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ALAC 2nd Session
Community Leaders Accountability and Participation Obligations
Cairo ICANN Meeting
(Held November 04, 2008)

Legend
Name: First name of member of group
Name L: First name plus first initial of last name if there's more than one person with the same first name.
Name?: If we think we might know who's speaking but aren't 100% sure.
Male: Unsure of who's speaking, but know it's a male.
Female: Unsure of who's speaking, but know it's a female.
Name: 52 - 0.31.06 We will identify a foreign language in square brackets with a time code for the beginning and end, so that you can quickly identify those passages. At the top of the transcript, we will advise you of the name(s) of the foreign languages you'll need to search for. For example, some transcripts may contain German, so you'll have to search for “[German” instead of “[French” to find all the passages. The speaker identification is the same convention as all the others. i.e. If we know the speaker's name we'll include it, otherwise we'll put a question mark after it, or if we can't even guess, then Male, Female or SP.
Interpreter. If interpreter actually translates French or German for a participant we will note it as “Interpreter”. It will normally be evident from the dialogue who the interpreter is translating for. If not, we will include a note in square brackets with respect to who they are translating for.
cuts out: Audio cuts out for less than 2 seconds. We may have missed something. We do not put this if it's just natural silence where no-one is speaking. We only put this if we can hear that there was briefly a technical problem with the phone line and/or the recording which resulted in temporary loss of sound.

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List of Participants
Important Note: Please note that this should not be considered to be an "official" list of the attendees. This is just a list of the participants that we were able to identify during the transcription. There may have been others present that didn't speak and some people may have participated that were not on the official list of attendees published on the internet.

Aguirre, Carlos
Aizu, Izumi
Ashton-Hart, Nick (ICANN Staff)
Bachollet, Sébastien
Brendler, Beau
Diakite, Hawa
Greenberg, Alan
Guerra, Robert
Langdon-Orr, Cheryl (ALAC Chair)
Leibovitch, Evan
Narten, Thomas (ICANN Board)
Nguyen Thu Hue
Salgueiro, José Ovidio
Scartezini, Vanda
Seye Sylla, Fatimata
Vande Walle, Patrick

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Cheryl: I’m not currently quorate. I will then leave it till five minutes past the hour… That’s fine.
Male: That’s okay.
Nick: It’s not showing up… overtalking
Izumi: I trust you.
Cheryl: What are we doing?
Male: inaudible That’s okay.
Cheryl: Okay. I… cuts out 00.16 …could have projected more.
Male: inaudible
Cheryl: So if you’re willing, we will leave the opening of this meeting until another… Well, I think 60 seconds is impractical – I can’t see a quorum arriving in 60 seconds. We will start the formal proceedings at 9:10, so if you want to ensure that you have your headsets, that you’re settled, that your computers are turned on, that you’ve done your banking and your messages and your e-mails, because you are going to have to focus on this morning’s proceedings. That gives you some 6 minutes now to get yourselves settled, to get yourselves organized, and to get yourselves able to hear other languages.
59
Izumi: I will stop when the meeting starts.
Cheryl: You can stop.
Izumi: Are we starting?
Cheryl: Thank you, Izumi.
Beau?: Hey, come on. We gave the world John Coltrane, you gave the world Paul Hogan.
laughter
Nick: And Midnight Oil, and Yothu Yindi, and many other excellent musical artists.
Cheryl: Okay.
Beau?: I like 04.28 Olivia Newton-John.
Cheryl: Okay. Okay.
laughter
Nick: overtalking …Tina Arena. So, you know, don’t be too harsh on Australian music.
Male: If we all start pushing our own music, inaudible is going to be interesting. You may not like mine.
Cheryl: laughter
Nick: I like all music that is good. Good is… cuts out
Cheryl: Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. I do note that we are now quorate. It is 8 minutes past the hour, and with your indulgence, I believe we can now start our meeting. I did say we would extend till 10 past, but any 2 minute opportunity to get a little head start I think is an important one to take.
Usual housekeeping matters. Please ensure that you’ve already got your headsets if you require interpretation services from Spanish to English, from English to Spanish, from French to English, or from English to French. A request from the interpreters this morning, which is far less a point for us, although some of us – myself I’m sure included – in the heat of debate tend to speed up. When we have our open meeting later today and guests may in fact come to a microphone, if you are near somebody who is running off at a very fast speed, could you please say, “Just slow down for the interpreters to catch up”? Apparently some of our discussions yesterday were a little like a fast race to keep up with.
A second point of housekeeping – and again, if any of your fellows are not at this table at this time, please pass this information on to them when you see them later in the day – the gala event tickets will be available today. You do not need to worry about getting any because Stacy will collect on behalf of each and every one of us sufficient tickets to ensure that there is no barging around, worrying “Have I got one?” or lining up to get one. If you are part of the ALAC and RALO group here, you have a ticket allocated, and if you see her come in and give me an unmarked brown envelope, it is not cash, it is the tickets for all of us. So worry not if other people at the morning tea have them or other people at lunch have them, no one will have them before ours have been corralled and we will have them today.
Enough of the housekeeping. The adoption of the agenda, and you’ll notice the lack of timing put next to the agenda. I’ve done that, as extraordinary as it is for me to do an agenda like that, for very good reason. Some of these points may in fact lead naturally into the other. We may have a shorter period of time on one matter because you’ve all discussed it over breakfast or in the bar, and one spokesperson can simply say, “No, we’ve all agreed. This is the way it is.” But the general order of the agenda is what I am proposing you agree to. I’m also asking is there any other matter for discussion or resolution or agreement that is under the topic of what we are discussing today, which is our accountability framework and our performance criteria, that you wish you have added to that agenda?
Go ahead, Sébastien.
Sébastien: I will try to write a proposal before the end of this meeting.
Cheryl: If I may ask for clarification, a proposal which we will perhaps be putting under resolutions at the end of our meeting? Thank you very much.
