IGF Open Consultation
Geneva, Switzerland
18 May, 2011
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The following is the output of the real-time captioning taken during the Open Consultations of the IGF, in Geneva. Although it is largely accurate, in some cases it may be incomplete or inaccurate due to inaudible passages or transcription errors. It is posted as an aid to understanding the proceedings at the session, but should not be treated as an authoritative record.
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>>CHENGETAI MASANGO: There is remote participation, and also there is transcription happening. So when you speak, if you please state your name and the organization that you are representing and then go into your statement. And also if you could speak not too fast because some people have the habit of speaking so fast, the transcription cannot keep up. Thank you.
So now I hand it over to the moderator.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you, Chengetai.
Good morning, everybody. I would like to welcome you to this second consultation -- IGF, consultation. I'm very pleased to be moderating on behalf of Kenya, Kenya being the host country for IGF. Looking at the time, I think we are 15 minutes late. I would like to go straight to the agenda.
We have got quite a number of agenda items, beginning, of course, with the preliminary opening remarks and adoption of the agenda.
We are going to have an overview of the meeting presented by Kenya regarding the logistics arrangements as well as the conference facility. Then around 11:00, we are going to be looking at the proposals received and grouped into themes.
Lunch from 1:00 to about 3:00. Come back and continue with the workshop proposals again. Then look at next steps which are any other business and adjourn the meeting around 6:00.
Unless anyone has a problem with the agenda, I think I propose we move on to the first agenda item and that's calling Kenya to give us an overview of the meeting venue and the logistics arrangements so far.
So Kenya, please. There is a video first from Kenya.
(Video).
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you very much for that. And we will go straight to a presentation on the logistics.
Thank you, Michael.
>>KENYA: Thank you, Chair, and good morning. I'm going to take you through the host country Web site, which has a lot of information. And the site -- the link is www.igf.or.ke. And we encourage you to connect to that site and also get the details.
But, briefly, I need to show you a location of where the IGF is going to be held.
So the meeting venue will be at the U.N. offices in Nairobi. And we have a map with a locality -- with the location of the meeting venue. This is a U.N. premises. I will quickly go to the U.N. offices and show you a bit of the facilities available.
Sorry, my Internet is quite fast, huh? Maybe for those on WiFi, you can log out for five minutes I can use it alone.
[ Laughter ]
Good. I think I can continue talking. The U.N. offices facilities are quite elaborate, and they are going to be adequate for the meeting. They have a number of rooms which can accommodate as many as 1,000 delegates. And we have also highlighted in the Web site the hotels, which are available for booking by delegates and contact addresses. And other hotels are quite near the facilities. Others are a bit distant. Others are near the airport. But for the comfort of the delegates, there will be transport from the airport and back to the airport and from the hotels to the meeting venue and back. And a schedule will be provided to that effect.
I think I may be faster than the Internet.
That's about accommodations. There is a registration. Registration, of course, you will be doing it through the U.N. IGF site, but there is enough information which would also be passed over to the local host for logistics purposes.
Travel information is also contained in the local host Web site. In terms of buses, arrangements and so forth, that site will be updated going forward as the final details of the logistics, travel logistics are dealt with.
We also have a link for news, and you will see a number of activities have already taken place. And going forward, whatever the activities we are going to hold, which we think is important to inform the potential participants, we are going to post it on the news link.
There is a link where you can log in. In case you want to be assisted in terms of any logistics, any information you need to get, these are all -- anything to do with -- maybe assisted to make some arrangements, to book hotels and so forth, you can always get to the "contact us" and put your details there and the kind of query you have and then it will be responded as soon as possible.
We have also opened up use for links on the local host Web site indicating what we are very proud of. There are a number of destinations which a number of you may enjoy when you are out there in Nairobi, Kenya.
Also, issues of visa arrangements, currency and so forth, the Schilling keeps on fluctuating. We have some kind of a tentative conversion rate. But, of course, the actual rate will be issued by our Central Bank on a date-to-day basis.
For more information, feel free to log in to www.igf.or.ke. In case you have any queries, we are here with you. You can contact any of us.
We have a number of Kenyans from the Secretariat seated around us here. Feel free and you are welcome to Kenya. As our secretary indicated in the video, "karable" (phonetic).
"Karable" means welcome to Nairobi, Kenya in 2011.
Thank you, Chair.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you.
[ Applause ]
Okay. I'll let the IGF Secretariat discuss the meeting rooms, so that we have a clear indication as we move on to the next agenda item on locating the workshops. But this is still logistics, but it will help in terms of allocating.
So I think the IGF Secretariat. Chengetai?
>>CHENGETAI MASANGO: Since we are discussing logistics, I just want to do a quick rundown on the rooms we have available. Before that, I would just like to apologize for the network here. It's not up to our usual standard, but we just have to work with it. And we will try to fix it during the course of the day.
So the main session, the plenary room, we have -- has a total capacity of 1,172 people. They are used to holding big conferences there, so I don't really see any problems there.
The second room -- second slide -- is workshop room 1 which we will be using as an overflow room during the opening and closing ceremony. First has a total capacity of 545. I will refer back to this room when we are discussing the workshops because it is a bit of an odd shape compared to the other rooms, and we have to figure out exactly what we are going to do with this room.
And then the next rooms we have, we have additional six other rooms that we can use for workshops. The drawings here are just for illustrative purposes only. Some of them can be reconfigured; some are stuck the way they are. But we have two workshop rooms with a total capacity of 112 people and two more with an additional capacity of 89 people can be sitting there classroom style.
And the next -- and then we have the last two rooms with a capacity of 84 people. So those are the rooms that we have to work with at the moment.
There's also additional rooms that we can use for bilaterals, et cetera. So if organizations want to book a room during the conference, please let us know. Just send us an e-mail to the IGF Secretariat.
We are going to have an IGF village which is in the same style as in the previous IGFs where organizations can display the activities or inform people about their IG-related activities. And these are not for commercial purposes.
One thing to notice if you are shipping materials, it is best to start early. On the host country Web site, they will have a shipping company and name and contact person for organizations to ship products to so that you don't have any problems with customs, et cetera, because since it is a U.N. conference, they are exempt from customs and also shipping them out.
But the organization has to pay for the shipping. The IGF or the Kenyan host country is not going to pay for the shipping. You are responsible for getting yourself in and out. They will just deal with the customs and smooth the process for you.
That's it for the facilities. And, as I said, it's a headquartered -- it is a U.N. headquarters, so it's got all the facilities you would expect from the U.N. headquarters from the Palais or any other U.N. HQ. Thank you.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you very much, Chengetai.
I think I would like to open it up for questions clarifying comments -- comments and clarifying questions. I see European Commission, please.
>>EUROPEAN COMMISSION: Thank you, Moderator. I'm (saying name) from the European Commission.
Concerning the IGF -- First, thanks for all the details and the logistics. Regarding the IGF village or booths or stands, whatever you want to call them, is there any clarity or can you already provide some clarity on the procedure to request a booth, the timing, et cetera, et cetera? Because that is still unclear to us. And as Chengetai suggested, we would like to start the preparation as early as possible.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you. IGF will respond.
>>CHENGETAI MASANGO: For requesting a booth, it's quite simple. You just send an e-mail to the IGF Secretariat with the subject title "village booth request." It is just so that we can identify them quickly and sort them out.
We have space for a total of 30 booths. So if you want a booth, it's best to ask for it early and then we will allocate them depending on the demand. If there is more than 30, then we'll have to use some method first-come, first-served. And also the things you will be displaying may come into it.
The booths are, I think it is, 3 meters by 2 meters. It is on the Web site, the IGF village booths, if you look on the front page of the Web site if you can get on with this network. But all information is there, and it is just as simple as sending an e-mail to [email protected].
If you send an e-mail to me, please just make sure you cc the IGF because I get hundreds of e-mails each day and sometimes they may slip through.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you, Chengetai.
Any other questions? Yes? Nominet.
>>NOMINET: Thank you, Madam Chair. Just a couple of little questions about the arrangements in the meeting rooms. I'm assuming that there will be transcription in each meeting room as there was in Vilnius. And second question, will there be translation -- I mean, interpretation in other than the main rooms?
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you.
Chengetai?
>>CHENGETAI MASANGO: Yes, there will be transcription in all the rooms. An organization, if they want to request for interpretation in another room, they will have to contact the Secretariat and request that. And it is up to the organization to pay for it. We are only providing interpretation in the main room, the main session room. And I will touch back on that when you start discussing the workshops -- when we start discussing the schedule as well, yeah.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you. ICC?
