[At-Large] Jack Ma New Co-Chair of Global Internet Governance Alliance #AliBaba #GIGA

Tue Jul 7 08:12:09 UTC 2015

Hello Alejandro,

thanks for providing the link to the article in English on the "People.cn" website, which is the online version of the "People's Daily", China's most official daily newspaper since 1949.

Having attended the meeting in Sao Paulo, I can vouch for these facts:
- after making his presentation, the Chinese Minister asked if there were any questions. As the recording will show, the comments or questions were mainly concentrated on two aspects:
- Human Rights in the context of the Internet (3 members),
- the wider geo-political context in which an observer can view the new interest of the Chinese authorities in global Internet governance matters, including NMI (1 member).

I trust the European Commission will be keen to provide the exact quote of what its representative said in Sao Paulo.

Jean-Jacques.

----- Mail original -----
De: "Evan Leibovitch" <evan at telly.org>
À: "Alejandro Pisanty Baruch" <apisan at unam.mx>
Cc: "PacNOG" <pacnog at pacnog.org>, oceania-icann at icann.org, "Caribbean ICT stakeholders Virtual Community (CIVIC)" <civic at dgroups.org>, "Pacific Islands Chapter of the Internet Society Discussion List" <picisoc at picisoc.org>, "igf-pacific" <igf-pacific at googlegroups.com>, "Arab IGF mailing list" <list at igfarab.org>, "apralo" <apac-discuss at atlarge-lists.icann.org>, members2014 at thespacs.org, "At-Large Worldwide" <at-large at atlarge-lists.icann.org>, "Cecily FAASAU" <cf at regulator.gov.ws>
Envoyé: Mardi 7 Juillet 2015 08:38:05
Objet: Re: [At-Large] Jack Ma New Co-Chair of Global Internet Governance Alliance #AliBaba #GIGA

Alejandro, you are correct in your points. There are plenty of concerns to go around. The larger one, that is the source of the others IMO, remains that NMI remains a largely redundant solution in search of a problem to solve. 

This most recent action is simply the latest chapter in the story of NMI's ongoing and desperate search for credibility. This search may indeed address my first point above, if the Chinese involvement in NMI introduces new "problems" to solve... (that the rest of the community may see as not being problems at all...) 

On Jul 7, 2015 08:18, "Dr. Alejandro Pisanty Baruch" < apisan at unam.mx > wrote: 

Evan, 

you should probably be more concerned by this, if you go after more substance and reasons to worry: 

1. China's own "order based" Internet governance, which Minister Lu presented in the NetMundial meeting and Chinese agencies say was praised: 

http://en.people.cn/n/2015/0702/c98649-8914757.html http://en.people.cn/n/2015/0702/c98649-8914757.html 

2. The composition of the Council with two people not only from the same country but working for its government (one directly and one in an organization that provides consultancy and a career path for the government.) 

Maybe Jean-Jacques has some explanations here, as this happened in his presence. 

Alejandro Pisanty 

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Desde: at-large-bounces at atlarge-lists.icann.org [ at-large-bounces at atlarge-lists.icann.org ] en nombre de Evan Leibovitch [ evan at telly.org ] 
Enviado el: lunes, 06 de julio de 2015 09:51 
Hasta: Douglas Onyango 
CC: PacNOG; igf-pacific; Caribbean ICT stakeholders Virtual Community (CIVIC); Pacific Islands Chapter of the Internet Society Discussion List; oceania-icann at icann.org ; Arab IGF mailing list; apralo; members2014 at thespacs.org ; At-Large Worldwide; Cecily FAASAU 
Asunto: Re: [At-Large] Jack Ma New Co-Chair of Global Internet Governance Alliance #AliBaba #GIGA 

On 6 July 2015 at 16:41, Douglas Onyango < ondouglas at gmail.com > wrote: 

Thanks for the explanation. 
I think a lot of people will be pleased to learn that we don't have 
another entity cropping up in this space. 

Your response w.r.t to Chinese reporting also clarifies why Jack Ma's 
appointment seems to overshadow the rest of the co-chairs. 

I guess this frees us up to deliberate more on the arbitrary and 
unprecedented co-chair selection criteria. 

I suppose so, and I too appreciate the explanation ... though the episode, as described, indicates a remarkable lack of media relations competence. Such a major issues as "what is the group named", one would think, should not be the subject of such needless confusion. 

But now that THAT's out of the way .... we can get back to the original issue of trying to figure out exactly what problem this organization -- whatever it is called -- is supposed to non-redundantly solve. ;-) Adding Chinese representation to the mix doesn't magically provide an answer to that question. 

- Evan 

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