EURALO FY18 Outreach Strategic plan

FY17 in review

In FY17, as in previous years, EURALO concentrated its related activities on:

• The annual EuroDIG events all over Europe (including sending 5 members of EURALO to the 2017 EuroDIG in Tallinn;
• The annual ICANN Studienkreis meetings in Europe;
• The European Summer School on Internet Governance (EuroSSIG) in Meissen/Germany in which several members are involved;  
• National IGF initiatives (Germany, Switzerland, France, UK and Ukraine); 
• Sending a representative to RightsCon in Brussels – funded outside the terms of the CROPP due to our late action on filing for CROPP. 

These Outreach opportunities focused primarily on identifying potential new members (ALSes or individuals), discussions about EURALO and At-Large. In many cases we spoke to potential candidates, distributed EURALO flyers and encouraged them to participate.

It has been particularly challenging to recruit new ALSes. Whilst Europe has plenty of organisations that might qualify as an At-Large Structure, the focus of activity in Europe leaves little or no interest for Internet Identifier issues that are the primary focus in ICANN. Whilst performing outreach, our teams on the ground have been very clear with potential applicants about ICANN’s limited remit and did not pursue organisations that had neither the interest, bandwidth, nor scope to be actively involved with ICANN’s policy development. As a result, our progress in terms of ALS growth has been modest. On the other hand, the region has experienced tremendous growth in its individual membership which are encouraged to join the purpose-built ALS, the EURALO Individuals Association. Notably, EURALO CROPP funded travellers included a number of individual users and we are seeing this approach paying off with an increase in the direct involvement of these individuals – particularly in policy work, which should be the main aim for outreach.

We are well aware that there are many more events and Outreach opportunities in the region every year but we had / have to deal with our limited capacities. And not every EURALO member has properly understood so far that Outreach is not only a regular task for the leadership but should be a commitment for everyone. EURALO members are EURALO’s ambassadors! We are working to get this message more widely understood and sink in mentalities but this takes time.

Coordination with our regional VPs Jean-Jacques Sahel and Mikhail Yakushev has improved. In addition, we have received support from ICANN staff Adam Peake and his ongoing input has been sought in identifying more European-wide conferences where EURALO could perform outreach, either using an already locally present EURALO ALS or individual members, or using CROP funding.

Strategy for FY18

With EuroDIG running its own fellowship program, emphasis on participation at EuroDIG for CROP slots has decreased but is still present. The RALO leadership is identifying other potential events to participate in using CROP, starting with an event called "re:publica, The 2017 instance of which took place in early summer in Berlin/Germany, became the biggest conference and fair on Internet politics in Europe with over 9,000 participants -- see: https://re-publica.de/en/about-republica.

This was already our aim for FY17 but unfortunately we missed CROPP slot deadlines, thus ended up sending all 5 CROPP slot travellers to EuroDIG. In FY18 we’ll make sure our CROP filing is done on time.

In FY18, EURALO will focus on the following events:

• EuroSSIG 2017 – http://www.eurossig.eu – we have not asked CROP for this and are not planning to ask for CROP, as we are using this opportunity to perform outreach, funded from another source. Outreach at the Summer School has been very successful.
• re:publica – 2-4 May 2018 https://re-publica.de/en/about-republica - we will ask for CROP slots for this.
• EuroDIG 2018 – June 2018 http://www.eurodig.org – we are likely to ask for a limited number of CROP slots for this. One challenge is that EuroDIG 2018 will take place in Tbilisi, Georgia which is currently located in the APRALO region. We have already started discussions with European Regional VPs to resolve this problem. In fact, ICANN regions might change by this date.
• SEEDIG 2018 – http://www.seedig.net/ likely to be in June 2018, back to back with EuroDIG – thus we could use CROP slots, provided the Region classification problem is resolved, as for EuroDIG.
• RightsCon – https://www.rightscon.org/  in North America this year, thus no possibility to send anyone, but we’ll monitor future RightsCon conferences that will take place in Europe.
• CDPD - Computers, Privacy and Data Protection - http://www.cpdpconferences.org/  Next year to take place in Brussels, 24-26 January 2018
• Internet Governance Week Brussels (2017 edition was on : https://ec.europa.eu/digital-single-market/en/blog/internet-governance-week-brussels-23-25-january-2017 )
• Eastern European DNS Forum - https://www.eednsforum.org/en/  12-13 October 2017 in Minsk, Belarus.

As in previous years, the challenge in identifying suitable venues comes from the variety of languages spoken in Europe. There are therefore few suitable European-wide conference that could offer the same access to potential ALSes as EuroDIG.

ALS Read-Out Session

This year RALOs may apply for funds for outreach activities (see: https://community.icann.org/display/CRALO/RALO+Requests+for+Funding+to+support+an+Outreach+Activity). Requests for room rental, catering, etc. may be requested.

Read-Out sessions may be held in any region following an ICANN Meeting. They are used to raise awareness of the results of an ICANN meeting to a particular audience. Any EURALO ALS could hold an ALS Read Out Session and invite its members or the public to discuss the results of the most recent ICANN Meeting. EURALO will launch a process in time to suggest an ALS Read Out Session immediately after the ICANN AGM (ICANN 60)

Collaboration

Collaboration with the local Regional Internet Registry has been until now through the annual EuroDIG. Indeed, EURALO is a EuroDIG partner and so is RIPE. This year, after years of planning and discussions to strengthen this bond, EURALO will be signing a bilateral agreement with RIPE based on a MoU similar to those signed by other RALOs with their Regional Internet Registry. This will open the door to opportunities to perform outreach at RIPE meetings.

Task Force on ALS Engagement

Most significantly in EURALO's strategy, EURALO has created a Task Force on ALS Engagement focussing on our already existing ALSes. With many ALSes not offering their full participation in EURALO activities, this Task Force has been studying the reasons for this low participation and methods to increase participation. Outreach does not only take place by recruiting new At-Large Structures, but also by recruiting more active members amongst the At-Large Structures - bearing in mind an ALS has more than just one member. A survey of ALS and member expertise has been undertaken, using personalised emails and follow-up to build an extensive database of membership skills.

The concept for a personalised seeking of policy commenting input was tested for two public consultation. The results are a qualified success, resulting in two ALAC policy Statements being drafted:

• Draft Framework of Interpretation for Human Rights
  • Sent to 3 ALSes and a response from 3 (100% response rate)
  • https://atlarge.icann.org/advice_statements/9985
  • Revised ICANN Procedure for Handling WHOIS Conflicts with Privacy Law: Process and Next Steps
    • Sent to 13 ALSes and a response from 9 (70% response rate)
    • https://atlarge.icann.org/advice_statements/9983

The EURALO Task Force on ALS Engagement will continue monitoring the ICANN policy consultation process and select future consultations on other topics to further refine the process of member consultation.

In the long term, this goes one step closer to the designing of an automated system that would perform such targeted requests as part of a Policy Management Process System, as described in the ATLAS II recommendations.