Any other comments or items to be added to the agenda? If not, we have adopted the agenda, which brings us to the short introduction and background. pause
Moving from where we were in our “We are volunteers,” and in fact the little exercise, which might I say from a personal perspective I found both fascinating and rewarding, to learn more about each and every one of your was a delightful experience. It is part of what was traditionally a structure ice-breaking exercise that we would run in our OneDay workshops, but we had such a business-based OneDay workshop with our own At-Large Advisory Committee review, we didn’t get to play the games and do the getting-to-know-you exercises that we normally would have. I certainly have grown a great deal in my understanding in each and every one of you and I hope you have grown slightly in your understanding of me from that exercise.
But every time we are discussing what we are trying to do today, I implore, remember we are talking about volunteers. We are talking about, in our group, volunteers whose core business with very few exceptions… There is always exceptions. I am looking at Carlton, he probably thinks what he does in real life measures quite closely to what he does here. But most of us work and live in a totally non-related environment. So what we are offering, to be leaders of At-Large and regional structures and our At-Large Structures, is possibly the most valuable time we have. And we have to ensure that what we’re asking is doable, it is achievable, but it also must be measurable, must be agreed to, and must be maintained as we move into this next 12 months.
I have now had the time to have had a conversation about performance criteria with each and every one of the other AC and SO leaders. And we are, albeit with some considerable force 11.18, universally admired for the fact that we are doing this. Today is our opportunity to get it right. laughter Okay?
The necessity to have measure on those of us who have put ourselves up to lead this community and to bring the voices from our individual member organizations, or our regions in the case of NomCom, means that we are saying we are already exceptional and willing to offer a great deal of our time and energy. If we fail to deliver on what we have promised, then those people who have put us here deserve to know. It is not I think reasonable that our members’ organizations, that my 12.19 ISOC-AU Board of Directors should have to troll through minutes of the meetings I attend on their behalf in Asia Pacific, nor that the APRALO executive should have to troll through minutes of the ALAC to see “Have I been active? Am I performing? Am I actually bringing the views of Asia Pacific forward?”
So it is important that we have a transparency and an accountability, but just measuring meetings by number, just measuring “Did you or did you not vote?” is so far from good enough I cannot begin to say. laughter I do believe, however, that having published those metrics we have at least got ourselves in the right mindset to say, “How should we measuring ourselves? How should we be describing our roles? And how should we then” – and this goes very much to what I’ve seen on the lists for proposals, the modifications to these rules of procedure – “should we be asking if we fail in any of those ways?”
I’d like now to go around the table and I would personally like to say I will stand back from the short introduction and discussion on my activities. I live in a goldfish bowl – everyone knows what I do or don’t do. By the way, I had the sushi for breakfast this morning.
Female: Where?
Cheryl: Up here. So yeah, I believe that you all should know very well what I do and what I say, but I do think it is an opportunity now for those of you who have fallen foul of the faulted metrics or those of you who have scraped through by the skin of your teeth but feel, “Oh, I really wouldn’t like to be measured like this next time,” or for those of you who have yet to be measured but would like to make sure you’re measured in a way that you can measure up properly to say, “My role here I believe is… and I think this could be best measured by…”
This is a forward-looking exercise, not a backward-looking one. I do not wish to hear why someone red-zoned, green-zoned, or purple-zoned on the spreadsheet. Old news, let’s move forward.
Yes, Nick.
Nick: Just as a point of information, there are copies of the draft text of changes to Rule 21 on the side over there. For those of you who are wondering, this was drafted based on the many suggestions that were sent on list from many people immediately after the first publication of the first spreadsheets. And viewed individually, a number of those proposals may have sounded appealing to one person or another. Part of the idea of combining them together was to make sure that everybody saw that the combined total of those various proposals would be a considerable burden on any volunteer group, and indeed some non-volunteer groups. So I hope nobody thinks I was actually coming up with this or proposing some…
Sébastien?: Yes, yes.
laughter
Nick: …outrageously detailed…
Sébastien?: Sure!
Nick: laughter
Evan?: inaudible 16.02 your performance.
Nick: Yeah.
Male: I guess we don’t talk about it inaudible agree with you that’s not what we inaudible.
Nick: And we also have copies of the latest spreadsheets incorporating last month’s numbers if anybody wants them on the side, so…
Cheryl: Thank you. I would like to focus whilst there are RALO people around the table on the ALAC. At the completion of that, I would like to hear from the RALO people because really, we’re yours. We are your voice and I would very much like to know what measurements you would like to see of us – of your representatives and of the NomCom.
So Izumi, would you care to start?
Izumi: For the introduction or for the music? laughter
Cheryl: For the discussion of… you know, the short report from you. How do you believe the roles you have? Even though you’re not continuing the role, how should…
Interpreter: Microphone, Madame Chairperson, please. Microphone.
Cheryl: Oh, sorry. Say again. How should the role of an APRALO representative to the ALAC be measured? What is the expectations? Are you to attend every single meeting of both? Are you to attend two-fifths? Are you to not attend at all? Do you do working groups? That is I’d like to hear your take on what we should be discussing.
Alan: In this round we’re only doing self-inspection? What we expect of others in the group we’re not doing on this round?
Cheryl: Correct.
Izumi: I’m still somewhat wondering what to say. The… My sort of reaction is that measuring by the figures often could be misleading because there’s no perfect way to measure, first of all, and that sort of hinders the reasons behind. And also it doesn’t really measure the quality or the contributions. Even though I was 58% attendance rate or something like that for the past 6 months… And sometimes I wanted to join but I couldn’t, and sometimes I totally forgot. Sometimes I made a lot of contributions during the meeting. Sometimes I was not doing that. Depending on the subject of my interest and the regional interest, it varied.
Of course, I’m very open to all the evaluations. The current form bothered me, that it sounds like only evaluating the quantity of things first. That’s the entrance to the evaluation of the quality. At least it should go parallel.
Also, as you… Well, let me stop here and I come back to later to develop more my ideas to be shared with you guys.
Cheryl: Thank you, Izumi. And in fact I might encourage the amount of time Izumi has taken is probably the amount of time we should take.
I know that you have previously indicated that you feel you have underperformed. I do not wish you to address that. I would like your idea as a new NomCom appointee, a recent NomCom appointee, what you believe expectations of a NomCom appointee from Asia Pacific should be and how we may or may not because to measure that. Moving forward.
