At 12:50 PM -0700 5/4/07, Danny Younger recently said:
Peter Dengate-Thrush offered congratulations on the development of the program but asked why the fellowships appeared limited only to ICANN supporting organizations or committees. Theresa explained that while any resident citizen of a qualifying country could apply, the target audience for the program will be government representatives that wish to participate in the Governmental Advisory Committee, the ccTLD community and the non-profit sector not associated with the At-Large Advisory Committee. The At-Large Advisory Committee already administers its own funding for these purposes.
This is not strictly true. There is a difference between At Large and the At Large Advisory Committee. The former has direct ICANN funding, the latter does not. At Large has funding that it administers but it is incorrect to say that the At Large Advisory Committee administers any funds at all. ALAC can propose expenditures of funds from At-Large, which it sometimes gets, and sometimes does not get. The point is that ALAC cannot just direct At-Large to go out and pay for travel for ICANN constituents, services, research, or anything else. There's a proposal process that has to move up through channels.