Mr. Cook:
Although you've asked Dan Steinberg for comment, please accept mine as well.
Diane Cabell
MAC
Mr. Cook quotes Michael Sondow:
> >{...}
> >This said, we offer a brief critique of the MAC's recommendations as
> >expressed in the Summary of the MAC Conference Call
> >(http://www.icann.org/mac-mar18.html), which, due to the shallow
> >thinking they reflect and their obvious lack of appreciation of the
> >objective reality that would ensue from their adoption, hardly merit
> >even the little space we give them here.
The shorthand terminology of the conference call notes may be shallow, but the
discussions that went into these recommendations were not. The MAC
recommendations and reasoning, as they were presented to ICANN, are at
http://cyber.harvard.edu/rcs/ titled "Conrades Report to ICANN." Reality,
especially the financial variety, was always on the table, however choices and
compromises were sometimes made between legitimate competing goals.
> >1. Any individual or organisation may be an AL member. Only
> >ORGANISATIONS that are members of a SO are excluded.
> >
> >Comment: No criteria whatsoever for membership is a clear invitation
> >to persons with no real interest in the Internet, but who seek to
> >use a newly created organization to further their political
> >ambitions, to join and manipulate their standing as members for
> >their own purposes. As Joop Teernstra has so well pointed out in his
> >proposal, an Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers
> >clearly has a primary if not unique responsibility towards those who
> >possess or make use of Internet names and numbers, and it is these
> >who should be its members. As to excluding from the At-Large
> >membership organizations that are members of the SOs, that is not
> >only impossible to control, since organizations are after all only
> >collectives of their individual members, but undesirable since the
> >organizations that belong to the SOs, as well as the individuals who
> >are members of them, need a forum for collective deliberation, and
> >that, by all reason, should be the At-Large membership.
The MAC consensus is to allow any Internet User be a member of the At Large
Membership community. We believe that their interests are affected even if they
do not hold their own domains or IP addresses, in the same fashion that tenants
have an equal interest in their town's building safety codes as does the
landlord. Some MAC members were of the opinion that ISPs could adequately
represent their customer's interests, but that view was not widely shared on the
committee.
As to excluding organizations that are also in SOs, the precise recommendation is
to exclude those organizations that have a *direct* vote in the election of SO
directors. For example, the President of the IETF (if there is one) would not be
permitted to cast an IETF vote for the At-large directors. The point is that the
SO interests shouldn't be able to capture the At-large voice as well. Individuals
who are members of SO organizations, however, are perfectly free to join the
At-large.
> >2. Members must apply by sending an on-line registration form
> >provided by ICANN, giving an e-mail address and other minimal
> >identification details, which ICANN will only attempt to verify if a
> >complaint is lodged.
> >
> >This is merely a convenience for the ICANN Board; but, like the
> >recommendation above, it invites the worst abuses. Who is to know if
> >the persons applying even exist, or if any of their information is
> >correct? Surely, minimal authentication, easily provided by postal
> >service mail-back, must be required in order to substantiate the
> >existence of the applicants.
The MAC is recommending that some land-based identification be required. We
debated the costs and efficacy of verification at some length. If extensive
verification procedures are applied, then costs go up. We opted for free
membership and traded that off for random verification checks plus investigation
upon complaint. It's a judgment call. We are now working on installing some
guidelines to assess the initial membership population to determine, before the
first election, if we are getting a reasonably authentic membership.
> >3. Members must re-register annually. Changes to registered
> >details, particularly e-mail address, must be advised on pain of
> >loss of membership.
> >
> >What is the point to this if there is no hard-copy authentication of
> >members' existence? It only invites further abuses, such as the
> >creation of unlimited false identities on a regular basis, or in the
> >event of an important vote.
There will be land-based authentication, if the ICANN board follows the MAC
recommendations. The conference notes do not make this clear.
> >4. There will be no membership fee. (We consider this to be too
> >difficult to set equitably, and costly to collect.