Thu Hue: First of all, I have to say that I am almost dead 20.08 for the last year. I was not so functional as the NomCom because I really don’t understand fully what I’m supposed to do. Maybe it’s partly of my fault. But now I understand that I have two thing to focus as a NomCom person for Asia Pacific. The first… As the rest of ALAC, two things. First is the policy and the second thing is the outreach. At the policy level I have to make sure that somehow to find the mechanism to work with the RALO, I have to found out. So that’s all that I can process on policy I’ve reflected 20.48.
And the other concern At-Large. I just find out this morning that we have 14 At-Large in Asia Pacific and I even don’t know who are they coming from the rest, except Australia and New Zealand. So this is something I have to find out urgently.
And the third job 21.10, which I think also equally important that I have to be somehow in the process of other constitution of ICANN for some means, because I don’t think ALAC can function, even me, well if I don’t know what happened outside of ALAC. And to be in one of the working groups of my interest, of my ability, and things like that.
So I think at most personal level and facilitation level, these are the two things I’m thinking about. So what I say is only for future. I don’t have anything of the past to record or to report. Thank you.
Cheryl: And thank you. It struck me just then, which is why I looked at Evan and nodded, and said this… you know, in the brain-dump we have to do about summit, something we’re missing is the opportunity to engage our Nominating Committee appointees from the regions in the whole ALAC in that as well. Just I think we need a placeholder for summit, to just think, “How can we ensure that those NomCom people will be there anyway?” might be part of some of what we do in terms of learning about ICANN and the other support organizations and the ACs. I know we’re running open meetings but we haven’t really thought of that.
Fatimata.
Fatimata: Thank you, Cheryl. Umm, back to French.
Interpreter: As a nominated person, as a member of ALAC, my first reaction was to attempt to understand how the mechanisms work.
Cheryl: I’m not hearing the French channel. Can someone check… overtalking 22.59
Interpreter: No, English, English.
Interpreter: No, you need your English channel, Cheryl.
Cheryl: Thank you. Okay.
Interpreter: Okay.
Cheryl: Thank you.
Interpreter: She… I recapitulate. The first thing is to attempt to understand how the structure functions, to get to know the persons, to understand their way of doing their work. And then, as far as the African region is concerned, to see what is not working and what I could have done or contributed to improve the functioning of the level of AFRALO. When I arrived here, the first thing I noted was that AFRALO had never had a series of meetings, teleconference meetings, it had not been established. Nevertheless, we managed to launch the process. We started to work on the procedures to try and get inputs, and that is how we were able to discuss with the working group on the ALAC Review and to contribute to it.
What I think I should be doing in the future is to try and recruit. That is my first proposal. Africa is an enormous continent, as you know. There are many organizations which can become part of ALAC. And to try and do my utmost best to have other people, other ALSes in here become part of us, to make them contribute. So this is part and parcel of the challenges that I should be facing with the other members of AFRALO. During this meeting, all the AFRALO members here present, or rather those who sit on the ALAC meetings – Hawa, Mohamed, and Didier – they agree that we should take on this role in advance and go ahead and do it.
So I think I’m on the right path. I’m sure that I will accept criticism in order to improve, but as for counting the number of presences and how can you calculate contributions, I don’t think it’s the right way for evaluation. I think it would be interesting to see over a given period of time what the efficiency of the person had been, what the person in question had contributed, because for one reason or the other, we may be absent from one meeting or the other because at that time either one is sick… At one point it happened I couldn’t go to India because I had problems with my eyes. These things do happen, we know it, and we can have family reasons, professional reasons that may prevent us participating in a meeting even though we would have liked to.
Moreover, also one may not contribute on a given topic because one has nothing to say on that particular topic because it’s a topic we’re not very familiar with or are trying to understand. For instance, the meeting we had yesterday NCC 26.58, I tried to understand until the very end of the meeting, “Why do they have a component for individuals?” because for me, the individuals are ALAC. And I continued the discussion with the others so I couldn’t contribute. So my not contributing at that particular moment, should it be considered negative?
There are several questions I ask myself concerning the way our participating is evaluated and I felt personally frustrated when reading the draft and I said so on the wiki because it would seem as if we are faced with irresponsible people, children for whom travel is a candy which we’re trying to obtain by saying something. If we count the number of contributions, it could be bad or good. “Okay, Fatimata spoke once, twice, three times,” but I could be saying just about anything and get a good note. I don’t think that’s the way to do things. Thank you very much.
Cheryl: You are a breath of fresh air, Fatimata. You make me smile and I thank you from the bottom of my heart for what you said.
Alan.
Alan: A point of clarification. The previous speakers have spent some time on what would be the right metrics and the wrong metrics. That I see as item number 3 or 4 or something, so I’m going to defer those assuming the subject will come back up.
Cheryl: Oh, yeah.
Alan: What I expect of myself, what I think as a NomCom representative representing North America, I do not include recruiting ALSes and things like that as one of my domains. We have a very active RALO and I have full confidence that that’s within their domain. On the other hand, I believe it’s my responsibility to keep in touch and work with the RALO when there are appropriate other aspects, whether it’s a policy aspect or an organizational issue that has to be done.
In terms of my own performance, I would expect myself to try to keep up with whatever issues are current depending on the stresses in one’s life and how busy things are. Sometimes one makes it, sometimes one doesn’t. We’ll come back later talking about expectations of others.
Normally we get very, very little mail on our mailing list of great substance, and it should be easy to keep up. If we were to have floods like we did yesterday in between meetings, we would be spectacularly successful in all ways if they all had substance. But we don’t in general, and my responsibility I think is to try to keep up and at least scan every e-mail, and when it’s appropriate give some sort of response. Sometimes the only response is “Sounds reasonable to me” or something like that. Sometimes it’s more substantive.
One of the challenges – and I find this in the role I’ve been playing as GNSO liaison – is a lot of the e-mail is of things that are not necessarily of great interest to me and often of a technical issue that are beyond my current knowledge. I used to be a technical person a long time ago – not in this world. Nevertheless, as GNSO liaison, I have to make sure this is not something that may be particularly relevant to ALAC or users in the long term, and I find I think one of my responsibility is to try to keep up to speed – that is you have to spend some time going… looking at background, talking to people who may be the expect in the issue, and finding out enough so that you can make a reasonable decision based on the constituency you’re representing. You know, as a NomCom rep, I don’t have that responsibility as much to the ALSes, but as the liaison I have it to the ALAC itself.
