[CPWG] Calif. AG mentions ALAC advice in note to ICANN re: PIR

[Evan Leibovitch]

On Sun, 10 May 2020 at 13:56, Olivier MJ Crépin-Leblond <ocl at gih.com> wrote:

I should add that the California Attorney General makes a direct reference
> to the ALAC's Advice as well as the ISOC Chapter Advisory Council letter,
> the letter signed by 824 non-profits etc.
> So how could the California Attorney General refer to the ALAC's advice
> that's allegedly "against the overwhelming opinion of the public"?
>

Simple. Because the ALAC final advice did not match its rationale. It said
that the sale was OK if certain conditions were met, while the rationale
pointed to outright rejection. Using the same premises, ALAC came to one
conclusion while the rest of the world (including the CA AG) came to
another.

Now, it has been argued (sometimes privately) that the conditions to be met
for approval in the ALAC advice were impossible to achieve given the
history of Ethos' responses. So then why play these obfuscation games?
Instead of advice that can be twisted and misinterpreted by bad actors, why
not be clear, as the EFF and NTEN and CA AG were? Roberto has explained
elsewhere what happened -- that the preferred advice was outright rejection
but an inferior path was chosen for various political reasons. What is
surprising that this admittedly inferior path went through ALAC without a
single abstention or dissenting vote.

Many long time observers of ALAC advice will see that it often is more
> mitigated than correspondence from other more focussed communities that act
> in unison. That is a direct consequence of the variety we have in our
> communities, both geographical and cultural - and I like to see it this way.
>

On most of the issues on which ALAC gives an opinion, whether it's in sync
with the outside world or not can't be measured because the outside world
just doesn't care. However, the ISOC/Ethos issue offered clear and visible
examples of public sentiment and coverage by the mainstream press worldwide
as well as a volume of comments to ICANN. Yet ALAC knew better and derived
a different conclusion from the same premises. And you're arguing that this
sense of superiority comes from ... better diversity?

You might have something of a point had there been a process of surveying
the public, or at very least ALS members, to determine the actual sentiment
"out there" in a way that would accurately direct (or at least inform)
ALAC's policymakers. Not only was this not done in the Ethos case, but
comments that did come in to ICANN were summarily dismissed and the word
"public" was used in quotes -- simply because many of the objections came
through an automated form.

In the absence of consideration of actual public sentiment, it's just a few
dozen self-appointed experts fabricating an opinion on behalf of the world.
I assert that it's the role of ALAC to accurately reflect what the end-user
community wants, not just to make stuff up based on its own biases --
diverse or not. In its deliberate ignorance and dismissal of public
sentiment, ALAC has diminished its credibility regarding execution of its
bylaw mandate. If it's demonstrably out of step with the outside world in
the few instances where the gap can be measured, can ALAC be trusted to
express the real "outside world" sentiment on issues of lesser importance?


> Democracies encourage all kinds of views and elections are usually pretty
> balanced. Only in totalitarian regimes are policies supported with a 99%
> support.
>

... as opposed to the two 100% votes in favour of the ALAC position on
Ethos? Not sure that's a comparison you want to make, since there appears
not even a 1% minority dissent to be had. Some diversity!

-- 
Evan Leibovitch, Toronto Canada
@evanleibovitch or @el56
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