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face="Book Antiqua">Hi,</FONT></SPAN></DIV>
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face="Book Antiqua">Some notable things about the
Canada/NZ/Aus/Switzerland/US/Singapore/Argentina/Uruguay 'middle ground'
proposal.</FONT></SPAN></DIV>
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face="Book Antiqua">1. If the USA is indeed on board with it, the USA has
endorsed the creation of a forum. I thought they'd hold out longer, but
the EU oversight proposal has brought things to a head, so cards are being
played now.</FONT></SPAN></DIV>
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face="Book Antiqua">2. The framing of the forum is not desirable.
</FONT></SPAN></DIV>
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face="Book Antiqua">*There is no mention of it being multistakeholder, much less
peer-level and open to unaffiliated individuals as
participants.</FONT></SPAN></DIV>
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face="Book Antiqua">*There is no mention of it having a mandate to do much of
what the IG caucus has proposed in terms of functions.</FONT></SPAN></DIV>
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face="Book Antiqua">*There is no mention of where and in what form it would be
constituted; we have suggested that outside of but related to the UN would be
preferable. We certainly don't want it based in an existing institution, i.e.
ITU.</FONT></SPAN></DIV>
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face="Book Antiqua">*The language about it being non-duplicative and focusing on
issues not otherwise being addressed adequately elsewhere could very well be
deployed by the US, private sector, and others to say that, inter alia, the
forum should not talk about any intellectual property issues because we have
WIPO for that, nor trade aspects because we have WTO for that, nor
interconnection costs or spam because we have ITU for these, nor privacy and
"information security" because we have the COE Cybercrime Convention for these,
and on and on. But the way these bodies have "handled" these issues is not
that desirable. As we all know, many of the existing bodies do not allow
participation, or meaningful participation, by CS; are controlled by particular
industry coalitions and government agencies with specific and limiting missions;
and accordingly produce outcomes that are not in tune with public interest
considerations. Presumably, talking about how those organizations function
would also be off limits. This would eliminate what Avri referred to at
the CPSR panel as the "gadfly" function of the forum---raising issues and
concerns not being raised within these bodies, pushing them, calling for
solutions that are in keeping with WSIS principles, etc.</FONT></SPAN></DIV>
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face="Book Antiqua">I hope these concerns will be raised in our interventions if
the opportunity arises.</FONT></SPAN></DIV>
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face="Book Antiqua">Best,</FONT></SPAN></DIV>
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face="Book Antiqua">Bill<BR></FONT></SPAN></DIV>
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face="Book Antiqua"><BR>> -----Original Message-----<BR>> From: <A
href="mailto:governance-bounces@lists.cpsr.org">governance-bounces@lists.cpsr.org</A><BR>>
[mailto:governance-bounces@lists.cpsr.org]On Behalf Of karen banks<BR>> Sent:
Friday, September 30, 2005 9:56 AM<BR>> To: 'Governance Governance
Caucus'<BR>> Subject: [governance] Forum/oversight: Middle Ground
proposal<BR>> <BR>> <BR>> hi<BR>> <BR>> we had an interesting
discussion last night about the new 'middle ground' <BR>> proposal from
Canada/NZ/Aus/Switzerland/US/Singapore/Argentina/Uruguay - <BR>> which, if
you read carefully, is very familiar - many of the key points <BR>> from the
WGIG recommendations are there.. still has a few fuzzy bits but <BR>> seems
to have the support of the African Group at least..<BR>> <BR>> we all had
hard copy last night, but it's not online yet.. does <BR>> anyone have
<BR>> a copy?</DIV></FONT></SPAN>
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