So I think pretty much everyone on the committee has to do that. I’m sympathetic when I hear others say that “This subject wasn’t of interest to me” or “I don’t really have the knowledge to comment on it,” but part of being on this committee is, in at least many of those instances, getting up to speed or at least talking to someone else in your region and making sure that one of you is getting up to speed on it. Otherwise I think people are doing a disservice, and I feel I would be doing a disservice to the organization if I didn’t at least try to do that. One doesn’t always succeed.
In terms of metrics, the metrics we have right now are dandy metrics. I do not believe any of them should lead to “Thou shalt resign at that point” or “Thou shalt be put before an Inquisition.” They’re good things to raise a flag there may be a problem. They’re not the only ones, as we’ve talked about. And I can give you again, an example – you said not to go into the past but I’ll go quickly into the past on one – the metric for me in the first time we reported to the last six months of generating GNSO liaison reports at the time of our monthly meeting was abysmal. Now I’ve sent out plenty of e-mails and other alerts on issues, but to be honest just before we got that first data 32.54, I decided to try again – so the timing was not as a result of the statistics if you look at it. It takes me 2 to 4 hours to generate those reports. Based on the amount of e-mail and comments I get, it’s not worth my time. And I’m not sure I’m going to continue with the level that I’ve been trying for the last three months because my time is a valuable thing and one doesn’t want to waste time by just throwing down into a bucket that just goes nowhere. And I’m sympathetic with everyone else in this committee who doesn’t want to waste time because they don’t think it’s going anywhere. And I think we need to look at that. When people aren’t performing, I want to be asked why am I not performing, and the rationale may not be what one expects. I’d like to think of myself and everyone else on this committee as rather intelligent, talented people – you got here, you must have something going. You impress somebody. And if people aren’t doing a reasonable job, certainly if it’s me, I expect someone to have the discussion.
Cheryl: Beau.
Beau: I see myself as having two responsibilities. One, the first primarily to the group who elected me, even though I ran unopposed. laughter It was sort of a sham election. See what happens in today’s election.
Male: Takes the wind out of that argument, doesn’t it?
Beau: No, I kind of like it.
Second is to my organization because they, you know, in essence, donate… Like many of us, I have a very, very busy professional schedule and my organization in essence donates time, but realizes that the issues discussed in these forums to some degree are of great import to consumers. So therefore I filter many issues through a prism that may make it seem like I’m not interested in issues like IPv4 to IPv6 transition or IDNs or other types of things like that, but that’s because those issues not important or on the table for American consumers. So I tend to try to focus on things that I’ve heard very directly from my experience are important to consumers – the fraud stuff, the enforcement things, the type of issues you’ve heard me talking about, you know, the RAA.
I would hope that performance can be… Well, I won’t get in… I guess we’re getting into that later.
I would like to say I think it was very helpful to me when a few months ago we began putting issues to votes. That is very helpful. I think that if we could do more of that rather than just, you know, the voting be for… In addition to voting for whether an ALS should be accredited or not, if we could do votes during remote times on issues that would be very helpful. The performance rules are difficult, I think. I would like to have the freedom to be able to participate in the ways that are best for me in many ways.
So I don’t know what else I can add at this point until we get to the other matters, so thank you.
Cheryl: Thank you, Beau. And I think that ending on the freedom to participate, so you’re giving the best set of skills that you bring, is something I think is very important to all of us.
Vanda.
Vanda: pause Okay. Sometimes I wonder what I’m doing here, but…
laughter
Female: inaudible 37.17
Cheryl: Oh, yeah.
Vanda: But what I… In some way, I just applied to come to At-Large because I was tired to hear from the Board that is this is something not so important, people don’t know what to do, and a lot of things that you are very aware about. And I think it’s… probably is not and something is wrong with this kind of things. And I cannot stay from that and just inaudible 38.07 and say, “Well, that’s it.” And so I decided to apply for that and I have a long discussion with the guy that appoint me, the group, George Sadowsky 38.25, about what they expected for someone to come here and do what. And I’m very glad to be here because I was right. You know, it’s not the external view. ALAC can do much more than the people and the community in ICANN really could understand and really expected.
So it’s our job now. And I believe this is a process. And as far as we improve a lot our contribution to the community, the community will realize the importance of to have internal support in any country of this world 39.29. And it’s like… ICANN is like a govern that ignores the people and sometimes they realize, “Wow, I need them, because without them I’m not a govern.”
So it’s something that… They are, in my opinion… I have a very long conversation with the people in the Board yesterday night and I believe they are starting to realize that is true – they needed the people to vote to that. So it’s become more and more important and I believe that we could contribute to make the representation of the user more and more important, and I believe that should be our matter 40.35 – how people are being recognized.
Cheryl: Sébastien.
Sébastien: Thank you. First of all, I would like to apologize for the interpreters, that I will speak in English even if I am French. I think… Because they told me, they asked me why, and it’s I think it’s important. I would like to tell you why I’m doing so. I think we need to strengthen our work and I think the best way to do that is to have a common language. And when I say “common language,” it’s not Australian, not New Zealand, not US, not English, it’s something in between of all that, something I can catch up and I can use it. That could be our common language, and it would be…
Female?: inaudible 41.31?
Sébastien: No, no, it’s based on English. But I think it’s important for the future, we maybe as a metrics we need… or as… when we have new people coming, it could be important to be sure that they will be able to work fully in English at our level, committee level.
I joined ALAC quite late in the process even if I followed this process since years. And I think it was the time to help, especially at the European level, to get on, to be ready, to have a RALO, and we had to help the people who were there since the beginning to do and finalize this task. It was done at the Lisbon meeting, and since that I am participating to this organization, and I think it’s a very important one for the overall ALAC. It’s one of the reasons I try to participate as much as I can and I try to put some ideas.
So one of the summit, for example, it’s for me one very important to the achievement of the first phase of the new ALAC. And as we are discussing the next phase, it’s really coming at the good moment. But that means that for our next three-four months, we will have a lot of things to do – to conduct the summit to a success and to conduct the ALAC to the next phase. I will try to do my best to help for that. Thank you.
