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Re: [soac-mapo] Request for volunteers

  • To: Evan Leibovitch <evan@xxxxxxxxx>
  • Subject: Re: [soac-mapo] Request for volunteers
  • From: Robin Gross <robin@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
  • Date: Wed, 8 Sep 2010 12:16:24 -0700

If we want to help the poor file an objection they are entitled to file, but cannot afford, why not just recommend that they don't have to pay the fee (a financial hardship exemption)? Why do we need to create an entirely new office and bureaucracy with special powers to file morality objections independent of any group/individual? It seems much less dangerous and problematic to lower fees for them than it is to create a morality tzar. Plus there is no objectivity if there is no group/individual/govt objects to a string and the morality tzar does. Let's target the harm we want to address - but not create a bigger harm in doing so.

Thanks,
Robin


On Sep 8, 2010, at 12:01 PM, Evan Leibovitch wrote:



On 8 September 2010 14:46, Robin Gross <robin@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
I am also keen to work on a statement regarding the independent objector. However, we should be sure we are on the same page. There was agreement on the call last week that we do not want an independent objector, so that should be removed from DAG4.

We have to remember to keep objections to new gtlds "objective" as per principle 1. If no religion, no govt, no community, no business, no cultural org, no person, etc. objects to a proposal for a new gtld, there is little grounds for expecting an "independent objector" to have any. That would hardly be an "objective" standard, if none of these interests objects, but the ICANN Morality Tzar can be secretly lobbied into filing an "independent" objection. So that is the direction I expect a statement from this group to flow. Is there any disagreement with this approach?


Yes, there is disagreement. At-Large took a very different approach to the IO and did not see it in quite such a negative light.

We saw the IO being able to launch objections on behalf of legitimate groups that could not afford the financial penalty of intervening and/or were not aware of the processes and/or might be caught offguard by an application trying to get "under the radar". Communities that may have problems with a proposal (and not just on MAPO-type grounds) don't spend all their time monitoring ICANN to see whether potentailly-objectionable strings might be proposed, but an IO would be doing that by definition. So we saw the IO from the point of view of empowering groups that were not familiar with navigating ICANN's inner workings yet still had a legitimate (though not necessarily sufficient for blockage) grievance.

In At-Large, by definition we have substantial contact with groups that generally have no interest in Internet governance, and certainly don't understand ICANN, yet have a deep stake in its actions. In this context we see value in an IO; without it the process is (in practice) opaque to all but insiders.

It's also possible that the IO could be the custodian for objections that need to be on the public record yet are not sufficiently broadly-based to justify getting beyond the Quick Look.

- Evan





IP JUSTICE
Robin Gross, Executive Director
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