Re: [members-meeting] Re: [icann-eu] Summary

[Jefsey Morfin <jefsey@wanadoo.fr>]

Dear T,

At 15:50 06/12/00, you wrote:
>roberto_gaetano@hotmail.com (Wed 12/06/00 at 11:55 AM +0100):
> > To be pragmatic, and accepting the will of the majority who sees this
> > short-sighted ancillary benefits as "incredibly valuable", may I ask 
> you to
> > what extent do we risk to lose them in case of a mixed system (5 direct 
> + 4
> > indirect). IANAL, but it seems to me that the moment you have even just 1
> > Director elected directly, you qualify for being a membership organization.
>
>that might be true in theory, but then the status karl was speaking
>of would depend on just one director rather than on five or nine of
>them. that's not pragmatic.

We are on the verge of a study supposed to propose a consensus. This
means the community is to find and negotiate an equilibrium. When you
start a negotiation you must know what you are going to claim, what you
are going to refuse and what you are going to concede.

The Board for various contradictory reasons has decided a "clean-sheet"
study. For contradictory reasons I accept that, but I want to take advantage
from it. Since it is really clean-sheet:

- what we claim is 19 @large Board Members - as our adversaries
- what we will never concede is less than 9 @large Directors
- what we may partly negotiate is the way some of them are going to
   be elected.

What Karl says we will inherit from the principle of @large Directors being
directly elected is not negotiable: this is our right and it would make 
everyone
question the Californian nature of the ICANN. Our atomic bomb there is an
alternative international ICANN as proposed by Roberto.

But we may obtain it from the law or from the bylaws. If the system of
modification of the bylaws is changed, granting previsibility to the ICANN
and stability to the network, we may negotiate we may negotiate for good
reasons to have them granted by the bylaws *plus* serious advantages.

- today I have not heard a single good reason. We are only talking about
   5+4 because this was an on the fly compromise explained by Vint Cerf,
   hardly a good constitutional reason.

- one advantage of common interest I would like to obtain is to have one
   ccTLD representative in every SO delegation to the BoD

   -  this would mean ICANN warranties us stability in the international
      relations (we need them as @large communities)

   -  we would not risk that their representatives would be discounted
      from the @large Directors set.

   -  we would see the ccTLD satisfied while avoiding a 4th SO and get
      a good alliance: ccTLDs claim (to the contrary of Louis Touton and
      DoC) that ccTLD legitimacy does not come from the USG but from
      us (as LIC: local Internet community) and they have duties to us and
      to the structuralisation of LICs. It would be logic we avoid a conflict
      and find an ally with our own partners.

- another advantage of common interest would be the area representation.
   Indirect election may be a way to democratically balance the democratic
   unbalance of the Digital Divide. China is telling us today that with India
   they represent 40% of the population and should claim for 7 Directors.
   A general "rule of area representation" should be established which might
   include an partly indirect representation system to compensate for the
   direct election system. But the rule should be general: as Roberto
   Gaetano and some NC members ask for it: the Chairman and the
   President should not belong to the same area. And most probably the
   Directors coming from the SO should not all of them be from the same
   Area, or should be of different areas. Incidentally that rule should apply
   to the Study group: every area should be represented. We also
   have the Asia/Pacific unbalance due to India and China population
   size: we have to build for a reasonable future. They claim to have
   already 850.000 DNs validated in China. We have to make sure that
   Africa and South-America may protect their interests.


>unless i'm very mistaken, there doesn't seem to be much of a plural-
>ity of opinion on this list to support an indirect-election option.

My position is neither against, nor for. We want to talk and listen.
Then to be tough in protecting our interests. Our interests are not
specifically a number of Directors or a type of election. These are
only a way to protect them.

>since ICANN's current staff and board has demonstrated that they're
>fairly hostile to the idea of direct elections,

Where did you see that? They have just organized the direct elections.
What they say is: "to stay a stable and good solution, ICANN must
stay small [this I agree], who can we stay small and organize and
make active a constituency of hundred of thousands or millions, if
not billion some time, of voters? We need you to tell how you see
the solution. A solution can be something independent from the
ICANN (up to you to build it) which would get 9 seats at the board."

What they want is a practical, credible, stable and consensually
accepted response about associations, media, sites, press, MLs,
information, polling booth, (re)counts, etc... ... and the funding for it.

They keep saying "we are not the world government, we cannot
manage the world constituency without credible help and funds".

>it's certainly true
>that conceding an indirect method (in whole or part) is more 'prag-
>matic'--but is that really the point?

IMHO conceding anything before a negotiation is losing it (you shown
you were ready to accept losing it). But refusing to negotiate is worst
because the other part will decide without you and most probably
against you. So we must negotiate the number of Directors, from 0 to
19, making clear that we will break under nine and very good reasons
and advantages for not having all of them directly elected.
This is pragmatism: negotiation is between equals talking together.

Cheers,
Jefsey