[governance] IGC

Janna Anderson andersj at elon.edu
Sun Dec 6 19:09:38 EST 2009


FYI,

Based on my personal experience, people are willing to sign up for group
sites like those offered by organizations such as IGF-USA and Diplo, but
they do not actively participate in these groups. Noting the number of
people who have signed up for such a group is in no way a measure of its
efficacy. I am one of the administrators for the IGF-USA Ning site. The only
action we see on it other than people joining is action we force by
requiring people to post ­ such as requiring that they prepare and post
information on presentations for the Oct. 2 meeting of IGF-USA last fall.

Most people still do business by e-mail, and we found with IGF-USA that
people joined Ning and then ignored it and just communicated on e-mail
lists.

I could be all wrong, but it seems as if most conversations of a political
nature among highly involved Internet stakeholders still happen mostly by
e-mail.

Janna

On 12/6/09 6:58 PM, "Tracy F. Hackshaw @ Google" <tracyhackshaw at gmail.com>
wrote:

> *Ditto about the criticism comment. All views are to be welcomed. Surely. :0) 
> 
> I am also not sure why it was necessary to refer to my current employment in
> your response. In any event and with a view to full disclosure, so as to avoid
> any misunderstanding, I have been involved with the using and promoting the
> use of Internet since my days as a student and Researcher at University
> (1993-1997) and have been involved with my current Government job as a
> civil/public servant from 2005 designing and implementing projects relating to
> digital inclusion and improving the lives of the citizens of Trinidad & Tobago
> through the use of ICT.
> 
> Now, first of all, I am confused about the statements that the discussions on
> improving the effectiveness of the IGC should somehow be subsumed under the
> IGF threads (again difficult to achieve with a limited mailing list format
> unless your email platform has an extremely effective search facility). When
> last I read it, para 72 of the Tunis agenda expressly states that the IGF is
> multi-stakeholder - NOT Civil Society focused. I refer specifically to:
> 
> "... Facilitate discourse between bodies dealing with different cross-cutting
> international public policies regarding the Internet and discuss issues that
> do not fall within the scope of any existing body."
> 
> Ginger's suggestion of starting new threads with these improvements in mind is
> perhaps more useful to achieve the objective.
> 
> Secondly, at last count
> from http://www.igcaucus.org/node/12/%253Cbr%2520/%253E I recognize that the
> IGC has approximately 150 members on the mailing list.
> 
> As a comparative example, Diplo's recently initiated Ning community has 646
> members with over 50 subject-specific sub-groups.
> 
> If Diplo were to solicit an average annual voluntary donation of US$10 (less
> than US$1 per month) from its membership for 1 year they could collect approx.
> US$6,460.
> 
> Imagine now if they used those funds to do effective outreach and recruitment,
> open up the discussion platform even further and therefore triple their
> membership for example ...
> 
> The cold, hard question that needs to be asked is the status quo a critical
> mass to move forward or does the IGC want or should I say need to grow and
> raise its profile in order to become a louder, more vibrant voice -
> representing as one group, for example, the interests of the very low-income,
> grassroots members they are mandated to AS WELL AS Digital Natives?
> 
> I have examined the IGC Charter again and for the purposes of the discussion
> nothing stated there expressly limits consideration and indeed, implementation
> of suggestions designed to grow and evolve the IGC into what it is destined to
> become. As a matter of fact, my own interpretation of several clauses of the
> Charter seems to suggest that the IGC should be doing more than what currently
> obtains.
> 
> And, on a technological note, Fouad, proper implementation of a social
> networking platform can cater for all users - including those who prefer to
> use a mailing list, or WAP, or SMS alerts, or even Fax - this is done via the
> implementation of full alerting and posting directly via <<insert your choice
> of delivery channel>> to the platform - the WWW being just one view of the
> network - as a matter of fact, this is desirable. Web 2.0 and Social
> Networking as we know is BOTH active/passive, as well as proactive & reactive
> hence its beauty, popularity, and effectiveness.
> 
> Its power, when used wisely is unmistakable. 
> 
> On Sun, Dec 6, 2009 at 7:03 PM, Fouad Bajwa <fouadbajwa at gmail.com> wrote:
>> My two cents on this:
>> 
>> * This is for the sake of discussion and should not be taken as
>> criticism, please!
>> 
>> Tracy, ummm, these ideas are a bit overwhelming though I like the
>> ideas about social networking website like using ning and we do have
