Alas, ALAC

August 22, 2002

Nancy J. Victory
Assistant Secretary for Communications and Information
United States Department of Commerce
National Telecommunications and Information Administration
1401 Constitution Avenue, N.W.
Room 4898
Washington, D.C. 20230

Dear Assistant Secretary Victory:

Please take a moment to read http://www.icannwatch.org/article.php?sid=908&mode=&order=0 (copied below for your convenience) by Professor Jonathan Weinberg.

It is one of the most concise and spot-on summations of ICANN's At Large activity that I've seen to date. Thank you in advance for your time and attention.

Sincerely,

Judith Oppenheimer
recently elected to supervisory panel of icannatlarge.com
http://JudithOppenheimer.com
160 East 26 Street, New York, NY 10010
212 684-7210

cc: icannatlarge.com
DNSO General Assembly
ICANNWatch

ICANN's At-Large Assistance Group (ALAG) has just released its report [ http://log.does-not-exist.org/archive-0208.html#02082014071029845261 ] proposing an at-large structure for ICANN.

For those of you who've lost your scorecards: After the ICANN Board in Accra trashed the report of the blue-chip At-Large Study Organization, which had called for the creation of an at-large supporting organization electing Board members (as had ICANN's Membership Advisory Committee, its Membership Implementation Task Force, the NAIS study, etc., etc.[ http://www.dnso.org/clubpublic/ga/Arc10/msg03486.html ]), and as at-large groups nonetheless had the temerity to self-organize, ICANN midwived the creation of the new At-Large Organizing Committee [ http://www.at-large.org/ ], led by Esther Dyson and Denise Michels. After that body too called for [ http://www.at-large.org/submission-to-evolution-and-reform-cmt.htm ] "dedicated At-Large seats on the Board," ICANN created still another group, to provide "implementation recommendations" for the Blueprint's rejection of at-large Board seats. (Hans Klein's masterly explication of the ever-shifting at-large alphabet soup is here [ http://www.cpsr.org/internetdemocracy/cyber-fed/Number_14.html ].)

The new group -- the ALAG, consisting of Esther Dyson, Denise Michel, Gabriel Piñeiro, Tommi Karttaavi, Peter M. Shane, Núria de la Fuente Teixidó, Edmundo Valenti, Vittorio Bertola, and Izumi Aizu -- has now issued its report (part 1 here [ http://www.fitug.de/atlarge-discuss/0208/msg00886.html ], part 2 here [ http://www.fitug.de/atlarge-discuss/0208/msg00886.html ]). The document notes that it is a response to the ERC's request for Blueprint implementation recommendations, and that its recommendations do not represent -- indeed, are contrary to -- "its members' preferred approach to individual user (At-Large) participation or representation within ICANN."

In a nutshell: ICANN would create an At-Large Advisory Committee, "available to provide advice and guidance to the Board and to other organizations within ICANN." ICANN would ensure that the ALAC gets "appropriate notice of upcoming and pending policy discussions and decisions, to ensure adequate opportunity for At-Large input." The ALAC would appoint a non-voting liaison to the Board, five delegates to the Nominating Committee, and liaisons to the supporting organization councils and the other advisory committees. ICANN would "review At-Large involvement after a full year and consider providing At-Large with full representation on the Board."

ALAC would sit atop a conclave of pre-existing organizations such as icannatlarge.com, local ISOC chapters, public-interest organizations, and local computer user groups. These organizations would be grouped into five regional bodies, which would send representatives to regional councils. The regional councils would in turn send delegates to the fifteen-member ALAC and to ICANN's Nominating Committee. "To accommodate the ERC's wish to have the NomCom appoint some of the ALAC's members," a third of the ALAC seats would be filled by the NomCom rather than the member organizations. At some point in the unspecified future, members of the ALAC constituent organizations would participate in elections to choose ALAC members.

Make you feel warm and fuzzy all over? The ALAG had some good people on it, and, plainly, some ALAG members worked quite hard and in good faith to develop the best possible plan, subject to the constraints of the Blueprint.

Just as plainly, though, those constraints are devastating. The main accomplishment of the Blueprint is that it eliminates the At-Large as part of ICANN's actual decisional structure. Even the best set of implementation recommendations for that plan can't make the proverbial silk purse out of the Blueprint's sow's ear.

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Judith Oppenheimer
http://JudithOppenheimer.com
http://ICBTollFreeNews.com
http://WhoSells800.com
212 684-7210, 1 800 The Expert
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Visit 1-800 AFTA, http://www.1800afta.org

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