>> ICC: Just two logistical questions. One, I'm not obsessed about meals and coffee and things like that, but the facilities for food for lunches and things like that. And then the second question was, if there were side rooms available, in case one would want to have side meetings and things like that, to be able to arrange?
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you. I will let Kenya respond.
>>KENYA: Thank you. Thank you, ICC, for the question. Logistics, yes, there are a number of places people can hit. But the host country is looking to logistics in terms of details of providing food, lunches and teas and coffees to the delegates. So I think you ought not worry about that issue.
In terms of side meeting rooms, I think Chengetai could be in a better position to elaborate on that. Thank you.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you.
Chengetai?
>>CHENGETAI MASANGO: Yes. There's -- there are going to be side meeting rooms. I think I touched at the beginning that you just have to send an e-mail to the Secretariat requesting for one and we'll fit you in on the schedule for bilateral meetings. Yeah.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you.
Any other comments or clarifying questions? Well, thank you -- oh. Please.
>> Thank you, Madam Chair. And good morning, everybody. I just wanted to raise a preliminary comment before we start to discuss workshops. I was not sure on the agenda where to raise it, so I'm just going to raise it now so we have time to think it.
I just wanted to point out we travel here to participate in an open consultation and MAG meeting, and I would like to ask a clarification from the Secretariat on the process of appointing a new chair and renewing the mandates of the MAG.
We have learned that there have been conversations between that U.N. bodies and the IGF Secretariat; and, if so, we would like to know what is the status of this conversation.
I'm sorry to bring this up, but the situation just undermines our capacity to plan ahead. It undermines our possibilities to receive funding, especially for developing country participants who come here. It undermines legitimacy of the process.
The community values very much what we are doing here, and I think that the number of workshop performances that we have received show that. But I believe that the U.N. should show that it values the process, too. So I ask for a clarification on that.
And I would like to ask -- and I think that I ask this and maybe Civil Society will support this proposal as well, that we have an open meeting tomorrow, not a MAG meeting, because we don't have an appointed MAG. So it will be really important for us to have an open meeting in which everybody can participate.
And just for transparency and clarification as well, if you could tell us after this date the people that still formally belong to the MAG. This would be important because we know that some people have left, and we don't have a specific list of formally MAG participants.
It is not for us to discuss now. I just wanted to raise the issue early so we have the day to think and talk to each other. Thank you.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you very much for that question. I think I will let the IGF Secretariat respond to the issues around the MAG mandate, the Chair and the executive secretary.
But regarding how we would want to handle the meeting today and tomorrow, I think -- I fully support the proposal to have it as an open consultation, as open as possible, so all those who are in this meeting room are actually welcome to be part of the MAG meeting tomorrow.
But, yeah, for the other questions, I will let the IGF Secretariat respond to that. Thank you.
>>CHENGETAI MASANGO: Okay, yes. The only other thing to that is the room is slightly smaller. We plan to break out into groups so that may not matter that much if people are standing in the room for the first session which may be, you know, 45 minutes or an hour before we break out and we come back in.
As far as your other questions are concerned, I'll start with the easiest ones going up. As far as who is in the MAG, yes, the Secretariat will compile -- will ask each MAG member to confirm and then we'll compile a list and update the list that's on the Web site.
And it's my understanding -- now, I'm just speaking about my understanding. I'm not giving you an official position or anything. But it is my understanding that the (inaudible) to replace the Chair, to find a new Chair and to find a new executive coordinator.
As far as the Chair goes, that's with the Secretary-General because the Chair is going to be the Secretary-General's special advisor for Internet governance. And those processes are with his process and his advisors. So we just have to wait for something to come up from him.
And as far as the executive coordinator is concerned, yes, there are processes that have to be followed. The position has to be advertised, first, in Inspira. That's the U.N. job database, so that it is open to all to apply.
But before that happens, they have to have the go ahead first from the U.N. that this position can be made open from the U.N. that this position can be -- can be made open and can -- a replacement be found. So, as far as I understand, the paperwork has been done. And we're just waiting for it to get the stamps and the signatures. And then it will appear in the U.N. job Web site. This, of course, unfortunately, the U.N. is a highly bureaucratic organization for certain things. There has to be checks and balances, et cetera. And it just has to go through the process. And we are all waiting for the process to complete. And there's nothing much we can do until the process is complete.
Thank you.
>> Thank you very much, Chair. And it's nice to see you chairing this meeting.
Well, first of all, I would like to support a discussion on the item raised by the previous speaker. I think we should spend a little time discussing it. It ties into -- and, of course, I call myself a MAG member with a question mark, because we're operating in a vacuum right now. We don't know whether we're still members or whatnot.
My other question relates to the preparations. And, regarding the invitations, who is going to send the invitations? Because usually it is the host country and the U.N. as well. And when are they going to go out? Also, what kind of representation do you have in mind? Will the Secretary General be there? Are invitations going to be extended to other heads of agencies and so forth? Thank you.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you. I'll let the IGF Secretariat -- thank you.
>>CHENGETAI MASANGO: Okay. As usual, I do expect that there will be a general invitation made under Secretary General Shah which will be on our Web site next month. This is in line with the other IGFs we've had previously. And Mr. Shah has indicated that he will be attending. And the ITU Secretary General is also going to be attending. And the list is still coming up. But we expect that level of ministers to be attending, high-level delegations from the European Commission. And so, yes.
That's -- and, also, if I can speak for the Kenyan host, since the question was put to me, they will also be inviting other ICT ministers from the region to come in for the meeting. And, if Alice wants to add anything on that, she can.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you. I think Chengetai said it all. We're expecting that level of participation. And the invitations should be going out soon both from the host country and U.N. Thanks.
Any other questions?
Okay. So we can -- oh, sorry. I can't see. African Union?
>>AFRICAN UNION: Indeed. Thank you, Madam Chair. I just have, again, one logistic question. Do we plan to -- we are planning to have some member of the communities, African communities, to plan a meeting on the African Internet IGF? Is it a possibility for the Kenyan government to facilitate that? They'll have an announcement at the end of the session. Could you please take that into consideration? Thank you, Madam Chair.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you for that question. Kenya, do you want to respond to that?
>>KENYA: Thank you, Chair. I think there's going to be an announcement at a later date, I mean, a later time during the meeting. I think, Chair, I would like to request that we have a bilateral discussion with the speaker, if you can see some of us.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: The African Union?
>>KENYA: Yeah. We can try to have a bilateral discussion, and we can make clarification on the expectations. Thank you.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you.
United Kingdom?
>>UNITED KINGDOM: Yes. Thank you, Chair. I have a logistical question. But just, first of all, I wanted to express our dismay that the post of executive coordinator still has not been advertised. I think it's quite intolerable that this kind of delay has occurred. We've heard about the possibility of the advertisement being issued over last three or four months, I'm sure. It's just incredible that this is still an unresolved issue at a crucial time when you're putting in so much work in preparing for Nairobi. And Chengetai is doing a fantastic job. But it's -- the appointment of the executive coordinator is very important and critical, really, to the credibility of the management of the process and so on. So I just want to put that on record from the U.K. government.
My logistical point goes back to the question about side rooms and the opportunity for setting up bilaterals and -- events here sort of ad hoc on the day. I think it's important that there is a clearly identified desk or contact point which we can go to to make that kind of request to get a booking in during the actual event. I recall from previous IGFs, sometimes it was difficult to know who to contact. And there was -- I think it was very -- there was an absence of that readily visible desk, you know, that I could rush to to secure a meeting for my head of delegation and so on. So, if you could ensure that such a facility is visible and accessible for that kind of purpose during the event, that would be much appreciated. Thank you, Chair.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you, U.K., for the concern expressed. And also, regarding the point of contact for the side events. I think the Secretariat will make sure that is -- a contact person and place is made available.
We have a question from a remote participant.
>> Ms. Chairman, there's a response from Miss Nnenna from West Africa, precisely Nigeria. And she's asking on the easy way to get a Kenyan visa from Nigeria. And she says we should deliver a message to the Secretariat that she has already submitted a proposal for an open forum on IGF.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you, Kenya. Thank you, Chair.
