Re: [ga] Response to Bret

[Gary Osbourne <gro@direct.ca>]

At 07:44 PM 28/05/02 -0400, Joe Sims wrote:

>This point is impossible to argue, so those who argue for their
>peculiar brand of transparency apparently simply don't care
>about this effect.  They would rather have the "benefits" of a
>homogenized public discussion than the benefits that almost
>surely flow from candid conversations about complex subjects.

I don't know if I'm one of those who want some
peculiar brand of transparency. I do know that
"to the maximum extent feasible" is at odds with
Vint Cerf repeatedly telling Karl Auerbach to
"take it offline" at Stockholm. It wasn't Karl
doing the homogenizing. I also don't think your
trip to Europe to discuss ICANN reform without
the knowledge, let alone the vote, of at least
some of the BoD members was particularily
transparent. Was there some valid, logical reason
for keeping it from them? If so, surely it can be
made public now.

I've served on numerous not-for-profit Boards
going back over 30 years, some of them dealing
with quite contentious matters. Only rarely would
one go in camera to deal with sensitive items
such as personnel, litigation, or something
contained in an NDA, for example. There were also
committees of the whole where directors could
express themselves without fear of being quoted
later. That is all understandable and reasonable
to me, though I will add that the inclusion of
staff or lawyers in camera was only if absolutely
necessary to a specific topic, and neither were
ever included in committee of the whole (a mini-
retreat as it were) so that discussion needn't
be homogenized on their account, as they aren't,
by definition, part of the 'whole'.

I didn't have a problem with that as ultimately
people were held responsible, proper minutes were
kept, including who voted for or against or
abstained, and these minutes were ratified and
published in a timely fashion. I've never seen
(whether from orgs that dwarf ICANN by any metric
but global impact, or from village PTA meetings)
such sparce and tardy minutes as eventually come
out of ICANN Excom and Special meetings.

Combined with sudden surprises out of nowhere
like the Verisign renegotiation, ICP-3, and the
Roadmap to Reform, none of which the community
were expecting, let alone requesting, how can
such secrecy be seen as "consistent with
procedures designed to ensure fairness"? What
we have with the ICANN not-for-profit is an org
that uses secrecy as its default mode, and only
opens up if, when, where, and to the extent
that it absolutely has to.

That does not instill or sustain trust that all
parties' interests are being dealt with fairly,
so any additional non-open, non-transparent
meetings are bound to be suspect as just leading
to more, perhaps unfair, surprises. What I find
peculiar is that you find such suspicion peculiar.

There's something I learned in school, and I know
I'm not the only one. If you hand in what you hope
is the right answer but you can't show your work,
the default is to assume that you're cheating. If
you're lucky, you can convince them you're guessing.

There are a number of valid, logical reasons why a
number of diverse affected parties, including those
who (s)elect BoD members, would like to know if the
BoD answers are just being cribbed from its staff
and lawyer. In absence of evidence to the contrary,
that seems to be the default, and safest, assumption.

That it is a lawyer and staff here now showing their
work, rather than Board members (other than Karl,
does this count as offline?), leaves only one
question, is the Board cheating or just guessing
when it comes to reform? It's all academic anyway.
both rate an F. -g

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