A Proposal to Merge NCSG, NCUC and NPOC for More Efficiency in ICANN=?utf-8?Q?=E2=80=99s_?=DNS Work

[james@icann.guru]

Well that's great I took forward to this new constituency applying via the appropriate processes then.


Seriously though this is why I want to focus the SG, we spend so much time not doing policy and working on charter revisions for a group that only has 30 members on one side, and another side that has hundreds of active but non contributing members, with total overlap between them, do away with the folloy and travel slots discussions, why do people care. We have less than 10 people active in policy from a combined membership of over 500. As Dave noted NPOC has spent 1000% more time on reforming itself than contributing to policy discussions, NCUC spends too much time on admin and outreach to folks that have no interest in policy work but just rather want a new line on their CV. Im tired of it to be honest.
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James Gannon
On 7/29/2020 7:31:33 AM, Raoul Plommer <plommer at gmail.com> wrote:
Right, well, imagine our surprise, when I thought we found a good name for us without changing the acronym and the "new" name was already in our charter that was updated last time in 2011. In our updated version of the charter it is again Not-for-Profit Organizations Constituency.

On Wed, 29 Jul 2020 at 00:55, James Gannon <lists at icann.guru> wrote:

>It turns out "Not-For-Profit Operational Concerns" was never ratified at ICANN. It has always been Not-for-Profit Organizations Constituency. At least if the latest official version of NPOC charter is to be believed
 
Just for the record. Seems like NPOC needs to revise its charter to be in line with the actual name of the constituency.
 
https://www.icann.org/resources/board-material/resolutions-2011-06-24-en#1.5 [https://www.icann.org/resources/board-material/resolutions-2011-06-24-en#1.5]
 
“Whereas, the Board has specifically directed that efforts be made to provide leadership and guidance within the GNSO's Non-Commercial Stakeholder Group to encourage the creation of broad, diverse and representative new GNSO Constituencies advancing global non-commercial interests.
Whereas, the Board has received a formal petition for the creation of a Not-for-Profit Operational Concerns Constituency (NPOC) within the GNSO.
..
Resolved (2011.06.24.05), the Board approves the proposed charter of the new Not-for-Profit Operational Concerns Constituency and formally recognizes the organization as an official Constituency within the GNSO's Non-Commercial Stakeholder Group (NCSG) eligible for formal GNSO administrative support and subject to the NCSG Charter approved by the Board.”
 
 
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James Gannon
 
From: NCSG-Discuss <NCSG-DISCUSS at LISTSERV.SYR.EDU [mailto:NCSG-DISCUSS at LISTSERV.SYR.EDU]> on behalf of Raoul Plommer <plommer at GMAIL.COM [mailto:plommer at GMAIL.COM]>
Reply to: Raoul Plommer <plommer at GMAIL.COM [mailto:plommer at GMAIL.COM]>
Date: Tuesday, 28 July 2020 at 19:02
To: "NCSG-DISCUSS at LISTSERV.SYR.EDU [mailto:NCSG-DISCUSS at LISTSERV.SYR.EDU]" <NCSG-DISCUSS at LISTSERV.SYR.EDU [mailto:NCSG-DISCUSS at LISTSERV.SYR.EDU]>
Subject: Re: A Proposal to Merge NCSG, NCUC and NPOC for More Efficiency in ICANN’s DNS Work
 
the argument that we need constituencies in order to expand travel support is the kind of trap we need to get out of. I think that the allocation to NCSG for travel support would be roughly the same

We do not need to expand our current travel support. Reducing it will likely result in less policy done. All the other Stakeholder groups' members get paid for their work at ICANN. What evidence do you have to support the claim that we would somehow have even roughly the same amount of travel slots from ICANN after our fusion, when all the SGs are getting the same amount of slots based on a number of internal entities(?) ?

It would be a different matter, if we were actually now expanding to create additional constituencies just to get more travel slots, which would be less savoury in my eyes too, but taking away 2/3 of the biggest perk (right after saving the world of course!) of our work seems just silly to me.