>>KENYA: Thank you to the Nigerian, for their concerns. What I would like to say is that, in the local host Web site, which I've just taken the members through, the participants through, it has all details of visa application and so forth. For those countries who do not have embassies within their countries, our Kenyan embassies within their countries, there are other arrangements they can make in terms of getting visa on arrival. In case of any difficulties, again, contact us on the web, local host Web site where we can get an e-mail and then appreciate how we can be able to facilitate the visa application. But we do not expect any difficulties going forward. And I think Kenya embassy -- we have Kenyan embassy in Nigeria, if I'm not wrong. Thank you, Chair.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you, Kenya.
Anriette and then the gentleman from UNECA.
>>APC: Thank you, Alice. Anriette Esterhuysen, APC. Just a clarification on the discussion about the African IGF. It was a proposal that emerged at an African Union meeting earlier. And Nnenna is involved in that. So, just for the sake of bilateral discussion, a proposal was then submitted to the Secretariat to have an open forum that can discuss it. So it would be good to have a bilateral discussion, but also note that these stakeholders involved in proposing an African IGF, as opposed to subregional IGFs, have asked for a space to discuss that at IGF during the proceedings.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you, Anriette. That's noted. Yes, please.
>>ECPAT: Thank you, Madam Chair. I'm Anjan Bose from ECPAT International. I represent child rights organizations. Since we're still in logistics, my question is: This year, as we saw last year, there was a number of young people who represented at the IGF. And we are planning to bring young people for some workshops and maybe some other exhibitions. Would there be any special kind of arrangement that might be required in this kind of a meeting with IGF Secretariat thinking of even that kind of space if we do bring young people to the forum? Thank you.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you. Chengetai, can you respond?
>>CHENGETAI MASANGO: Yes, we can.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: UNECA?
>>UNECA: Thank you, Chair. I want to confirm what was said by Anriette. We had sent a e-mail a few weeks ago requesting a workshop for African IGF in Nairobi.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thanks for that. No other questions? Oh, European Commission.
>>EUROPEAN COMMISSION: Thank you, Moderator. Just a point of clarity. And this is a question better answered by using Web site of IGF. When we'll be able to visit it, please let me know. But for the booths, it is not clear to me. And we have had some exchanges with the Secretariat, and we didn't get clear information. Are the booths going to be for free? Are we going to have to pay for them? This is not a point for us, but we just need to have that information. Thank you.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Chengetai.
>>CHENGETAI MASANGO: Yes, the booths are free. The IGF doesn't charge for anything. Yes.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Yeah. The host country pays for them. Any other questions? Okay. If there are no other questions or comments, I think I'd like to perhaps go for a break. And we can come after 10 minutes at 5 past 11:00 to begin discussions on the workshops. So we'll be back at 5 past 11:00. Thank you.
(Break)
>>ALICE MUNYUA: We'd like to start the second session, please. I'd like to go straight to the next agenda item, overview of workshop proposals and updates. Please -- yeah.
(scribes lost audio.)
>>CHENGETAI MASANGO: How do we do the weighting? If we say all workshops, all themes have six feeder workshops, then we have to look at those ones who have 29. We will just have six? And taking stock the way forward, we have got five. So they all get in regardless of quality, et cetera. We can also make more room for workshops if we have workshop sessions during lunchtime. That's one thing we have to consider today and tomorrow, exactly how accommodating we want to be.
After this, I think the best thing is just to open up the floor for general comments and then we can take the themes one by one. But just to remember that we're not discussing individual workshops because if we discuss individual workshops, there is 111. We cannot do that. So general principles on the selection of the workshops.
The MAG has done a grading of the workshops, and we can use that. But it's -- it's open up to comment.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you, Chengetai.
You've asked a few questions. I think we need to think about, first one being how many workshops can we really accommodate. Also taking into consideration the logistics presentation that was done earlier.
How do we want to deal with the weighting of the workshops? And then there is the issue of the -- you know, Kenya having requested that the opening ceremonies move back to the first day in the afternoon so we have go the morning and one hour. So then which session then takes priority? So those are our questions.
But I think we can take general comments now and also perhaps respond to comments with those questions, and then we go back to discussing under the themes as presented on the agenda.
We will open it up to questions, comments on those few.
I see European Commission, ICC. There is a remote participant.
Yes, European Commission first. Thank you.
>>EUROPEAN COMMISSION: Thank you, Madam Moderator. I will try to be as brief as possible.
First of all, we would support -- understanding the logistical restraints, but we would not support starting the workshops at 8:00 a.m. I think that would illegitimatize the workshop selected for that slot.
Having workshops during the lunchtime, it is a tough decision. On the other hand, we think that the IGF is such an occasion that we might as well ask a bit of sacrifice from participants if they are interested in the workshop.
One possibility that's put on the table to be discussed is that if there are workshops that are not selected for whatever reason and do not want to merge and they are fine with having a slightly more problematic time slot, then the lunchtime time slot might be useful.
As a general comment, I'm not going to comment about the number of proposals except to say that I understand the need to have an equal number of feeder workshops. But there are multiples of certain themes that reflect the interest -- the bottom-up interest in that particular theme, and that's something you can't really change or modify.
As a general comment, as you know, these were public proposals. The European Commission together with members of the European Parliament and forthcoming (inaudible) of the EU and a number of stakeholders have submitted two workshop proposals. One is on governance of cloud computing -- I will not go into details. One is on the governance of cloud computing, and the other one is on Internet resilience and stability.
What I want to say is we are more than happy to discuss in whatever time, in whatever format is appropriate the possibility to merge with other similar workshop proposals.
We have done an internal analysis, and our impression is that, for example, in cloud computing, cloud governance, there are a number of workshops that are frankly quite overlapping. We are overlapping with others; others are overlapping with us.
So we are open to suggestions on what would be the best way to propose a merge to ensure that the workshop participants can discuss and propose themselves whether a merger amongst them would make sense.
We will be here for both days. So I'm open to bilaterals or open discussion, whatever way is preferred. Thank you.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you, European Commission.
ICC?
>>ICC: Thank you, Madam moderator. Ayesha Hassan speaking for ICC and its BASIS initiative.
Since this is the first time I'm taking the mic, we would also like to express our great appreciation to the host country of Kenya for the stellar efforts you are making to prepare this year's IGF and take this opportunity to say a special thank you to Chengetai Masango and Seitti Arata and all of the interns and fellows that is helping this year's Secretariat move forward despite the lack of leadership and other resources and that they have had in the past. So bravo to all of you. We look forward to working with you to make this year's IGF a success.
A few responses to some of the questions and some general thoughts before we dig into the substantive issues. I agree with the representative from European Commission, starting at 9:00 would be just much more practical and less detrimental to the participation of the workshops who would be scheduled at 8:00. So we support that.
Starting at 9:00 also should mean that there is badging opening earlier because we've had in previous years a challenge where people would arrive for side meetings, for instance, at 8:30 or something and they couldn't get their badges. So that might be something just to pay attention to.
Now that we know that we're trying to get to a goal of 70, just a few general suggestions for how we might look at some of the mergers as the European Commission has pointed out. There are several proposals which are not very much developed, but they are really expressing, I think, from the stakeholders who have put them in that they're interested in the topic. And so encouraging workshop proposers to look at the other proposals in the category and even across categories because in some instances what we're seeing is issues that may have been brought up under an IG4D proposal actually could be merged with something in the emerging issues category or other similar situations. That may be one thing to look at.
It is also very heartening to see the range of stakeholders who have put in proposals this year, many of them new. So when we look at creating opportunities both for those who have been long-term participants and those who are new participants to have workshops, we might consider taking a look at entities that have put in more than three -- you know, more than two, three, four proposals and there are, in our analysis -- there are at least six or seven entities that fall in that category. And perhaps they can be encouraged picking their favorite two or three, if necessary.
That would reduce some of the workshop proposal numbers, if they're interested in a particular topic and they're not able to get all four of their proposals. Then perhaps they can be invited to join other workshop proposals in the same topic area.
I see the question posed about IG4D on the -- or emerging issues on the first day. One perspective in making that decision could be to look at the fact that emerging issues is coming to a new topic, the mobile Internet and issues. It could be really helpful for that session to be on the second day to allow some workshops to have taken place on that new emerging issues set of topics. So in that case, I would provide some support to having IG4D after the opening ceremony and emerging issue on day two in the morning.
Thank you for giving us some detail on the open forum proposals. The IGF, we've always considered that the open forums are just a really important opportunity for stakeholders to learn about what various organizations and processes are doing on the IG issues. So it really is a great way to cross-pollenate and provide an exchange of information and updates.
So I think those are important sessions to consider how they're fit in.
