[Chapter-delegates] NEWS RELEASE: Internet Society Fellowship Awards

[Greg Wood]

Hello,
For your reference, the news release below will be publicly  
distributed around 1400 UTC on 17 March 2009.
Sincerely,
-Greg

INTERNET SOCIETY FELLOWSHIP AWARDS BUILD TECHNICAL LEADERSHIP IN  
DEVELOPING REGIONS

Enhanced Program Supports Diverse Voices in the Internet Standards  
Community

WASHINGTON, D.C. and GENEVA, SWITZERLAND - March 17, 2009 - The  
Internet Society (ISOC) today announced it has awarded fellowships to  
support participation in Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF)  
meetings by 19 technologists from 15 countries in developing regions  
around the world. The Internet Society is the organizational home of  
the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF), the Internet's premier  
technical standards body. Ten fellowship recipients from this round of  
awards will attend next week's IETF meeting being held in San  
Francisco on 22-27 March.

This year's Internet Society Fellowship to the IETF program attracted  
150 applications with recipients coming from Bangladesh, Brazil,  
Kenya, India, Malawi, Mauritius, Mongolia, Morocco, Pakistan,  
Venezuela, Uganda, Uruguay, and the Democratic Republic of Congo. The  
program pairs recipients with an experienced mentor at IETF meetings  
to support their participation.

"We are very excited to start the year with such a strong group of  
Fellows," said Karen Rose, Director of Education and Programs at the  
Internet Society. "The Internet Society Fellowship to the IETF is a  
key demonstration of our commitment to facilitate technical leadership  
and increased participation in Internet standards development by  
technologists in the developing world."

Ten Fellowships were awarded to individuals who will be attending the  
IETF for the first time.  In addition, nine alumni of the program were  
selected to receive the Returning Fellows award, which supports their  
participation in an additional IETF meeting.  Returning fellows are  
able to leverage their initial IETF experience to provide additional  
contributions into the IETF standards processes, while helping to  
build engagement by their local technical community in standards  
tracks that have important implications for regional Internet growth.  
Their attendance at the meetings also increases the visibility of the  
IETF in developing countries.

"Internet Society members Afilias, Google, Intel, and Microsoft have  
provided key investments in the IETF fellowship program," said Drew  
Dvorshak, Senior Manager for Organisation Members. "Fellowships are an  
important opportunity for business leaders to benefit from ISOC's  
global resources by funding a unique and effective effort to develop  
the next generation of technologists, which are key part of enabling  
the emergence of the next billion Internet users."

Since its inception in 2006 the ISOC Fellowship to the IETF program  
has sent 47 technologists from 29 developing countries to meetings of  
the IETF.

Additional information about the Internet Society IETF Fellowship  
Program is available at:
http://www.isoc.org/educpillar/fellowship/

The selected ISOC IETF Fellows for 2009 are:

IETF 74, San Francisco, USA

Noah Kevin Sematimba (Uganda) is the Assistant Manager of IT systems  
at Warid Telecom Uganda Limited and was a key player in setting up the  
Internet Exchange in Uganda and still serves as the technical chair of  
the Uganda Internet exchange point.

Coko Tracy Mirindi Musaza (Rwanda) is an AfNOG instructor and IT  
consultant and is interested in the Control And Provisioning of  
Wireless Access Points working group, whose mailing list he has been  
following since 2006.

Ceron Joao Marcelo (Brazil) is a network operator and Masters student  
at the Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul. Joao has been  
following the Inter-Domain Routing working group mailing list since  
last October.

Muhammad Haris Shamsi (Pakistan) is the Head of Product Development at  
Pakistan Mobile Communication Limited and is heavily involved with the  
Networkers' Society of Pakistan and is a founding member of the IPv6  
Task Force Pakistan.

Blessings Msowoya (Malawi) is a Network Engineer at the Malawi  
Sustainable Development Network Program and is also part of the team  
that manages the .mw ccTLD, the Malawi Internet Exchange Point (MIX).   
His interests are in the DNS Operations, Control And Provisioning of  
Wireless Access Points, and IPv6 Maintenance working groups.

IETF 75, Stockholm, Sweden

Md. Aminul Haque Chowdhury (Bangladesh) is pursuing his MSc in  
Computer Engineering at the Ajou University, South Korea and has been  
following the IPv6 over Low power WPAN working group.

Ronald Nsubuga (Uganda) is the Senior Administrator, IP Data Networks  
at MTN Uganda and was part of the group of editors for the document  
from AfNOG to NTIA NOI response about DNSSEC.

