[Chapter-delegates] ITU Followships for the World Telecommunication Policy Forum, April 2009, Lisbon, Portugal

[Sivasubramanian Muthusamy]

Hello

Every document listed at page
http://www.itu.int/council/groups/wsis/index.html is locked. It is possible
that ISOC as an organization has access, perhaps with the right to share
with the members and chapters. If so, could we please have some of these
documents mailed to the chapter delegates list?

Thanks.

On Mon, Feb 16, 2009 at 11:38 PM, Olivier MJ Crepin-Leblond <ocl at gih.com>wrote:

> "Alejandro Pisanty" <apisan at servidor.unam.mx> wrote:
>
>  my two cents re ITU/WTPF:
>>
>> It is worthwhile to read through the ITU documents to which Constance and
>> the ITU pages point to.
>>
>
> Of course, this is only possible when either having a TIES account,
> something provided free only to ITU members (defined as Member States,
> Sector Members, and Associates).
> Sector membership stands at 63,600 Swiss Francs and you can choose an 1/8
> or 1/4 of the contributory unit, except if you're a sector member from a
> developing country in which case you can contribute 1/16 of a unit.
>
> This is absolutely technocrat talk and is, as it currently stands, and as
> it was in the 80s and 90s (which is the time I was part of an organisation
> which had "oh miracle" access to a TIES account), a gigantic paper-producing
> machine - now probably even worse because the people producing the
> e-paperwork don't even get ashamed when they see the CD/DVD of their work.
> In the past, they used to get ashamed when seeing the piles of yellow, green
> and white papers amounting to more weight than substance.
>
> In Cairo, Dr. Touré was confronted about this aberration. How can he
> promise an integrative management of processes and the free participation of
> the public to ITU processes when barriers exist everywhere and the
> complexity of the organisation is such that it seems *impossible* to make it
> more transparent and accountable?
>
>
>> The key one is the Secretary General's letter, which last I read was in
>> its third draft.
>>
>> For ISOC members there are several salient points:
>>
>> 1. the definition of NGN's or New Generation Networks.
>>
>>  a. The definition is broad, in evolution, and subject to strongly
>> disagreeing viewpoints;
>>  b. In general the definition of IP-based networks for all, converged
>> purposes and services sounds like "very Internet-like" and pleasing but is
>> fraught with the paradigm of "owned networks" and can also be seen as
>> big-telco-plus-government paradigm recovery;
>>  c. NGNs are seen as the opportunity to regain control over networks.
>>
>
> d. entertain ambiguity so as for each listener to make up his/her own mind.
>
> Discussions have been going on at the IGF & other governance forums as to
> what this really meant.
> They ended up in circular arguments.
>
>
>> 2. A very telling point is the relationship between NGNs and the Internet.
>> For many in ISOC the only point, or surely the main one, for a new build of
>> IP-based networks is to enable access to the Internet with its full rainbow
>> diversity of contents and services, not for creating controls and choke
>> points.
>>
>>  Or, caricaturally if you wish, to allow more use of Skype, not to
>> restrict it further or make money from it.
>>
>
> And this is said whilst the exact opposite is said from ITU "members". I
> have a growing fear that they either have no clue what an NGN should be or
> there is a strong disagreement within ITU and between its members about
> this.
>
>
>> 3. Thus other issues of interest, like Network Neutrality in some of its
>> versions, may be questioned.
>>
>> 4. Veni points to issues related to Internet Governance and I think he is
>> right that the writings of the WTPF have discrepancies with the WSIS
>> agreements. Sometimes in explicit language and sometimes in a more cryptic
>> form they endorse a view that is not the same multi-stakeholder,
>> problem-solving view that most in ISOC and other of the Internet's own
>> organizations are working on. And, certainly, other related events and
>> expressions reinforce this view.
>>
>>  One of them is the set of expressions by the SG of the ITU, Dr. Hamadoun
>> Toure, about the Internet Governance Forum (calling it a waste of time and
>> apparently impatiently circumventing it with the WTPF, which is
>> intergovernmental in nature in spite of allowing some - limited, controlled,
>> and pre-filtered - non-governmental attendance.
>>
>
> Frankly, I do not know what ITU's bottom line is. Frankly I don't know if
> they know. Does anybody here know?
> Calling the IGF a waste of time is offensive to the good people who have
> participated in the IGF. I don't understand the reason for such a statement.
>
>
>> I believe that a vigorous discussion about the WTPF's agenda and documents
>> among chapter delegates and ISOC's membership is necessary and, given the
>> date, urgent. I hope to be kicking off some of it with the above.
>>
>>
> The question I have is: do they know what the agenda is? With so many I am
> increasingly confused by it all.
>
> Kind regards,
>
> --
> Olivier MJ Crépin-Leblond, PhD
> http://www.gih.com/ocl.html
>
>
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>



-- 
Sivasubramanian Muthusamy
http://isocmadras.blogspot.com
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