Cheryl: Patrick. And I think it’s very important that we listen closely as someone who has recently been appointed and come in pretty much in the middle of this “Oh hell, look how measure ourselves?” moment, I’m looking forward to hearing your very honest views, please.
Patrick: Well, I was about to do that bit in French, but somehow Sébastien convinced me that maybe we should find a common language, so I will try to do that one in English.
As you know, I’ve been only for two months on the ALAC. First of all, I must say, and maybe this is something we should try to do in the future, I was a bit surprised that from one day to another suddenly there was some expectations that I was not really aware of. Although I’ve been, as you all know, active in ICANN in different contexts for several years, the work of the ALAC as such is not 44.37 a surprise for me. But for example, I was told… Well, I was elected on the 3rd of September, on the 9th I had my first teleconf – which is not in the spreadsheet, by the way.
Nick: We saw that.
laughter
Patrick: And… Well, just right in the middle of my core business hours, which means that… Well, I managed to participate. I managed to participate to the next. I’ll manage to participate to the other meetings. But it’s one factor that I had not taken into account when I applied for the election.
So I think that there is a need, especially for these people coming from the RALO side, that the RALO… that the ALAC informs the RALO what the expectations are, not only in terms of which profile should the candidate have which availability the candidate should have. Because we all know we are volunteers, we are doing a lot of unpaid work, and at the end of the day, when you have to set priorities, the priority will go to the one who is paying your salary, I guess. And I think it might be useful in the future to get that information back to the RALOs so that those applying for positions in ALAC are fully aware of what is expected from them.
This being said, I don’t think indeed that just having quantitative measures of who has attended the call, who went to an ICANN meeting, who voted ALS accreditation and so on is a good criteria. I mean, these things need to be done, but just like Fatimata said earlier, we are not experts on all matters. To be honest with you, I’m not a lawyer, I do not understand much about contracts, although the very basic thing that each party should do whatever is stated in the contract. But regarding relations between registries, registrars, registrants and so on, I 47.20 understand that it’s essential that registrants get a good service from registrars and so on, and this is a matter important for the ALAC. I’m not an expert, and so indeed on such a subject I don’t think I could provide very useful input. At the same time on other subjects like security which is more within my area of competence, I think I might contribute better.
And also as people coming from the RALO, there’s another part of our job which is to try to bring to the ALAC what is the feeling of our region. Again, just Beau mentioned earlier that the North American region is not very receptive to the whole IDN thing, which makes sense. In the same way, Europeans stand to prefer using ccTLDs and the whole thing about the new gTLDs is of minor importance. So again it’s difficult for us Europeans to come to the ALAC and say, “Well, the European region thinks that we should be doing this and that about gTLDs” because I don’t think we really have within the European RALO a critical mass to say that we have indeed a consensus about what we should do about such issues.
And this brings me to another point which is if you want to measure participation in the case of people coming from the RALO and the ALS background, part of our job is also to go back to our organizations and say, “What do you people think that I should bring forward at the ALAC?” Of course this is nowhere on the spreadsheet but it’s also a work we are doing for the ALAC.
So again, it’s I don’t think we ever manage to find objective criteria to measure who’s doing, who is performing, who is underperforming, and so… because there are so many circumstances that would allow or prevent you to participate on some points, but you will be maybe overparticipating on other points. So just to say that, well, we are not discussing yet Rule 21, but at that stage, I will point out that it’s very difficult to draft in the text how you should measure people.
Now if you ask what I think is my job, I would say that first of all it should be to try to get the feeling, try to get the consensus of the region I’m representing in some way, though I’m not sure whether that somehow… Although I could bring a European accent to the work of ALAC, I’m not strictly representing European interests within ALAC, just like – and this is maybe another debate we should have – an ALAC-appointed member to the Board of ICANN does not strictly represent ALAC. And it’s been the same way between the RALOs and ALAC, I think.
And so I think this is one part of my job. The other part of my job is trying to bring expertise in matters where I do have expertise and try to avoid occasioning chaos in matters in which I do not understand anything.
Cheryl: Thank you. Hawa, because you have just arrived, I will skip you. So you… maybe briefed perhaps by Patrick, because you have the mutual French language, on what we’re doing and I will go straight to Robert.
Robert: Good morning, everyone. I think this is an interesting session and I come I guess from a region that I see is kind of in a way…
Female: inaudible 52.26
Cheryl: Microphone. Go ahead.
Female: French – 52.33
Cheryl: Thanks. We note his apologies and offer him our best wishes in return. Go ahead, Robert.
Robert: Yeah. We’re just saying that to some it seems that the North American region perhaps is far more active than others, just to… But it’s just the issue of language, and I think it just makes us easier to participate in some things. And I know that I count on for me what is a very active NA RALO region. We meet quite often, once a month, but we also engage virtually very often as well. And so, you know, we try to be active.
In terms of kind of my activities and how I see that I could go better and some of the issues that I’ve had, in terms of the issues, I’ve just transitioned to a new position and one of my biggest challenges is that a large staff meeting of some 50-some people coincides between 9 to 11 o’clock in the morning, which is sometimes the time of our ALAC call. And, you know, some other calls as well too. So that is problematic because it’s a staff meeting that I can’t miss.
That being said, I think that, you know, I also had issues with my back earlier this year which has gotten better. And, you know, having more staff as well, my position is actually going to free me up to actually be more involved in internet governance issues, both here at ICANN and other related activities as well too. And having my staff being able to help me go through some of the documents and comment I think will be a good resource.
In terms of, you know, things that could be better, I think that in terms of the liaison position that I have, what I’ve tried to do for the SSAC is that the SSAC unfortunately meets a lot of times outside of ICANN meetings – at IETF meetings and at other meetings – and I’m not sure if the criteria used to measure my engagement in those meetings was counted or not. That might count for a lower kind of activity because I can’t go to these other meetings. What I have tried to do is… I’m spending half of my time in Toronto and in Washington. I’ve actually had the opportunity to meet up with Steve Crocker in person and some of the ICANN people in Washington as well to actually try to build links. I think one of the biggest challenges going forward that I’m going to try to address is the lack of linkages that we really have with some of the other constituencies and the ability to speak with some of the other stakeholders. That’s been difficult before because they’re not based in Toronto, and going forward I think that’s something that I want to try to do.
