I've said it before and I'll say it again; the best possible use of extra funds allocated to ALAC is to forgo travel and outreach and instead spend the money on public polling and R&D.
The current ALS->RALO->ALAC feedback loop just doesn't work and we have many years of evidence. The best way that ALAC can perform its bylaw-mandated function is to actually survey the billions -- or some usable sample of it -- rather than expect that a self-nominated group of do-gooders (present company included) will be able to make anything more than a poorly-educated guess of what the world-at-large needs from ICANN.
Checking off diversity tick-boxes on such a global phenomenon as domain names, to me, is a pointless exercise. What ALAC desperately needs is statisticians, educators, researchers and tech-centric policy wonks. All are in critically short supply; maybe THAT is where the real outreach is necessary.
[...] Other Cities considering the acquisition of a TLD might be interested in forming an ALS
I said a decade ago that if the City of Toronto proposed to spend one public dollar on acquiring a TLD I would be first in line at City Hall with a detailed response in opposition. To me this is a bread-not-circuses issue; a TLD in this context is a purely vanity item that offers no real benefit of access that wouldn't exist without it. Since then my PoV has been vindicated through evidence such as the sad fate of those who wanted .nyc to become a community asset. We have so many lessons to learn from and *still* the discredited notion of city TLDs remains alive? The mind boggles.
Dot-Hamilton? Maybe. Naah, not even Hamilton.
- Evan