[atlarge-discuss] Focused Mission Statement (was: point of order)

[Joop Teernstra <terastra@terabytz.co.nz>]

At 08:12 a.m. 13/10/2002 -0400, Ron Sherwood wrote:

>     Your suggestion that we develop two mission statements and then vote for
> the most popular, has the benefit of democracy but also suffers from the
> biggest problem with democracy...  alienation of the losing side.
Ron,

If we abandon democracy, we undermine our raison d'etre.
I am not interested to stay with a group with "leaders" that do not want to 
listen to their own members.

The members must be polled, reliably and frequently, especially in the 
beginning.
Polling officers should be elected.

>     Isn't it possible for us to have two (or three) strings to our bow?
It is possible, but you have to look at  the dispersion of the few energies 
that people with real lives have to give.

My preference is for a focused mission, a battering ram that remains aimed 
at the weakest point of the "Global Internet Governance" fortress: ICANN's 
obligation to be a membership organization.

Here we are, members who signed up to be counted as "ICANN AT Large" 
members  having been corruptly excluded and sidelined by ICANN.
I feel that, without going back to our members and *ask* them,  it is 
nothing short of betraying them to now insist on diluting the focus and 
instead  using their names to take on "the whole bad world".

May I point again to the beginning that has been made by Cecily Wood, 
Sotiris, Walter Schmidt and Vittorio trying to find a more focused 
formulation. http://www.icannatlarge.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=7

Let me add my own draft:


Preamble:

This organization (ICANN At Large) has grown from the original commitment 
of ICANN and its Memorandum of Understanding with the Unites States 
Government to be a membership organization.

Our initial membership has voted to have an internet presence named
icannatlarge.org
Both our name and our website domain may be changed when they would be no 
longer relevant.

********
Our Mission is to create a legitimate and respectable  structure that 
allows for the democratic consultation and representation of 
Individual  Internet users in global internet governance bodies such as ICANN.
********

Legitimate means developing process and respectable means undertaking a 
*big* PR job.

Even such a focused mission is  in itself already a huge task for people 
who may not have more than 30-60 minutes a day to devote to such a task.

If we succeed in this mission, ICANN, or whichever body that may replace it 
and still has provisions to be a membership org , cannot look past us.



--Joop


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