[chapter-delegates] WGIG summary of replies to the questionnaire

[Franck Martin]

Patrick,

I don't fully agree with what you are trying to do but I recognise its 
value.

What may be ISOC should set up is "The Internet Ombudsman".

An office where people could come to lodge complains about the running 
of the Internet in general. The Internet ombudsman office would be 
tasked to direct the complainant and the adequate respondend to the 
right forum to solve their issues.

For instance if a country has an issue about the running of a ccTLD by a 
private company, the Internet Ombudsman would then direct these two 
entities to the ICANN and would follow the case through the process to 
ensure that all parties are equally informed of their possibilities and 
recourses.

In some cases the two parties could accept the Internet Ombudsman as 
litigator in their case and accept its decision.

The office could be set up with 3 staff: The ombudsman, one technical 
adviser, one legal adviser. In the beginning may be the same person 
would carry the three functions.

Funding for the office would come first from ISOC/PIR and then from any 
organisation which would accept the Internet Ombudsman as a facilitator.

The main rule for the Internet Ombudsman is not to make decisions but to 
ensure that all parties are properly informed of all the aspects of 
their case and to ensure that the case moves toward closure.

I see so many people voicing their problems in the wrong forum, leading 
to further frustration because nothing is solved.

I think this Internet Ombudsman would solve the Internet Governance 
issue, while keeping all the organisations due their jobs as before.

Cheers


Patrick Vande Walle wrote:

>[I posted this message to memberpubpol at elists.isoc.org and someone
>suggested I should repost it here]
>
>Dear all,
>
>I am trying to launch a debate here regarding the WGIG process. The goal is
>to have a common position of the ISOC chapters and to escalate it to ISOC
>and WGIG. My first thoughts after reading the WGIG summary:
>
>The first question was if there a need for an additional body. Actually,
>there might be a need for two bodies, one new and a reformed existing
>one. Internet Governance is a vast domain, ranging from IP address
>allocation issues to interconnection tariffs, freedom of expression,
>intellectual property issues, cybercrime... Only a small part of the
>above is currently managed by ICANN.
>
>One of these bodies should address the oversight function by taking over
>the role of the DoC in relation with ICANN, and especially the control
>on the root zone. The majority of the TLDs in the root zone file are
>*country* codes, thus this is a matter of national sovereignty, which
>cannot be delegated neither to specific government nor to the private
>sector, the latter lacking any legitimacy under international law.
>
>My opinion is that a reformed GAC (let's call it GOC, with an “o” for
>oversight) could address that part. Root server operations being 90%
>technical, the workload on the GOC would be rather limited. But since it
>would be multilateral, it would de facto be less challengeable.
>
>I would like to stress the fact that, under such a model, ICANN would be
>left largely untouched, which should reassure the many within ISOC who
>preach the “if it ain't broken don't fix it” attitude. Having cut its
>link with the DoC would actually give extra legitimacy to the ICANN
>process, as it will not appear to be flawed from the start.
>
>The other body would address the other parts of IG in terms of
>discussion, coordination and facilitation. This body should be
>lightweight and rely on others existing institutions or fora to take the
>lead when discussing specific issues (WIPO on IP issues, IETF on
>standards issues, etc).
>
>The funding of this group should be balanced between the public and the
>private sector. It needs to work for the common good and should be in a
>financial position that prevents it to be captured by one or another
>interest group.
>
>Regs,
>
>Patrick Vande Walle
>  
>

-- 
Franck Martin
ICT Specialist
franck at sopac.org
SOPAC, Fiji
GPG Key fingerprint = 44A4 8AE4 392A 3B92 FDF9  D9C6 BE79 9E60 81D9 1320
"Toute connaissance est une reponse a une question" G.Bachelard

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