[bestbits] Quick Update on WGEC meeting day 2

[Adam Peake]

Avri, thanks for the report, and having followed some of yesterdays discussions online, thank you *very* much for your interventions during the meeting. Good luck today.

About your last point, tweets.  The meeting is transcribed, we can see who is saying what.  How is tweeting a problem?  Perhaps clarify with the chair.  

Thanks again,

Adam


On May 2, 2014, at 3:03 PM, Avri Doria wrote:

> Hi,
> 
> It was a long day.  We finally made it through all of the proposed
> recommendations that group members had offered.  We are at least half a
> day or more behind our schedule for the meeting.
> 
> We also had a discussion of the Correspondence group report.  While the
> report was appreciated by all, we developed yet another point of
> fundamental disagreement:
> 
> - This is marvelous work that should become a living document
> 
> - This is a useful piece of work, but enough trying to understand, now
> lets come to conclusions about new mechanisms and bodies to fill the gaps.
> 
> Discussions were robust, and some of the language remains bracketed and
> needs further discussion.
> 
> The fundamental oppositional themes remained as subthemes, especially
> the scope of Enhanced Cooperation:
> 
> - among governments
> 
> - among all stakeholders.
> 
> One of the longest discussions revolved around the need to include
> discussions on issues related to marginalized peoples issues and women's
> participation in the Internet governance as part of Enhanced
> Cooperation.  The fundamental group-division fed into the discussion:
> 
> - this discussion is a waste of time that keeps us from discussing the
> real issue of Enhanced Cooperation - relationships between governments
> and a new body wherein those discussions can be held
> 
> - this a critical component of Enhanced Cooperation among all stakeholders.
> 
> Neither side in the discussion could believe that the discussion went on
> as long as it did.  I am sure this discussion will resurface at some
> point in day 3.
> 
> As it was apparent that there are, at least two models of Enhanced
> Cooperation, there had been discussion the first day of including these
> models in the document.  This discussion continued the second day with
> some some arguing:
> 
> - We should have a report on the things we could reach consensus on, and
> there seem to be some such points
> 
> - we should discuss the various oppositional models.
> 
> At one point one of the protagonists argued that they were only
> accepting certain text because they expected a document that would
> include a model that rejected the relevance of the discussion of the
> points they had just accepted.
> 
> We also did not manage to resolve the issues of whether we would have"
> 
> - a chair's report
> 
> - a WG group
> 
> Today's meeting starts at 9am (I better start getting ready) and is
> likely to go until 9pm again as was the case on day 2.
> 
> A skeleton of the draft report was sent to the members and it is
> attached for reference as is the text of the first day's discussions
> 
> A point I want to make in this sketchy report, some governments have
> begun the move to argue that the WGEC is only having these oppositional
> problems because it is trying to be a multistakeholder discussion. There
> is every chance that a final oppositional impression is being set up:
> 
> - realizing that a 16 year fundamental difference of opinion needs more
> a few days of meetings spread over a year to resolve
> 
> - the multistakeholder model is the root of all failure
> 
> Of course I realize that within the group of civil society readers of
> the sketchy report, we have people on both sides of this discussion.
> 
> Finally there was a moment when an observer was reprimanded for using
> twitter to say things that offended some WG members.  To me, this showed
> how really out of touch the whole WSIS based Tunis Agenda driven
> discussions are in todays' world.
> 
> Or rather, how the opposition between the restriction of expression and
> free expression are also one of the fundamental oppositions that
> underlay our discussions.
> 
> avri
> 
> PS. Hopefully others who were in the room and who are on these lists can
> correct or amplify this quick report.
> <30APR2014-WGEC-Geneva, Switzerland.txt><DRAFTfinal report-140501>____________________________________________________________
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