. Any and all background info and so on would of course be most helpful.
I didn't get a reply to this. So what I had to go on was Robin saying NCUC has appointed me, and you saying thanks for "asking the ALAC to consider accepting" me and that I could join those lists that are open to anyone (but not those that are not). The latter didn't sound like a formal agreement to liaise, so I assumed I was to await word on a decision. Three weeks went by, no word, and in the meanwhile I was not added to the relevant closed lists or did not get any briefings etc. From today's mail (reproduced with permission) I see why,
On Sep 23, 2009, at 8:47 PM, Nick Ashton-Hart wrote:
I'm sorry Alan and Bill (and Cheryl).
I did not get from Cheryl's email that we were to subscribe Bill to either of the ALAC-only lists, that's why he wasn't subscribed. Am I to understand you want Bill subscribed to both ALAC and ALAC- Internal?
Hence, while I gather from your post you felt you'd said yes, I think you can see that this wasn't clear to either me/NCUC or staff. Anyway, the weeks rolled by, and then I saw Sebastian at the IGF meeting in Geneva. I understood him to say that ALAC actually had not decided whether it wanted or needed to liaise with NCUC, since we'd said that NCUC would be dissolved if we got a properly configured NCSG charter.(see below*) I pointed out that this was still up in the air, so NCUC would be around for the foreseeable future and we ought to be liaising. The next day we spoke again and Sebastian said well, probably we should liaise with NCSG, not with NCUC, no? I repeated that the actually existing entities ought to be in communication etc. So, this is why I said yesterday in the blog post that I'd gotten no reply and understood ALAC had decided against. Chalk it up to miscommunication. Hence I was pleased yesterday that on our EURALO board call Sebastian said in fact ALAC wants to do it, and to receive your message here. And now I've just received subscribe messages to the ALAC and ALAC-internal lists. So voila! When the NCSG situation starts to take more shape we can revisit what's the best way to maintain bidirectional communication flow going forward. On the EURALO call, we also discussed whether it wouldn't be good to also have a link running the other way, ALAC=>NCUC. Adam was suggested as a logical candidate, although this might take some arm twisting, especially after yesterday's various back and forths. Personally I think it'd make a lot of sense to have him if he's willing. [*Just to clarify: IF we could have a charter in line with the NCUC- proposed version, in which constituencies are easily formed and collaborate in a non-fragmentation-producing structure, THEN it would make sense for NCUC to dissolve and its members to form various issue- specific constituencies, e.g. on privacy, freedom of speech, etc. As you know, we have asked the board to collaborate with us to review the charter issues and arrive at a mutually acceptable formulation. Unless and until we get there, it would not make sense to dissolve NCUC, inter alia because launching new constituencies now would lock in the dysfunctional staff/SIC charter, as NCUC noted in its letter to the board. This is just one reason why I'd have thought it'd have made sense for you to back the NCUC version rather than the staff/SIC version, but what do I know.] On your second point, the meeting in Seoul question:
Also the ALAC discussed that as we will attend the User House meeting and (with the exception of the single purpose IRT issue and our Joint Response / work activity that enveloped our time (and was conducted in the scheduled meeting time for NCUC and ALAC in Sydney) meetings since Mexico ( well Cairo actually) have been a duplication of effort and topic and that as we had a very full set of demands in our Seoul agenda, and as ALAC and RALO leaders had complained about the workload and requested more time to address policy development matters; unless Robyn proposed a topic that required a specific F2F between the NCUC as a GNSO constituency and our AC then we would only schedule the User House meeting and use the time for other priority meetings... In my reply to Robyn et.al and welcoming you as an NCUC Liaison to the ALAC I also covered off (in shorter form) all of that as well... Why you have not been made aware of all this immediate and welcoming response to your offer from the ALAC however I can not say.
I saw that but didn't know how to read it. I would suggest that NCUC- ALAC cooperation in the new NCSG and beyond is a pretty worthy topic that requires a F2F, one that has several readily tractable parts (e.g. identifying substantive issues where there's probably sufficient alignment of views that we could develop joint positions, perhaps starting with the registrants' rights charter) and some more difficult but important to talk through parts (e.g. preferences and perceptions on the charter, constituencies, etc). But perhaps it might make sense to consider alternatives to the traditional format? Maybe something facilitated by a third party, or from the bottom up? Or failing that, maybe we could just schedule something in a bar or resto and try for a less formal and on-guard mindset all around? Wolf suggested that perhaps some folks from EURALO (e.g. Sebastian, Wolf, Adam and myself) could try to think through a workable option. If you and others in ALAC are open to considering suggestions, I'm sure NCUC would be too. More than enough for now. Cheers, Bill
2009/9/23 William Drake <william.drake@graduateinstitute.ch>
Hello,
I see on the agenda item 3, "ALAC response to recent activities of the NCUC."
Given the general lack of NCUC-ALAC dialogue and information sharing, I'm guessing that not everybody will be equally aware of the background. To that end, the following links might be worth perusing prior to the discussion.
http://blog.internetgovernance.org/blog/_archives/2009/9/22/4329523.html
http://www.icann.org/correspondence/ncuc-to-beckstrom-18aug09-en.pdf
Thanks,
Bill
PS: I will probably have to leave the call after an hour
*********************************************************** William J. Drake Senior Associate Centre for International Governance Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies Geneva, Switzerland william.drake@graduateinstitute.ch www.graduateinstitute.ch/cig/drake.html ***********************************************************