On dynamic coalition proposals, it will be important to apply the criteria we talked about in the past are the dynamic coalitions providing an update on what they have been doing and who is involved and ensuring that there is a range of stakeholder views in what's being developed there. So that might also help us to decide how those proposals are considered.
I would also suggest on the feeder workshops and numbers, maybe looking more at a proportional allocation instead of a set six per topic given the proposals we have now seen come in in different quantities under different topics.
Lastly, I would say that we have really tried to protect the lunchtime in the past, and I think other stakeholders have expressed that as well. It has just been such a great opportunity for people to interact in the village, for people to have lunch and interact, for side meetings to take place. And it makes it really challenging if there is absolutely no block in the day where there is just kind of interactive time. So we would put our support behind protecting that slot and finding other creative ways to both give people enough opportunity to have their proposals considered but also give the overall schedule an opportunity to give that kind of interactive space to stakeholders.
I think, too, thinking about any part of the lunch hour for side meetings, et cetera, that will also have some bearing on the logistics for lunch. So I just put that out there as a practical consideration. Thank you very much.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you, ICC.
I have China.
>>CHINA: Okay. Thank you, Madam Moderator. Also thanks to IGF Secretariat and host country of IGF's next meeting, Kenya. It is a pity we were able to participate the first of that meeting regarding the proposed theme to the IGF6 is the catalyst of change, access, development, freedoms and innovation.
We have a comment to make. We do recognize the catalyst role of the Internet as the Internet has become global infrastructure. It has impacted every aspect of our lives.
In this sense, access, development, freedoms and innovation are not extensive and cover the catalyst roles of the Internet.
(inaudible) might be restricted perspective of how we look at. So we will suggest to remove the four words and simplify the theme to "Internet as a catalyst for change."
And also in terms of the proposals, subthemes of the meeting, we support keeping the first MAG meeting used in the themes, subthemes as we have in Paris, mainly the development agenda, emerging issues, managing critical Internet resources, security, openness and privacy, access and diversity and taking stock the way forward.
About workshops setting the IGF Secretariat have released a meeting agenda for Nairobi about 100 more workshop proposals, we suggested organizer of the meeting and IGF Secretariat can hold the meeting (inaudible) and efficiency and merging similar workshops in this theme together for awaiting the public policy. That's all. Thank you.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you very much, China.
A question regarding the theme, is there anybody who would like to respond to that? Or a comment regarding the theme?
Okay. Perhaps we can come back to that again. I would like to give the floor to the next person. I think it is Avri Doria by remote participation. Yes, thank you, please.
>>AVRI DORIA: Thank you. There is a question and comment. A question from Avri Doria from United States. She is speaking as an individual. And her question is: Will the open consultation spend any time discussing the informal MAG's program design?
>> And comments from Nnenna from Nigeria. Yeah, comments. She is saying -- just a second. Yeah, her comment is: She said I think the merger principle can be used because she saw some workshops can be merged going by the presentations. That's her own contribution and comments. Thank you.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you, Avri and Nnenna.
The question regarding the nature of informal MAG design, Anriette would like to respond to that? I guess some question was raised in the morning and concern raised again. So we may want to look to discuss that later.
Okay, yeah, I think Chengetai understands. Is the question about to break out into groups tomorrow to deal with the workshops, or is it about the nature of the MAG? So question back to Avri. We can get back to that later.
Chris Disspain. No, it is Emily Taylor.
>>EMILY TAYLOR: Sorry. I used Chris' label because I couldn't find my own. Thank you very much. I just have one comment on the overall program, a high-level one, and just a general comment on the workshops as well.
First of all, you mentioned, Madam Chair, that there is a request from the host country to have the opening ceremony on the first day. And, of course, that is a very sensible proposal.
Just one flag to raise on that, is that I think some extensive work was done in rejigging the overall format of the meeting which I felt was very positive. And so as long as we don't lose that work in accommodating the change in schedule for the opening ceremony, I think that's just one to note.
Like other speakers, I think the principle of allowing workshops, as many as possible, and encouraging mergers on similar issues is a good one. Some of the workshops, I noticed as I went through them, are placed in odd categories and probably would do well to move categories.
And, also, if you look back at the questions posed in the program paper, relatively few of the workshops that I could see really address those questions. However, from the workshop proposals, you saw some other initial themes that aren't actually captured in the questions in the program paper, if I can put it like that. So, for example, there were themes bubbling up about the role of social networks with the catalyst of change that would fit the overall program title but didn't seem to be captured in any of the high-level observations on a specific point.
We have put in on behalf of .next, we have put in a workshop proposal on IDNs and the idn.idn experience and we are already speaking to another workshop organizer on a similar theme about the possibility of merging.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you, Emily. I think I will let the IGF Secretariat, again, reassure you regarding the request for the host country, that it is not going to be affecting the program any.
Chengetai?
>>CHENGETAI MASANGO: We will reassure that we will try to not affect the program -- well, affect it as little as possible.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you.
I have Martin Boyle from business entities. Thank you.
>>MARTIN BOYLE: Thank you, Madam Chairman.
As those have indicated, I think we do have to be realistic about how much we try and fit into an agenda and particularly when you start getting people -- expecting people to turn up very early or sacrifice eating. I think you have probably gotten to a point where people are going to end up reaching some sort of overload.
So I would strongly support people who said that we should try and avoid lunchtimes, which are actually quite important for people to be able to meet others in the margins of the meeting and, also, to avoid any meetings before 9:00.
Certainly, I think for every one of the preparatory meetings for the IGF, we have had the same problem, that we have considerably more workshop proposals than sensibly there are slots for them.
And I think that's probably a good, healthy sign. And it is also something where we do need to try and think about some attempts at rationally getting down to a smaller number.
And certainly the concepts of feeder workshops to the main sessions, I think, actually worked particularly well last year and should be retained.
But I think one of the other things we do need to look at is ensuring that we do get the range of topics, because, of course, people have come in with new ideas and imaginative approaches.
And I think it would be just a little bit disappointing if some of this exploratory work were dropped in favor of the same old subjects.
Certainly picking up on the last speaker, the idea of trying to encourage everybody to look -- who has put a proposal in to look fairly critically at what they have put in in comparison with what other people have put in and to open discussions with other workshops to try and find out about the complementarity is a good idea.
But I think it is something that perhaps the Secretariat also needs to give fairly clear contact points so that somebody who does want to contact another workshop can find who to go to, who is responsible and open that dialogue.
I think the last speaker also referred to topics that were cross-category. And, in fact, when you fill in a workshop proposal, you end up having to choose a category, no matter how much your proposal might fit in to several different categories. And that is something that is probably worthwhile, the Secretariat doing an initial perusal over to try and spot those which do have a wider range -- a wider range of interests.
The last point I'll make is actually specifically about one of those proposals. We have put in a proposal for encouraging an exchange of views between parliamentarians which we have had quite a large number at recent IGF meetings and other stakeholder groups.
And I'm mindful of Chengetai's comment about the need to ensure that you are using resources, particularly of interpreters and so I suggest that perhaps -- sorry, excuse me. Sorry about that.
Perhaps it's -- this is one where interpretation of that session could be particularly useful. So I just put that one forward. I would certainly note, though, that I would not envisage this particular workshop fitting in any of the categories but rather into several of those categories. Thank you, Chairman.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you very much, Martin.
George?
>>GEORGE PAPADOTOS: I have listened very carefully to the proposals regarding some reduction or merging of workshops. And I endorse this idea of encouraging mergers and so forth.
But, of course, the question still remains that if they don't want to merge, on what grounds and who is going to take that decision to tell someone that you cannot participate? Is it the Secretariat? Is it the host country? How has it been done in the past?
Also, there is a forgotten rule that we can apply, that if a particular workshop has not submitted a report in the previous IGF, should not be allowed to participate in this one. We have a repeat offender, and I think we have to stick to that particular rule. I don't think we would be interested in accepting a workshop that didn't bother to submit a report in the past.
But, as I said, the issue is still there as to how this decision -- difficult decision, because it is definitely a healthy sign that there are so many workshops and we know that they are the bread and butter of IGF and they also have an impact on attendance. Thank you.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you, George. I think regarding the issue of workshops and those who wouldn't want to merge and who takes the responsibility, I think it will be the MAG. But I think I will let the IGF Secretariat clarify on that. I don't think it will be the host country's prerogative to do that.
But, also, taking into consideration, I don't think there has been any -- I think there has never been any rejection of any workshops. So I think it is something that we may want to consider and what criteria, one of them being whether a report has been submitted before.
