[Chapter-delegates] ISOC Romania

Tue Jun 13 14:06:13 PDT 2006

Dear David, Dear All,

Thank you for your kind answer and your attention to this problem concerning
ISOC Romania.

Indeed, Radu sent a mail signed by both of us to Lynn this 02.06.2006. We
regret not to have an answer yet, even if it is not such a surprise as the
question never received a real answer from ISOC after 5 years and many
attempts from its president Eduard Tric for ISOC Romania to be chartered. I
keep tracks of those emails and documents and could send them again if
needed. 

To be short, here is a (long) summary of ISOC Romania history :

- 09.07.2001 : ISOC Romania was created in July 2001 in Paris, with ISOC
France and ISOC Wallonia as helping structure. The ceremony was hosted by
the General Delegation to French Language, honored by the presence of Mme
Anne MAGNANT, General Delegate :
http://www.lafrancite.org/ISOC_Roumanie.htm

- 30.12.2002 : Eduard Tric sent a mail to our friend Terry Weigler with copy
to the ISOC-ECC mailing list, with five documents in attachment (curriculum
vitae, bylaws for ISOC Romania, ...) and details about the procedure
organized in Romania to create the ISOC chapter;

- 10.04.2003 : I sent a mail to the ISOC-ECC list, to ask a right to vote
for ISOC Romania, still "in formation", as other chapters "in formation"
participated to that list, had been welcome participants to ECC meetings and
had an opportunity to vote (MoU or official representative).

- 11.03.2004 : during INET in Barcelona, we participated in the ISOC-ECC
Meeting. This exchange of question/answer gave some hope :
"11. Eduard Tric from Romania, expressed his disappointment about the lack
of recognition of the ISOC-Romanian Chapter after 2 years of having send the
application.
12. Jim Galvin answered him that ISOC is keeping track of the Romanian case
and that they will try to announce a final decision in a short time".
(Record : see
http://www.isoc.se/sajt/bilder/pdf/ISOC-ECC%20INET%20meeting%20minutes_3.pdf
)

- 02.06.2006 : This final decision has not yet been announced two years
after the Barcelona meeting, the "short time" becomes quite long. Projects
are developing anyway, between Romania and other countries or regions, with
Francophonia or with Europe.

Radu Cotet adds, in the mail sent to Lynn and to ISOC-ECC :
*****
"This situation is completely abnormal, and here are some arguments about
the situation of Internet and IT industry in Romania:

1. Romania was one of the first East European countries to have been
connected to Internet, it was in the early nineties (1993) when me (Radu
Cotet) and my wife [Mariana Cocirdan] (which was working then for the
Computer Science Dept of the University of Namur, Belgium) have made the
first tests of the Internet connection with our colleagues from the
Politechnica University of Bucharest - P.U.B. (among whom Mr.Nini Popovici
was the leader of the team), and helped them configure their first email
server and send their first emails abroad.
Since then, the team of P.U.B. has grown to became what nowadays is called
the RoEduNet http://www.roedu.net/who.html

And RoEduNet is one of the dozens of large Romanian ISPs.

2. The quality of the Romanian universities is very good, the development of
the IT industry in Romania has been important during the last years, and
very large US IT companies come to hire their researchers and programmers in
Romania - examples: the third language spoken at Microsoft Inc. in Redmond,
WA is Romanian, after English and Russian, many Romanian born engineers are
working for Oracle, Cisco, Sun Microsystems etc., and I am not even taking
into account the semiconductors industry, where the situation is similar
within big companies like Fairchild, Intel, AMD etc.

3. The 2002 ICANN Meeting was held in Bucharest, Romania, between the 24th
and the 28th of June 2002

4. Romania is actually the "new India" for the software outsourcing, Gartner
Group is presenting this as a fact, as do other analysts:

http://tubbydev.typepad.com/offshore_programming/2004/06/index.html
Romania leads outsourcing charge (source ZDnet UK)

http://www.silicon.com/management/itdirector/0,39024673,10005975,00.htm
Romania emerges as Indian offshore alternative

and last but not least

5. Romania with its 23 millions inhabitants is the second largest country in
East Europe after Poland.

So how is it possible that (for example) the F.Y.R. of Macedonia chapter
(country with only 2 millions of inhabitants) has already been officially
recognized by the ISOC, and not the Romanian one.
ISOC Macedonia is just an example among many others, we don't have anything
against our colleagues from Macedonia and we have congratulated them for
their recognition, but what about the Romanian chapter?
Why this discrimination?"
*****

ISOC Romania received full support from ISOC Belgium-Wallonia during our
General Assembly this 8 June 2006. 
Questions arose anyway about the usefulness of supporting the Internet
Society when it is so difficult to have the Internet Society "moral"
support...

Anyway, we wish the best success to the new entities creating ISOC chapters,
mainly in Europe at the moment...

Thanks for your attention and eager to welcome our partners from the Chapter
Romania as colleagues within the Internet Society,
Best regards,

Marie-Anne Delahaut
President, ISOC Belgium - Wallonia
___________________________________________
Marie-Anne Delahaut * delahaut.marie-anne at wallonie-isoc.org
directrice de recherche et responsable du Pôle Information
director of research and head of the Information Unit
Institut Jules-Destrée * the Destree Institute
Namur, Région Wallonie * www.Wallonie-en-ligne.net/
Internet Society Wallonie * www.Wallonie-ISOC.org/
Tél. : +32(0)81.26.10.12. - Fax : +32(0)81.22.64.11.

> -----Original Message-----
> From: chapter-delegates-bounces at elists.isoc.org 
> [mailto:chapter-delegates-bounces at elists.isoc.org] On Behalf 
> Of David McAuley
> Sent: lundi 12 juin 2006 23:38
> To: rco at info.fundp.ac.be
> Cc: et at isoc.ro; chapter-delegates at elists.isoc.org
> Subject: [Chapter-delegates] ISOC Romania
> 
> 
> Dear Radu:
> 
> I saw your note of Saturday but not the one preceding it 
> which you mentioned. 
> 
> ISOC Romania was indeed a matter under discussion back in 
> 2001 and for a number of reasons it was unable to be 
> completed back then. However, I noticed in a recent mail by 
> Eduard Tric to ISOC ECC that things may now have changed in 
> such a manner that chapter formation may go forward. I have 
> today written to Eduard and am hoping that he and I may soon 
> discuss the matter and bring it to conclusion. 
> 
> Also, Jim Galvin served as ISOC's VP of Chapters for three 
> years and that service concluded at the end of last year. I 
> am now serving as Director of Membership and Chapters and in 
> that capacity I look forward to working with Eduard.
> 
> I hope this addresses your concerns. Thank you for your note 
> and best regards, David
> 
> David McAuley
> Membership Director
> Internet Society
> 703-326-9880, ext 104
> 703-963-5887 (mobile)
> mcauley at isoc.org
> 
> 
> _______________________________________________
> Chapter-delegates mailing list 
> Chapter-delegates at elists.isoc.org 
> http://elists.isoc.org/mailman/listinfo/chapter-delegates
> 