[ncdnhc-discuss] Notes from June 25

[James Love]

Alexander Svensson wrote:
> Actually, I believe this misportrays the meeting (and I 
> was there, too). There were few if any people who thought 
> that calling for elections now seems like a /realistic/
> approach. ["not in the play" -- ICANN (Bucharest) Blog]

     Ok.   Alexander is right.  Most people in the at-large meeting, were 
not ready to ask the ICANN board to have elections for board members, on the 
grounds that this is not "realistic."  And another way of putting this is 
that they were unwilling to go here, in Bucharest, and even ask for 
elections, in the public meetings.  I asked if they thought elections were a 
sound thing (a good thing) from a practical and policy perspective, of if 
the decision to abandon elections was only about not challenging the board. 
   It seemed to be mostly about not challenging the board, but with Esther, 
it seemed a bit of both.


> Actually, since the Blueprint does hardly mention the
> At Large, we were not discussing the official ICANN
> "reform" version of the at large. We were discussing
> how At Large can *become* a part of ICANN.

       Actually, the Blueprint *and* at-large.org has a particular view of 
how the at-large will function.  It will be a sham consultation process run 
by the ICANN staff, with zero voting power and zero voting mechanisms.  What 
  do you think its future is?


>>Esther went on about
>>how unpopular elections and were in Asia and parts of
>>Latin America, and how little support there was for
>>elections among the non US members of the ICANN board.
> 
> 
> Actually, if I remember correctly, she was not talking
> about the non US members of the ICANN Board and she
> was talking about undemocratic, manipulated elections.

     She said both.  She said that many non-US members of the board were 
afraid of undemocratic, manipulated elections, so we just skip the elections 
I guess.  What she did not say and what is the bigger problem is that board 
members don't want a legitimate election process that elects people they 
don't like.   That is the real problem, and she knows it.


>>At one point I said "look, in the White Paper,
>>individuals were going to have 8 of 19 board seats.  In
>>Cairo this was reduced to 5 elected members.  Then
>>there was talk after Accra of having an at large as a
>>supporting organization, with 3 board members.   Now in
>>the blueprint document, they will have 1 of 19 members
>>of a nominating committee.  Can you tell me how that 1
>>member will be chosen?"  At this point, Dyson told me I
>>should stop criticizing people,
> 
> 
> Actually, she and several others said that you should stop
> criticizing those people who haven't written the proposals
> you are criticizing. 

      Actually, she and several of the icannatlarge.com panel members said I 
shouldn't criticize anything.  She did everything she could to stop any 
debate over whether or not the decision to eliminate the elections was a bad 
idea, or to discuss any strategy to reverse this decisions.  It wasn't 
"constructive" because anything that doesn't have support on the board isn't 
constructive.

>>I got into a debate with Denise about the value of
>>pushing for a harder line on a role for the public in
>>ICANN, mentioning the possibility that the US government
>>could protect the rights of individuals in the ICANN
>>process.  Denise told us that she had 20 years of
>>policy experience, and she knew exactly what was going
>>to happen.  She said:
>>The US Senate would do nothing.  The US
>>House of Representatives would do nothing.  The DoC
>>would accept a slightly modified MoU in the
>>fall, and the ICANN board would adopt the
>>blueprint, without elections, in Shanghai.
> 
> 
> Actually, that's what she said would happen if all you
> did was complain. (I know that's not all you do -- you
> really seem to believe that the US Government will
> intervene to help you, and e.g. I disagree.) The comments 
> with respect to Denise Michel's experience with policy-making 
> came in response to your statement that maybe we all 
> (present at the meeting) didn't have /your/ policy 
> experience.

     Actually, that is what she said will happen, regardless of what we do. 
  Denise and Esther were giving us this "resistance is futile" borg talk, 
and I think this is stupid.   The US Congress is sending out letters 
attacking ICANN and NTIA is sending out all sorts of mixed signals.   Look, 
if you don't want to have the US government rebid the contract (something 
your own GA motion called for by the way), tell me what your smart idea is. 
  Plead with the ICANN board to be nice?   Get the EU off its butt to do 
something?   Create an alternative to ICANN?   Is resistance futile?   Is 
ICANN good enough for you?


> Last posting on this, promised.

     Ok.  What is your opinion on elections?  Do you agree that zero 
elections is a good thing?   Now is the time to be clear on these issues.




-- 
------
James Love, Consumer Project on Technology
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