Michael Sondow wrote:
> Diane Cabell wrote:
> >
> > I would like to point out that the Membership Advisory Committee recommended
> > that the At-large membership consist solely of individuals.
>
> What else? Guinea hens?
Corporations and other legal associations.
> > We reversed an
> > earlier recommendation to permit organizations to join the at-large and we
> > did so over very strong objection from some committee members who felt that
> > such corporate support would be absolutely necessary to ICANN's survival.
>
> As indeed it is. But there are better ways of getting that support,
> am I right?
>
> > The At-large membership will elect half of the ICANN BoD and as such will
> > have the single largest voice in the decision-making process.
>
> I wonder who they are going to be? Will IBM and MCI pay to bus up
> ISOC members from South America? Will they make a deal with APNIC to
> pay for new infrastructure in Singapore for votes? Will online
> voting through dnso.org-style mailing lists suddenly be inaugurated
> just in time to get the vote of the ISOC-, CORE-, and
> Ogilvie-manipulated masses? Will EDUCOM come to the rescue with a
> thousand votes from undergraduates in computer science departments
> who have been told that there's only one candidate, like David Maher
> did on the ENREDO list? How are they going to work it, do you think?
> They must be really scratching their heads over this one, huh?
The demand was made on behalf of the small business owners who haven't the time or
expertise to thoroughly master the technical intricacies of the SO policy issues.
The small company with a modest e-commerce ambition that is acting much like a
general individual user, but has a slightly different interest to represent than
that of the non-commercial user. Mssr. Kaplan was particularly concerned that
this group was unrepresented. It was a tough decision to make to exclude them and
it may be one that ICANN will choose to reverse if individual membership is
undersubscribed.
We could not find any basis for excluding employees of IBM or MCI as members of
the At-large. They are as entitled to join as I am. I'm sure your proposals for
ensuring that the At-large membership is fairly representative of the larger
community would be most welcome.
Diane Cabell
http://www.mama-tech.com
Fausett, Gaeta & Lund, LLP
Boston, MA
