preliminary notes from 30 Sept. board meeting online

[William Drake]

Hi Avri,

On Oct 13, 2009, at 11:04 AM, Avri Doria wrote:

> On 13 Oct 2009, at 10:22, William Drake wrote:
>
>> Hi
>>
>> On the one hand, they refer to the charter as transitional.  On the
>> other, they want approval of the CC in the near future, which very
>> well may lock us into it.
>>
>> To the extent that SIC seems set on doing it, it might not be
>> productive in terms of our larger agenda to spend scarce political
>> capital arguing against a CC as a matter of principle.  But we
>> clearly should continue to press the points that a) it should be
>> delayed until the charter issue has been resolved, and b) it should
>> only comprise non-commercial actors.
>
> what do you mean by non commercial:
>
> a- that the organization be non profit
> b- that their membership be non profit

Of course b.  The International Chamber of Commerce is non-profit, so
are all the other industry associations.  That's why I referred not to
the membership orgs comprising peak associations like INTUG, but
rather to the members of those orgs.
>
>
> i would recommend adding consideration of:
>
> c: That they have consulted with the consumer protection
> constituents already in the NCUC and can show why this is not
> duplication
> d. That they be able to show that they are already viable in terms
> of having an active membership and an email list and have started
> creating postions and having enough people to start really
> contributing to the working groups

> e. That the new charter be again put out for review before final
> Board approval
>
> (these are the kind of things that i think should be standard for
> all new constituencies)

I'm fine with these, but wouldn't adding more conditions (under which
what, we won't complain?) invite more push back from board, staff,
proponents?  I was thinking timing and actually nonprofit were a
minimalist set of criteria it's harder to argue against.  I guess
we'll see how it all plays soon enough.
>
> One thing to point out is that having appointed the council member
> from that constituency, there is no rush - they have their seat at
> the table and have been called on to create the constituencies.  To
> immediately create the constituencies without building time seems to
> go against what they said they were going to to.  Let the chosen
> representatives start leading a pre-constituency (like the city TLD
> constituencies have.

Makes sense, but "at least one of the petitions is ready for Board
action in the near future" doesn't sound like this is thinking.
>
> Also I think it is important to point out that there is no need to
> wait a year to until the SG charter is worked out - with the
> participation of these representatives of potential constituencies
> negotiations can start immediately.

Right.  Not sure this is getting through despite repetition among us.
>
>> On the latter, in a discussion on the ALAC list, Roberto argued
>> that "if the objective is ultimately to build a consumer
>> constituency, the president of the largest consumer organization
>> worldwide could be a good starting point" (?!).
>
> Nothing to argue against 'could be'

Well, consumer orgs that have nonprofit memberships and advocate
nonprofit interests might have some issue with calling a hybrid
industry lobby a consumer protection body, much less the world's
largest.
>
>> Again, INTUG has long acted as a leading business lobby for major
>> transnational corporations, although it now comprises national
>> associations that include noncommercial orgs too http://intug.org/members/our-members
>> .  Click through the membership lists for those associations and
>> you will find a lot of entities that should be in the CSG, not the
>> NCSG.  It would be entirely reasonable to insist on that should the
>> issue arise.
>
> What is the overall balance between C and NC organizations?

You'd have to go through each member org's website and count.  But
here's a pretty relevant example, the Australian Telecom Users Group
that Rosemary also heads and is an INTUG member.  It comprises:

http://www.atug.com.au/mdcarrier.cfm  11 telecom carriers and ISPs,
all of which sound like for profit firms
http://www.atug.com.au/mdserviceprovider.cfm 7 service providers, one
of which "represents the ICT interests of 16 hospitals and 65 health
agencies," some of which I'd guess are nonprofit.  I'm no expert on
the Australian health system.
http://www.atug.com.au/mdconsultant.cfm 10 consultancies, sound for
profit to me, and another listed as research
http://www.atug.com.au/mdconsultant.cfm 5 equipment suppliers like
Nokia Siemens etc
http://www.atug.com.au/mdother.cfm 7 other entities including a
government body and Quantas airlines, etc.

So, is an org with this membership a consumer protection outfit
advocating the interests of the noncommercial sector that would
properly be placed in the NCSG, rather than in the CSG?

Roberto et al may think this is an irrelevant question, but I do not.

Bill