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<div>Hi Bill,</div>
<div> </div>
<div>That call disturbed me as well. My immediate reaction was that we
needed to compete with the BC by coming up with our own definition of public
interest. I foresaw disaster if Steve’s definition was accepted. I
immediately reached out to some of our more experienced members, learned a
bit of the history involved and received some very generous offers of
assistance to craft our own working definition of public interest. I want to
thank Kathy and Joy, in particular, for their kind offers in this
regard.</div>
<div> </div>
<div>I should note that my preference from a philosophical standpoint, as I
mentioned in our discussion earlier this year on the Council of Europe
paper, is to do away with the term 'public interest' all
together. I reject the notion that there is any such thing as “public
interest”, at least one that can be determined. I was tempted to
bring out a bunch of mathematical formulas, write about Arrow’s
impossibility theorem, Pettit's discursive dilemma and demonstrably
prove that true social choice, or public interest, can never be truly
determined. Tempted, but fortunately I’m not an academic so I was able
to resist that temptation. :)</div>
<div> </div>
<div>I then prepared to suggest that we make a collective NCSG effort
to craft a definition of public interest, but discovered that some in
our community felt we were best served by the ambiguous undefined term we
have now. Yes, it allows the powers that be to define the public interest as
they see fit, but over time it just may be that our members may benefit from
that more than they would from any tightly formulated strictly defined term.
It’s something to think about.</div>
<div> </div>
<div>Going forward:</div>
<div> </div>
<div>1. I think the first step is not to immediately start working on an
official NCSG definition of the “public interest”, but
rather first to determine whether we want such a definition or
would prefer to argue that “public interest”, like pornography,
is just something you know when you see it. What is in our member’s
interest?</div>
<div> </div>
<div>2. If we are to proffer a definition of “public interest”
I’d suggest we view it more as a defensive effort than an offensive
one. Usually in drafting quasi – legislative text you want narrowly
defined terms to limit the scope of application. Not so here. We’re
doing this primarily to shoot down the BC effort. I’d prefer
general definitional terms in our bread and butter areas, such as
“human rights”, “free expression”,
“privacy”, rather than more narrowly defined terms such as those
favoured by the BC. In the inevitable compromise I’d suggest that
broad terms would give us a better ability to pursue our goals in the future
than as opposed to more narrow ones.</div>
<div> </div>
<div>3. If we can come to a coherent position, I agree that this would be an
ideal topic for our NCPH discussion with the CSG. It’s current,
important and allows us to attack the BC proposal at a time when we’re
a bit more equal numerically than we are in the Accountability effort.</div>
<div> </div>
<div>Happy Christmas all,</div>
<div> </div>
<div>Ed</div>
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<blockquote style="PADDING-RIGHT: 0px; PADDING-LEFT: 5px; MARGIN-LEFT: 5px;
BORDER-LEFT: #000000 2px solid; MARGIN-RIGHT: 0px">-----Original
Message-----<br />
From: William Drake <wjdrake@GMAIL.COM><br />
To: NCSG-DISCUSS@LISTSERV.SYR.EDU<br />
Date: Thu, 25 Dec 2014 09:42:26 -0600<br />
Subject: Re: Important blog post about the ICANN Accountability CCWG<br />
<div> </div>
<div><span>Hi</span></div>
<div> </div>
<div><span>I was slightly taken aback on the 16 Dec. accountability call
that a few good people were quickly flocking to the Business
Constituency's very narrow view that the public interest </span>
<span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">for ICANN is limited
to the Availability and Integrity of Registrations and
Resolutions. See this CircleID post: </span><a
class="external-link"
href="http://www.circleid.com/posts/to_serve_the_public_interest_you_first_have_to_define_public_interest/"
rel="nofollow" style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);
text-decoration: none;">
http://www.circleid.com/posts/to_serve_the_public_interest_you_first_have_to_define_public_interest/</a>
</div>
<div> </div>
<div>Not unusual though, people often gravitate to concrete language in the
absence of equally concrete alternatives. Groupthink amidst complexity
can lead to adumbrated conceptual searching. One could argue this has
happened often in many IG processes; the WGIG definition of IG in the
WSIS leaps most immediately to mind, but there are many examples.</div>
<div> </div>