> >
> >This is preposterous on the face of it. No membership fee to belong
> >to, and vote for the directors of, the international organization
> >controlling the technological and sociological development of the
> >Internet, the most economically and socially potent tool for
> >communication yet invented by man? Why? So that the present Board
> >need not go to the trouble of thinking of a way of collecting dues,
> >something that is accomplished by every other organization without
> >great difficulty? And with what consequences? That persons may join
> >and vote, not only without having to substantiate their identity but
> >without being asked to make any a priori personal contribution
> >whatsoever? And how is ICANN to support itself? Through the funding
> >of special-interest groups, invariably those with the biggest
> >purses, and who will manipulate and control ICANN in proportion to
> >the amount of financial responsibility they provide for its
> >functioning? Is this what is meant by responsibility and
> >responsiveness to the community, as expressed in the White Paper and
> >ICANN's own bylaws?
The MAC spent a lot of time discussing this. Again, if dues are assessed against
members, then lots of people won't be able to afford it, particularly in
developing nations. On the other hand, the costs of processing membership are
significant and if thousands of people apply, a fee may have to be assessed after
all. There was plenty of coverage of this debate in the reports and in the
real-time scribes notes from the various meetings and you are most welcome to
review those materials. The bottom line of the MAC's consensus (which was not
unanimous) was that if ICANN chooses to raise the money for these costs via IP and
domain assignments, then they are free to do so; however voters shouldn't have to
pay extra for the privilege of participating.
> >6. Members form a single world wide constituency to elect AL
> >directors.
> >
> >A nice sentiment. However, it remains to be seen if it has any
> >inherent significance, in light of the other, more pragmatic,
> >measures that may make its realization impossible.
I have no idea what you mean. What the MAC means is that there shall not be
different classes of voters with different rights.
> >9. There is no limit to the number of candidates at any election.
> >
> >Shall all members be candidates, then? And voters as well? Every
> >person in the world, regardless of their character, relation to the
> >Internet, or willingness and ability to participate conscientiously
> >in its functioning, may be both a member of ICANN and a candidate to
> >its board of directors? This is to turn democracy on its head. As
> >always in such undefined situations, those who wish to control and
> >manipulate will find it easy to do so, since there will be no
> >structure impeding them from imposing their own. He who organizes
> >controls, as is well known.
Are you saying that allowing citizens to freely run for office is undemocratic?
I'm afraid I don't follow your logic. Meanwhile, the MAC made a specific set of
recommendations on the criteria that candidates should meet. Perhaps you haven't
had time to digest the Singapore Report or the Conrades Report to ICANN
http://cyber.harvard.edu/rcs/
> >10. We see no need for a nomination committee, or for an electoral
> >committee. These are tasks for the ICANN executive.
> >
> >And who is this executive? Is it not persons who must be empowered
> >by the membership, which at first is not yet formed? In the chaotic
> >and anarchic membership situation created by the foregoing
> >principles, any two or more persons masquerading as the interim
> >executive will have no trouble at all in manipulating the
> >candidature and election of the At-large directors. There must be
> >committees; as many as there are tasks to be performed; in order
> >that the power to control events be distributed and therefore
> >limited. The constant pretence that organization can be avoided will
> >per force result in an undesirable organization. Just as nature
> >abhors a vacuum, so human organizations abhor undefined
> >responsibilities, which are invariably assumed by those interested
> >in using the power that comes with them for their own ends.
Who will oversee the election of the Nomination Committee? What will be the
financial cost of a Nom Com? Again, the question is one of how best to invest
limited resources.
> >Our comments end here at the last recommendation. As stated earlier,
> >the comments given here are poor because their subject is poor. We
> >remain amazed that such poverty of thought could result from such
> >richness of initiative on the part of so many. And again, we say
> >that those who have reduced the rich suggestions offered in good
> >faith by the potential members of ICANN to such poor recommendations
> >stand aside to let those willing and able to provide ICANN with a
> >better foundation for its future take their place.
Rich initiatives require rich resources. There is strong support for a lean, mean
administration of names and numbers in contrast to a benefit-heavy bureaucracy.
Again, a judgment call. I am personally confident that these issues can be
revisited once a fully-elected Board is seated.
dc
