[NCUC-DISCUSS] NCUC Event News

[Edward Morris]

Hi Bill.

Thanks for all of the hard work you do in the various venues you're active
in. Earth is very lucky to have you (as are we).



> I am also talking with staff about securing a space within the main ICANN
> Durban program for an NCUC workshop.  A priori, on both substantive and
> effort optimization grounds I'm inclined to do another prequel, this one to
> our IGF Bali workshop, The Debate on ‘Closed’ Generic Top Level Domains
> http://www.intgovforum.org/cms/wks2013/workshop_2013_list_view.php?xpsltipq_je=253.
>  After all, it'd be nice to sponsor a debate on a hot topic in front of a
> full ICANN crowd a couple of days before the Board may take action one way
> or another on the matter (although that expectation could mean some push
> back from ICANN on the topic, we'll see).  This seems like a useful
> contribution we can make, and we have members and other colleagues who'll
> be in Durban who have strong views on the various sides of the matter who
> could serve as speakers.  The other option I thought about was to broaden
> the focus and do a workshop on the GAC's Beijing Communique, and the
> community responses to it.  But this might be seen in a less favorable
> light in some quarters, plus we can get into that via the closed topic
> anyway.
>


If the consensus is to go in this direction I'm happy to support the idea.
It's not, though, the way I think we should go in Durban.

I'm very happy to do general educational programming under our name in
venues like the Internet Governance Forum (IGF). It's outreach, we're able
to present our values, and it gives a forum for our academic members to do
their thing. It also plays into the idea that we strive to be supportive of
the MS model externally while being critical, when necessary, internally,
to make it function better.

I don't want to lose sight of the fact, though, that we're not an
educational group. We are not ICANN's programming arm. We're advocates.
ICANN Meetings present some of our best opportunities to advocate for our
positions. Our group is deeply and passionately divided on the closed /
open question. While it might be entertaining for some to watch Milton and
Kathy tear into each other with articulate and well developed points of
view on  open / closed, I'm not sure that accomplishes much for those whom
we are representing.

In that light, might I suggest as an alternate topic  akin to "The Current
State of Multistakeholderism in ICANN."

The rejection of our reconsideration review request  has stimulated a lot
of discussion across various ICANN communities. There are threads on the
Registry and NTAG lists, for example, that are extremely supportive of our
procedural position. Could this not be an opportunity for us to reach out
to some of those who are supportive in other communities, see if they'll
pop on a panel for a half hour and have an honest discussion about where we
are on MS and where we may be headed? Could this not be an opportunity to
demonstrate to the Board the breadth of opposition to the BGC decision and,
as well,  cultivate our cross community ties?

Of note, if after the final Board decision on the RRR we decide to go
forward with a CEP that will be taking place around the time of Durban.
This could be a very salient issue at that time.

A split session could then continue with a discussion of the procedural
difficulties we've highlighted in our response to the GAC Communique. Is
this a situation where all stakeholders are equal, but some are more equal
than others? Is the problem only getting worse, and why? Milton detected a
threat (give us what we want or some of us are going home)  at the end of
Heather's online discussion on the Communique. I did as well. What does
that portend for the future?

I'm certainly open to other ideas but I'm not sure our programming at ICANN
Meetings should highlight our differences. Rather I'd suggest  it should
focus on values and topics we have at least rough consensus on so we can
then persuade others as to the validity of our point of view. That's
advocacy and that is our proper role at ICANN.


Ed
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.ncuc.org/pipermail/ncuc-discuss/attachments/20130525/f6c801e5/attachment-0001.html>
-------------- next part --------------
_______________________________________________
Ncuc-discuss mailing list
Ncuc-discuss at lists.ncuc.org
http://lists.ncuc.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/ncuc-discuss