Request to nominees in upcoming NCUC election

[Norbert Klein]

On 11/14/2012 5:13 AM, Brenden Kuerbis wrote:
> Dear NCUC Membership,
>
> Nominations for the upcoming NCUC Election closed on Oct 31, 2012.  
> Many thanks to the following individuals who have accepted nominations:
>
> The current NCUC Executive Committee has developed a list of questions 
> to help the NCUC membership learn more about the nominees. If you have 
> been nominated, please take a moment to complete and post to the list 
> answers for the following questions...
> _/
> /_

_/1. Why do you want to serve on the EC?/_

Good wording - “to serve.” I had been in the NCUC since 1999 – in a way 
my “home environment” in ICANN. I did not send in my name to compete 
against another candidate when I sent in my name – it was to serve our 
non-commercial causes. Only later there was also another good name. I 
would probably not have put forward my name, if there had been another 
name I trust at that time. - I even considered to withdraw when another 
good name appeared on the list – but there were voices saying it is a 
good sign for us to have more than one candidate for a position, so I 
did not withdraw.
/_
_//_2. Provide a brief biography of recent experience, associations, and 
affiliations relevant to serving on the Executive Committee. Describe 
the relevance of your personal and professional experience to serve on 
the NCUC Executive Committee, and identify any conflicts of interests 
you might have._/

I had been before in the NCUC on behalf of a Cambodian NGO, the Open 
Institute, then on the NCUC EC, then on the GNSO, and finally two years 
on the ICANN Nominating Committee, a term limited function. - After 
caring to create the Cambodia Chapter of ISOC – done, and recently 
having handed over leadership after two years – I have again some free 
time. I saw that there were at that time no other candidates to serve in 
the EC – so I sent in my name, considering that I had accumulated some 
experiences in ICANN over the years. - Conflicts of interest? I see 
none. But I continue to see – almost throughout all these years, that 
the so called “marginal voices” - the non-commercial interests, and the 
small and economically weak sectors of the global community, continue to 
be challenged, to speak up in order not to be disregarded.

_/3. The EC performs several functional responsibilities for the 
Constituency. What level of time commitment can you bring to your EC 
role on a weekly and overall basis? Describe any concerns or limitations 
on your ability to attend online meetings of the Executive Committee and 
ICANN Meetings in person./_

Being “retired” allows me to handle my time quite flexibly. Some 
concerns and limitations in the past were that online meetings were 
often schedules to fit European and US East/West coast time zone 
preferences – having me sometimes online, in Cambodia, between midnight 
and early morning. Not nice, but even that can be handled.

_/4. Communication with the membership is critical. How would you keep 
members apprised of your EC-related activities?/_

A big concern – and one that has not been well attended to in the past 
(I assume not only in the Asia Pacific region). It is not only a task to 
keep existing membership appraised, but to expand the membership in the 
region. Such challenges have been discussed repeatedly in the past 
without much success, referring to the absence of a full time, or even a 
part time, secretariat (not only in the region – but also related to our 
global existence). While I do not have much hope that we will be able to 
have such a service structure soon, I think this task rests in the 
responsibility of Executive Committee as a whole – and the regional 
representative have to be active.

_/5. How do you foresee NCUC’s function, scale, or role changing in the 
future? What areas of ICANN policy, if any, need more attention and why? 
Be concise (200 words maximum)./_

/First,/ We should cooperate to define the “non-commercial” character of 
NCUC more clearly – looking back on our history it is not just an 
administratively or legally definable role we played. (I remember that 
for years we had internal problems because of a non-commercial sports 
club in our membership, and while a majority of the NCUC members were 
concerned with ICANN policy development, the sports club claimed not to 
be interested similarly.) Our history as NCUC has a track record being 
sensitive so that ICANN should not become carried away by big commercial 
interests, to stay withing the limits of its technically defined 
mandate, within which we were concerned to maintain, if necessary to 
defend, the freedom of the communicating non-commercial society.

/Second,/ I cannot see much of a possibility to define our function, 
scale, or role more concisely. We are one element – and a weak one – in 
the wider system of ICANN and the surrounding world of government 
regulations and, at present, also the ITU. I see therefore also for the 
future more a role as a monitor of other’s dynamics, and then as a 
common effort among our membership, how to react and how to respond.

Norbert Klein
Associate, Open Institute
Phnom Penh
Cambodia


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