Hi all, I couldn't agree more with Bill, and with the comments made by Avri, Matthew, and James. While I am not as knowledgeable about the entire process and its auxiliary effects, I recognize the points raised by Kathy in particular and hope more collaboration, open dialogue, and continued efforts to increase transparency and accountability will ease such doubts, which are understandably merited. It is also important to explicitly affirm that there is still much work to do, even after the transition. As a U.S. citizen, I also find the further politicization of the process disadvantageous and frustrating. Yes, oversight and respectful disagreement or challenging is of course encouraged and necessary, but it should not be used as a political tool to further antagonize the Obama administration or delay the process to wait for a government that is deemed more favorable or ideologically aligned to certain interests, especially when the elected officials raising their concerns about the transition -- to my knowledge and please correct me if I am wrong -- have not been involved in the process. Idealistic at best or or hopelessly ignorant and naive at worst, we as the NCSG are better than petty politics. The implications for the multistakeholder process as well as the perceived affront to existing promises about U.S. government oversight represent too great of a threat to me. Best, -Michael __________________ Michael J. Oghia Istanbul, Turkey Journalist & editor 2015 ISOC IGF Ambassador Skype: mikeoghia Twitter <https://www.twitter.com/MikeOghia> *|* LinkedIn <https://www.linkedin.com/in/mikeoghia> On Wed, May 25, 2016 at 11:42 AM, William Drake <[log in to unmask]> wrote: > Hi > > I strongly disagree that a delay will not help anyone. It will very much > help the governments of China, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Iran, et al to > convince some of the vast number of developing and transitional country > governments that have been on the fence that the whole multistakeholder > enterprise is just window dressing for US hegemony and that they now must > urgently explore every national and multilateral option to strengthen their > ‘cybersovereignty’ and insulation from the dreaded GAFA etc. The > transition fails, we will be dealing with massive ripple effects across > multiple issue spaces for years to come. There are geopolitical reasons > NCUC members have advocated the US giving up its role since at least a > decade ago in the WSIS meetings. The hope was to 'remove the target' so > governments could maybe focus instead on ways to deal with real issues that > impact access to and use of the Internet. The ‘delay’ makes the target > much much bigger, and if somehow the US political process manages to make > Il Donald the president, the target will grow by orders of magnitude and > fragmentation will become an ever more relevant concern. I guess I > shouldn’t complain since I live in Geneva and might get to attend lots more > bitterly divided UN meetings etc, so can keep as busy as a Beltway Bandit. > > Anyway, here’s the link to the letter from Rubio and four other Republican > senators saying that the US should retain control until after the election. > http://www.rubio.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?a=files.serve&File_id=96B86CF4-58BE-4E5A-A20A-C9D3D9A0A7CE > > > Cheers, > > Bill > > > On May 25, 2016, at 08:33, James Gannon <[log in to unmask]> wrote: > > I agree delay is not going to help anyone, ‘testing’ the plan will bring > us nowhere as the very powers that people have concerns over and wish to > test will likely not be used in any reasonable testing period. We will > likely not have to spill the board, file community IRPs against ICANN or > take recourse to the California courts, and to insinuate otherwise is > playing to the people who like to hear the media spin reels around the > transition. > > Our proposal is sound, is based in strong governance and law, and is ready > to be executed. We either believe in the ability of the community to build > design and execute or we don’t. > > I do. > > -James > > > > > On 25/05/2016, 06:55, "NCSG-Discuss on behalf of Dorothy K. Gordon" < > [log in to unmask] <[log in to unmask]> on behalf > of [log in to unmask] <[log in to unmask]>> > wrote: > > There will always be issues that can be used to avoid the transition. > Delay is really not going to help in this case. I believe delay will kill > this, and we will look back with regret if it does not go forward now. > best regards > DG > > ----- Original Message ----- > From: "Ron Wickersham" <[log in to unmask] <[log in to unmask]>> > To: [log in to unmask] <[log in to unmask]> > Sent: Wednesday, May 25, 2016 5:11:00 AM > Subject: Re: great opening statement by Brett > > i'm not convinced that going slow is any kind of attempt to kill the > transistion. i share the concerns Ed and Kathy have enumerated, and > am extremely uncomfortable with the important items that were shuffled > off into workstream 2 just to get these contentious and very important > issues off the table. dividing the work up is ok, but get the whole > work stream parts 1 and parts 2 and if need be parts 3 and 4 resolved > before the actual transition. > > as both a NCUC and NCSG member as well as a USA citizen, i don't see > how my representatives can approve a half-finished plan where the > stakeholders have not resolved important issues -- the only thing > the stakeholders have addressed is how to divide the work into two > streams and agreed on the first part only. > > not every one who shares these same concerns is a USA citizen, these > concerns are not US centric at all. and with the change in leadership > of ICANN in the middle of the process affects the continuity of the > deliberations and adds additional uncertinty. > > i'm on the side of proceeding more slowly. a finished good plan that > is agreed (really a compromise) between all stakeholders will stand on > its own merit and will succeed. > > by overloading with too many separate, sometimes overlapping, groups > makes it impossible for Non-commercial volunteers to participate in > all the important steps. still we can recognize if the final plan > is insufficient to address our valid interests, so we have to see the > end product to adequately judge our position. > > -ron > > > > ************************************************************* > William J. Drake > International Fellow & Lecturer > Media Change & Innovation Division, IPMZ > University of Zurich, Switzerland > [log in to unmask] (direct), [log in to unmask] (lists), > www.williamdrake.org > *The Working Group on Internet Governance - 10th Anniversary Reflections* > New book at http://amzn.to/22hWZxC > ************************************************************* > >