How would the amalgamation affect our influence at NCPH, and moreover at the GNSO? For one, at the GNSO, NPOC was recently mentioned as one true case of evolution of the GNSO and thus likely to result in NCSG getting another seat at NomCom. I think to even reconsider Sam's proposal, we need a serious analysis on the results of such magnitude. I am sure there are other such examples that we need to find out about.
 it seems like many of the most active NPOC people are individuals now (Sam?). NPOC was initially founded by big nonprofits with trademarks whose talk of “operational concerns” was kind of a euphemism for trademark protection.
 
People are individuals, active or not. NPOC only allows organisations as its members and individuals represent those organisations at ICANN. I represent Open Knowledge Finland. It turns out "Not-For-Profit Operational Concerns" was never ratified at ICANN. It has always been Not-for-Profit Organizations Constituency. At least if the latest official version of NPOC charter is to be believed, that is hosted at ICANN's website. "Operational Concerns" seems just spin and graphics on a website and business cards some years ago. Nothing official. We have also updated our charter in our review process to reduce the size of our EC from six to four, enabling us to send the most active member from the region to every ICANN meeting with CROP.

We should really be concentrating on our actual work. Our internal structure seems the least of our problems at the moment and to be perfectly honest, I don't think the whole discussion is very positive as a whole. I would certainly like to wait at least until our new chairs are on board to revisit this discussion again.

-Raoul
 
On Tue, 28 Jul 2020 at 10:41, Michael J. Oghia <mike.oghia at gmail.com [mailto:mike.oghia at gmail.com]> wrote:
In addition to Milton's comments on the third point, I want to highlight another point. There is so much natural overlap between the issues that each constituency addresses that trying to divide or delineate more explicitly may end up backfiring or creating confusion and more unnecessary work. A united, but still specialised, approach seems more prudent to me.

Best,
-Michael
 
 
On Tue, Jul 28, 2020 at 12:25 AM Mueller, Milton L <milton at gatech.edu [mailto:milton at gatech.edu]> wrote:
Hey, Raoul:
 
Having three ECs and ICANN supporting most of those members to live meetings is a major difference in my view. Almost all EC members should be concerned with policy anyway, so eradicating 2/3 of our travel slots would likely result in even less policy activity.
 
MM: They don’t actually support all of them. But even if they did, the argument that we need constituencies in order to expand travel support is the kind of trap we need to get out of. I think that the allocation to NCSG for travel support would be roughly the same – the difference would be that a unified SG would better be able to select people to travel based on their contribution to the policy or admin work, not simply because they held one of an artificially inflated number of positions.
 
Sure, the administrative work is probably doubled with the triumvirate as opposed to a singular structure. However, Maryam gets paid by ICANN to maintain most of the administrative work (just like is done with other SGs) so it's not really eating _that_ much into the efficiency of volunteers.
 
MM: Seriously, Maryam does not do most of the administrative work. Ask Bruna! The constituency chair has to communicate, develop meeting agendas, hold votes, etc. And we have to find people to occupy those positions.
 
What WOULD help with the confusion, is to embrace the logical division that is set in the names of our constituencies. Delegate NGO issues to NPOC and individual user issues to NCUC. Very easy to explain to all newcomers.
 
MM: I don’t think that division actually describes the difference between the two. And I don’t think you are going to get much support for arbitrarily re-dividing the NCSG along those lines.
 
NCUC has always been composed of noncommercial orgs, indeed we did not even have individual members until relatively recently. My own member org, IGP, is happy where we are; it seems like many of the most active NPOC people are individuals now (Sam?). NPOC was initially founded by big nonprofits with trademarks whose talk of “operational concerns” was kind of a euphemism for trademark protection. NPOC left that behind some years ago however. Most of the policy issues NCSG is active around, such as privacy and free expression, are as salient to individuals as to organizations. So, trying to impose a new division on the two would just shuffle people around and create more confusion.
 
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