[atlarge-discuss] Outreach : brainstorming ideas and looking for responses

["Richard Henderson" <richardhenderson@ntlworld.com>]

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In order to claim that we represent ordinary users and the internet public, 
we need to increase our membership significantly. Otherwise we will be 
marginalised as a minority group, whereas the constituency we seek to 
promote and represent is in fact millions strong and deserves to have a critical 
executive role in the administration of the DNS and the future development 
of the Internet.

ICANN being ICANN, the true voice of the internet majority will always be 
sidelined (particularly if it challenges ICANN policy) unless it 
negotiates/determines from a position of numerical strength. Size of membership 
is what ICANN will most truly fear, because the larger and wider our 
membership, the stronger our claim to be truly representative.

Therefore, the premiss behind the ideas I'm posting (below) is that 
mass-recruitment is essential, and that we broaden our remit beyond mere 
"technical mission of ICANN" (which will never attract more than a few 
thousand) to become an organisation upholding the interests of the individual 
in the Internet, ranging from the way it is run, to consumer issues, to freedom 
and justice. Only if we embrace the issue of "The Future of the Internet" - as it 
impacts on individuals, families, communities with all their various interests - will 
we be relevant to many and grow significantly in numbers.

The following Outreach ideas are not meant to be wholly rational and "sensible" 
in the first instance. They are intended to provoke thought, incite comment, and 
are basically a brainstorming exercise so we can explore collectively the ways we 
might achieve a broader membership. Some ideas you may quite like. Some, you 
may rule out completely.

I take the view that most significant Outreach will take place at a national or local 
level, and I regard it as axiomatic that we press forward with establishing 
representatives for each country, and websites to accompany that representation 
wherever possible.

OUTREACH IDEAS:

Possible points of access and recruitment:

1. Through University and College Internet Societies and IT departments, with a 
view to a student membership and network. This could be a worldwide feature of 
our movement, but could be promoted best at national level, with a view to sending 
speakers to various campuses. I believe in the idealism of young people, and they 
are a vital recruitment zone.

2. Through Trade Union movements, interest groups, and already-established 
organisations at local and national level. We should demonstrate the importance 
of a "free" Internet run by people for people, not dominated by big business. 
We should demonstrate the link between organisations' interests and the future 
and freedom of the Internet. We should seek to affiliate with these pre-existent 
organisations and networks, and seek the representation and involvement of their 
memberships. It may indeed be possible to 'capture' whole membership lists of 
organisations, and link up via e-mail to significantly enlarge our representation of 
individuals.

3. Through a "map" approach, starting with the world, and divisible down to 
country and town level, seeking to encourage representation from every town that 
has internet access (and indeed, indirectly, seeking representation from those villages 
and communities that don't). This would be a very graphic method of demonstrating 
our scale, scope and purpose - as an organisation speaking for ordinary people from 
every corner of the globe.

4. Through conventional coverage and development of links with press and media, 
working particularly at national and local level. Publicity and Marketing are essential, 
and strategies should be consciously developed, targetting opportunities and planning 
the timescale and levels of publicity which will be most beneficial. However, we should 
never fall into the trap of 'spin' superceding 'substance', and we should always put 
integrity and truth before image and soundbite.

5. Identifying certain key movements, whether Green organisations, religious/cultural 
groups, UN organisations, commerce or small business groups. Working out the 
"interface" and common ground on which to approach them, and demonstrating how 
the future of the internet (and its administration) is vital to them.

6. Negative strategies. I believe it would be very useful to analyse, develop, and 
summarise for publicity, some of the most glaring failures, abuses, and controversies 
ICANN and its close allies have been guilty of. This is all part of the process of 
conviction and argument and recruitment (rest assured, ICANN would not hesitate 
to do the same to us). Clearly, this negative sub-category would merely be a small 
argument in our prevailing positive message.