But I think Chengetai had also posed that question in terms of a weighting perspective and how we reject or accept workshops.
Anyway, Chengetai?
>>CHENGETAI MASANGO: Yes. It would be the Secretariat of the MAG that would look at the workshops and make a determination.
As far as rejecting -- well, we have rejected workshops that don't, you know, fulfill the criteria. It is not that -- but the bar has been low. It is not that -- are we going to make the bar a little bit higher this time around just to ensure the quality of the workshops that are coming?
And if you don't merge, then, of course, that is an option. But people have been on the whole willing to merge.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Yes, United Kingdom.
>>UNITED KINGDOM: Thank you, Chair. Just seeking a point of clarification of how long each individual -- is each individual workshop? Is the timing allowing for 1 1/2 hours or 2 hours or for merged one -- a merger of two or three workshop proposals, would they get longer? Generally, is there a scope for some flexibility on duration of workshops that could help unlock the problem of a subscription, which we agree is very much a healthy sign. And it will be unfortunate if we are having to turn down proposals in such a situation for purely logistical reasons.
I wonder if there is flexibility in how much time is allocated to integral workshops. Could it be down to the proposer to suggest times? I don't know. It may even be possible for a proposer to agree to a one-hour slot. Maybe that's asking too much. But anyway, clarification on that would be grateful. Thanks.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Chengetai?
>>CHENGETAI MASANGO: At the moment, we've calculated 90-minute segments. That doesn't mean that two segments can't be joined together if it's a merger of four workshops, et cetera, and they can have two sessions overlapping.
The rules for the time are not set in stone. We can discuss this and if it is an option in order to put -- accommodate more people or to put the number down of individual workshops and they can have a joint workshop, then, yes, it's worth considering.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you. Anriette.
>> ANRIETTE ESTERHUYSEN: Thank you, Alice. I strongly support BASIS' proposal. I'm surprised that the Secretariat is reluctant to enforce its own rules because at every open consultation, you have and endorsement from the IGF community to exclude proposals from applicants who did not submit a report on their previous workshop. Frankly, it is disrespectful to you, to the MAG, and to us. So I think it is the simplest rule to enforce.
Just a few other questions, particularly if it saves people's time as well, I think a lot of very useful points have been made.
I think for feeder workshops, maybe to add some criteria which possibly the MAG is already looking at, and that is a focus on public policy issues. I think for feeder workshops that would be important.
And then also addressing the development dimension which was at the February open consultation as being a very important component of the IGF being based and organized in Kenya by Kenya.
I think the other one as well -- which I do think you try to consider is diversity of views and diversity in participation so that it is not diverse just in terms of different stakeholders but actually people that have different opinions so that you have a richer discussion. Whatever happens to the theme, I'm sure you are considering.
I think the other point that has been made in the past in many of the concrete proposals on workshops is to ensure the number of speakers are not -- that there are so many speakers in a workshop that you are not going to have a lot of interaction. You know, if there are ten speakers, then you know there is not going to be enough time for substantive discussion with the audience.
And perhaps even for future workshops, asking the organizers to provide information on how they're going to facilitate the workshop. A little bit more stronger encouragement to ensure that you don't just have speaker after speaker after speaker. Then some other points. I'm restating recommendations that we've made before. But I think they can be implemented for Nairobi. And that would be evaluation for workshops, an online evaluation form, a URL made publicly available so that participants can evaluate that workshop during the workshop, at the end of the workshop. That's a very useful learning tool for the Secretariat, the MAG, and for workshop organizers. And reporting format. You might want to look at revising the reporting format a little bit, so that convergence and divergence of opinions can be captured. So that's a previous proposal that's in the record. And then I think -- my -- I think that's the practical suggestions for the workshop.
I think the final point I want to make -- it's in part responding to China's proposal on the main theme and some of the other comments that have been made.
I think that the development was really stressed as very important at the February consultation. And we are planning this IGF in the context of working group on IGF improvement and the resolution that the CSTT is working with. And I think there is general recognition that the IGF has to increase participation from developing countries and from actors from developing countries. So I think whatever decisions we make about the main theme of the IGF and also how we treat the IG4D session should consider that we have an obligation to that very strong sentiment that was expressed at the open consultation to have a strong focus on development and to organize this IGF in such a way to increase developing country participation. And on that, I would propose that the current question framed in the program paper on development in the -- for the IGF session are perhaps a little bit unclear and maybe too many.
So one proposal that I've heard some people discuss as possibly having for that first session, simpler questions. And to distinguish between questions on the substance of development issues and questions on process, a lot of participation of developing country stakeholders and perhaps have one question on process. And then have each of the main themes, the other main themes -- openness and access, et cetera -- define one question on policy from a development perspective that can then be discussed in those main themes. And then that gives us quite a neat structure of questions that we can reflect on in the final session, the taking stock session, which will clarify continuity and which ensure that development is effectively mainstreamed.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you very much, Anriette. We've got a remote participant, Barrack Otieno, and then the European Commission.
>>Thank you, Chair. Barrack Otieno. I think he has -- he was trying to add to the discussion, but now he's able to get assistance from another participant. So I think he's okay.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: European Commission?
>>EUROPEAN COMMISSION: Thank you. First of all, I should apologize because I forgot to congratulate the Secretariat and the host country for the work they're doing. So my apologies. I take the opportunity to congratulate and express our thankfulness now.
A few comments on the points that were put forward. Not on all, but on some. There was a mention of either workshop or some format to ensure the participation of parliamentarians in the discussion. The European Commission would fully support the idea. In fact, the delegation with the European Parliament will be present. And I cross my fingers, because in the European Union you never know. But the latest information that I have is that the delegation or the European Parliament will be present. And I think it would be beneficial for all stakeholders and for parliamentarians from different countries and regions amongst themselves to discuss these topical issues on which they could benefit. And it's them who say they could benefit from the expertise and views of other stakeholders.
The point was made on allowing supporting and allowing the evaluation of workshops. We, obviously, feel that that would be a good idea. And you can't really have an accountable process without some form of evaluation, ex-post evaluation on what you're doing.
On the other hand, we should be a bit careful not -- and I'm sure this was not what the previous speaker intended. We should be a bit careful not to use the evaluation as the only criteria or the main criteria. Because the reality is that sometimes a workshop can work more or less well independently of the efforts of the organizers of the workshop. There are many, many factors that can go into the successful workshop. So it should be one of the criterion. It is an important criterion. We don't think it should be the main criterion or the most important criterion. But it should be there most definitely.
We also share the view that there shouldn't be too many speakers at the workshop. On the other hand, our experience, not in assessing the IGF context, is very much depends -- you can have 15 speakers and have a very interactive discussion if the speakers actually listen to structure, the answer, and the general theme and they're willing to interact. You can two speakers that monopolize the whole conversation. So it is about the number of speakers, that is true. But it's also about the general -- the way the workshop is designed. And that also should be kept in mind as criterion.
Furthermore, we think that one important thing to keep in mind -- and we're aware of the fact that it is difficult to use it as a criterion. But this should be a message, we think, sent to workshop organizers. Workshops are -- allow me to be blunt. Workshops are completely useless if their purpose is to hear what we already all know or if they are -- if, in the end, they are simply to hug each other and say that we all agree on something. Because, in reality, in Internet governance view, is that there are more points of disagreement than points of agreement. And the only way to move forward is to confront each other on disagreement. It should be a clear message to workshop organizers not to refrain from different points of view, keeping the level of discussion civil, of course, and correct. But different points of view should be encouraged.
And last, but not least, I would, again, encourage not only the other MAG but also the other multilateral discussion in this context and other contexts to all workshop proposers, let's really look seriously at the overlaps that we have.
Our analysis showed us there are at least five workshops, besides the one we proposed on cloud computing, one way or the other. And there are four or five workshops that deal with resilience, Internet security, et cetera. This is good, from our perspective. It means that the topics are all right, are interesting. But we should really make an effort. And, again, I'm here both days. There are my contact details in the workshop proposals. We are fully available to discuss merging without denaturing the nature of the proposals, of course. Thank you very much.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you. George?
>>GREECE: Thank you. On the issue of Parliamentarians, in the past I've suggested to both Asai and to Kummer -- and I have repeated this -- a close cooperation with IPU, Inter-Parliamentary Union. I was also pleasantly surprised to see that under current WSIS events, there is participation by something like 50 parliamentarians. And the information about that particular participation appears on both sides of the IPU in the ITU as well.
