[icann-eu] At Large Study Committee

[Marc Schneiders <marc@schneiders.org>]

Dear members of the At Large Study Committee,

On your website you ask for input. As one of the (ex?) At Large
Members, and as a participant in the endorsement phase of the
elections (in Europe, hence the cc to the icann-eu list), I feel an
obligation to send you at least some feedback.

1. It seems to me that it is very important to conduct a thorough
study into the way in which the elections (all phases of it) were
conducted. The main goal of this study should be, if I may say so, not
to point fingers at people, but to learn from mistakes for the
future. This should be the basis for all the rest of the work.

2. Your committee would greatly enhance its credebility by ensuring
that as much data as possible (due to considerations of privacy etc.)
are made available for research. Perhaps the possibility that certain
researchers or research groups get access to data that are not
suitable for publication on icann.org, and cannot be made generally
available, should not be excluded. Without the facts, and as many of
the facts as possible, finding relevant conclusions may be very
difficult. Different techniques may be used to anonymize privacy
related data, such as IP numbers.

3. Personally I am worried about possibilities for so-called capture
of at large elections. Study of some of the data may alleviate such
worries, but only when researchers have sufficient access to e,g,
server logs.

4. It would be a bad idea to change the structure of the At Large
without first looking thoroughly at how the elections have actually
worked and what sort of people participated. We should first learn
from the experience of the past year before we start changing the
principles. That is the reason why I would not, right now, like to
answer questions like "How should "At Large Member" be defined?"

5. One matter is, however, already clear to my mind, even before
conclusions from the past election process are formed: the lack of
possibilities to organize as at large members, to get into touch with
each other, has seriously hampered any form of the consensus building
on which you, rightly, put so much emphasis in your list of questions.

May I wish you wisdom and success in your task?

Regards,

Marc Schneiders