James.Ryan on 30 Oct 2000 18:12:26 -0000


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Re: <nettime> vote action


>the technical and bureaucratic implementation of the vote. two good
>(user-nominated) candidates won, auerbach and mueller-maguhn; the rest
>are just a bunch of sops and yes-men, one of whom--the asian rep who
>lives in the US--believes that ICANN is a model for twnety-first
>century governance.


As a resident of New Zealand, I voted in the Asia Pacific region.  Though 
I nominated all the candidates who openly supported equal rights over 
domain names to noncommercial interests, I was disappointed that only two 
or three made it through the nomination.  In particular, there was a woman 
from Japan who made open statements in her profile that she believed the 
Internet was being taken over by commercial interests and that the current 
domain name administration system was biased towards profit-making 
enterprises.  She vowed to "level the playing field."  Despite the fact 
that she had the most nominations when I cast my vote two days before the 
deadline, she mysteriously was not on the ballot.  Since her link is now 
gone, I don't even remember her name.

While I voted for Sureswaran Ramadas, who wanted ICANN to concentrate more 
on equal access for poorer nations, nonprofits, etc. I nearly vomited when 
the "yes man" that Ted describes won the vote.  If you have recently eaten 
some rancid meat and have sudden need to retch the contents of your 
stomach, follow http://members.icann.org/cand/196.html

I am sure that he won simply because most people either didn't have the 
time to read all the profiles or just didn't have any particular stance 
one way or another and just voted for their country.  Japan has by far the 
largest Internet population in Asia, and the largest at-large membership 
in ICANN.

I know you can't agree to participate and then complain about the rules
after you've lost, but this first experience was pretty bitter.  I wonder
if ICANN will ever open up its records so that we can see why some nominees
that were doing well suddenly vanished?  Also, what is the policy on
residing in the region you represent?  It seems unfair that Asia Pacific is
represented by a guy living in Washington DC who proclaims openly that he
"may be viewed as a representative of business and to some extent the
intellectual property group."  AARGH!!!!  Is there any way to make ICANN
irrelevant? (this is just a cry of despair, but if anyone really wants to
try and answer.....)

-jr

t byfield <tbyfield@panix.com>
Sent by: nettime-l-request@bbs.thing.net
2000/10/27 13:21
Please respond to t byfield

 
        To:     nettime-l@bbs.thing.net
        cc: 
        Subject:        Re: <nettime> vote action

pit@klubradio.de (Thu 10/26/00 at 09:46 AM +0200):

> {piggyback on}
 <...>

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