Vinayak Hegde (India) is interested in the IP Performance Metrics and  
Performance Metrics for Other Layers working groups, which he uses in  
his work on Internet measurement and analysis as an architect at Akamai.

Afaf El Maayati (Morocco) is the Project Manager of the .ma ccTLD at  
the National Telecommunications Regulatory Agency.  She is interested  
in the DNS Operations, DNS Extensions, and Internationalized Domain  
Names in Applications working groups.

Dorcas Muthoni (Kenya) is the General Manager/CEO of Openworld LTD, a  
software firm, and she also runs a user group (LinuxChix) for women  
engineers across Africa that mentors young women to pursue careers in  
computing, as well as build capacity for practicing women.

The selected Returning ISOC IETF Fellows for 2009 are:

IETF 74, San Francisco, USA

Subramanian Moonesamy (Mauritius) is a consultant for Eland Systems  
and continues to participate in the IETF main discussion, Domain Keys  
Identified Mail, and Anti-Spam Research Group (Internet Research Task  
Force) mailing lists. He has also provided comments on numerous  
Internet Drafts.

Baasansuren Burmaa (Mongolia) is the Director of .MN Registry at  
Datacom LLC where she has reviewed some of the Internationalized  
Domain Names in Applications (Revised) working group documents  
together with other ccTLDs. By attending a third IETF meeting, she  
aims to bring operator interests from Mongolia into IETF working groups.

Mohibul Hasib Mahmud (Bangladesh) is currently working at BRAC BD Mail  
Network Ltd. (bracnet) as the Senior Manager, Technology Division. He  
is looking forward to the Domain Name System Operations working group  
meeting as his current research focuses on DNS traffic behavior; since  
attending IETF 73, Mohibul has become interested in IPv6 and IPv4  
compatibility issues, particularly in the developing world.

Asim Zaheer (Pakistan) is employed by Mentor Graphics and is a part- 
time graduate student at the Lahore University of Management  
Sciences.  Asim follows the IP Security Maintenance and Extensions,  
Mobility for IPv4, and Mobility EXTensions for IPv6 working groups as  
part of his work responsibilities.

IETF 75, Stockholm, Sweden

Alberto Castro (Uruguay) is a graduate student at Universidad de la  
Republica Oriental del Uruguay and is looking forward to participating  
in the upcoming Path Computation Element working group meeting and the  
Locator/ID Separation Protocol discussions.

Martin German (Uruguay) is a graduate student at Universidad de la  
Republica Oriental del Uruguay. He continues to participate in the  
Path Computation Element working group and Locator/ID Separation  
Protocol discussions.

Alejandro Acosta (Venezuela) is currently an Internetworking  
Coordinator at British Telecom, Venezuela and is working with a group  
of universities in Venezuela (la Universidad Catolica Andres Bello,  
Metroprolitana and Universidad Nacional Experimental Simon Rodriguez)  
to help them develop IPv6 in their networks.

Eduardo Ascenco Reis (Brazil) is a Senior Network Analyst at CTBC  
Multimidia.  Eduardo follows the Inter-Domain Routing working group in  
his work with BGP routing table optimization, AS interactions on IXP  
environments, and Large AS versus different IP services (transit,  
private and public peering).

Jean Philemon Kissangou (Congo) is the Technical Manager at DRTVnet in  
the Congo where his work interests are in the IP over IEEE 802.16  
Networks, IPv6 Maintenance, and IP Telephony working groups.

About the Internet Society
The Internet Society is a non-profit organisation founded in 1992 to  
provide leadership in Internet related standards, education, and  
policy. With offices in Washington, DC, and Geneva, Switzerland, it is  
dedicated to ensuring the open development, evolution, and use of the  
Internet for the benefit of people throughout the world. For more  
information, see:
http://www.isoc.org

About the IETF
The Internet Society is the organizational home of the Internet  
Engineering Task Force (IETF), the Internet's premier technical  
standards body. The IETF is a large, open, international community of  
network designers, operators, vendors, and researchers concerned with  
the evolution of the Internet architecture and the smooth operation of  
the Internet. It is open to any interested individual and there is no  
membership required. Work is done through mailing lists and various  
working groups. The IETF holds meetings three times per year. The work  
and consensus calls take place online to reduce barriers to  
participation and maximize contributions from around the world.

Media Contact:
Greg Wood
Internet Society
wood at isoc.org
+1-703-439-2145