[EURO-Discuss] NCUC-ALAC liaisons and meeting

[William Drake]

H CLO,

Changing the subject line to reflect the content and copying the NCUC  
list, as the issues under discussion do not pertain just to the  
EURALO.  I'm not sure which of the multiple ALAC lists would be best  
to forward this to, please advise.  Of course, whether anyone anywhere  
will actually have the patience to plough through this epic I don't  
know, but it's good to say it the record.

On your first point, the liaison question:

On Sep 23, 2009, at 8:55 PM, Cheryl Langdon-Orr wrote:

> Hi Bill, I'd like you, EURALO and the ALAC to be very aware of a  
> single
> point of concern to me in the Blog reply /thread you made in the link
> provided below... specifically the following...  PLease note that  
> Robyn as
> Chair of NCUC wrote to me in email appointing you as the NCUC  
> liaison (i.e.
> advising me of you offer) I replied to her message with copy to  
> staff, copy
> to ExCom list (PUBLIC)  within minutes of the receipt of this advice  
> and
> announced at the following ExCom and then full ALAC Meeting(s) that a
> Liaison from NCUC was most welcome and that you in my opinion with  
> your
> involvement with EURALO a perfect fit for the Job, and expected in  
> fact that
> you would be well aware of this reply as well as would have attended  
> (if
> available) or reviewed our meetings since then (you are already on the
> relevant lists get notices links to agenda's etc.,) where the ALAC has
> discussed that we will need to appoint a Liaison to the NCSG (with the
> existing NCUC being a constituent part of that under the current  
> model were
> working with) or review later complaints to us from both our  
> previous NCUC
> Liaisons did not motivate us to appoint a replacement to Beau for a  
> month or
> so before this change would need to occur any way in our view...

I think I've correctly parsed this sentence and traced the trajectory  
of the disconnect.

On 1 Sept. Robin wrote to you

> On 01/09/2009, Robin Gross <robin at ipjustice.org> wrote:
>> Dear Cheryl, Alan, and Nick:
>>
>> We are saddened by the recent breakdown in communication between
>> members of NCUC and the At-Large community and hope we can work to
>> resolve any differences through open dialogue and a shared commitment
>> to improving civil society participation at ICANN.
>>
>> Therefore we have appointed William Drake to serve as a liaison
>> between NCUC and ALAC in the spirt of encouraging an open exchange of
>> communication and an effort to prevent any future misunderstandings
>> between the organizations....

To which you replied

>> From: Cheryl Langdon-Orr <langdonorr at gmail.com>
>> Date: August 31, 2009 9:34:46 PM PDT
>> To: Robin Gross <robin at ipjustice.org>
>> Cc: Alan Greenberg <alan.greenberg at mcgill.ca>, Nick Ashton-Hart <Nick.Ashton-Hart at icann.org 
>> >,  William Drake <william.drake at graduateinstitute.ch>,  "Non- 
>> Commercial Users Constituency Executive Committee & GNSO Reps.  
>> Discussion" <ncu-exec at ipjustice.org>,  ALAC Internal List <alac-internal at atlarge-lists.icann.org 
>> >,  ICANN AtLarge Staff <staff at atlarge.icann.org>
>> Subject: Re: NCUC-ALAC Liaison to Encourage Open Communication
>>
>> Robyn, thank you for asking the ALAC to consider accepting a Liaison
>> from the existing Non Commercial Users Constituency (NCUC)...
>>
>> This concept/ proposal is one which, whilst we have not ever discused
>> either internaly in the ALAC, nor in any of our recent meetings with
>> NCUC, is one I'm confident the ALAC, RALO's and wider At-Large will  
>> no
>> doubt welcome, and Bill of course, seems to be a 'natural fit' for  
>> the
>> task...
>>
>> Of course all our meetings (with rare exceptions) are open so without
>> any formal 'ALAC approval' or role creation he is of course *more  
>> than
>> welcome* I will ask Staff to ensure he is subscribed to the relevant
>> lists and that he gets notice of our meetings, briefings etc,.   Of
>> course as a EURALO Board Member he should be familiar with the ALAC's
>> ROP's etc,. but I'll also get staff to see if he wishes a briefing
>> call with us to discuss anything re these or other matters.


So I said

On Sep 1, 2009, at 2:36 PM, William Drake wrote:

> Hi,
>
> Thanks, Cheryl and Robin.  I'd be happy to try and help increase the  
> level of information flow and mutual understanding.  Any and all  
> background info and so on would of course be most helpful.

I didn't get a reply to this.  So what I had to go on was Robin saying  
NCUC has appointed me, and you saying thanks for "asking the ALAC to  
consider accepting" me and that I could join those lists that are open  
to anyone (but not those that are not).  The latter didn't sound like  
a formal agreement to liaise, so I assumed I was to await word on a  
decision.  Three weeks went by, no word, and in the meanwhile I was  
not added to the relevant closed lists or did not get any briefings  
etc.  From today's mail (reproduced with permission) I see why,

>
> On Sep 23, 2009, at 8:47 PM, Nick Ashton-Hart wrote:
>
>> I'm sorry Alan and Bill (and Cheryl).
>>
>> I did not get from Cheryl's email that we were to subscribe Bill to  
>> either of  the ALAC-only lists, that's why he wasn't subscribed. Am  
>> I to understand you want Bill subscribed to both ALAC and ALAC- 
>> Internal?


