[governance] IGF financing

Wed Jun 13 19:45:19 EDT 2007

Carlos,

You’re comment regarding an intent to
blackmail by Chris Disspain is totally inappropriate. Yes, I am a board member
of auDA. But this in no way makes a difference to my response to the spurious allegations made
about Chris on this list, and about which Jeremy Malcolm has already posted a
response from Chris refuting these comments.

Comments such as these reflect poorly on
the IGF’s stakeholders. And given this is in a financing thread, you would have
to ask, who would want to fund a body that makes such comments?

I passed on the comments to Chris, and he’s
suggested, if I want, I could post the complete text of his comments, which are
below. Any reasonable person reading these comments would see there is no
intent on “blackmailing”. The text below makes it perfectly plain that keeping “critical
internet resources” off the agenda is NOT what this was about.

To suggest any intent to blackmail is a
serious allegation, and in this case is one that cannot be sustained.

David

A number of advisory group members met
tonight to discuss today's meeting and I am sending this to you and the list to
express our concerns.

Firstly, we were under the impression that even though the advisory group has
yet to be officially reconstituted we were meeting here following yesterdays
open consultation as the advisory group in anticipation of formal approval from
the Secretary General. In fact this meeting has turned into another open
consultation seeking to set the agenda for and structure of the igf.

I want to make it clear that most of us have no problem with critical internet
resources being an agenda item in a main session if agreed. Rather, we are
concerned that there appear to be fundamental changes being mooted which are
unacceptable to and may lead to the withdrawal of some non government and
perhaps even government participants.

Overall the topics and format of Athens were a success and to ensure the continued
enrolment of all stakeholders should be maintained.

Chief amongst our concerns is the concept, that seems to have been 'agreed' in
today's session, of final recommendations arising from the igf. In effect, a
negotiated document. This is way outside of the mandate of the igf and is,
simply, unacceptable to the majority of non government people here.

We are dismayed that this meeting seems to have been taken over by government
officials well versed in international manoeuvring or 'UN games'. It is likely
that this will marginalise the legitimate concerns and interests of developing
countries for whom issues such as access are key. This is not what these
meetings were intended to be.

There is a grave danger that financial support and general involvement of non
government participants will be withdrawn.

I intend to raise these issues at the meeting in the morning but thought it courteous
to let you and the rest of the list know in advance.

----- Original Message ----
From: Carlos Afonso <ca at rits.org.br>
To: governance at lists.cpsr.org
Sent: Wednesday, 13 June, 2007 10:37:09 PM
Subject: Re: [governance] IGF financing

Yes, there are other ways. The blackmailing tone in the letter from 
Disspain (which he claims to be from a "group" -- can we guess who this 
"group" is?) may be shocking for some, but what is really the reason the 
ICANN camp was so supportive? When Microsoft or any other big one 
supports a "pluralist" project like this, what do they expect in 
exchange? Is the same situation: they expect adherence to certain rules 
which comply with their interests. In the case of ICANN camp, to ensure 
that certain themes and proceedings remain anathemas. Or else..., as 
Chris so frankly states.

So the IGF does not need funding which captures it. One criteria is 
diversification -- do not depend for anything on just a few funders. 
Another is the mobilization of the 174 governments who happily signed 
the agreement to form the IGF but did not take the corresponding 
responsibilities (except for very few).

frt rgds

--c.a.

William Drake wrote:
> Hi,
> 
> On 6/11/07 6:44 PM, "Bertrand de La Chapelle" <bdelachapelle at gmail.com>
> wrote:
>> Anyway, I'd be happy to learn what your own preference would be, what concrete
>> solution you favor : just governments ? or just the UN ? or just some
>> international organizations ? The key question is, again : what is the
>> appropriate financing structure for the IGF in order to guarantee regularity
>> of resources and independence from lobbies and pressure groups ? Can we
>> address this issue calmly, with the attention it deserves ?
>>
> ------
> 
> According to this news item from yesterday,
> www.theregister.co.uk/2007/06/12/igf_nominet_2007/
> 
> ³Kummer has spent much of the last six months trying to win more funding. At
> a meeting at Parliament last week, hosted by Nominet, the not-for-profit
> which operates the .uk registry, the Department of Trade and Industry
> announced it had found £23,000 down the back of its sofas (the Swiss
> government has donated $500,000).²
> 
> 174 states & the EU signed off on the Tunis Agenda creating the IGF.  If
> just ten more could find some chump change in their sofas (equivalent to
> about a nanosecond of their foreign affairs budgets, or maybe one cocktail
> break at the G8), we (taxpayers all---to two countries in the case of us
> unfortunate US expats) wouldn¹t need to have this conversation, the IGF
> could have something more like a secretariat, and Markus could refocus his
> energies.  To me the question is not can we shake micropayments out of
> individual taxpayers and financially marginal NGOs, but rather what sort of
> game are the governments playing here.
> 
> Two cents,
> 
> Bill
> 
> 
> 
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-- 

Carlos A. Afonso
Rio       Brazil
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