[Chapter-delegates] ISOC Report on Plenipotentiary Conference week 2 & views on Internet issues

[Sivasubramanian M]

Dear Veni,

On Tue, Oct 26, 2010 at 3:41 PM, Veni Markovski <veni at veni.com> wrote:

> Siva,
> ITU's role is clearly defined in the WSIS documents, as well as the role of
> civil society, governments, intergovernmental organizations. We can't define
> it today, five years later.



>
> What I find strange is, that there were no ISOC meetings at the PP10, where
> we could share views and exchange ideas on ways to coordinate better our
> efforts.
>

Yes, Chapters could have contributed better to the process of shaping ISOC
policy.



> The results were good, but they were achieved in the last day, in the last
> hour, and by that time there were no people from ISOC in Guadalajara.
>


> I firmly believe chapters are vital for ISOC, not just as a proof it is an
> internationally diverse organization, but as an opportunity for ISOC to
> reach out and find out what the problems are in different countries. Even at
> the PP10 it was clear that problems of developing countries are different
> from the problems of developed countries (although, in some cases with
> unexpected facts!). There are many chapters in countries, where ISOC could
> search for facts or inspiration, in order to prepare good documents to be
> used among governments.
>

World Telecommunication Development Conference happened this year (May 8)24-
June4) in Hyderabad, India
https://elists.isoc.org/pipermail/chapter-delegates/2010-May/006259.html

The Chennai Chapter could have contributed to the ISOC delegation's efforts,
I replied directly to offer our participation the same day.

*"**I will reach out to the Government of **India**. Isoc **India** Chennai
possibly together with other **India** Chapters,  could send out a
communication to draw the attention of our Ministry of Information
Technology and Department of Telecommunications to important aspects of
ITU's involvement in the Internet. **Please advise us on the specific points
to be raised with our Government **which may be in a postion to discuss that
with other friendly delegations.**"*

I did not get a reply.


> One of the conclusions from the PP10 that I've made myself, is that the
> documents, provided by the West are not good enough for the East. The ITU,
> and the governments there, are in desperate need of good documents, which
> simply cannot be produced by ISOC Headquarters in US or Switzerland. What
> might work is for the bureaus to reach out to chapters, and see under what
> conditions these documents can be produced. Government officials can't spend
> time reading 30-page document, printed on white paper, and full with nice
> pictures of how the Internet works. They need 2 pages, with facts, and
> sources. Perhaps chapters can do this, and perhaps ISOC should explore this
> possibility, including compensating the chapters for the time and efforts
> they will use to produce the documents.
>
> As a chapter representative, coming from a country, where we have constant
> issues with attempts by the government to introduce one way or the other
> some restrictions on the Internet, our chapter has certain experience in
> understanding, among other, relations between government and big
> IT-companies, wiretapping, monitoring of Internet activities, VoIP services,
> etc. I am sure that other chapters have experience in similar or different
> areas, and this experience is much broader than ISOC's, as well as more
> relevant in the context of preparing documents, aiming at governments at the
> ITU.
>
> But, of course, it is up to ISOC if they want to engage the chapters in the
> ITU outreach, or prefer to work the old way. I, for one, while in
> Guadalajara, reached out to ISOC, but ISOC did not respond. As a chapter
> president, I find this behavior strange.
>

Apart from WTDC in Hyderabad, there were other events during the last two
years in which ISOC Staff traveled to take part (e-India at Hyderabad),
committed funds by way of sponsorship  (South Asia Network Operators Group
Conference in Chennai) or organized the entire event with a very large staff
delegation (INet Delhi and IGF Hyderabad). If there was any other ISOC
International participation, I did not know.

In all these events Chapters in India could have contributed to ISOC's
efforts but it does not happen this way. Why?

Sivasubramanian M



>
> Best,
> Veni
>
>
>
>> ITU's aspirations to control the WSIS process needs to be checked. ISOC's
>> second week document is very clear on the limits of ITU's role in the WSIS.
>>
>>
>>
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <https://elists.isoc.org/mailman/private/chapter-delegates/attachments/20101030/209ab32e/attachment.htm>