Hence, while I gather from your post you felt you'd said yes, I think  
you can see that this wasn't clear to either me/NCUC or staff.

Anyway, the weeks rolled by, and then I saw Sebastian at the IGF  
meeting in Geneva.  I understood him to say that ALAC actually had not  
decided whether it wanted or needed to liaise with NCUC, since we'd  
said that NCUC would be dissolved if we got a properly configured NCSG  
charter.(see below*)  I pointed out that this was still up in the air,  
so NCUC would be around for the foreseeable future and we ought to be  
liaising. The next day we spoke again and Sebastian said well,  
probably we should liaise with NCSG, not with NCUC, no?  I repeated  
that the actually existing entities ought to be in communication etc.

So, this is why I said yesterday in the blog post that I'd gotten no  
reply and understood ALAC had decided against.  Chalk it up to  
miscommunication. Hence I was pleased yesterday that on our EURALO  
board call Sebastian said in fact ALAC wants to do it, and to receive  
your message here.  And now I've just received subscribe messages to  
the ALAC and ALAC-internal lists.  So voila!  When the NCSG situation  
starts to take more shape we can revisit what's the best way to  
maintain bidirectional communication flow going forward.

On the EURALO call, we also discussed whether it wouldn't be good to  
also have a link running the other way, ALAC=>NCUC.  Adam was  
suggested as a logical candidate, although this might take some arm  
twisting, especially after yesterday's various back and forths.   
Personally I think it'd make a lot of sense to have him if he's willing.

[*Just to clarify: IF we could have a charter in line with the NCUC- 
proposed version, in which constituencies are easily formed and  
collaborate in a non-fragmentation-producing structure, THEN it would  
make sense for NCUC to dissolve and its members to form various issue- 
specific constituencies, e.g. on privacy, freedom of speech, etc.  As  
you know, we have asked the board to collaborate with us to review the  
charter issues and arrive at a mutually acceptable formulation.   
Unless and until we get there, it would not make sense to dissolve  
NCUC, inter alia because launching new constituencies now would lock  
in the dysfunctional staff/SIC charter, as NCUC noted in its letter to  
the board.  This is just one reason why I'd have thought it'd have  
made sense for you to back the NCUC version rather than the staff/SIC  
version, but what do I know.]

On your second point, the meeting in Seoul question:

> Also  the
> ALAC discussed that as we will attend the User House meeting and  
> (with the
> exception of the single purpose IRT issue  and our Joint Response /  
> work
> activity that enveloped our time (and was conducted in the scheduled  
> meeting
> time for NCUC and ALAC in Sydney)  meetings since Mexico  ( well Cairo
> actually) have been a duplication of effort and topic and that as we  
> had a
> very full set of demands in our Seoul agenda, and as ALAC and RALO  
> leaders
> had complained about the workload and requested more time to address  
> policy
> development matters;  unless Robyn proposed a topic that required a  
> specific
> F2F between the NCUC as a GNSO constituency and our AC then we would  
> only
> schedule the User House meeting and use the time for other priority
> meetings...  In my reply to Robyn et.al and welcoming you as an NCUC  
> Liaison
> to the ALAC I also covered off (in shorter form) all of that as  
> well... Why
> you have not been made aware of all this immediate and welcoming  
> response to
> your offer from the ALAC however I can not say.

I saw that but didn't know how to read it.  I would suggest that NCUC- 
ALAC cooperation in the new NCSG and beyond is a pretty worthy topic  
that requires a F2F, one that has several readily tractable parts  
(e.g. identifying substantive issues where there's probably sufficient  
alignment of views that we could develop joint positions, perhaps  
starting with the registrants' rights charter) and some more difficult  
but important to talk through parts (e.g. preferences and perceptions  
on the charter, constituencies, etc).

But perhaps it might make sense to consider alternatives to the  
traditional format?  Maybe something facilitated by a third party, or  
from the bottom up?  Or failing that, maybe we could just schedule  
something in a bar or resto and try for a less formal and on-guard  
mindset all around?

Wolf suggested that perhaps some folks from EURALO (e.g. Sebastian,  
Wolf, Adam and myself) could try to think through a workable option.   
If you and others in ALAC are open to considering suggestions, I'm  
sure NCUC would be too.

More than enough for now.

Cheers,

Bill
>
>
>
> 2009/9/23 William Drake <william.drake at graduateinstitute.ch>
>
>> Hello,
>>
>> I see on the agenda item 3, "ALAC response to recent activities of  
>> the
>> NCUC."
>>
>> Given the general lack of NCUC-ALAC dialogue and information  
>> sharing, I'm
>> guessing that not everybody will be equally aware of the  
>> background.  To
>> that end, the following links might be worth perusing prior to the
>> discussion.
>>
>> http://blog.internetgovernance.org/blog/_archives/2009/9/22/4329523.html
>>
>> http://www.icann.org/correspondence/ncuc-to-beckstrom-18aug09-en.pdf
>>
>> Thanks,
>>
>> Bill
>>
>> PS: I will probably have to leave the call after an hour
>>
>> ***********************************************************
>> William J. Drake
>> Senior Associate
>> Centre for International Governance
>> Graduate Institute of International and
>> Development Studies
>> Geneva, Switzerland
>> william.drake at graduateinstitute.ch
>> www.graduateinstitute.ch/cig/drake.html
>> ***********************************************************