I think it’s been a bit of a challenge the first couple months of this year. I think I’ve tried to be as constructive and engaging as possible in some of the meetings. I think that perhaps I speak too much at the in-face meetings and not as much on the ongoing dialogue between meetings – so that’s something that I hope to address.
I also really would like to encourage… One thing I’m going to try to do is just for… Even though English is being mentioned as the common language, I think there are other regions, because I do speak other languages and I don’t necessarily as much with the French colleagues and the Spanish colleagues. Going forward I think that’s something that I’m going to try to do because I think that our voice is our diversity of opinions and we don’t have necessarily as much of that as we could have and getting more ALSes from the North American region involved.
I’ll stop with that.
Cheryl: Thank you. Carlos.
Interpreter: Thank you very much. Apart from the general consensus, I must say that I’ve always been a rather discordant voice and the voice of those who don’t agree, because there are some who are never agreeing. I do not wish to abandon my cause for multilingualism, but I believe and I must repeat that we are not all speaking the same language and we do not have the obligation to speak the language of those we are representing. We are representing users and very frequently, it would seem to me, and I have the feeling that we are not talking this language.
Sometimes it would seem to me that we are trying to defend the interests of those which we are not. We mention topics and subjects which do not interest the user, and that’s for two reasons. First of all, it doesn’t interest us, and if this is the case, and they invent 58.16 subjects and topics supposedly interesting for the users, when finally they are not of interest to the users. And we are not… Other sectors are of concern to others sectors. I must also add to be sincere that this task is not an easy one and I must be sincere and honest and say and confess that I’m trying to learn and I’m the 59.04 legitimate representative of users in my region. I’m a final user in my region, and like all users, we are learning what ICANN truly is. This has cost me two years to start to be conscious and aware and learn the mechanism and know the mechanism, and recently I’ve just started really to participate, and this because I wish to be sincere.
We’re trying to work very intensely in the region which I represent, is one of those which has developed most during the last two years and 13 the ALS which I established two or three years ago today has chapters in six countries and this is supposed to raise and increase participation. I think we have to encourage participation and this is the challenge for the coming year, both for this year and next year, without abandoning the challenge which I have brought along with me when I started with multilingualism. I’m not abandoning this challenge and I believe that these documents are not sufficient. That is the document that are translated are not sufficient, and we need to know and the documents in each of the languages of participants as much as possible. That’s not some documents because we know certain documents in the language which can be understood by the users but we do not know the antecedents of this document which has been translated because the antecedents have not been translated. I know that what I’m trying to raise seems to be a utopian affair, but I repeat that it becomes necessary that we get closer to the language of users. Very often, very frequently we mention topics and themes which concern ICANN and are of no interest to the user. So we do not have the feedback which we are looking for.
Now we’re trying to work in the region to change this situation, and that is why I have been the objective participation and I think that we are one of the regions with more ALSes. This week we have achieved 31, and we are now 31 ALS and it’s not all are participating by the fact that during the past… the… only 10 of the 31 have participated. But finally I have committed myself to the fact that this participation should increase and it will increase to the extent that we are talking the same language like the users and that the users know what we’re talking of and what it’s all about, and this is what we need and that is what we need – multilingualism and capacity building of the user or we go to the language, to the users’ language 03 topics we’re dealing with here and we have to show that these are of interest to the user.
Sometimes it would seem to me… Sometimes it seems to me, or I’m under the impression… Yesterday somebody said it, ALAC is only a committee, which has never been listened to, and when it takes decisions, we’re there just to render legitimate the resolutions which are adopted during the meeting. It would seem to me that this should not be so. When we talk of metrics, when we talk of our participation, it would seem to me… And I say that although… so that my work perhaps may reveal certain defects, I’m a full-time devotee, full-time working for users and the internet to the extent where I’m in a position to do so in our region, and I’m trying to do that here and to mention it here, we are trying to increase the users’ capacities.
And to sum up and in conclusion, I have two objectives which I’m not going to abandon – multilingualism, translation of documents, and, for the coming period, participation, more active participation of the ALSes in my region and a participation with more structures which are accredited in the region. Because there are many countries in my country, more than 30 which do not have any ALSes, which ignore the very existence of ICANN. And the very last thing, I believe that this participation should be done with no discrimination whatsoever. Discrimination will occur when we ignore the fact that the language is not the language we know and I therefore call on the fact that we do not… that we have free participation with no discrimination. And thank you for your attention.
Cheryl: Thank you, Carlos, and I hope you appreciate my indulgence, because that was a little longer than I would have liked. But the value of what you said has been heard.
José, you have a very concise moment or two.
José: 31 to 1.07.43
Interpreter: …to see the voice and to hear the voice of that represents as ALAC at ALAC. It is difficult, because my representatives do not represent many and at the same time I have to say I guess my personal opinion, because what I represent wanted me to say that I am carrying their voice and expressing their… Our objective is to ensure the participation of users, but this is rather difficult because the themes which we are discussing here are not interesting to users we represent. And each of the meetings of the ICANN when the community where the meeting is being held, the community does not participate. I’m talking of users, and the users do not participate because the topics we are discussing are not interesting to them. And to us, we must try to find a form or a way, some method of making them participate.
Now as to the measures or the system which is being proposed here, they’re not very attractive, I must say, and I do not think that they are the ideal measures or criteria to be used. There is a minimum of criteria and objectives which must be achieved so that we try to solve the problem of the lack of participation of certain people, because we’re all volunteers. But even as volunteers, we are all professional, we are people who are suppos-… we are civilized people who are supposed to accomplish the work for which we have been selected or elected and we have to do that.
Now in conclusion I wish to say that for the question of multilingualism, very frequently it’s not only a question of change of language, because Carlos and I, we are jurists, we are legal experts, and we have no opinion on these issues. But for questions which are of interest to us, questions 43 legal questions of participation, North American participation, or is based… we have our own system but it’s difficult and we wish to express the point which interests us. It’s not a question of doing it in another language or in our language, it’s a question of different cultures. So it’s not only another language but also another culture we’re expressing. Thank you.
