Evan
IMO top priority should be the production of the long delayed documents,
brochures etc to explain issues to the public.  I have to say that I haven't
read this document yet - haven't prioritised the time to do that.
I'm responding to your email and other opinions I have read on the document.

 I do not think that we can say that an ALS is derelict in its duty if we
haven't got the policy documents or statements translated in a timely
manner, if we haven't got a primer written to explain the issue BEFORE we
ask for comments on the policy statement. If they can't get this info out to
their members, they cannot do what we ask of them.
So I think that if Staff has any time at all, one excellent thing to do
would be to prepare a "backgrounder" for EVERY policy item up for
discussion - a simple 2 pager that indicates the basic issue, that includes
a glossary, and is in the major languages. So that ppl know what the
background is to the document that is sent out for comment. And then they
can try to comment.
And if after giving everyone the tools and supporting them over a period of
time, there's no activity, then yeah we can do something about it.

Jacqueline
--------------------------------------------------
From: "Evan Leibovitch" <evan@telly.org>
Sent: Sunday, April 13, 2008 3:34 PM
To: "Nick Ashton-Hart" <Nick.Ashton-Hart@icann.org>
Cc: "At-Large Worldwide" <alac@atlarge-lists.icann.org>; "NA Discuss"
<na-discuss@atlarge-lists.icann.org>
Subject: Re: [NA-Discuss] [At-Large] ALAC Draft Accountability Framework and
Conflicts of    Interest Policy

>
> I wish to go on record that, in my view, the request, production and
> debate of this document constitutes dereliction by ALAC and ICANN staff
> of their duties to the ICANN and to the public ALAC pretends to serve.
>
> Mostly the document is bureaucratic gobbledygook, the complexity of
> which encourages its ignorance rather than its heeding. However, my
> biggest problem with it -- and the ensuing discussion -- is not so much
> the details of the wording so much as the disturbing and (to me)
> destructive philosophy that underlies the whole document and why it
> exists.
>
> ALAC and ICANN have barely begun to commence -- let alone fulfill --
> their obligations to the public, yet they have sought to waste extremely
> scarce resources (both staff and volunteers) obsessing with yet more
> internal construction and hand-wringing over the obligations of the
> public to them.
>
> The ink is barely dry on the last RALO memo of understanding, and we are
> already wasting precious time how to lay blame and punish
> "non-performers". Not only does this indicate a distasteful inclination
> towards negative re-enforcement, but it reflects a continued
> ignorance/denial -- within our own community -- of the role At-Large
> serves.
>
> To be blunt, ICANN needs me more than I need ICANN. I do not say that
> out of pure ego, since I believe that phrase applies to every ALS and to
> every individual on this mailing list. We all serve here in a very
> difficult role, making topics that are generally boring and
> uninteresting to the public not only relevant but interesting enough to
> learn about (AND respond to!). ICANN and ALAC should be falling over
> themselves in figuring out how to support its public members and attract
> high quality thinking; instead they obsess with rules, limits and
> censure protocols. How utterly counter-productive!
>
> I have an extremely difficult time getting my own ALS members to
> substantively understand policy in its _primary_ fields of interest
> (open source, software patents, DRM etc). ICANN issues are peripheral to
> our mission, as they are to the vast majority of the public -- and this
> was the intention for ALSs by design. Unlike NCUC and other ICANN
> constituencies, At-Large is not (intended to be) populated with policy
> wonks who thrive on (and often make a career out of) advising others.
> It's meant to represent the public, which by and large has to be
> "encouraged" to even care about ICANN issues. In my ALS and I suspect
> many others, policy opinions must be nurtured and encouraged and require
> significant background information supplied in the local street language.
>
> It's not an easy or quick process, and it's barely begun. Yet here we
> are -- having supplied the public little or none of this critical
> background -- already working on how to punish those whose greatest sin
> will be to have turned nothing into nothing.
>
> I would assume that a bureaucratic organization such as ICANN already
> has policies in place for issues such as conflict of interest. That ALAC
> still feels the need to re-examine and re-work these issues in its own
> image appears to indicate that:
> 1) it has an inflated opinion of its own level of maturity
> 2) it wants to look busy, regardless of whether its actions actually
> serve its mandate
> 3) it still hasn't really come to terms with why it exists and who it
> serves
> 4) all of the above
>
> Given that ALAC and ICANN have given so little to support its ALSs and
> their members, it's not hard to find ALSs that have given little back.
> Given that ALAC needs all the help it can get, it should be spending
> ZERO time on how to decrease its ranks. Even one person-hour spent by a
> committee member or someone from an "underperforming" ALS is one
> person-hour that ICANN would not have had otherwise.
>
> Of course, leadership positions bring with them additional obligations.
> On these and related matters, it's amazing how much internal muck can be
> handled with common sense and discretion.
>
> I urge ALAC members to consider the folly of continued obsession with
> procedure, or any activities not geared directly to educating the public
> and extracting public-centric policy from the result of that education.
> Everything that does not serve this mission is a distraction from it,
> and obviously ALAC is far too easily distracted.
>
> Personally I would like to suggest a six-month moratorium on _any_ ALAC
> activity regarding internal procedures, simply to see if it could
> survive such a drought without entropy or implosion.
>
> Note: This is my personal view. It is not stated in my capacity as
> NARALO chair.
>
> - Evan
>
>
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