So, if you want to maximize -- and I think a lot of MAG members have supported the idea -- participation by parliamentarians around the world, you have to cooperate with the IPU, Inter-parliamentary Union. It's here in Geneva. They are very keen to working with several parts of the U.N., human rights council. They attend common meetings in New York and so forth. And I think that should definitely enhance the overall event in Nairobi. Thank you.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you, George. Chengetai.
>>CHENGETAI MASANGO: Sorry. I just wanted to respond a little bit to Anriette's points. Yes, the Secretariat is very willing to make, you know, binary decisions like the use of a report. That's very easy to do, and we can do that quite easily. It's a little bit more difficult with the qualitative evaluation of the workshops. And for that we also need input from the MAG, which will help us make that determination.
Also this is just, generally, tomorrow we plan to break out into groups. And then these groups will be discussing the themes for the first half. So, for example, Anriette mentioned the Internet governance for development, that questions need some improvement. So in those groups I think that will be the perfect time to take another look at these questions and improve them. And also, when looking at the individual workshops as well, we should note workshops that are, you know, not quite there. But we can go back to the workshop event and say, if do you this, this, and that, then those workshops will be accepted as a feeder workshop or as any other workshops in those general themes. So that's just one thing I just wanted to point out. I will restate these instructions tomorrow. But, you know, you can think about them tonight as well as you look through the workshops. Thanks.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you. Kenya.
>>KENYA: Thank you, Chair. I just wanted to restate that as concerns the parliamentarian session, Kenya takes note of the valuable input from the participants here. And, as regards the U.K. members of Parliament, we are going to work with Nominet and U.K. to ensure that the event is successful. We have been able to do this in the past during the East African IGF forums. And we've been able to attract quite a good number of parliamentarians and had useful deliberations. So we still believe that, based on the past experience, this is going to be a successful event. Thank you.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you. There's someone at the end. I'm sorry. I can't see the -- quite clearly. Ah, Katitza, sorry. Yes, please.
>>KATITZA PEREDA: Thank you, Chair. I cut my hair, maybe fat. Good morning, and I thank you for the opportunity to speak. I would like to thank the host institution for all the wonderful work they are doing in this moment organizing the next Kenya meeting. We also want to thank the Secretariat that, despite all these lack of resources, they're still going on and trying to make this a successful meeting. We want to start to echo what the Greek representative said about the importance to enforce our own rules or the secretary's rules to approve workshops who have complied with the rule of submitting previous reports.
While reviewing the workshop description -- as a MAG member, we have to review all the workshops and grade them -- we verify that many of them have complied with reporting mechanisms. But there were just a few, a very few exceptions, at least in the ones I reviewed in that they haven't.
What was interesting on this exercise, to go back to last year's report, is that we were able to verify also if, for instance, the workshops complying with the rule of gender balance, developing country multistakeholder participation at the end.
So I have put notes on my grading of those who have complied with those rules also last year. Because it's a good exercise. I think so.
While reviewing the workshops, we also noticed that there were a few workshops that are controversial on content, but they were very well developed. We believe those workshops would be welcomed, but a diversity point of view might be encouraged. For instance, I will put just two examples. There's one about digital citizenship, children and young people's rights in their online work, and a second workshop about protecting the most vulnerable users in society, the role of different actors in helping the new user survive in online work. They were very well developed, and they touched the concerns of those who organized that conference. But we think that, if needed, a strong advocate on freedom of expression and privacy on those workshops. And we hope that Secretariat could help or could be a facilitator to be able to encourage those organizers to involve those civil society advocates on those panels.
At the same time, for instance, civil societies have presented a very well workshop, it's workshop 10, about the reflection on the -- in their proposal to where the IGF 2.0. While many of them, I not necessarily agree with proposal, we think is a very valuable contribution for a polemic proposal. And we hope that other stakeholders could support that and be productive, try to participate in that workshop, too.
Regarding the workshops -- what was your -- regarding the workshops, we also see, while reviewing the previous last year report, we realize that some workshop organizers are actually repeating the themes they discussed last year and other years. And I think it will be good to encourage organizers to do new themes each year instead of to repeat what we have discussed the previous years.
That's all for me now. Thank you.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you. We've got Council of Europe.
>>COUNCIL OF EUROPE: Thank you very much. Lee Hibbard from the Council of Europe. And thank you, Madam Chair, and thank you to the Kenyan authorities for all the hard work in preparing the hosting of the IGF this year. We very much look forward to working with you all in unpacking the access development and freedom angles of the main theme of the IGF, in particular with regard to human rights, rule of law, and democracy for the Internet. Important thanks to Chengetai Masango and Seitti Arata for the very effective secretariat support.
2011 promises to be a very productive year for the Council of Europe responding to challenges of the Internet. And we'd like to share these new responses in Nairobi by several workshop proposals which touch upon a diversity of public policy issues, such as protection, in particular, regarding consent, principles of transparency, and accountability, data minimization, et cetera, new guidelines on freedoms and responsibilities for media and Internet intermediaries, Internet governance and principles that frame and envision Internet from a human rights perspective, human rights guidelines for mutual assistance and cooperation formed between states on cross Internet content, and best practice regarding strengthening criminal justice capacities and cooperation in the fight against cybercrime.
Now, that said, as regards to questions at hand regarding workshops and related matters, I think, in my opinion, I would tend to prefer retaining as many workshops as possible because this brings in people. It justifies their travel and promotes inclusion, basically. This is notwithstanding the need to be critical, as one speaker said, and maximize encouragement for mergers. But no obligation unless there's a real flagrant duplication, I would say. Careful, I would say, attention to not overmerging workshop proposals, as people, bodies, can lose themselves in the merge. It makes it difficult for them to justify organizers spending time actually traveling. One speaker regarding the lunch is quite sacred, at least a small lunch as a possibility as a networking opportunity and a little reward in respite from the long days in many different sessions. Like one of the speakers said, I like the idea of a standing proposal for open evaluation of workshops. And a minimum number of key questions are being answered at the end of the IGF.
Once workshops are validated after this planning meeting, I'm not quite sure how much control of workshops should be exerted. Of course, I think what's important is some quality control by people, for example, those who understand the concerns being shared here is a way for some port of person, some sort of attention to control the event would be good, but not too much control over the freedom of workshop to organize itself, et cetera.
And, just to finalize one last thing, I'd like to express the Council of Europe's firm commitments to the IGF still and for the future. We support multistakeholder dialogue. And it's real, tangible. And we can see it with the work that we do with the EuroDIG Secretariat and in a new Council of Europe 4-year strategy on Internet governance, 2012-2013, which will be the focus of our open proposal.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you, Council of Europe. I have remote participant Barrack, and then Anriette, and then European Commission.
>>Thank you, Chair. We have a comment from Mr. Nirani Nimpuno. He's supporting the ICC's suggestion to approach those who have suggested three, four, five workshop proposals to be asked to pick two or three favorite proposals in favor of their other proposals.
And quick question from Nnenna from Nigeria. There are workshops that look like last year's topics. What is the rule about such? Thank you.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you. I have Anriette, please.
>>APC: Thank you, Alice. Just a suggestion that just occurred to me. In the light of the comments from European Union and also from Council of Europe that one shouldn't interfere too much in how workshops are organized. You can have 15 speakers that are interactive and three that are not. I think it's a very legitimate point. Has IGF ever -- I don't think so, because we organize workshops -- considered having a briefing session at the beginning of the IGF for workshop organizers just to, in a gentle, encouraging way, make some of these points about facilitation and interactivity? It might even be an opportunity to build the capacity of workshop organizers that have not thought about that. So I'm not sure if that's possible. It might be logistically difficult. But it's worth, I think, considering.
And, just to clarify that my proposal earlier about evaluation was not as a tool to help us select workshops. It was as a tool that could become standardized in all IGFs for participants to evaluate workshops so that it would be -- it would provide information for workshop organizers that they can then take into account in the future. It wasn't intended as a process for today or tomorrow or with a build-up.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you, Anriette. I think that's a great idea. In fact, I'd suggest that we even go farther and have a level of instructions for workshop organizers on the Web site as well as having a briefing session. Thank you.
I have the European Commission.
>>EUROPEAN COMMISSION: Thank you, Moderator. And thanks to all the participants for their very useful comments. I would like to offer, first of all, a clarification. And I'm sorry for the bureaucracy. My comments are not the comments of the European Union, but they're the comments of the European Commission.
I understand sometimes you need a Ph.D. to understand the difference. But we, too, have difficulties. But just put it on record that these are not the comments of the EU or the European Union but of the Commission.