Cheryl: Thank you. And I appreciate the fact that we need to be very cognisant of language and culture, whilst are interrelated, are indeed very, very different things.
Hawa, you’re the last to share with us, and I trust Patrick has given you a briefing on what it is we are doing in this roundtable. And then Nick wants to make a clarification. Go ahead, Hawa. pause
Hawa… Oh, okay. I have to repeat the question. What we are doing, as you may have heard since you’ve joined us, is sharing not a looking-backwards but a looking-forward “My expectations for someone in my role is…” and “These types of measures” – be they quantitative or qualitative – “are appropriate for that type of role.” So what do you see an AFRALO representative doing here in the ALAC and how perhaps that could measured? And if you do not wish to answer because you haven’t been in the whole of this exercise, I understand and will accept that.
26 to 1.12.49
Interpreter: Thank you, Cheryl. In actual fact, I’ve listened and… I was given a summing and I’ve listened to the other speakers and I am really involved. But I have a small idea. Yes, thank you. pause I have a small idea regarding my roles as a member elected to ALAC for the At-Large group. On this point, I think that in spite, we are a specific region, we are a 36 which has its own problems and its advantages and very different from the other regions, and the participation is different. Our participation is also different.
The role which I’m going to play here is to insist on multilingualism. I am very proud of having interpretation here today. At the beginning I insisted and I came, like many people I was like in an ocean where there were no French speakers, but I’ve insisted and today I have the interpretation that is 13 of that in the Francophone inaudible African community but all the French-speaking communities because today we are able to communicate and we have a possibility of making our voices heard today.
So with the problem of communication which is improving from one year to the other, the most important thing which I hope to see in our region of Africa is to promote to the accreditation of ALSes because our ALSes are the least or the minimum number of ALSes in the other regions and that’s what I wish to work for. And the communication between ICANN and Africa and with the increase of the number of ALSes, we can have more final users.
And in conclusion, what I’d ask, since we all come from different cultures, to be patient and tolerant so that the newcomers should not be 37. We are very easily intimidated by the participation of… I can’t find the right word, but for the newcomers we are intimidated – I don’t know whether others would confirm that – and we’re at a loss at the beginning. So please be patient with us so that the others can learn and can play the role they’re supposed to play. Thank you.
Cheryl: Okay. Thank you, Hawa. And if we had to have some key words there, it’s a matter of enabling and facilitating and supporting and now making happen all of what I’ve heard here today, which has a focus in two directions. It’s clear from the notes I’ve taken that your telling me that your roles both sit within the At-Large Advisory Committee and within your RALOs and/or region. In the case of the NomCom, depending on the region you’re coming from, you see yourself as an integral part even of ALS development. In other regions, you see yourself as acting perhaps in the more purist Nominating Committee role for your region, but there is still a task that you believe is one that includes integrations of 57 and working with the region and the ALSes there.
Thank you very much for that. I have in fact looked at what we’ve done and I think to some extent we’ve done 3 and 4 together, but we need to just tease out a little tiny bit more on how we would measure these qualitative as opposed to quantitative things. And let me just do something first, which is to bring quite firmly where I think we should head with an in-depth discussion of the 32 of the proposed changes to Rule 21. So if I could have your attention please? sound of paper ripping
Alright? Now having dealt with the proposed changes to Rule 21, we have discussed… – oh, I do apologize – here a number of key 50. Our measurements go both ways – our activities here, our activities in our regions. But we also need to have some form of measurable, but it may be that we need to look at what we are doing in our role as a liaison, for example, with the group we are liaising to, and meeting metrics are not just the only way to do that.
Carlos, I need to give the floor for just one moment to Nick because you raised a couple of points which he felt needed to be clarified about background, I believe, was it, in different languages? Is that the case?
Nick: Yeah.
Cheryl: Go ahead.
Nick: Just as a point of clarification, especially for newer members, I wouldn’t want you not to know, the original ALAC Rules of Procedure which are the current rules are actually available in the five UN languages on the Rule of Procedure page. If you like, I can later send you that link, Carlos, but I just… That’s obviously without prejudice to any comment you make, I just didn’t want anyone who is more comfortable working in another language not to know that those are available.
Cheryl: As we move into this, in my opportunity to speak with… and because we need to talk about liaisons here as well, in my opportunity to speak with the other leaders of the groups that you all liaise to, many of them have said to me they would like to simply be able to know that they are able to communicate with us in a number of ways – chair to chair, via a staff mode, via the liaisons – on a number of matters that a free-flow of information occurs in a number of ways. But that in terms of how satisfied they are on how or who we have sent to them can be measured is often best a quan-… sorry, a qualitative response such as “Has performed beyond expectations, “Is an important part of my committee,” “Is more than satisfactory,” “Is very much suitable,” “Would be more helpful,” or “I am more than happy to have back next year or in two years’ time.”
I actually think we can simply seek the advice of some of the other leadership roles, the other chairs on how our liaisons are performing. I think that is possibly an ideal qualitative measure. And so what I’d like to do now is ask each of you… And I’m actually going to wind this up very, very quickly. I gather… Nick, can you check… 11 o’clock we have our… we’ve got the Board in at 11? There’s been no change?
Nick: 10:30.
Cheryl: We’ve got the Board in at 10:30.
Vanda: In 10 minutes.
Cheryl: Okay, thank you. What I think we need, having heard that we want qualitative not quantitative, even some of the quantitative stuff, something like of you do not attend three ALAC meetings in a row, that’s nearly a quarter of your year. That’s I would have thought a serious concern, but that’s different if you have sought leave, that’s different if you have clearly been working on the working groups and everything else. So I think whatever we come up with – and I’m going to suggest this needs to be taken off line because we just don’t have time, and perhaps we can reconvene after the Board leaves on this matter, if you are happy to do so, okay, because we can’t cloud the Board time – I’d like to see some five or more of the following are suitable, not every single one of the following are suitable, that we also measure in some way the work that’s being done in your region so that your regional people feel that they’re getting value out of you here.