<div>It still shocks me slightly that after all these years and the AOC
language that there's been no significant effort to do a study of the
term's usage in telecom regulation and other arenas, cross-nationally
not just in the US, In order to try and come to a functional and balanced
working definition for the ICANN context. I'd love to see us put
forward an alternative and would happily partner with anyone who wanted to
try. I've proposed that NCSG and the CSG jointly organize a day
long policy conference at the Buenos Aires meeting akin to the three NCUC
has done, and there appears to be interest, we'll discuss at the DC NCPH
meeting in January. If that gets momentum, maybe we could do a session
at which we present our own view or views for consideration. I don't see
how the accountability process moves forward well without at least one or
two solid contending formulations of this foundational issue.</div>
<div> </div>
<div>Bill<br />
<div>Sent from my iPad</div>
<blockquote type="cite"><span>On Dec 23, 2014, at 10:07 PM, David Cake
<<a href="mailto:dave@DIFFERENCE.COM.AU">dave@DIFFERENCE.COM.AU</a>>
wrote:</span></blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite"> </blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite"><span>It is worth noting again that many of the
'Public Interest Commitments' made by new gTLD operators contain
clauses and commitments that are probably not in the public interest at all,
and that go against consensus policy recommendations. A case in point is
many of them bring in the idea of a globally protected trade mark list,
which was explicitly rejected as policy, and protects the interests of IP
maximalist trade mark owners more than the public. </span></blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite"> </blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite"><span>David</span></blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite"> </blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite"><span>On 23 Dec 2014, at 5:54 am, Milton L Mueller
<<a href="mailto:mueller@SYR.EDU">mueller@SYR.EDU</a>> wrote:</span>
</blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite"> </blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite">
<blockquote type="cite">
<blockquote type="cite"> </blockquote>
</blockquote>
</blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite">
<blockquote type="cite">
<blockquote type="cite"><span>But *within* the legitimate ICANN
jurisdiction, there are broad</span></blockquote>
</blockquote>
</blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite">
<blockquote type="cite">
<blockquote type="cite"><span>constituencies that need representation.
ALAC is one voice for them,</span></blockquote>
</blockquote>
</blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite">
<blockquote type="cite">
<blockquote type="cite"><span>and I consider our NC/NP's to be another.
We are as close to a "public</span></blockquote>
</blockquote>
</blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite">
<blockquote type="cite">
<blockquote type="cite"><span>interest" as one gets in a
multi-stakeholder model, and I want us to stand up</span></blockquote>
</blockquote>
</blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite">
<blockquote type="cite">
<blockquote type="cite"><span>proudly for that representation in the
abstract, even if it makes total</span></blockquote>
</blockquote>
</blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite">
<blockquote type="cite">
<blockquote type="cite"><span>sense to define specific issues narrowly on
their own merits.</span></blockquote>
</blockquote>
</blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite">
<blockquote type="cite"> </blockquote>
</blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite">
<blockquote type="cite"><span>Yep, I agree. But that's also what makes
the P.I. rhetoric so seductive and potentially dangerous. </span>
</blockquote>
</blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite">
<blockquote type="cite"><span>I think we need to advocate public
interest-oriented goals, as we understand them, but we need to bear in mind
that other constituencies can also claim that mantle. Indeed, if you pay
careful attention to ICANN's past 5-8 years you find that the term is
most commonly used by the BC and most frequently invoked by GAC, Steve
DelBianco and Marilyn Cade, usually to justify policies that we don't
support. </span></blockquote>
</blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite">
<blockquote type="cite"> </blockquote>
</blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite">
<blockquote type="cite"><span>--MM</span></blockquote>
</blockquote>
<blockquote type="cite"> </blockquote>
</div>
</blockquote>
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