RE: [wg-c] Cairo meeting?

[Jeff Shrewsbury Info Avenue <iamarketing@InfoAve.Net>]

Hello, All: 

I'm all for the "internet way" whenever possible and was no happier than
anyone that the next ICANN meeting was set for Cairo. But based on the past
ICANN meetings when the working group and constituency meetings we're not
available for online participation, these are the only opportunities we
have to present a united voice (or something close to united) to the board.

If working group members that choose not to come to the physical meetings
are able to participate remotely, that's great. And if that is the case,
then there is no reason not to have a meeting anyway (even if there is only
six people in the room) because then everyone has a chance theoretically to
participate whether there physically or not. 

But to ignore a meeting, I think, dampens the spirit of what we're
chartered to try to accomplish.

So does anyone know if working groups and constituency meetings will be
widely available for online participation or will the only remote
participation be the general and public meetings as usual?

As a side note, if these meetings are going to cause so much hardship for
travel and ancillary expenses, why do we have to have them twice a year?
Why not do it by remote participation in all cases?

js


At 11:02 AM 2/16/00 -0500, Mikki Barry wrote:
>At 7:24 AM -0800 2/16/00, Christopher Ambler wrote:
>>Correct, I do not agree.
>>
>>When there is no agenda at this late date, how can anyone be
>>expected to make last-minute travel plans? Should one spend
>>the effort and money on the presumption that there will be
>>a reasonable agenda at attendance? I don't think so.
>>
>>When a meeting is held in a location such as Cairo, where the
>>logistics for attendance are non-trivial, one would expect
>>a greater amount of pre-planning and pre-publication of
>>information. As is typical with ICANN, however, we not only
>>do not have that, but they're late (again).
>
>Add to this the promise that online participation (to "govern" this 
>online forum) is supposedly given the name weight as attendance, and 
>further adding that much of the debate will concern what consumers 
>want and what confuses them when consumers as a group are NOT allowed 
>a voice, and you have a rather interesting construct of those who 
>believe in the "old" ways of decision making (face to face meetings) 
>and those who believe in the "Internet" way.  I find the whole thing 
>rather amusing, personally.
>
>