[bestbits] IGF Open Consultations and MAG meetings in Geneva 1-3 December 2014

[William Drake]

Hi

The IGF secretariat has announced that we will be Open Consultations and MAG meetings at the International Telecom Union (!) in Geneva on 1-3 December 2014.  This could be an important meeting from the standpoint of advancing civil society objectives for the IGF, in particular laying a foundation for follow up to the NETmundial mandate to strengthen the IGF.  If the meetings turn into another one of those occassions where we just sit around talking about “what worked and what did not” in Istanbul (e.g. complaining about the wifi, the number of panelists on main sessions, how many workshops, etc.) it will be a missed opportunity to put us on a good path to the November 2015 meeting in Brazil.  Hopefully the new MAG members will have been announced in advance and will be able to attend.

Hotels could be expensive at that time of year so anyone thinking of coming might want to start looking into options now.  There should be some bits of financial support for MAG members from Least Developed Countries (LDC’s), Developing Countries, and Transitional Economies.  Others will have to find their own way.

I would again reiterate that it is really important to get a top notch civil society contingent in place that can work together and be strategic.  Nominations are due 20 October, via the IGF website.

I have proposed that if indeed new members are seated by then and able to come, there should be break-out sessions for each stakeholder group so that we can do some in-depth consultation and transfer of local knowledge and experience.  Don’t know if the proposal will gain traction, but I believe  the civil society group would really benefit from something like this.

Best

Bill

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William J. Drake
International Fellow & Lecturer
  Media Change & Innovation Division, IPMZ
  University of Zurich, Switzerland
Chair, Noncommercial Users Constituency, 
  ICANN, www.ncuc.org
william.drake at uzh.ch (direct), wjdrake at gmail.com (lists),
  www.williamdrake.org
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