[Chapter-delegates] Notes from Chapter and Members Meeting, Lisbon 29th March

[Anne Lord]

Dear Colleagues,

Attached below are the notes from the recent Chapter and Members  
Meeting on 29th March in Lisbon, Portugal. Thank you to all those who  
participated in the meeting. Comments are welcome.  I will also post  
the notes from the Prague meeting very soon.  Both sets of notes will  
also be available on the wiki.

Best wishes,

Anne
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Anne Lord, Senior Manager                             <lord at isoc.org>
Chapter & Individual Memberships                  http://www.isoc.org
Internet Society (ISOC)                "The Internet is for everyone"
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Chapters and Members Meeting
Lisbon, 29 March 2007

Attendees:

ISOC
	Karen Rose,
	Sebastian Bellagamba
	Anne Lord (by phone)

ISOC chapters
	Alejandro Pisanty, (ISOC Mexico)
	Veni Markovski (ISOC Bulgaria)
	Sebastian Bachollet  (ISOC France)
	Rudi Vansnick  (ISOC Belgium)
	Victor Ciza (ISOC Burundi)
	Didier Kasole (ISOC DRC)
	Baudouin Schombe (ISOC DRC)
	Aziz Hilali  (ISOC Morocco)
	Christopher Wilkinson  (ISOC Wallonie)
	Norbert Klein  (ISOC-Cambodia In formation)
	Patrick Vande Walle  (ISOC Luxembourg)
	Yaovi Atohoun  (ISOC Benin)
	Khaled Koubaa  (ISOC Tunisia)
	Osten Franberg (ISOC Sweden)
	Stefano Trumpy (ISOC Italy)
	Peter Koch (ISOC Germany – by phone)
	Hans Dittler (ISOC Germany – by phone)

Apologies
Lynn St.Amour was unable to attend as she was required at a PIR  
meeting and the conflict was unavoidable.
Note: Those joining by phone were not connected until after the  
meeting had commenced.

1. Welcome and introductions

All those present at the meeting briefly introduced themselves by  
stating their name and affiliation.

2. Update on ISOC priorities for 2007 – Karen Rose

Karen Rose gave a presentation on the priorities for ISOC in 2007 and  
opened the floor for questions.

3. Comments and questions

During the presentation the educational project to translate key ISOC  
documents was introduced. While the project was met with support,  
concern was expressed about the cost of translations. It was  
explained that working group(s) would be formed and it was the task  
of the working group(s) to identify which documents have priority to  
be translated and (hopefully) that there would also be volunteers to  
assist with actual translations.

There was a comment that the project did not have to translate all  
the material at once, and that it would be a step-by-step approach.   
It was suggested to use small face to face working group meetings  
with chapters to help to try to focus on the work over for example a  
three day period. It was observed that there was considerable energy  
from the chapters to assist with multi-lingualism projects and that  
this was appreciated.

There was a comment that it will be essential for the educational  
translation project to not only addresses the translation of key ISOC  
documents, but also the use of training, informative, and educational  
materials produced by the Chapters or identified by the Chapters in  
their environment, thus inviting a more proactive participation by  
the Chapters themselves and the chance to showcase their resources.

There was a question as to the budget for chapter development. This  
was not answered at the time as it was not known by the ISOC staff  
present and it will be followed up in a separate email to the chapter  
delegates list.

Action: Anne to mail the chapter delegates list concerning the budget  
for chapter development.

It was commented that there has been a lot of ‘history’ with respect  
to ISOC and the chapters, and that it was recognised that  
collectively (both the Secretariat staff and the Chapters) ISOC is  
now more ably placed to deliver.  There was specific mention of the  
ISOC membership system and hope was expressed that ISOC and the  
chapters are able to work closely in partnership going forward.

ISOC responded by confirming that there is a commitment from staff to  
provide value to chapters and to work closely with chapters. It was  
commented that there was no quick fix, but rather an incremental and  
step-by-step approach would be needed with equal participation from  
both chapters and from ISOC staff in partnership.

Action: Anne to mail the chapter delegates list concerning intentions  
regarding the membership system and project plans.

It was commented that a number of chapters have joined the ICANN  
RALO’s – out  of 11 (ALS) organizations in the African RALO, 9 were  
ISOC Chapters.

