ICANN ALC
Proposed membership in At-Large Constituency (ALC) of ICANN
Luc Flaubert, of ISOC-Quebec recently posted an invitation for ISOC chapters to become members of the At-large constituency (ALC) of ICANN. We are already members of the Noncommercial Users Constituency (NCUC).
Contents
Issues
Is there any conflict in being members of both constituencies?
Would it make us more or less effective in terms of influence? We haven't done much with ICANN so far as an organization, but we should try to in the future -- it's an essential part of the discussion of Internet governance issues.
The ALC has not been very influential in the past in affecting ICANN policies.
What are the actual procedures for implementing a policy recommendation?
Arguments
Danny Younger's argument against membership of the ALC at the Feb 15, 2007 AGM
It can be downloaded here.
Response from Luc Flaubert - Feb 18, 2007
Thanks for this, Joly and Danny.
ISOC Québec will consider joining NCUC so we can participate in both the At-Large and NCUC.
Regarding participation in At-Large, from our perspective, if we are going to try to convince the ICANN board to reinstate board representation of the user community, we have better chances of accomplishing this by already being part of At-Large.
Having said this, I want to say that I understand and respect Danny's position.
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Luc Faubert
http://www.isoc.qc.ca
Veni Markovski's response pro membership of the ALC at the March 15, 2007 isoc-ny meeting.
( some audio will be made available of this) Veni Markovski argued that ICANN needed constructive input from the Internet community, and that lack of input rather than an intentionally antidemocratic stance on the part of ICANN leadership, was the real problem. He suggested that, as of now, ALAC represented the most effective method of such input. Danny Younger is trying to maintain old schemes that while perhaps nominally more democratic in structure, failed to be effective in practice, and were thus discarded. Participation, and wider participation, are what counts and ALAC, particularly via the influence of Roberto Gaetano, is the best current avenue for that.
