[CPWG] Ready, Fire, Aim

[Evan Leibovitch]

OK, Hamburg is starting.
What's the progress on this?

When am I being asked to participate? And for how long?
Is the issue of strategic planning specifically on the table, or will it
just be caught in a blur of other things?
I've heard no updates since August.

- Evan

On Wed, Aug 30, 2023 at 5:42 PM Jonathan Zuck <JZuck at innovatorsnetwork.org>
wrote:

> Folks,
>
> I’m doing my best NOT to put my “thumb on the scale,” so to speak on this
> issue as it’s one worthy of thoughtful consideration. Like Evan, I believe
> we involve ourselves in many issues on which we do not have a unique (end
> user specific) perspective to bring to the table. In that case, we are
> redundant and exhausting what volunteer resources we have without much
> effect.
>
>
>
> Evan and I do NOT always agree on what the core issues for end users are.
> We agree on DNS Abuse and disagreed on the sale of ORG which I truly
> believed to be immaterial to individual end users and should have been more
> a focus of NPOC. We agree that prices could be higher to good benefit, even
> in underserved regions though this requires a more careful analysis than
> anyone has truthfully done.
>
>
>
> As for an At-Large mandate, it’s twofold, the identification and
> amplification of end user interests as preservation and effacy of the
> multistakeholder model. Between those two we can talk ourselves into ANY
> issue and I, like Evan, think we should always be endeavoring to talk
> ourselves OUT of a particular issue, leaving only those where we have a
> unique, end user, perspective to bring to the table. Our value is not that
> we are smart people but that we are dedicated to a singular mission.
>
>
>
> In any case, let’s have a fulsome discussion about the future of the
> At-Large and what we want from it, in Hamburg. I’ve set aside 2 hours for
> our anniversary which is intended to be 10min of celebration and 1:50 of
> discussion, breakouts, debate, etc. Evan, I hope you’ll be able to
> participate.
>
> Jonathan
>
>
>
>
>
> *From: *CPWG <cpwg-bounces at icann.org> on behalf of Evan Leibovitch via
> CPWG <cpwg at icann.org>
> *Date: *Monday, August 28, 2023 at 10:21 PM
> *To: *mike palage.com <mike at palage.com>
> *Cc: *CPWG <cpwg at icann.org>
> *Subject: *[CPWG] Ready, Fire, Aim
>
> A high-level tangent inspired by the current discussion:
>
>
>
> A casual reader might look at this thread and come to an observation that
> there are two separate issues being discussed, that may not have much to do
> with each other. The conversation that Mike, Steinar, Olivier and others
> are having concern details -- contract language, specifics about volumes
> and dollar amounts and assignment of responsibilities. Meanwhile, I have
> barged in -- surely unwelcome by some -- to challenge the very premises
> upon which ALAC's participation is being conducted.
>
>
>
> I have done this because, in my observation, ALAC lacks -- and has always
> lacked -- an overarching set of objectives upon which to base strategy and
> ultimately tactics. We engage in the minutiae of contract language (etc)
> without clarity of what ALAC -- and what the constituency it is mandated to
> speak for -- wants from the end result of such engagement.
>
>
>
> *Strategy without tactics is the slowest route to victory. Tactics without
> strategy is the noise before defeat -- Sun Tzu *
>
>
>
> While I was involved deeply in At-Large I would note that any internal
> attempt to create a coherent statement of purpose would be invariably
> torpedoed by people insisting that we engage in a never-ending attempt to
> define the "public interest". As a result, all attempts inevitably sank in
> the bureaucratic mud. Two separate third-party ICANN reviews of At-Large
> seemed to wholly overlook the lack of overarching purpose and mandate
> service while themselves dwelling on the minutiae. It's probably best that
> we don't depend on outside consultants to define our purpose, but why can't
> we do it ourselves?
>
>
>
> WIthout a clear mission, ALAC has weighed in on many issues in which
> non-registrant end users have no stake at all. Take vertical integration.
> End-users don't know and don't care about the domain supply chain. Even
> domain consumers -- technically outside our remit but closest to end-users
> in the ICANN food chain -- could hardly care less if they bought their
> domain from a registrar or directly from a registry. And yet there we were
> at the virtual table, as if our constituency has a crucial stake in that
> topic's outcome. Think of how many parts of the current ALAC agenda fit the
> same description. Meanwhile, on high-profile issues that WOULD affect
> end-users, such as the delegation of .XXX and the attempted private
> takeover of .ORG, we were silent. Such choices of action and inaction
> clearly telegraph -- throughout ICANN and the world around us -- a lack of
> both purpose and focus.
>
>
>
> This glaring deficiency continues to retard ALAC's agency within the rest
> of the ICANN community. Over the years I have received many private emails
> insisting that ALAC has more respect now than it did in the past and that
> it is invited to the policy table more often. To me this is tokenism. I'll
> be more persuaded that At-Large has the respect of ICANN when we get that
> second Board seat that was recommended and promised so long ago. Until
> then, or until a policy we want that is opposed by the domain industry is
> implemented, I will maintain that ALAC is being pandered to. We are
> tolerated in working groups so long as we make little line-item corrections
> and don't challenge their very premises or the ability of contracted
> parties to maximize revenue. We have the authority to talk directly to the
> Board, yet we chase after Public Comment solicitations just like anyone in
> the world can. We respond to the actions of others, we never initiate or
> try to set the agenda. One of the last such initiatives by At-Large, a
> white paper of which I was a co-author, was received with a smile and
> summarily binned; not a single response was returned from staff or the
> community. Maybe the cosmetics have changed in the last 15 years but the
> underlying politics certainly have not.
>
>
>
> While the status quo is obviously sustainable -- so long as ALAC members
> get funded to pretend they're the UNSC at a cavernous U-shaped table three
> times a year and learn how to play the insider games -- it doesn't do
> anything to serve At-Large's bylaw mandate. The inmates will continue to
> run the asylum, because the only entity really capable of making them
> accountable to the world-at-large is just fine with being tolerated.
>
>
>
> - Evan
>
>
>


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