7. "Themed" initiatives. For example, you develop an initiative called "Schools of the 
World" linking to the theme "Sharing the Future : the Internet for All Our Children". 
In a similar vein to the "map" approach, you try to spread out and involve as many 
schools worldwide as possible. (This would be facilitated if we constructed links with 
eg Teachers' Unions etc.) We try to get a teacher representive (or more than one) and 
we link to interest/education/freedom issues and information. Setting up (from simple 
beginnings) a global movement like this would extend the scope of our membership, 
the importance of a free internet for all children, and the great thing about schools is 
that they are so closely knitted into their communities in so many places.

8. Club membership and affiliation : the world is full of clubs, hobbies, interests etc. 
Set up lists of organisations, listed geographically and by subject/category. Approach 
clubs through national and local representatives. Explain how the Internet and its future 
matters for them. Encourage even just ONE representative to join our organisation 
(and of course, develop from there to involve the rest of their membership list).

9. Exploiting the mass-following of sport worldwide. Sport is an interface which is 
worldwide. It can be an image of worldwide friendship, involvement and things we have 
in common. And the Internet is a meeting place, a linking place, and a place for 
supporters and players. Take Football for example : using the same "map" method, you 
could try to create a link and representative with as many clubs as possible in every 
country on the planet... "The Internet Future : is YOUR club represented yet?" Sport is 
high-profile. Sport uses the Internet. Clubs may be willing to exchange links. And 
supporters might join up so that their own teams are represented in this worldwide 
process of representation.

10. Dialogue and Targetting Interested Parties. For example, analysis of whois lists 
enables me to see who are the most active domain registrants in the .info and .biz 
roll-outs. Why not enter into dialogue with some of these? Similarly, at local and 
national level, why not analyse, identify and engage webmasters, IT workers, interested 
groups or businesses? In this area we might not enrol such high numbers, but we would 
be attracting a more informed group, and a membership with the kinds of skills we 
could use.

CONCLUSION.

If you've read all this, I applaud your stamina. You could probably think of another 
10 initiatives in place of these. What I'm doing here is more of a "vision" thing than a 
"practical logistics" thing. And these ideas may be kicked into touch by one or all. 
I'm just brainstorming.

But the point I'm trying to make is : without a substantial membership, our influence is 
limited and our claims can be marginalised in the very area we argue most strongly 
- representation.

And yet, if we broaden our scope a little, while keeping ICANN/DNS/"How the 
Internet is Run" as a central project, we can create the kind of scale and representation 
(and global representation too) which ICANN knows will have the moral authority to 
demand representation and executive power.

The Internet is a Worldwide resource for all the ordinary people of the world. The 
people of the world have a right to determine its development and its future. That's 
simple democracy. And much as Mr Sims loves to rule out "global democracy" 
along these lines, what we are proposing here is in fact something idealistic and about 
freedom and the reality - that the internet has truly become something that belongs to 
ALL the people of the world. Its ideas, its dreams, its freedom, its sorrows, its charities, 
its projects... it is this power for such great good, and for bringing ordinary individual 
people together.

The concept of global representation, and the right of the millions upon millions of 
ordinary people to have a priority over big business in the decisions taken over the 
development of the Internet : this is an ideal which is waiting to be turned into a reality. 
Because it is an ideal (and a beautiful ideal too, because the Internet is growing so 
many creative opportunities for ordinary people) it will face opposition from those tired, 
grey, sordid power-brokers for whom the control of the net is more about "control" and 
"vested interest" and "power"...

But the Internet has unleashed a different kind of power, creative, democratic, 
subversive of dishonesties and stolen power.

So... however impractical some of my brainstorming ideas may seem... I invite you to tell 
ME, in reply, the ways YOU think we can "grow" a membership which truly, 
and authoritatively, represents the interests of the ordinary people of the internet - millions 
and millions of them.

Faced with a movement that grows exponentially, and embraces openness and democracy, 
ICANN will find it very hard indeed to exclude its greatest constituency.

Richard Henderson