[At-Large] Internet Society Statement on the NETmundial Initiative

[Joly MacFie]

For some background on this read Kieren McCarthy
<http://www.theregister.co.uk/2014/11/07/internet_un_security_council_net_mundial_initiative/>
and Philip Corwin
<http://www.circleid.com/posts/20141007_beyond_netmundial_initiative_or_inertia/>
.


 joly posted: " Yesterday, November 16 2014. following it's meeting in
Honolulu, the Internet Society's Board of Trustees issued the following
statement: Recently, the “I* Group” different from the one-time NETmundial
meeting in which we participated in April 2014; we e"


[image: Internet Society]
<http://isoc-ny.org/p2/wp-content/uploads/2014/11/isoc.png> Yesterday,
November 16 2014. following its meeting
<http://internetsociety.org/board-meeting-agenda-no-117> in Honolulu, the
Internet Society's Board of Trustees issued the following statement
<http://internetsociety.org/news/internet-society-statement-netmundial-initiative>
:

Recently, the “I* Group” [1] was invited to participate in the NETmundial
Initiative, which is different from the one-time NETmundial meeting in
which we participated in April 2014; we endorsed the outcomes of that
meeting. This new and different NETmundial Initiative has been organized by
the partnership of the Brazilian Internet Steering Committee (CGI.br), the
Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), and the World
Economic Forum (WEF)[2]. This announcement has resulted in considerable
discussion and concern amongst various stakeholders regarding the purpose,
scope, and nature of the proposed activity or organization.

The Internet Society Board discussed this proposed NETmundial Initiative in
depth during its meeting November 15 – 16, 2014. As a result, the Internet
Society Board first emphasizes that the main priority facing the Internet
community right now is the IANA Functions’ Stewardship Transition and
recommends that all organizations in the Internet community should be
highly focused on effectuating a successful transition. The Internet
Society remains fully committed to the September 2015 milestone set for
completing a plan that will meet the criteria set by U.S. National
Telecommunications & Information Administration (NTIA).

With respect to the need for new groups, such as the NETmundial Initiative
and its Coordination Council, the Internet Society Board reiterates that
the Internet Society’s longstanding position is that there is no single,
global platform that can serve to coordinate, organize or govern all the
Internet issues that may arise. At its heart, the Internet is a
decentralized, loosely coupled, distributed system that allows policies to
be defined by those who require them for their operations and that ensures
that issues can be resolved at a level closest to their origin. The
ecosystem draws its strength from the involvement of a broad range of
actors working through open, transparent, and collaborative processes to
innovate and build the network of networks that is the cornerstone of the
global economy.[3] Based on the information that we have to date, the
Internet Society cannot agree to participate in or endorse the Coordination
Council for the NETmundial Initiative. We are concerned that the way in
which the NETmundial Initiative is being formed does not appear to be
consistent with the Internet Society’s longstanding principles, including:

• Bottom-up orientation
• Decentralized
• Open
• Transparent
• Accountable
• Multi-stakeholder

The Board has asked the Internet Society’s CEO, Kathryn Brown, to convene a
dialogue within the Internet Society community. This includes Internet
Society Chapters from around the world, Internet Society organization
members, the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF), the the Internet
Architecture Board (IAB), partners from the Internet technical community,
and others. The dialogue should consider whether any new initiatives or
groups are needed at the current time and, if so, to define the objectives
for any such effort.

In addition, Bob Hinden, Chairman of the Internet Society Board of Trustees
has initiated a dialogue with the Chairman of the ICANN Board, given
ICANN’s leading involvement in the NETmundial Initiative.

The Internet Society remains committed to a vision of the Internet that is
open, inclusive, decentralized and for the benefit of all people throughout
the world.

Notes:
[1] The I* Group encompasses the Internet Society, IETF, IAB, World Wide
Web Consortium (W3C), Regional Internet Registries (RIRs), ICANN, and the
regional Top Level Domain (TLD) organizations.
[2] https://www.netmundial.org/press-release-1
[3] The Internet Society’s position from the World Summit on Information
Society (WSIS) of 2003 and 2005, is “Many issues cannot be solved by new,
overarching structures at a global level but rather by building on today’s
open, multi-stakeholder and cooperative processes.” And that the community
should “...consider whether new structures will bring truly measurable,
positive change to the functioning, stability, security and openness of the
Internet.” (http://www.internetsociety.org/wsis).


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