Re: [ga] Who speaks for the ALAC?

["Richard Henderson" <richardhenderson@ntlworld.com>]

It's simple.

ALAC doesn't speak for Internet Users.

It speaks for the ICANN agenda.

ALAC is an instrument of the ICANN Board, developed to constrain, contain,
and marginalise the At Large movement, which would insist on democratic
accountability being brought to bear on the ICANN Board.

ALAC has been developed "top down" and it lacks the mandate of ordinary
internet users.

Therefore, it is truer to say that ALAC is representative of the ICANN
Board. It does not represent Internet Users. No-one has asked for it. No-one
has voted for it.

It is perfectly obvious that the defence of User interests, and the
development of an adequate 'Watchdog' role on ICANN's machinations, requires
a worldwide structure which is *independent* of ICANN and organised
externally.

At present ALAC is not defending Users. It is acquiescing. ICANN has
appointed its 'representatives'. ICANN (via Denise Michel) writes its
responses.

ALAC is a sham.

Richard Henderson

----- Original Message -----
From: Karl Auerbach <karl@CaveBear.com>
To: <DannyYounger@cs.com>
Cc: <ga@dnso.org>; <vb@bertola.eu.org>
Sent: Thursday, May 29, 2003 3:59 AM
Subject: Re: [ga] Who speaks for the ALAC?


> On Wed, 28 May 2003 DannyYounger@cs.com wrote:
>
> > Having read the "ALAC responses to comments received on the proposed
> > criteria, process and guidelines", I have only question:  Was ICANN
Staff member
> > Denise Michel the author of all of these responses?
> >
> > http://alac.icann.org/correspondence/responses-21may03.htm
>
> I agree that the answers are more than wimpy.
>
> For example, the answer to L. Gallegos, in my reading, amounts to a
> statement that the ALAC, in its paternalistic way, knows best how people
> should talk to one another and that it's either the ALAC way or the
> highway.
>
> And when I suggested that the ALAC impose no requirement on at-large
> members unless equivalent requirements are imposed on members of the SO's,
> the ALAC said (paraphrase) "We can't control the SOs".  That's not an
> answer, it is an excuse.  The ALAC could have said "We will advocate that
> position to the Board" and in the meantime "we will not impose any
> requirement that is not imposed on SO's".
>
> The old IDNO and other nascent assemblies in ICANN were dismissed as being
> non-representative because they could not demonstrate thousands and
> thousands of active, unified members.  I'd suggest that the ALAC's failure
> to garner more than a trivial number of comments (even after extending the
> period for such comments) is indicative that if those other assemblies
> were in fact disconnected from "the public" that the ALAC is even further
> disconnected and isolated.
>
> The ALAC lacks the gumption to do what is right; rather it seems intent on
> doing what is convenient.
>
> --karl--
>
>
>
>
> --
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