Who would be interested in forming a during-this-meeting ad hoc group to actually work out some of what I’ve seen in Izumi, the work Izumi put together, that says, “When things have gone wrong, how we go” but “How are we going to measure when things have gone wrong”? Who would like… I’d like to think of one person at least from each region. Who would like to perhaps pen this…? Alan, you I would have thought would have a fair amount, because you’ve put a lot of work into…
Alan: I’m not sure I know exactly what you’re saying yet.
Cheryl: Metrics. How are we going to write down metrics? For example, failure to attend three meetings in a row, you ask a question why. But that three meetings in a row if you sought leave is different.
Alan: Okay. You’re saying can we identify what the criteria are including qualitative ones…
Izumi?: For intervention.
Alan: …to…
Cheryl: For intervention.
Alan: …that require intervention.
Cheryl: Yeah.
Alan: Yes. I will certainly participate if you ask me to.
Cheryl: I would very much like to ask you. I’d also like to ask Fatimata. Who’s g-… Are you saying yes or no? laughter I’m not sure what to do, Carlos. The head was going in two directions.
Carlos: 32
Interpreter: In spite of the opinion which I’ve already expressed, now if we should 43 Rule 21, one month is not going to be sufficient to discuss it, and therefore to be precise, this is a process. And the participation and the right of defence if we are accused, this is a process which does not come to an end after a discussion of a half an hour or an hour. That’s what I think.
Cheryl: That… Sorry, Carlos. That is exactly our point. Would you be interested in working in an ad hoc working group to establish a set of draft of measurables? Yes or no? Yes. Thank you.
Yes, Robert?
Robert: I don’t wish to volunteer but I would support Carlos that at least a lawyer should be on there, because I think it would be useful. We don’t have too many lawyers, and not that I want to make this too complex but I think their perspective in terms of defending other people would be useful.
Cheryl: Thank you. I hesitate to offer myself, but at the same time I really do think I have an enormous interest in this because any intervention that is going to be required if it fails in the earlier days will come to the chair, so I will put my hand up for Asia Pacific. I now call for someone from Europe. How about the new kid in camp? Patrick?
Patrick: 16
Cheryl: Well, it’s all very nice to put people in when they’re not here, but I don’t think that’s appropriate. Patrick?
Patrick: When do we have to inaudible?
Cheryl: Probably, you know, from in the bar on now, you know, just during this time and keep on going.
Patrick: 32 …we still have to deliver a statement on the ALAC inaudible.
Cheryl: Yes. Mic.
Patrick: Oh yes. Yes, sorry. So I was just asking when are we going to do that because we are still working on the statement on the ALAC review which I should be 54 today, so…
Cheryl: No, no, no. The ALAC review has till the 13th of December.
Patrick: 13th of December? Okay. So we can take that off-line on the mailing list.
Alan?: You did ask for something out of this meeting.
Patrick: Yeah.
Cheryl: This, our of this meeting, yes. That’s right.
Patrick: No, but we first agreed to have something today.
Cheryl: Yes. That is unachievable before today still, but we have to agree. Group of people, the Board is about to arrive, we stop this conversation. When they leave, we can restart this conversation if you need any more, but we are going to have to allocate an ad hoc working group. Are you interested in representing Europe on that?
Patrick: Well, yes, I provisionally accept.
Cheryl: Provisionally accept, thank you. laughter Sorry? Where am I? Oh, sorry. I didn’t see Evan. Go ahead, Evan.
Evan: I know I haven’t been part of the first round and that’s probably just as well. I just want to stand back and ask why we’re going along with all this move with the assumption that new rules, new regulations, new wording needs to be done when we haven’t even examined if the status quo has been implemented properly. I think there’s a lot of opportunity for the use of discretion and the application of qualitative measures and things like that, and I’m just wondering if we’re spending time that we should be spending on policy, spinning our wheels as opposed to making an existing system work the way it should rather than reinventing something.
Cheryl: Let me respond to that. The existing system and the existing rules calls for metrics which when we measure them are clearly faulted because they talk about number of meetings attended in certain periods of months, and number of votes you have or have not put a vote in for. They are the metric we produced. The hue and cry there is two-fold – they both are unfair and they are both inaccurate and not appropriate as a measure.
Yes, go ahead, Alan. Sorry.
Alan: “I missed one of the metrics. I resign. Can I go home now?” pause I’m pointing out that the current metrics, as simple as they are, are not implementable according to the words, so we need something… 01
Evan: But they also do not require resignation upon not meeting them. There’s a process of consultation, there’s a process that exists right now that if somebody doesn’t meet them, there’s a consultation, there’s a process that can be done to deal with that.
Alan: No, there isn’t. It says if you don’t meet them, the chair advises you to quit, and if you don’t quit, they talk to whoever appointed you to get you out.
Evan: Okay. And I guess I still have a problem understanding why that doesn’t work. Because…
Cheryl: Evan, it’s not working. It’s just not working. pause
We know who our ad hoc committee are. We are now awaiting the members of the Board. Please, can we assure that we have the table dynamics appropriate. We’ve got Thomas already here. Who else we expecting, Thomas?
Thomas: Dennis and Jean-Jacques, I believe.
Vanda: Jean-Jacques is…
Cheryl: Jean-Jacques? Jean-Jacques’s lurking up there 08.
Vanda: overtalking …in some way… overtalking
Cheryl: Come on in! Okay.
Male: inaudible
Cheryl: Can we bring that up, please? I don’t have it in front of me. I have no idea where it is. Nick?
Vanda: Nick is…
Cheryl: Whilst we’re waiting for the Board members to arrive, any of you who wishes to go and grab a cup of coffee and bring it back in, do so now. It needs to be a fast one.
Vanda: Yeah.
Nick: 44
Male: Good morning, Cheryl.
Cheryl: Good… Please. I know. I’m busting. Believe me, I would like to have had the break too.
Nick: I don’t even remember inaudible.
Cheryl: Good morning. How are you?
01 to 1.34.48
Cheryl: …on new metrics for our accountability. We have an ad hoc working group now being formed, and we obviously have a great deal more discussion to go on, but it was essential that everybody had the opportunity to take a short break, and I do thank you for the indulgence you’ve shown us by delaying the beginning of our meeting for some…
End of Audio