[ncdnhc-discuss] DNSO "dues" and voting rights

[Milton Mueller]

>>> Iliya Nickelt-Czycykowski <iczycykowski at aip.de> 10/02/02 04:44PM
>>>
>OK, so we are not the only one in debt to the DNSO. There may even be
>some political reason for us to boycott the payments. Alas, the real
>reason is that we simply don't have the money and never will. There

You're wrong, sorry, that "we don't have the money and we never 
will."  My organization could easily afford to pay $100 again,
or even more. I simply won't do it. It is a value proposition, 
and my answer to the proposition, this year, is NO. Whereas last
year, it was YES, because it still seemed as if there might
be some benefit from helping to shape ICANN policy from
within. I suspect that at least three or four other large
organizations, who paid $300 to NCDNHC last year, would
agree with me. 

Iliya probably doesn't know that there is a major debate within
DNSO about whether it makes sense to have ANY constituency
pay these silly dues, or whether the money for ICANN's policy
formation should be part of ICANN's budget, and the constituencies
should concentrate on what they are supposed to do, namely make
policy, rather than annual fundraising drives. 
All constituencies but registries and registrars agree with me
that it should be part of ICANN's budget. 

Compared to what ICANN spends on Jones Day lawyers the 
amount of money is trivial. Admittedly ICANN is not rich, and needs
to worry about money, but the $100,000 it would have to pay for
sound, representative, bottomup policy input is minor. 

Note that ICANN charged .org applicants $29,000 for 
evaluations. The NCDNHC supplied a critical part of that
evaluation and received not a cent. This is one of many
reasons that I totally reject Dany's contention that this is
some kind of debt. If there are debts involved, ICANN owes
me thousands of dollars for my time. The same is true of 
Dany's time.

Note that ICANN declined to let ITU cover some of the
costs of GAC, and insisted on allocating $45,000 of its own
funds to support GAC secretariat. The reason is entirely
political: the ICANN mgmt wants to prop up Twomey and
hold off ITU. If ICANN lets the DNSO flounder for lack 
of funds it is deliberate, not a matter of lack of money. 

How much money did ICANN management spend resisting
Karl Auerbach's lawsuit, which simply asked them to provide
Board members with information they have an airtight legal
right to get? 

--MM