Re: [ga] Roessler Comments on Mission Paper

[Karl Auerbach <karl@CaveBear.com>]

On Wed, 22 May 2002, Joe Sims turgidly wrote:

> While these are cogent comments, they do illustrate the difficulty of
> actually writing something called a "mission statement" that is both
> something more than a listing of specific acts that are permissible (which
> is certainly not a mission statement that would be useful on a going
> forward basis) and writing something less specific that is not subject to
> the kind of word-smithing that Thomas has done.

A mission statement ought to fit onto a low denomination postage stamp,
not fill a book.

But I take the Dilbert view of mission statements - that they are
meaningless.  If ICANN needs a mission statement, it ought to try one of
the mission statement generators such as
http://web.mit.edu/rlgarcia/www/missionstatement.html

Perhaps what ICANN needs more than a "mission statement" is a "not its
mission" statement.  More on that point will be found further on in this
note.

On the "mission statement" half of the what-to-do vs what-not-to-do 
equation, I wrote the following in a couple of minutes:
 
  ICANN's mission is to make technical policy decisions on certain limited
  technical matters concerning DNS and IP addresses upon proper and full
  consultation with the Internet community including Internet users,
  allowing all parties an equal right to state their views and have those
  views heard and considered, and reaching decisions using clearly defined
  processes and with a full written record of how each decision was 
  reached, what criteria were applied, and what balances were struck.

If you want an actual list of jobs to be done, I suggest that there are
many such lists written by many people.  The largest of these lists is, of 
course, the self-justification written by ICANN's own "staff".

Examples of a rather more concise and less self-serving lists may be found
at:

	http://www.alvestrand.no/icann/icann_reform.html
	(This is from the chairman of the IETF)

	http://www.proper.com/ICANN-notes/dns-root-admin-reform.html

	http://www.cavebear.com/rw/apfi.htm

Getting to the "not its mission" side of the equation:

One could build a list that begins something like this:

  - ICANN's decision making processes shall not inquire into
non-technical matters except as those matters are demonstrably essential
to the making of the decision.

		--karl--














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