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<p>Hello all,</p>
<p>I agree budget cuts hurt, but I can well understand it's something ICANN has to do. </p>
<p>In my opinion fellowship program should be part of those cuts too. ICANN has very important core functions to run, so if ICANN has to reduce costs, I'd prefer cutting fellowship costs more than cutting for example IANA related costs.</p>
<p>In general, fellowship program is good (as long as ICANN can afford having it), but it's not perfect. Most of the program participants are motivated and active in ICANN meetings, but not all of them. For example, during the Hyderabad meeting I took a day off after the ccNSO meeting days (which was my main interest) and had a full-day city sightseeing. And I shared the tour with two persons that were there under the fellowship program - chosen by their cultural background. While talking to them during the day it became obvious that they were happy with free traveling to India, but they couldn't care less about the meeting itself. So I hope that possible budget cuts would force ICANN to re-evaluate selection criterias to fellowship program more carefully dropping off those not so motivated participants.</p>
<p>I prefer not to sign the petition.</p>
<p>Juhani</p>
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<p>Stéphane Van Gelder - Milathan kirjoitti 2018-02-21 23:15:</p>
<blockquote type="cite" style="padding: 0 0.4em; border-left: #1010ff 2px solid; margin: 0"><!-- html ignored --><!-- head ignored --><!-- meta ignored -->Completely agree with Andrei. I oppose the signing of a petition to oppose cuts. I would add to his reasons the fact that the Board Chair and the CEO have both laid down extremely well articulated arguments for why budget cuts are needed. I would worry that a EURALO response through a petition would not only look political, it would look immature.
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<div>If we have strong arguments as to why some cuts should not happen, let's produce them through the usual ICANN discussion channels open to us.</div>
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<div>Thanks,</div>
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<div>Stéphane <br />
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<div>On 21 Feb 2018, at 21:24, Andrei Kolesnikov <<a href="mailto:andrei@rol.ru">andrei@rol.ru</a>> wrote:</div>
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<div dir="ltr">I'm against signing any petition on <a href="http://change.org/">change.org</a>, because it sounds political. If community is against the cut, this must be articulated with facts, numbers and names. I don't like personnel cost increase, but this is another issue. --andrei</div>
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<div class="gmail_quote">2018-02-21 20:06 GMT+03:00 Olivier MJ Crépin-Leblond <span><<a href="mailto:ocl@gih.com">ocl@gih.com</a>></span>:<br />
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<div>Dear colleagues,<br /><br /> on yesterday's EURALO monthly call, the following Action Item was recorded.<br /><br />
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<blockquote type="cite" style="padding: 0 0.4em; border-left: #1010ff 2px solid; margin: 0"><a href="https://community.icann.org/display/%7Eolivier.crepin-leblond">Olivier Crepin-Leblond</a> Olivier to follow up on the EURALO mailing list on the suggestion from Oksana for EURALO support the petition against reduction of the ICANN fellowship as well as to write an EURALO statement against the CROP elimination.</blockquote>
<br /> As you know, the ICANN FY19 budget is undergoing to reduction. This will mean that some programmes are frozen, whilst others are actually reduced. The current draft of the program is showing drastic cuts in community engagement and policy. The Fellowship is being slashed, and so is the NextGen program. The Community Regional Outreach Pilot Program (CROP) which was confirmed into the main budget as it was seen as being so helpful, is being cancelled altogether. It is a terrible state of affairs, as it appears that ICANN has targeted community initiatives for outreach and engagement to a much greater extent that other programmes and the cuts, as a percentage of the budget for outreach and engagement initiatives are way larger than for other programmes.<br /><br /> You might has seen a petition out there, entitled "Stop the ICANN Budget Cuts and Save the Fellowship Program!"<br /> On last night's EURALO call, Oksana Prykhodko asked whether EURALO could be inclined to sign this petition:<br /><a class="m_-2903894471054100483moz-txt-link-freetext" href="https://www.change.org/p/icann-stop-the-icann-budget-cuts-and-save-the-fellowship-program">https://www.change.org/p/<wbr />icann-stop-the-icann-budget-<wbr />cuts-and-save-the-fellowship-<wbr />program</a><br /><br /> The signing of a petition is highly unusual for a RALO. I can recall several occurrences of a RALO releasing its own Statement. I can also recall EURALO supporting EuroDIG as a partner - and this translates to the EURALO Chair (previously Wolf Ludwig and now yours truly) being active in the organisation of EuroDIG. If my memory serves me right, the only time EURALO has signed a Petition, might be the signature for support of NetMundial outcomes. Perhaps can Wolf help with other potential occurences?<br /><br /> At the end of the day, there are no rules on whether EURALO may or may not sign this petition. So the decision is in your hands, the EURALO members. <br /><br /> Should EURALO sign the petition?<br /> Should your ALS sign the petition? <br /><br /> Kindest regards,<br /><br /> Olivier MJ Crépin-Leblond<br /> EURALO Chair</div>
<br />______________________________<wbr />_________________<br /> EURO-Discuss mailing list<br /><a href="mailto:EURO-Discuss@atlarge-lists.icann.org">EURO-Discuss@atlarge-lists.<wbr />icann.org</a><br /><a href="https://atlarge-lists.icann.org/mailman/listinfo/euro-discuss">https://atlarge-lists.icann.<wbr />org/mailman/listinfo/euro-<wbr />discuss</a><br /><br /> Homepage for the region: <a href="http://www.euralo.org/">http://www.euralo.org</a></blockquote>
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<div>Andrey Kolesnikov</div>
<div><a href="http://ripn.net/">RIPN.NET</a></div>
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<div class="pre" style="margin: 0; padding: 0; font-family: monospace">_______________________________________________<br /> EURO-Discuss mailing list<br /><a href="mailto:EURO-Discuss@atlarge-lists.icann.org">EURO-Discuss@atlarge-lists.icann.org</a><br /><a href="https://atlarge-lists.icann.org/mailman/listinfo/euro-discuss">https://atlarge-lists.icann.org/mailman/listinfo/euro-discuss</a><br /><br /> Homepage for the region: <a href="http://www.euralo.org">http://www.euralo.org</a></div>
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