[NCUC-DISCUSS] NCUC EC Elections 2013: Statement of Candidacy of Pranesh Prakash

Tue Dec 3 01:26:03 CET 2013

Dear all,
I am grateful for this opportunity to put myself forward as a candidate
for the EC from the Asia-Pacific region..  Below are my responses to the
candidate questions.

> 1. Why do you want to serve on the EC?
Short version:
A desire to help uphold civil rights, ensure equitable global
distribution of power to influence the contours of the addressing
system, a feeling of civic responsibility, and the institutional mandate
of the places I work at.

Slightly longer version:
I've been dealing with issues in the peripheries of ICANN for a while
now, and both my current affiliations (Centre for Internet and Society
in Bangalore and the Information Society Project in Yale Law School) are
members of the NCUC.  While I've laid low most of that time, and have
lurked on the mailing list, I felt now would be a time to delurk,
especially given the the momentous shifts happening in the DNS space
currently (gTLDs, internationalization/globalization of ICANN, attempted
expansion/re-imagination of ICANN, the slow growth of competing roots, etc.)

I think I would bring to the EC a fresh perspective and interest in
learning to compensate for a lack of ICANN institutional knowledge.  (I
take it for granted that the knowledge I bring on technical and policy
issues relating to Internet governance wouldn't be unique to me given
the NCUC crowd.)  I wish to help in the expansion of the NCUC and help
make it easier for new-comers to understand the issues and participate
in NCUC processes.

> 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.

Standard three-paragrapher:

=====
Pranesh Prakash is currently Policy Director — and was part of the
founding team of — the Centre for Internet and Society, a
Bangalore-based non-profit that engages in research and policy advocacy.
 He is also a Postgraduate Associate in Law and Access to Knowledge
Fellow at the Information Society Project at Yale Law School.

His research interests converge at the intersections of technology,
culture, economics and the law. His current work focusses on
interrogating, promoting, and engaging with policymakers on the areas of
access to knowledge (primarily copyright reform), 'openness' (including
open government data, open standards, free/libre/open source software,
and open access), freedom of expression, privacy and Internet
governance, and he is a prominent voice on these issues in India, with
his research having been quoted in the Indian Parliament.

He works with delegations from multiple developing countries at the
World Intellectual Property Organization.  In 2012, he was selected as
an Internet Freedom Fellow by the U.S. government, and was appointed by
the Indian government to a Group of Experts on Privacy to frame the
principles that would underlie the upcoming privacy law. He regularly
presents at conferences on both policy issues and on activism,
participates in academic networks and conferences, and has taught
masters’ students as well. He has degrees in arts and law.  While
studying at the National Law School in Bangalore, he helped found the
Indian Journal of Law and Technology, and was part of its editorial
board for two years.
======

I'm a lawyer by training.  While the bulk of my work in IPR reform has
been around copyright, I have for many years followed (at a distance)
trademark issues at ICANN, UDRP decisions in a few jurisdictions, etc.
(Thanks, Konstantinos and Robin!), and have on occassion commented on
them too (some intances provided below).  The work I've done around
privacy, anonymous speech, intermediary liability, freedom of speech in
India and at the global level provide me a good background to deal with
these issues within ICANN.  One of my main focus areas in Yale is
Internet governance.

I've served on the India IGC MAG, and have taken part in 5 IGFs
(speaking in 10 workshops/sessions, organizing 3 workshops, organizing
Dynamic Coalition on Open Standards meetings/statements), 1 WSIS+10
review meeting (organized a workshop on review of the WGIG report there)
and, for what it's worth, I am a member of ISOC Bangalore too.

Some past interventions and ML/blog posts on ICANN-related issues:
  * July 2008 | 'The narnia.mobi dispute, or "English 101 for WIPO's
arbitration panel"' (on a UDRP decision)

<http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/commons-law_mail.sarai.net/2008-July/002841.html>
  * Sepember 2009 | OKTaTaByeBye.com (on a UDRP decision)

<http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/commons-law_mail.sarai.net/2009-September/003113.html>
  * July 2009 | Letter to ICANN on NCSG (supporting NCUC version of NCSG
charter vs. ICANN staff version)
    <http://cis-india.org/internet-governance/blog/letter-to-icann-on-ncsg>
  * October 2009 | Control Shift? (Article for general public on
explaining DNS, ICANN and the Affirmation of Commitments)
    <http://cis-india.org/internet-governance/blog/icann-control-shift>
  * December 2010 | Signed on to the Milton Mueller-drafted 'Comments on
the ICANN Proposed Final Version of the Applicant Guidebook'

<http://dcexpression.wordpress.com/2010/12/10/comments-on-the-icann-proposed-final-version-of-the-applicant-guidebook/>

Conflicts of interest: none, to the best of my knowledge and information.
My primary sources of income are CIS and the ISP, both of which are
policy/academic research centres, and apart from that I get a minute
amount of money (less than 1% of my income) from media organizations
that publish my work.

> 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.

Both the places that I am currently affiliated with are supportive of my
work on Internet governance broadly and will be supportive of me
devoting more time to ICANN-related work.  Thus, I will be able to take
part in these meetings not just by volunteering my time, but as part of
my professional activities too.  Given however, that my professional
commitments are quite broad, the time commitments I can make may be
uneven, with some weeks being better than others.

I already travel quite a bit on work, and shouldn't have limitations on
attending either online NCUC EC meetings nor in-person ICANN meetings.
I will predominantly be in the UTC-0500 timezone till the end of August
2014.  If there are any currently-unforeseen problems that crop up,

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

I'd do so primarily over this list.  I'd also be scouting for new
recruits to NCUC at the various conferences I go to, to expand the
number of people a EC member has to report to :)

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).

  * I believe the new gTLDs program is going to change ICANN very
subtantially.  There is a need to ensure that if commercial interests of
the dozens of new TLD operators are at odds with user interests, then
commercial interests don't automatically prevail.  While this has always
been the case (after all, that's why NCUC exists), with the expansion of
gTLDs, this could really explode.
  * Scrutiny of GAC's advice to ICANN to see when it is justified and
when it unreasonably restricts freedom of expression, freedom of
association, freedom of movement in a borderless world, and the right to
privacy.
  * Scrutiny of ICANN's expenditure of the money realized from the gTLD
application process.
  * With the TMCH being operations there is a need to ensure that
trademarks are not used to subvert speech rights.  While NCSG's April
reconsideration request against the "marks plus generic terms" change
didn't succeed, there is still work to be done.
  * I think NCUC's expertise ought to not only be made available, but
also pushed towards groups/individuals that are working on issues
relating to domain names in different countries, where in some cases,
the challenges to ToSes of the registries and registrars will emerge.
  * One of the toughest challenges facing us is how to strengthen
ICANN's accountability mechanisms, ensure that it is kept free of
institutional capture, while ensuring that it is both responsive and
excessively controlled.  (This is essentially the fundamental problem in
designing any political institution.)

Regards,
Pranesh

-- 
Pranesh Prakash
Policy Director
Centre for Internet and Society
T: +91 80 40926283 | W: http://cis-india.org
PGP ID: 0x1D5C5F07 | Twitter: @pranesh_prakash
--------------------
Access to Knowledge Fellow
Information Society Project, Yale Law School
T: +1 520 314 7147 | W: http://yaleisp.org

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