[Chapter-delegates] A request for advice from the Board of Trustees

[Ted Hardie]

Dear colleagues,

At the annual general meeting, the Board of Trustees discussed the rise in
attacks on the Internet way of networking and the broader set of attacks on
the Internet's value to humanity.  The Board asked, as a result of these
discussions, that the staff build action plans for the upcoming year that
reinforced the "Defend" aspect of the society's efforts to build, promote,
and defend the Internet.

As we look beyond the staff actions to how to mobilize the society as a
whole, the Board is seeking your advice.  We believe that many who are now
disparaging the value of the Internet are doing so to audiences of
regulators, lawmakers, and civil society that cannot effectively imagine a
network that works differently.  As a result, they cannot imagine the
damage or impairment that changing the fundamental nature of the Internet
would bring.

To issue an effective call to action, the listeners must understand what
changes if they do not act.

We would like to know your thoughts on how to provide that contrast--how to
show what the world would look like with an Internet that has succumbed to
these threats.   One in which encryption provides no confidentiality; one
in which access to the network is determined by state approval rather than
voluntary association; one in which every piece of content or commentary
must be submitted to algorithmic acceptance prior to being made visible.

As we come up to the meeting of the board on November 12th and 13th, we
would like you to consider what advice you can give us on this point, and
we ask you to provide it either with your usual report or instead of it, as
you prefer.

Thanks, as always, for your efforts on behalf of our mission,

Ted Hardie
For the Board of Trustees
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