[At-Large] ICANN Board Nomination

[Karl Auerbach]

On 08/27/2010 03:57 PM, Franck Martin wrote:

> Unless there is a system like Jury Duty, you will only have at the
> ICANN board, people who are interested by ICANN matters (the ICANN
> sphere).

The key word is "interested".

For the most part in the word of ICANN "interested" means financially 
interested - which ICANN covers with the smoke and mirrors phrase 
"stakeholder".

Those of us who are interested in the idea that natural people are the 
atomic unit of governance from which all authority flows find ourselves 
"interested" in a non-financial way.

I see from this list and also my my other contacts that those of us with 
that kind of interest are many and are found in all nations.  I would 
assert that our numbers are greater than those who have a mere financial 
interest in internet governance.

I see ICANN as a model, for good or ill, of future institutions of 
authority.  (I don't care whether the word is "governance" or 
"government" - to my mind the differences are irrelevant to these 
questions.)

And as a model I fear greatly the fact that these models encourage and 
empower those with financial "interest" and hinder those with other 
kinds of "interest".

I view ICANN as a cauldron in which competing "interests" are at 
near-war with one another.  I don't accept the "nice guy" theory of 
internet governance.

In that cauldron I want the public board members to be smooth warriors 
in which skill with the political iron hammer is as important as silent 
skill with the diplomatic silken cord.

I want our Othello to have a touch of Iago.

My concern about the ALAC system's dominant role in the seating of the 
one public director is that I perceive the proposed mechanism as being 
one that will seat people whose skills are more balanced toward nice 
agreement than bloody battle.

One way to redress my concern is to alleviate, even if only a small 
part, the financial stress that will be felt by those who are not driven 
to ICANN by a financially "interest".

	--karl--