[atlarge-discuss] Membership Dues

[DannyYounger@cs.com]

It costs money to participate in ICANN.

The GAC is a self-sustaining organization that through the generosity of the 
Australian government has paid for the costs of its own participation.  When 
members of the ALAC meet, there is room space at the convention hall to be 
paid for.  If Icannatlarge.com intends to send delegates to ALAC functions, 
it will need to share in those costs as well as the travel expenses of the 
delegates which should be borne by the membership (otherwise the elected 
representative(s) will not necessarily be there to represent their members' 
interests).  The more delegates that are sent, the more money it costs.  
Websites cost money (unless the organization manages to always have a 
volunteer webmaster, and always manages to obtain donated hosting services).  
Voting services cost money (unless the DNSO Secretariat continues to 
generously offer this service).  Generosity won't necessarily last forever... 
 especially as more and more votes are held which start to tax the human 
resources of those supplying a free service.  If Icannatlarge.com also 
intends to have meeting space at various Internet or ICANN functions, this 
too will cost money.  If Icannatlarge.com representatives are invited to 
speak on behalf of users at key conferences, this also will cost money.

Bottom line, it takes money to run an organization, and that requires 
membership dues.  

It's time to take your head out of the ground and face realities.  This is 
not just a discuss-list (like the DNSO's GA) that anyone can join... there 
are financial obligations to be met which require the imposition of fees.  
Successful organizations collect member dues and attend to their 
responsibilities... in turn, those dues help to define who is, and who is not 
a member.

As per the earlier MAC report:  "The question of fees was revisited in Berlin 
in light of public comments received after Singapore.   Concern was expressed 
that low entrance barriers would result in a large enrollment of people who 
were not actively interested but enrolled only because it was easy to do so." 
 This is precisely what can be seen in Icannatlarge.com at the moment -- the 
barrier is so low (just type your name and hit the ENTER key) that it results 
in 80% of the purported membership not participating in any way at all (not 
even a single message to a forum or list).

I support a much higher barrier -- real cash.  



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