Hi all, I am forwarding this e-mail so that those of us that are working on the LA meeting planning can see what Nick is saying is needed for us to come up with. I am assuming that ICANN would need the same type of framework to convince them of the LA meeting as it would for the Summit. (Ignore the parts of the message below where Nick and I are squabbling.) So, judging by what Nick states, it may not be quite the horrendous amount of work that we first thought that it would be. D Darlene A. Thompson Community Access Program Administrator Nunavut Department of Education/N-CAP c/o P.O. Box 1000, Station 910 Iqaluit, NU X0A 0H0 Phone: (867) 975-6531 Fax: (867) 979-8870 dthompson@gov.nu.ca -----Original Message----- From: Nick Ashton-Hart [mailto:nick.ashton-hart@icann.org] Sent: Wednesday, August 01, 2007 10:01 AM To: Evan Leibovitch Cc: Thompson, Darlene; jam@jacquelinemorris.com; secretariat@atlarge-lists.icann.org Subject: Re: [Secretariat] ICANN Summit planning group Thanks for your note Evan, but it is important that everyone understands the process that goes on when a request for funding is made in At-Large to ICANN, such as the one that you have made. The proposal for a project and funding connected with it is then sent to ICANN (me). We then internally must speak about it and we come back to the requestors with either a decision or a request for more information. At no time would the community be presenting the idea to the board for funding, or presenting it to anyone else; it is sufficient that you have sent it to me. What would be helpful is if the North American regional request can be endorsed by the other four regions. It would also be useful if we can come up with a basic framework for the structure of the meetings - not agendas, but objectives from your part, and from the logistical perspective, the structure of the meetings - how many plenaries, how many meetings of each region, and any subcommittees that you think should meet, how many members they would have, and how often they would meet. I can very happily come up with a proposed structure along these lines for you - or you can do that yourself; as you wish. What you could definitely do is get the regional buy-in from the other four regions. I hope that this makes sense and that you now realise that the task which confronts you is perhaps less onerous than you had thought it might be. On 1 Aug 2007, at 10:30, Evan Leibovitch wrote:
Hello everyone,
As you correctly state, Nick, the Summit -- if it happens -- will be a _major_ undertaking. Much needs to be done, not the least of which is demonstrating to ICANN early on that
a) it's worth doing (both in regards to budget as well as endorsement of the event itself) b) the people involved have the drive and skill required to make it happen
There is a sense that we need to move with a speed that (based on my own observations) may be unusual for ICANN At-Large. The work that needs to be done in just the next few weeks is substantial, as I suspect that proponents of the idea will need to "pitch" it to ICANN's Board and staff as well to the At-Large community at the LA meeting. To succeed at this we will need to be well prepared in advance, both to outline what is required as well as to anticipate objections and be able to address them. We need to act now, simply to ensure that the Summit is adequately part of the appropriate LA meeting agendas to allow us to state our case.
As well, as Darlene said we experienced a significant amount of enthusiasm for the proposal in San Juan, and proponents have been concerned that we don't want to lose that momentum. The creation of the area on Google Groups was done (by me), not to circumvent any channels but to ensure the _immediate_ existence of an on-line "home" for the event planning as we spread the word to other RALOs. Not having such an on-line home to date has been seen as an obstacle to our finding out who else within the At-Large community is interested in participating. I don't think there will be any objection to moving the discussions, file areas etc. to official At-Large resources as they are made available to us. As we move forward the effort will require need not only a mailing list, but also a private wiki and place from which participants can upload and download shared files (before they're ready for full public access).
Please understand that while we saw the need to quickly have a private workspace for Summit planners -- especially in the very early period -- there was never any intention to create a "hidden" area. The participants who I know care very much about transparency, not just in regards to the ombudsman. We will need as much support for our proposal within ICANN as we can achieve, and it does not serve our purpose to alienate _anyone_.
Now -- having said all this, I kindly ask to return to focus on Darlene's original request. We need the assistance of all RALOs in helping us find people from every region who would be interested in supporting -- or, even better, contributing their skills to -- our effort.
- Evan