We would fully support the idea of the APC, I believe, to have a briefing session for workshop organizers. As a matter of fact, that's quite a common practice. It takes a bit more time, but it's quite a common practice in all the conferences and workshops we organize. Because you also need -- if you're organizing a workshop but the moderator is another person, you need to give clear instructions, recommendations, or messages or gentle nudging on what you're actually expecting as a whole from the workshop. If it relates to what was said, there is no obligation but there should be a message that controversial discussions are not a problem, which, frankly, was our feeling in IGF that there was a general feeling that you shouldn't be controversial. And that kind of loses the whole point of meeting together and discussing.
There was a point made, I think, by Katitza -- I think it was her -- concerning the repetition of workshops, having a workshop that is similar to a workshop done a previous year. That's a very good point which we can share.
On the other hand, we should also be careful to -- not to be radical for the sake of being radical in the sense that there are certain issues which are naturally considering cybersecurity is an issue that goes on and on. And you can either have a workshop that focuses on what happened this year and that would be different from the previous year. But we're discussing about general principles or approaches, et cetera. Then, unavoidably, the general theme of the workshop will be similar to previous years workshops. That's a fair point which we fully share.
Concerning the proposal, I think, by the ICC that those who had proposed three or four or five proposals should be gently nudged to select their best proposals -- and, incidentally, the European Commission made two proposals. So we're out of the picture, I think you need to be a bit careful there, because it's not about the number. If all the five workshops proposed by the same organization are great workshops, then those should be retained. So they shouldn't be -- if, on the other hand, amongst the five workshops, there are varying degrees of evaluation, according to what the MAG decides, et cetera, then we might ask -- you or whomever, might ask the organizers to select their best ones. But we shouldn't just penalize people because they show the effort to come up with 5 or 6 or 10 good ideas. I think that's all I wanted to say. Thank you.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you. UNESCO.
>>UNESCO: Thank you, Moderator. Let me first thank the Secretariat, the moderator, and the next host country Kenya for the efforts made to prepare well for the IGF. We're so pleased to see how well we're advancing despite the obstacles we're all aware of. So congratulations to you.
I think encouraging mergers is a good one, encouraging diversity, too. The criteria of gender balance, geographical balance, and strong focus on development and the multistakeholder setup could be important criteria also for the workshops.
We also see that coffee breaks, lunchtimes are essential for networking opportunities. And we should keep them free. We support online evaluations. And we, UNESCO, have submitted all reports from former workshops. And we have this time we will have our executive board, so we will have few people coming to the IGF only. And we have only submitted three workshop proposals.
We wanted to give -- it's a little heads up also to some of the workshops who did mention us as core organizers and who are not in contact with us now. I thing there are 10 workshops where we're mentioned, so we will not, most likely, be able to participate in all these this time because of the executive board.
I wanted to make a point the Council of Europe just made before. It is important for some of the participants to be on workshops and to organize workshops. And it's a way, really, to ensure participation, too. So perhaps some of the -- if -- for those who need a workshop to be able to participate, one could perhaps consider the less attractive slots if it's just a way to get them to. Thank you.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you. I have Portugal, and then the gentleman next to Anriette. Then Patrik Faltstrom and the U.K. Portugal first.
>>PORTUGAL: Thank you very much, and good morning. This is the first time I'm talking today. Let me congratulate Kenyan authorities and Chengetai Masango to keep things moving and rolling despite this incredible period that we're facing with IGF left with no leadership and coordinator.
I would like to call attention for the need to ensure multistakeholder is in all the workshops. I think that this is very important.
My second point is about the taking stock and the way forward. And, in particular, the IGF improvements. I would like to underscore the importance of the theme at the IGF. And Portugal is available to discuss it with all new stakeholders in an open and inclusive way involving all the stakeholders. Otherwise, what is the purpose to discuss this issue?
On the other hand, we should focus in having a constructive workshop than the other way around. Divergence of opinions are good. But we have to build a constructive dialogue. Otherwise, it will be impossible to move on and to compromise. Thank you.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you, Portugal. Gentleman --
>>ECPAT: I'm Anjan Bose from ECPAT International. Just a comment here. I've been participant at the IGF for the last six year. What I'd like to see is a workshop, which is great. Everybody brings ideas forward, and there is a lot of sharing happening. We learn new things, new trends. I'm not against that. That definitely is the way to go.
But I would suggest, from looking back, if we had done the workshop and proposed something and that really made a difference in terms of policy changes, if those proposals, whatever will discuss within the workshop, had actually long lasting impact. And, if some of the workshops that we are looking at highlight some of the changes that has happened over the years of running IGF, and how maybe in the future IGFs we can dedicate a slot that can actually reinforce the value of IGF in moving these issues forward, that would be one of the criteria. If some of the workshops can actually highlight some of the issues that we have managed to achieve could be one of the criteria. Just a thought.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you. Patrik?
>>PATRIK FALTSTROM: Thank you, Moderator. What I will do is read out the points that Mrs. Nirani was pasting into the chat as she was cut out. So this is Nirani Nimpuno saying the following: I would like to join others in thanking the Chair and the Secretariat for their excellent work despite the lack of leadership, time, and resources at this time. It is very encouraging to see that the planning process is moving forward so well despite these challenges. I agree with Anriette's point about rules. The rules are endorsed by the community. We have discussed them open amount of times. And they have been made clear to all workshop organizers. So I see no reason why we should not apply them. It was noted that several of the cloud computing workshops overlapped. While I don't believe in the matter of forced marriages, I do think it is constructive to contact workshop organizers with similar themes and ask them if they believe it would be useful to merge. I would also like to support the ICC's suggestion to approach those who have submitted three, four, five workshop proposals to be asked to pick two to three favorite workshops in favor of their other proposals.
Finally, as for the main theme, I believe there was substantia discussions about this both during the open consultations and the open MAG meeting in February. The final wording was what came out of those vivid discussions in February. So completely removing the four keywords in the main theme at this late stage as proposed by one participant would not be respectful about that process or the outcome of that discussions.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you very much, Nurani.
I have got the U.K. and then ICC.
>>UNITED KINGDOM: Yes, thank you very much, Chair.
I wanted to support the proposal, I think it was from Anriette, for a briefing session for workshop proposers. I think that's a very helpful one. I think it provides -- that briefing session would provide a useful opportunity to reinforce the importance of orientating as much dialogue in the workshops towards the questions. And that would be identified under the main themes, the questions that would be most relevant to the workshop -- to each individual workshop because we shouldn't lose sight of the importance of the questions because by the end of the IGF, I think we're all looking for some ability to assess progress in identifying the answers to those questions. So the four days will progress the dialogue helped by the formulation of the questions and the workshops' proposers should try to bear that in mind.
And in moderating the dialogue and interaction in those workshops, I very much agree with what has been said earlier about workshops not being dominated by presentations and lots of speakers. They should be -- they should maximize the opportunity for interaction amongst stakeholders engaged on the issue in that workshop and cut down to a minimum the staged presentations, as it were.
So, the briefing session should -- one benefit of a briefing session would be to remind everybody of that. I wonder actually -- maybe I missed something, but do the workshop proposers have to identify which questions are most relevant to their workshop? I wonder if they were asked to do that or will be asked to do that, if they're not already asked. That might help the awkward and difficult process of merging, if you're able to compare workshop proposals on a similar theme, which are attempting to answer the same questions, that might help the process of engineering mergers, which nobody wants to do. But if the number of slots is oversubscribed, then as we said earlier, it is perhaps inevitable.
I just also wanted to take the opportunity to alert colleagues here or stakeholders from commonwealth countries that one of the open fora will be one for the Commonwealth Internet Governance Forum. We will have an open forum. We are working on the proposal now.
There will be a meeting of the steering committee, which the U.K. is part of, to discuss the potential for examining capacity-building and tackling cybercrime. I just wanted to flag that out for stakeholders and representatives of governments from commonwealth countries here, that there will be an open forum hosted by the Commonwealth IGF.
Thanks very much.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you, U.K.
ICC?
>>ICC-BASIS: Thank you, Chair. I just wanted to support those who have said that the workshops should be encouraged to have a broad range of views, not just stakeholder groups and other forms of diversity but views to ensure -- sometimes within stakeholder groups, there's actually a broad range of views or experiences that would be really helpful. So that's something for proposers to keep in mind.
Like others, I just wanted to point out that there are several references in proposals, which I realize it is early days and many people didn't have a chance to get all their details finalized. But there are references to we'll be inviting ICC/BASIS, need business representative, private sector representative.
