Re: [icann-fra] RE: [ICANN-EU] [Q&A] the exciting adventures of a nominee

["Roberto Gaetano" <roberto_gaetano@hotmail.com>]

Good evening everybody (in this part of the globe - translate the wish into 
your local timeframe).

I thought this post was a joke, but since I saw reactions to it, I will try 
to take it seriously.

Jefsey Morfin wrote:
>
>There are French citizens from all the regions as France has national
>territories in NA, SA, AA, Africa and Europe. I certainly accept to be
>an European candidate as most of the national territory is located there,
>but I definitly resent - I am not agressive but certainly very serioius
>about it - not to be able to discuss the regional concens of my country
>with the candidates of their area. I also resent that my fellow citizens
>from Mayotte, La Reunion, La Guyanne, La Martinique et la Guadeloupe,
>Saint Perre et Miquelon, Noumea, Thaiti, etc.. could not dialog with the
>French or the other European Community candidates. They are as good
>French citizen as me. Pretending and acting otherwise purposedly
>would be pure racism or offence against my country.

Please tell me that this is not a real post, but a "Guignol de l'info" spot 
(funny, "post" is an anagram of "spot", I never thought about that before)
First of all, ICANN has never spoken about political, social, economical, or 
whatever else "identity". They only spoke about "geographical distribution". 
We may question a lot of things, but the geographical location of, for 
instance, Thaiti in the Pacific Ocean, has not been challenged insofar.
Second, ICANN is using the UN Statistical Services (or whatever the correct 
name, you may find out) to locate any "country or part thereof" as defined 
in ISO-3166 in a "geographic region". I even raised a point with ICANN 
(before this election phase) about St.Pierre & Miquelon, because I 
erroneously thought that they put it in a wrong region, while it has been 
correctly put in NA.

So much for the "formal" approach": ICANN has always said they were looking 
for "geographical distribution", and this is happening. BTW, in Yokohama 
Andrew (McL) asked for advice. GAC reps were there. The outcome was to use 
the UN Statistic Whatever (alternative proposal, by Paul Twomey, rejected, 
has been to use the FIFA Regions - it was not a joke, it was a genuine 
effort to find "objective" rules).

What *really* drives me mad is the use of the term "racist".
We are talking about the people of la Réunion, Martinique, and so on, 
whether they feel that their problems (internetwise) are more similar to the 
ones of the French Metroplitan (.fx) or the ones of the islands or other 
territories nearby.
Why somebody in Paris is feeling authorized to speak on behalf of the people 
of some Pacific Ocean or Indian Ocean Islands, and on top of that accusing 
others of racism, escapes me.


>
>I am therfore sorry to have to do it, but I must solemny protest against
>what is most probably a mistake in the site design. But it imposes
>ethnical, cultural and geographical discrimination between my fellow
>citizens and separtes more than one million of them from the national
>community. Would you accept that he US citizens from Alaska and
>Hawaii could not talk to US candidates?


Alaska is anyhow in NA.
The problem may lie with Hawaii, but for one reason or the other, when the 
map of the regions and countries and subdivisions thereof was designed, UK 
and FR took a different approach as the US.
The former kept the point of view they had with UPU, that is that they 
needed "different" postal codes (this is the origin of the ISO system, BTW), 
while the US endorsed the POV that everything was coming under one single 
umbrella. Whichever POV was historically successful, is moot.
The fact is that, even with the US, we have funny situations, like PortoRico 
in LAC, not NA. Some parts of the Caribbean[Caribe]/Bahamas[Bahamas] are not 
latin-speaking (see Peter de Blanc comments on several lists), but then, we 
must agree on a rule.
And the rule was the UN Statistic body.

>
>I will not juge from one case, but it is however important and childish
>enough to have some concern about the ability of the current ICANN
>culture to manage basic international operations.

The basics of managing international operations is to be able to put aside 
petty national interests and/or local perspectives.
Who did it, and who didn't, in this case, is before our very eyes.

Regards
Roberto

_________________________________________________________________________
Get Your Private, Free E-mail from MSN Hotmail at http://www.hotmail.com.

Share information about yourself, create your own public profile at 
http://profiles.msn.com.