>> an example of one of our members from the DiploFoundation using it on
>> http://www.diplointernetgovernance.org and many of our members can
>> help implement it if the IGC reaches consensus to it in the near
>> future.
>> 
>> But, I would like to share a small case here, last whole year, I had
>> no electricity in Pakistan for about 16-20 hours everyday and had to
>> use a small but very expensive Edge device to access my emails and was
>> limited in my participation because of my Internet speed at 4-10kbps.
>> This means I can't access websites like Facebook or Ning. Similarly,
>> some things would be of key concern regarding the afore mentioned like
>> whether do we all in the developing world have such speedy access to
>> the Internet to open and participate in such live discussions or the
>> choice of passive email medium is the best route since everyone at one
>> point in time or the other can participate equally and inclusively.
>> Also, the issue about access of the social network on a mobile device
>> or low-spec machines might come up and the solution for IGC is
>> supposed to be easily, equally, inclusively accessible by all of our
>> members and even those that are yet to join or use the Internet!
>> 
>> I know some of these ideas may be easily implemented if this was the
>> same as the government agency you are serving in for smaller projects
>> but we have an IGC Charter we follow with mutual and inclusive
>> consensus and any change to that has to be taken forward with mutual
>> consensus and through a collaborative process that the IGC Charter
>> provides us with.
>> 
>> I also know a lot of IGC people that I've seen participating in the
>> various international meetings mentioned but one also has to realize
>> that the members usually do so by interest or voluntarily or if they
>> find resources through fellowships and grants like you and me to put
>> as an example.
>> 
>> I don't know if the charging of fees is a good way to go. Most of us
>> don't have credit cards in the developing world and we won't be able
>> to pay up. Say the fees was set to a one time US$50, that would be Pak
>> Rupees 4200 which is a lot of money for us and so would it be for many
>> other nations. Maybe I can meet up with Ginger on the various
>> occasions that I have and pay her the dues but what will the rest of
>> the 99% of IGC do? In my personal opinion, bad idea!!!!
>> 
>> I have learnt one thing while participating in Civil Society that we
>> have to think about others when we plan or suggest such ideas and
>> invite all or atleast think about the low-income and least developed.
>> All of us are not in the best case scenario nor in the worst of
>> conditions but still we have our limitations and we have a gather as a
>> community to carry out  a number of collective activities with regards
>> to Internet Governance Forum and Internet Governance in general.
>> 
>> My own feelings come down to the fact that since we are discussing
>> restructuring of IGF in a separate discussion thread, these
>> discussions about improving IGC functioning in proportion with the
>> previous should also be done in the same thread so that we have a
>> record of all these suggestions that can be later put together as
>> suggestions for IGC. The suggestions for IGC can be moved to our
>> website while the suggestions for the restructuring of the IGF can be
>> collected, shared and then disseminated to the secretariat.
>> 
>> I also like what Kati has shared as they are some wonderful ideas with
>> the Civil Society aspect in mind and would be very useful in the
>> future indeed that concern us all and as she mentions the meetings,
>> those come from the Open Consultations and MAG meetings strategy for
>> IGC!!!
>> 
>> Lets keep the ideas flowing in!!!
>> 
>> On Mon, Dec 7, 2009 at 2:56 AM, Tracy F. Hackshaw @ Google
>> <tracyhackshaw at gmail.com> wrote:
>>> > Hi everyone:
>>> > I am not sure if this was discussed/raised/explored/shot down before,
>>> > because of the current IGC discussion list format, but from my own
>>> > experiences, here are some thoughts to move the IGC forward and attract a
>>> > wider and deeper cross-section of "civil society" (see the excellent and
>>> > concise LSE definition of this dilemma
>>> > 
>>> at http://www.lse.ac.uk/collections/CCS/introduction/what_is_civil_society.h
>>> tm):
>>> > 1. Evolve the dialog away from the dated mailing/discussion list format
>>> > towards a more transparent and open Social Networking & Collaboration
>>> > platform - I recommend that Marc Andreessen's and Giani Bianchini's
>>> > brilliant Ning technology be used as opposed to the somewhat restricted
>>> > Facebook, Orkut, and the like. Establishment of appropriate IGC presences
>>> on
>>> > Twitter, Scribd and YouTube will also be useful. Utilization of emerging
>>> > solutions such as Google Wave should be explored. Enterprise solutions
>>> such
>>> > as Social Text, Lotus Connections are also available if a more robust
