Re: [ICANN-EU] Re: European At Large Council

["Griffini Giorgio" <grigio@mediapoint.it>]

T.Roessler wrote:
>
> > Yes but it should be manageable otherwise the director will spend
> > most of his energies in trying to understand what is the concern
> > rather than trying to find a solution for such concern. 
> 
> If your main concern is about ressources needed to follow
> discussions, and mere monitoring of tendencies, there's no real need
> for elections and the like - I'd rather expect that the structures
> needed will naturally evolve.
> 
I agree that structure naturally evolves and my main concern is about having 
such kind structure in place quickly. The first regional director will be seated 
within five weeks and I would like to speed up a bootstrap process. 
The model I was proposing it will not endanger your view but it will simply 
delay 'openness' (in the meaning of a more general partecipation in the 
process) just for the time needed to put up a skeleton of such body.

> > And if we talk about understanding if there is consensus thing
> > may become even worse... It is like to have to cope with a whole
> > stadium voting: If you get consensus it will be surely
> > representative but how much it will takes to safely count raised
> > hands ?
> 
> "Consensus" doesn't need to mean raising hands.  It's rather like
> this: "Do we have consensus?  Whoever objects, do it now, and give a
> rationale why."  This works quite nicely.
> 
I often hear such consideration but I still think it is wrong or at almost 
incomplete because you cannot know how many people heard your call. 
By doing this way you will not measure 'positive' consensus but you will just 
have an index of 'non-dissenting' opinion on an unknown total population. 
This way you will include in the count (improperly in my view) also 
uninterested or unaware parties and it is difficult for me to call it 'consensus'. 
I'm sure that the way you talk about works quite nicely and it is often used to 
shorten up discussions where there is an high membership count but with 
few active partecipants usually when some of this few one have diverging 
opinions. 
I still prefer the 'positive' consensus method (raising hand or say an explicit 
"Yes,I agree" on a list) because it is more transparent and safe and also I 
have also in other places seen 'non-dissenting opinion' method applied in a 
completely unfair manner.

> > As already told in another msg I think it is almost unpratical to
> > act as there were no boundaries while they actually still exists.
> 
> The question is whehter and how these boundaries influence
> ICANN-relevant topics.
> 
I think that differences about sensibility on social impact of  ICANN decisions 
and national pride concerns and their side-effects will be the most noticeable 
ones.

> > There are 'cultural boundaries' not 'technologic boundaries' and
> > they should converge at their own pace by influencing themselves
> > until they reach a stability point. (Ach... entropy again...:-)
> 
> [...]
> 
 ?

> > Any other concept of 'representativeness' will be questioned as
> > arbitrary because if you choose another one you will be
> > 'instantly' not representative (by the new concept) for placing
> > that choice.
> 
> Sorry, but you don't become a representative for the general public
> by saying "I want to be a candidate" (which is easy), and getting a
> handful supporters afterwards (which shouldn't be that difficult,
> either - friends and family are sufficient).
> 
I agree, but this is the kind of representativeness you may find here in 
@large elections. I'm not arguing if it is wrong or not in itself but if it is more 
or less corect to act on a behalf of a different one in this such bootstrap 
process When this bootstrap is done the representativity issue will be a 
whole another different story.

> The best way to attack the representativity argument is, in my
> humble opinion, to make the process open for all, and try to record
> the differing opinions. But I wrote that before, you remember?
> 
Yes but in this uncoordinated effort to build up a body how can we be
sure we will not miss some opinions? When we will have a 'sort of ' initial 
body we can charter it to measure representativeness by 'positive' 
consensus gained by open access and public readability.

Best regards
Giorgio Griffini