[NCUC-DISCUSS] Candidate statement from Ken Herman for NCUC Chair

[Ken Herman]

Dear fellow NCUC Members:

 

With thanks to my nominating colleagues, I accept the nomination as a
candidate for the position of Chair of the Non-Commercial User Constituency.


 

In this message I briefly explain some of my reasons for running and what I
hope to achieve as well as provide my background for those who do not know
me and describe why I feel I am qualified for this important role.  For your
ease (and, perhaps, sanity) I provide a kind of executive summary to avoid
falling too much into the TLDR category!

 

I hope this helps to understand my candidacy for NCUC Chair. 

 

Feel free to reach out to me if you have any questions.

 

I welcome your support.

 

Best regards

 

Ken

 

*********

 

Let's get the basics out of the way:

 

Name: Kenneth Herman

Declared region:            North America

Gender:              Male

Employment:    Self-employed as a technology consultant

Conflicts of Interest:     None

 

I have no constraints on my ability to devote the time necessary for the
role.

 

I learned early on that vague promises are easy, so instead I will try to
describe what I would hope to accomplish together with the EC.

*	I've noticed that from year to year, the ambition is always to
increasing community engagement. My ambition as Chair is to explore, with
the community, not only what we mean by "increasing engagement", but also to
find ways to measure our success in these areas and the creative ways we can
actually meet the goals we set. 
*	To me, an important aspect of engagement is making the space for
members to participate at increasingly higher levels. To that end, I would
work with the EC to create opportunities for members. The NCUC comes with
many specific roles (NCSG EC, NCUC Policy Committee (yes, that exists), and
even a financial function (yes, there does seem to be funding)), and
therefore opportunities. Let's work together to see how we can fill these
roles and give more members a chance to contribute and participate!
*	We cannot ignore the fact that all participation in the NCUC is
voluntary (and I do not know a lot of people who are looking for more
uncompensated work). Let's find a way to substantially recognize those that
do contribute (sadly, payment is not possible, but currency is not the only
"currency" in this world, if you get my drift). 
*	Let's explore the broader aspects of what it means to be
"non-commercial". The focus on rights and privacy will always sit at the
core of our constituency. That said, my career in the non-profit sector has
demonstrated that, for the most part, our constituents often do not have the
resources or expertise to manage their internet presence. Notifications from
their registrar regarding changes or disputes to their domain ownership may
go un-noticed or ignored as so much spam or incite panic. Working with our
partner constituency we may want to examine how to better engage with the
larger non-commercial community.
*	Finally, I would like to explore mechanisms for ensuring as wide a
participation as possible at the in-person ICANN meetings. I cannot think of
a better way for active members to become fully aware of the scope of ICANN
than through exposure to the intensive machinery that occurs at these
events. 
*	Mostly, my ambition is to create a well-run, transparent and vibrant
constituency group, that offers as much as possible to our members and the
wider community.
*	Communication with the community is essential for transparency and
engagement, and I will continue existing efforts to keep all members
informed using the established channels.

 

There is really only one simple reason why I became a candidate for chair of
NCUC. I believe that my skills and experience gained in my career in
management, coordination, and facilitation, as well as my active
participation, engagement and contributions to the group over the past few
years, will prove useful to the group. Also, I believe that members deserve
a choice, even if (especially if!) all candidates have something substantial
to offer.

 

Who am I? Here's my Career and ICANN Background in a "nutshell"

*	My
<https://icann-community.atlassian.net/wiki/spaces/gnsosoi/pages/106812155/K
en+Herman+SOI> SOI give the basics (click it).
*	Although my awareness of ICANN goes back many years, only recently
have I become more directly involved, starting with in-person attendance at
ICANN 63 (Barcelona), 64 (Kobe) and 66 (Montreal), mainly in order to better
understand the non-commercial community before I became a member. 
*	My career includes 30+ years in ICT, many of them in leadership
roles, mainly for international development non-profit institutions and two
years as a United States Peace Corps Volunteer in Fiji helping to create the
national computer education programme. 
*	From 2005 until retirement in 2017, I worked for the United Nations
as the UN-system technology coordinator, during which I attended and
participated in many WSIS forums and IGFs. During that period, in 2012, I
was the liaison to the UN System ICT community during discussions between
the UN and ICANN on protecting second level UN names during the new gTLD
process.
*	Joined NCSG/NCUC in 2020, and agreed to fill the vacant NA Regional
Representative role. Served 3 terms.
*	Participated as the NCSG/NCUC representative to the Transfer Policy
Review Working Group during the final 18 months of its work (>90%
attendance).
*	Coordinated and moderated the ICANN80 (June 2024, Kigali) NCUC Issue
Forum.
*	Coordinated and moderated two virtual sessions on RDRS (February
2024), with post-session notes circulated.
*	Participated in ICANN regional outreach session (March, 2025) on the
gTLD programme speaking about the Applicant Support Programme.
*	Member of the North American Regional Advisory Team for the FY26-30
North America Engagement Plan.

 

 

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.ncuc.org/pipermail/ncuc-discuss/attachments/20250515/a5eebfca/attachment.htm>