Stockholm, Wednesday 13 June 2012, 18:15 - 20:15 CEST at the Conference City Center, Room 401
Summary Notes
Wolf Open the GA in the eve of EuroDIG in Stockholm expressing his hope that for the next 2013 GA meeting EURALO would count with institutional funding.
Roll call – Attendees: Veronica Cretu ind. member Moldavia; Sandra Hoferichter and Wolfgang Kleinwächter, Medienstadt Leipzig, Germany; Avri Doria, ind. member Sweden; Yuliya Morenets, TaC France; Oksana Prykhodko, Media Platform, Ukraine - Secretariat; Olivier MJ Crepin-Leblond, ind. member UK - ALAC Chair; Yrjö Länsipuro, ISOC Finland; Wolf Ludwig, Comunica-ch - Chair. Delayed arrival: Sébastien Bachollet, ISOC and e-Seniors France.
Remote participants: Rudi Vansnick, ISOC Belgium; Eric Tomson, ISOC Wallonia; Manuel Schneider, Wikimedia Austria and Switzerland.
Apologis: Christopher Wilkinson, ISOC Wallonia; Bill Drake, ind. member Switzerland.
We have a guest Constantine Rusu from Moldavia, and hoping to have the first application from Moldavia.
Rudi had to cancel the Stockholm participation in person but we have him in the AC.
Apologies from Christopher. His ALS is present remotely through Erick.
3. Confirmation of the assembly quorum
As there was no formal voting foreseen for today's GA – except approval of the agenda and the Board report – no quorum was needed.
4. Adoption of the Proposed Agenda
Adopted.
5. Adoption of Minutes from last 29 May 2011 GA in Belgrade.
The detailed minutes by OCL were adopted.
Part B
Proposed Agenda Items
6. Discussions and Adoption of EURALO Board Report June 2011-2012
Wolf gave a short summary, asked all to take a look at the monthly updates in English and even in Russian.
ALAC Representation - Recap
We will know by the end of August who will be the new European At-Large representative selected by the NomCom.
3 EURALO Representatives in At - Large.
3. Initiatives: Highlights. Sandra came up with ICANN Academy proposal.
Avri contributes essentially to the curriculum. In 2 weeks there will be a discussion in Prague.
Recently selected MAG members at the Internet Governance Forum (IGF) and EURALO members: Bill Drake, Veronica Cretu and Yuliya Morenets.
EURALO was one of the founding members of the EuroDIG in 2008 and became one of its carrier organizations representing civil society and Internet users.
Board Report: Representation of EURALO in EuroDIG was increased in the past few years being a strong part of its core team incl. Secretariat.
Discussion should focus on point 4 – Outreach and In-reach and related problems.
There are new ALS joining EURALO.
2 from Ukraine
One application from France, Austria, which makes a total of 31 ALS.
Regarding decertification, we need to do something about this ("dead ducks").
We have a common goal: To have one ALS per country. It is challenging in Europe, Asia and Africa. This is a long-term goal and vision.
Finding new members is a question of outreach, keeping them is a question of in reach.
For constant In-reach you cannot simply count on online participation, we have instruments at our disposal such as conference calls. We have to think and reflect on opportunities.
There is a gap between At-Large members level, regularly participating at ICANN meetings, and "ordinary" member ALS lacking such incentives and regular involvement.
These are the factors stressed in the Board Report and discussed in detail during the GA:
Yrjo: We should make an effort to make institutions more interested in becoming ALS.
We have two main channels in EURALO. In Germany more of the ALS involved are mobilized in Internet issues.
There are options to reach out to more Wikimedia chapters (besides Austria and Switzerland) as well as to other ISOC chapters. Some other target groups were mentioned such as senior communities etc.
Wolf mentioned that Intellectual property would be one of the hot issues in the next years. There are lots of barriers from the Private sector to abuse intellectual property to impede open access.
