Re: [ga] Re: Byfield on GA Reform / comments

[Karl Auerbach <karl@cavebear.com>]

As I read this discussion, it seems to me that it is between those who are
willing to accept a subordinate and nearly voiceless status and those who
are not.

Under the current regime and under the "reform" plan(s), the GA is a toy
body that is allowed to exist as a kind of placebo for what, in ICANNland
are "the lower classes", those who use the net (and who ultimately pay the
costs.)  The so-called "reform" further reduces the GA.  Personally, I
believe that the converse ought to be the path - that the names council
should be abolished and replaced by a new entity that consists only of
people elected by the GA.

I object most strenuously to the "stakeholder" notion that is infused
throughout ICANN now and proposed that certain people, merely by virtue of
their affiliation with groups or concepts such as intellectual property or
DNS registries, more worthy than you or I, to sit on those bodies, such as
the names council - and in less than two months, on the board - that
actually have powers to make decisions about Internet policies.

As for "moderated" - we have seen ICANN's notion of "moderation", a system
in which communications is so crabbed and limited that the "result" is not
a group position hammered out and agreed upon by counted votes, but
instead is a mishmosh of opinions that is so unfocused that NC or "staff"
can do a bit of exgesis to justify whatever it wanted to do in the first
place.

ICANN's "moderation" as censorship is deep seated - ICANN ignored the
work of the IFWP, ICANN labeled as "arrogant" and "juvenile" those who
petitioned for a delay in the UDRP that was railroaded through the
proto-incompletely formed DNSO, and ICANN's "staff" has "moderated" me by
silently refusing to publish any of my own writings on ICANN's web site,
despite the routine posting of similar materials by other directors and
affiliates.  How often has the board of directors (or staff) "moderated" 
the DNSO by ignoring its decisions - such as about WLS or .org?

The GA does need process - I have long been an advocate of an form of
Roberts rules modified for electronic contexts - but if the GA needs
anything, it is not "moderation".  Quite the contrary, it needs to as a
group make a clear resolution, and vote on that resolution, about what it
sees as its role.

		--karl--





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