[governance] intervention draft - why are the more progressive elements of IGF functions ommitted

Parminder parminder at itforchange.net
Fri Feb 17 06:26:15 EST 2006


Vittorio,

I only mean to push some points I want pushed sitting over here, through
people I know who are at the meeting. And in this especially, the insistence
on keeping the 'access' and 'critical internet resources' issues within IGF
ambit as they presently are in tunis agenda. I myself have only such insight
into discussions and views as I read on this list, and therefore find it
fine to discuss these impressions openly.... There are mails that have
spoken against these issues to be kept within IGF functions.... or so it
appeared to me. 

Parminder 

________________________________________________
Parminder Jeet Singh
IT for Change
Bridging Development Realities and Technological Possibilities 
91-80-26654134
www.ITforChange.net 

-----Original Message-----
From: Vittorio Bertola [mailto:vb at bertola.eu.org] 
Sent: Friday, February 17, 2006 4:38 PM
To: Parminder
Cc: 'Governance Caucus'; 'Jeanette Hofmann'
Subject: Re: [governance] intervention draft - why are the more progressive
elements of IGF functions ommitted

Parminder ha scritto:
> One, a lot of issues - like access, affordability - are being argued as 
> not being IGF issues (despite they being in para 72)

I'm not arguing against this. I couldn't read all the flood of emails 
that appeared on this list in the last few days, but as far as I 
understand, you misunderstood Bill stressing one specific part of the 
mandate as an attempt to deny the others.

> (As I write this I also read your today's intervention which speaks 
> exclusively of process and participation issues, but not on substantive 
> mandate of IGF, and doesn't call for a commitment to 'full compliance 
> with para 72' - and these are parts of Tunis agenda that were gained 
> after a lot of struggle, and we have been considering them among few 
> victories from WSIS.)

You might have noticed that the agenda item currently under discussion 
is "Nature, character and structure of the IGF"... And I don't think 
that you can ask all civil society people that take the floor (all 
speaking personally or for their own org, by the way, and not on behalf 
of CS or of the caucus) to stress your pet issue every time they speak.

By the way, governments in the room openly said that they were annoyed 
by so many civil society people taking the floor and repeating the same 
points again and again.

> For example, if one finds that some of ICANN decisions have implication 
> on wsis principle of 'promoting freer access to information for all' 
> (even the issue of their operational costs that they collect from 
> registries and its implication on cost of obtaining domain names may be 
> considered one such issue) and that they are not 'incorporating WSIS 
> principles in IG mechanism', the what is one expected to do about it. 
> Just complain to ICANN, and expect them to change. Why wouldn't an open 
> ended discussion on this issue, and even presentation of options, be a 
> legitimate domain of IGF.

I think it would - even if I think it would be unlikely to happen, it 
would be promptly stopped by many stakeholders speaking against it, and 
please realize the forum has no authority, you can't force a discussion 
to happen at the forum unless all forum participants accept it... unless 
you want to point a gun to Ambassador Gross and force him into the room :-D

> Why is CS so keen to limit IGF's domian

Actually, all our interventions go in the direction of making it broader 
than most governments wish (actually, the so-called "Anglosaxon 
Conspiracy" pushes for the forum not to discuss anything meaningful, and 
the EU and others push it to discuss spam and cybercrime only).

> The kind of argument given in your email, and those of many others here, 
> makes me believe that you seek essentially only two functions from the IGF

No offense meant, but would you please listen to other people, rather 
than presume what they want? You're attributing to most people in the 
caucus intentions that they never had and statements they never made.

Thanks,
-- 
vb.             [Vittorio Bertola - v.bertola [a] bertola.eu.org]<-----
http://bertola.eu.org/  <- Prima o poi...

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