>>> > solution is desirable.
>>> > 2. Move the IGC into the mainstream and raise its profile through a
>>> physical
>>> > "re-launch" or "event". This event could consist of the presentation of a
>>> > series of Civil society position papers as alluded to by Katitza. A timely
>>> > slot for this would perhaps be immediately pre-IGF 2010, or for more
>>> > diffused but consistent impact, pre-ICANN, iNET and IETF 2010
>>> > meetings/conferences.
>>> > 3. Develop a regular meeting or series of meetings where the IGC
>>> membership
>>> > can interact and engage in strategic planning. The technology deployed if
>>> > (1) is accepted will make this extraordinarily simple - time zone
>>> > considerations aside.
>>> > 4. Develop a Strategic Plan, Operating Budget and solicit appropriate
>>> > financial support from its membership - membership growth beyond the
>>> > existing should be guaranteed by (1) and (2). The Wikipedia donation model
>>> > is instructive. I am also certain that the IGF Secretariat will provide
>>> > support if a Strategic Plan, Budget and Operational Plan for 2010-2011
>>> were
>>> > presented.
>>> > Mobilize. Grow. Prosper.
>>> >
>>> >
>>> >
>>> >
>>> >
>>> >
>>> >
>>> >
>>> >
>>> > On Sun, Dec 6, 2009 at 10:30 AM, Katitza Rodriguez
>>> > <katitza at datos-personales.org> wrote:
>>>> >>
>>>> >> Dear IGC members:
>>>> >>
>>>> >> I would like to see the IGC grows as a caucus. Grow not only in terms of
>>>> >> members but grows in terms of outcomes/deliverables and capacity of
>>>> >> organization.
>>>> >>
>>>> >>  It is vitally important that IGC produce their own papers to address
>>>> the
>>>> >> most relevant topics at the IG level. It is equally important that IGC
>>>> can
>>>> >> take into account also all those collective civil society papers that
>>>> were
>>>> >> released in other venues but are crucial also for the IGC debate. It
>>>> should
>>>> >> be both ways. All will depend on the issue, the time, the knowledge, the
>>>> >> capacity, our energy, our passion and our capacity to make things done,
>>>> >> among many other factors.
>>>> >>
>>>> >> We all need to learn to put in the table not only the issues that we
>>>> care
>>>> >> about but also the issues that others civil society participants care
>>>> about,
>>>> >> and defend all with the same passion.
>>>> >>
>>>> >> We should be able to better organize ourselves. Having meetings every
>>>> >> morning before each meeting to debrief of what's going on in each
>>>> workshop
>>>> >> and be able to respond in each workshop is vitally important. Some
>>>> >> groups/networks/coalition does this work. Can we do it as a whole group?
>>>> >> This can happen only if we are well organized. There were more than 111
>>>> >> workshops. If we can monitor all the workshops and have always one or
>>>> two
>>>> >> civil society participants able to put in the table those issues that we
>>>> >> care about, we will a better capacity to at least educate/share
>>>> >> knowledge/give another point ot view to all those who are on the room,
on
>>>> >> the issues that civil society participants cares about.
>>>> >>
>>>> >> Hopefully, the candidates have a vision on this regards and can move
>>>> >> forward the process. IT is a lot of work, and its not easy but we should
do
>>>> >> it if we want to be effective.
>>>> >>
>>>> >> Warm Regards
>>>> >>
>>>> >> Katitza
>>>> >> ____________________________________________________________
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>>> >
>>> >
>>> > ____________________________________________________________
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>>> >
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>>> >     http://lists.cpsr.org/lists/info/governance
>>> >
>>> >
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> --
>> Regards.
>> --------------------------
>> Fouad Bajwa
>> Advisor & Researcher
>> ICT4D & Internet Governance
>> Member Multistakeholder Advisory Group (IGF)
>> Member Civil Society Internet Governance Caucus (IGC)
>> My Blog: Internet's Governance
>> http://internetsgovernance.blogspot.com/
>> Follow my Tweets:
>> http://twitter.com/fouadbajwa
>> MAG Interview:
>> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ATVDW1tDZzA
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> ____________________________________________________________
>> You received this message as a subscriber on the list:
>>      governance at lists.cpsr.org
>> To be removed from the list, send any message to:
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>> 
>> For all list information and functions, see:
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>> 
>> -- 
>> Janna Quitney Anderson
>> Director of Imagining the Internet
>> www.imaginingtheinternet.org
>> 
>> Associate Professor of Communications
>> Director of Internet Projects
>> School of Communications
>> Elon University
>> andersj at elon.edu
>> (336) 278-5733 (o)
>> 
>> 
>> 

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