[atlarge-discuss] Re: Judyth's comments on scale and legitimacy

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

I agree with a lot of this, Judyth
(comments below)

----- Original Message -----
From: <espresso@e-scape.net>

>we hundred-or-so on this list can hardly constitute ourselves the At Large
electorate or claim to legitimately represent them.

This is exactly my argument for making Outreach a first priority. Not all
people are interested in the fine detail of ICANN politics (in fact, hardly
anyone is) - but people ARE interested in the Internet, see it as "theirs"
and as a world resource of which they are stakeholders. So I take the view
that we should construct a broad-based movement, selling the idea that "It's
YOUR Internet" which tries to convey the idea of people in every community
and every region and every country joining up for a kind of "people's
movement" of the Internet. A movement which sets itself apart from big
business. A movement that embraces the really high ideals for a better
world. And - within that broad based movement which could attract FAR more
members - you can include the issue of "Who runs the Internet?" This way, we
first attract hundreds of thousands of members (to make ourselves far more
representative) and then we use that added authority to demand
representation for users at the heart of ICANN (unless, as you say, ICANN is
cut back to a powerless narrow technical mandate). I have pledged to work
for a minimum membership of 100,000 in the next year. I would prefer it if
we aimed for a million.

We should aim to affiliate with other already-established organisations:
teacher unions, universities, student unions, religious groups, local sports
clubs... almost antwhere where there is an already-established group of
people... and we should "sell" the idea of defending the Internet and
creating this great democratic online force for good. Equally, we should
attract individuals too. We should organise locally and regionally, and we
should work together to create marketing messages which LOTS of people can
buy into. We should use local and personal contacts. We should even engender
friendly rivalry between one country and another to see who can attract %
growth in numbers. We should prioritise the growth and creation of this
really significant user-base.


>I would also like to see the replacement of the "at-large" terminology
since it has evidently been co-opted for other purposes. >Perhaps what is
really needed is a concerted effort to invite Internet users to form their
own local chapters which could elect >representatives to an "Internet House
of Commons"

I agree that the term "At Large" has little or no meaning to the general
public and should be replaced by a name/concept that millions of ordinary
people can understand. There is, though, a case for retaining the "At Large"
term as a subsidiary name so that we can continue to be seen within ICANN
participants as an At Large organisation : indeed, if this planned growth
took place, as THE primary At Large organisation in the public and media
perception.

As to the concept of an Internet House of Commons, although we are talking
British terminology, I think its fairly well understood throughout much of
the world. I've reserved www.internetparliament.com and
www.theinternetparliament.com and www.theinternetparliament.org for an
initiative along these lines, but are - if you like - my fallback if
IcannAtLarge.com gets captured or doesn't embrace the scale of movement I
believe in. Put simply, the case for democratic representation of ordinary
users over the administration of the Internet is very strong indeed. The
Internet belongs now to the world - to hundreds of millions of users (and
non-users too). It is their Internet and they have the primary right to
determine how and by whom it is run, developed, and administered. Put
simply, we need massive membership, so ICANN can no longer marginalise us,
and so the media and governments recognise us and really take interest.

We need to go round the back of ICANN's defences. Rather than compromise our
principles to participate in an ALAC which is ICANN's mechanism for
reversing and cancelling out democratic user representation, we should
simply follow our own agenda, regardless of ICANN, and become so large and
significantly representative that they are politically pressured to take us
into account. We have to make ICANN fear our authority. It is largescale
membership that they will really fear, if it is combined with intelligent
interfaces with the media and US Govt and EU etc.

I accept that others in this organisation want a slimmed down ICANN and a
slim small membership of cognoscenti who understand the ins and out of ICANN
and the DNS.

However, I don't personally see that strategy ever working with ICANN. They
will just create layer upon layer of reasonable discourse and "consultation"
to protect their powerbase and keep real elected user participation at arms
length.

Conversely, I think we stand at a time and an opportunity which is RIGHT for
the development of a worldwide movement (providing we have enough
commonsense to understand that very few people are interested in ICANN
itself, but millions feel they deserve a stake in an Internet that has truly
come to belong to everyone).

Thanks for your comments, Judyth.

Richard Henderson




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