This is one of the hot topics in the next 2-3 years; this may mobilize new people from the younger generation. For example ACTA, which was not known a year ago, it came up, we had huge demonstrations in countries. These are the new social movements of the digital age. When we say we represent Internet users in the broader sense, we need to take into account. We do not need convincing the convinced – only but should reach out to broader parts in our societies.
Being open includes individuals in a more systematic manner. After EURALO modified its Bylaws in this respect last year, our plans to create a "home" ALS for individual members needs to be implemented. This was noted as a priority Action Item for 2012 - 13.
EURALO Officers and Board - See report and EURALO Workspace.
7. Approved funding for the GA 2013.
We are in the lucky position to prepare for next year, to have a face-to-face GA. But we will not just do it as we did it the previous years. We should discuss and develop a concept how we can organize and conduct a more attractive agenda for our members, besides the regular GA requirements. A org. team needs to be created for this, starting in spring 2013 and being composed of people investing some time for this preparatory work.
Veronica from Moldova: Some questions:
1.- Long-term vision of EURALO in terms of quality/quantity
2.- Euralo should position itself as an entity.
3.-How often do we ask for feedback from ALS?
4.-How often ALS report to EURALO?
There should be a strategy, for those who are in place for EURALO can be even more valuable.
Wolf: How to attract new ones and keep the ones involved.
Wolf recalled the ALS Survey 2010.
Wolf: Design of the last survey was the wrong one (top-down, bird perspective and concentrating to much on institutional issues). Wolf asked to be smarter on the design of such surveys.
Main problem is the lack of responsiveness. We must extract from our (inner circle) priorities. Platforms like EURALO and EuroDIG are not a priority in the daily lives of our members. And our mailing list as a main communication channel is not sufficient for inter-active exchanges.
OCL: Problem faced by all regions. It is hard to keep up with all that is going on. Especially with regards to technical issues. It is important to promote the idea of the Working Groups, members do not need to read everything that has taken place.
OCL: There are beginners guides which have been written. He has a concern that even the first message will not go through. The input has been very little as to what the ALS wish to know.
OCL: We have had 2 chances to see if face-to-face meetings have generated more involvement (capacity building programs and GAs for AFRALO and LACRALO). This is something that its being understood by ICANN. It is a long process. The demands and requests for funding have to be made.
Avri: There is no need to meet face-to-face. Without the bottom up interest nothing is going to happen.
Yro: There are too many issues in ICANN, we are trying to do too much.
Let's invent a mechanism for remote participation. Remote conferencing.
There are other types of communities: Wikipedia/Wikimedia, they are different in socialization. You have the immigrants and native, and native are more used to online.
OCL: People having a similar view on things. The problem we are faced with is one when we encourage diversity, it is hard to integrate people with different background, they are not all techs, or not lawyers. Problem: Communications. Speaking on the phone is difficult. Interaction outside the meeting space is highly beneficial. OCL hopes that the slope will not be a deep one. OCL suggested smaller working groups face-to-face.
ICANN meetings help people understand the meetings and what goes on, the effect of people going to ICANN meetings makes them believe they can make a difference.
Eric Tomson: Official statement from my ALS : in general, everyone's participation in EURALO has not been passive ; with ISOC-ECC, EURID, etc. it is sometimes difficult to make additional time ; within the limits of At-Large influence over ICANN, EURALO and ALAC seem to be doing the best job available. So we support Olivier, Wolf, Oksana, et al.
Eric Tomson: Personal statement : nothing replaces face-to-face meetings. I wouldn't imagine a world where people NEVER meet personally.
Veronica: Working Groups: Diversity comes with a set of different values which makes things complicated but also very interesting.
Briefing on 10 year ALAC Anniversary.
OCL briefly mentioned the Anniversary event.
AI : Next GA will be organized in a different way.
AI: Start discussion on possibility to create Working groups.
At 20:15 CEST the 2012 GA was resolved.
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