There was a request to allow participants to speak in their native  
language at the meeting with offers of those present to translate at  
the mike.

It was commented that it was important for everyone to work together  
more effectively to exchange information etc. to work towards a  
stronger ISOC in the future. It was reaffirmed from staff that this  
is a goal and that ISOC is now better staffed than ever before.

There was a comment that ISOC France had supported ISOC Benin in 2002  
with finance and that it is necessary to think how the ISOC chapters  
can be different from other associations. Once a chapter is approved,  
how can it be ensured that they become strong and vibrant.  It was  
suggested that there should be a requirement for a chapter to have a  
minimum amount of activity or a minimum set of requirements to adhere  
too, such as one to two meetings a year.

It was commented that it is important for the logos of the chapters  
to be standardised.  As part of a professional organization we need  
to have a consistent look and feel – it is very important.

In reviewing these minutes, Lynn St Amour wished to add that there is  
a standard logo and trademark policy and failure to use that could  
invalidate the ISOC trademark. These will be put on-line.

Related to this it was mentioned that it has been suggested in the  
past that there could be an “Awards” programme for example for the  
best chapter of the year and that this could motivate chapters.

ISOC commented that the need for greater communication between the  
chapters and the Secretariat is recognised. She also asked how the  
chapters manage communications to their members and how inter-chapter  
communication can be best facilitated?  There was a comment that  
there was a need to provide training to use tools like the ‘wiki’s  
and ‘marratech’.  It was observed that it would be good to  
standardise on communications tools used.

Christopher Wilkinson (ISOC Belgium Wallonia) referred to the recent  
request from the ISOC Chair concerning up-dating the Internet Briefs  
and suggested that it would be useful to publish a new Internet Brief  
on Communication Tools, because many individual members (including  
himself) did not have access to up-to-date tools or know how to use  
them. In Prague  ‘Marratech’ – remote conferencing software was used  
and this was successful. There was a query as to why it was not used  
at this meeting. It was answered that ‘Marratech’ was actually in  
test and had not been officially deployed yet. However, if the  
testing is successful then it will certainly be used to facilitate  
remote participation with other meetings during the year.

ISOC is trying to address some of these areas with the Regional  
Bureau approach which allow for a far higher level of personal  
contact and communication in languages other than English with the  
chapters. It is early days but the results are good so far!

There was a suggestion to hold a general meeting of all chapter  
delegates at Rio or before. It was suggested that one individual from  
each chapter could be paid for at the IGF meeting.  This is currently  
being investigated.  There was a question regarding the coordination  
of chapters in preparation for the IGF meeting in Rio de Janeiro in  
November.   Matthew Shears (who is currently working part time) will  
be co-ordinating this.

It was suggested that it would be good to share information about  
local chapter activities and the chapter wiki is a medium for this.  
Email will be sent soon by the Education team to ask for volunteers  
from among the chapters to be part of a project (mentioned at the  
beginning of the meeting) which will look at how we collectively  
manage the information resources that are available to us with a view  
to translating these materials to make them more accessible.

It was noted that Chapters are volunteer organisations many of whom  
have membership fees and many that do not. However it was commented  
that funding is often an issue as chapters have expenses that exceed  
revenues in connection with running their chapters: expenses often  
associated with running events, developing promotional materials,  
sending mailouts, administering membership dues etc. It was felt that  
this was an important issue and there was a need for ISOC to consider  
the issue of funding to chapters.

ISOC (Karen Rose) summarised by thanking everyone for attending the  
meeting and contributing to a very useful discussion. She also  
commented that she felt the real value of the meeting was the open  
dialogue between chapters that was facilitated. The dialogue had been  
wide ranging with discussions on everything from standards,  
relationships and multilingualism. There were many process and  
content issues highlighted along with many differing views. She  
commented that it was necessary to ‘bed down’ some of the mechanisms  
for communications which may then improve things on a number of  
levels as we go forward together.

4. Next meeting

There will be chapter meetings in conjunction with the upcoming  
Afrinic and LACNIC meetings.  There will also be a chapter meeting  
around the June ICANN meeting in Puerto Rico.