I just wanted to say that in most cases, I have not been contacted and no one from business has, that I know of.
I would just encourage workshop proposers, we are here, a number of us. Please feel free to contact me. I'm happy to facilitate. We have a strong group of experts planning to come to Kenya. And certainly if workshop proposers are inviting particular types of expertise, we may be able to convince even others to come. We are happy to help fill in those blanks.
I would also say that the analysis of workshop proposals at this stage, there are several workshops where I don't see any reference to a business angle or a business expert being identified in the discussion. And I think that where the topics would include a business angle, it makes sense to have a business or more than one business person included in that discussion. And, again, we're here to help to contact us. Thank you.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you.
If there are no more general comments -- oh, Council of Europe and Marilia.
>>COUNCIL OF EUROPE: (saying name), Council of Europe. Just to wrap up the last series of comments by saying, I think it is really incumbent on us and the MAG to do best efforts regarding workshop proposals, those (inaudible) by personalizing the contacts with those workshop proposers who may be far away, who may not be here, who may not be online and to really spend time having a quick chat about what they're doing, what they expect to be addressed and sharpening their understanding about what's been discussed here.
I fear there might be a disconnect, and it is very important that this briefing that we're talking about is not taking place on the day of the event. That's too late. For me that's far too late.
And in terms of the -- I mean, from my experience with the EuroDIG, it is something which needs to happen now. The conference calls, just personalizing contacts and trying to communicate these concerns is really important now and in the next weeks, months. On the day of the event, it is much too late.
In terms of quality control, that's key. Thank you.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you. Marilia.
>> MARILIA MACIEL: I wanted to get back to a suggestion that was made by Anriette before, which is to say that I agree we should propose participants of workshops should be able to evaluate themselves, what they think about their workshops. This is very important for us to improve from one year to the other.
The second suggestion I would like to make is we put together an open survey that would guide workshop organizers in reporting back from their workshops. The surveys could be customized or tailored to each main theme in order to get back to the general questions in each main theme. I think it is very important that when workshop organizers write their reports, they are -- they report back to this general question and they try to explain how the general questions were addressed in the workshops.
And I would like to suggest that the groups that are gathered around these main themes, they work together in order to propose this. This specific open survey is to be handed into workshop organizers later so the same group that has worked on the organizing can work on the open-ended survey.
I would just like to make a very brief comment on the selection of workshops. I believe that is very important that we value the efforts and the proposals and people who take the time to propose the workshop for the IGF.
But I like to go back to this point that I really feel we are dealing here with public time, it is our time, it is the time of the community. And we have to make sure that the workshops reflect what are the concerns of the community. If we are here -- I believe we are entitled to make a decision about what is the main themes for the IGF this year and to make a selection and to have some criteria to do it.
And I fear that workshops will be like a ticket to go to the IGF. It is not the purpose of workshops at all. If we have a problem of funding -- and I think we do have a problem of funding -- then let's name it correctly. We should not make the workshops to be a ticket to the IGF because the idea of the workshops is to advance and debate some key issues. If we make them flat, just general proposals, then people will lose interest on the IGF all together. And I think this is the worse scenario of all.
So I really think that we should have clear guidelines and we should say no to a workshop proposal that doesn't have conditions to be carried out. Because many people, I believe, are proposing workshops in order to save space and to develop the proposal later on. And I know that because I have done that before in the past.
So it is a common practice. The deadline is approaching, and you put something on paper and that's it. And if we approve that, we are just signing a blank check. So what is our role here? Why do we come here to discuss each workshop proposal? I don't see the point at all.
For instance, reports, are we going to stick to this criteria and say, okay, if you did not present a report last year, we won't accept this workshop proposal? Because no one takes it seriously anymore. No one. So we are at some point playing fool here. Let's stick to the guidelines we decide, and let's say no to the workshops we have to say no because they can't sustain.
And maybe last year it will be an important topic, but this year the important topics that have been identified by this community here have been this and this and this. And it is important that we stick to that. Thank you.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you. We have a remote participant.
>> Thank you, Chair. There is an important comment and proposal from Mr. Barrack Otieno. He is proposing that workshop organizers should try as much as possible to involve as much panelists from Africa so it would be possible to elicit interest and support from African governments since this will be the major forum in the continent. That is his own contribution.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you. I have the European Commission, and then we have to wrap up this session so we can go to discussing the workshop under the various themes before we break for lunch.
European Commission, please.
>>EUROPEAN COMMISSION: Thank you, Madam Moderator. I will try to be as brief as possible. I want to react to the intervention of the remote one. I think that rules should be respected. If there is a reporting requirement, it should be respected.
On the other hand, it would be useful as I think was the suggestion of the previous speaker to have some kind of guideline to ensure that the reporting has actually been assessed of quality. We can type up a quick report that doesn't add value. The open questionnaire or whatever idea we can come up with would be very useful.
On the point of putting placeholders, the previous speaker did it. We did it. I think nobody in this room can claim that they never did it because that is what they are. It is very complicated to present a good enough proposal without knowing in advance what others are proposing. So I think there should be an effort -- and I would be happy for clarification on the process. There should be an effort not to merge just for the sake of merging. And, frankly, it is not -- workshops should not be a condition of the tickets to come to the IGF. They should not be a card, "I participated, I spoke at the workshop." Even if we are not speakers but the workshop has value, we prefer to have that workshop. We can intervene from the audience. We can participate.
But it should be a process -- a clear process now, afterwards remotely, whatever, to make sure we can talk to one another and merge what can be merged to turn -- if there are placeholders, to turn those placeholders into useful workshops.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you, European Commission.
I'd like us to now go to -- to move on to discussing the workshops under the different themes. We have the development agenda, which, I think, has about 22 workshops. And then emerging issue with 17. Taking stock in way forward with five. IGF Secretariat had asked a question regarding rating, which I think we still have to deal with. Some of you had already started discussing specific -- very specific issues around the questions, reframing the questions, which, I believe, we can discuss in detail tomorrow when we break into the breakout groups. But it would be good to have an indication of how we want to deal with those.
So there is the issue of weighting and quality control as well as unpacking the theme and the workshops so that we are clear what we want out of them.
I will let the IGF Secretariat comment on that and then open it up for comments on the specific.
We are starting with the development agenda first. Chengetai?
>>CHENGETAI MASANGO: Thank you, Alice. Alice, basically, said what I wanted to say. And so I would like to open up the floor for comments on the Internet Governance for Development section if anybody has got any comments, taking into consideration that tomorrow morning we are breaking up into the groups. This is just the general discussion.
We break into the groups, and then the groups come in and we can have an ending discussion at the end.
So for the topic of Internet Governance for Development, do you have any comments? And also as importantly, comments on the weighting of that section or section on the whole.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you, Chengetai.
Fouad?
>>FOUAD BAJWA: Thank you, Chair.
Well, initially the question formulation part which we -- the activity that we carried on from February, early this year, it constituted more than 90 members from across all stakeholder groups. And obviously we've had the feeling continuously that since we are not -- have not yet achieved development mainstreaming, there are confusions around the question. So that was the initial compilation. The group agreed to move that forward initially.
But, once again, we're open to the fact that tomorrow as we break into groups, we can revisit the question, make it more focused and as the earlier participants from APC and so forth have already suggested, we can revisit the question and keep it very focused because due to the fact that we have lesser time on our hands within that particular session, we can have a very focused discussion. So that option is open. And I would be more than happy to lead that group with my colleagues and work out a more focused question. Thank you.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you for offering to lead the group tomorrow.
Any other comments on the development agenda? Tulika (phonetic)?
>> Thank you, Chair. Since I have taken the floor for the first time today, I would like to, once again, say thank you to the Kenyan authorities for hosting this IGF without the support that we in India had with the full Secretariat and the whole thing working. We hope that things will work out even better than what we have been thinking about.
And I would also like to thank the Secretariat for taking on the work and doing things in the interim that we had been doing earlier. So actually we have been doing things pretty well.
I am taking the floor for two reasons. When I was looking through the list of workshops and looking at the questions and response to these questions, I saw that for many of these responses, when we had asked whether they had workshops earlier, the answer is no. And at the same time, we are here trying to discuss how to get much out of the workshops.
How does one understand or try to assess whether these people who have not held workshops earlier in the IGF will be able to deliver to what we are expecting?
Those will be organizing workshops in the IGF since the first five years. In that situation, one has to understand whether this qualifies them as people who should be given a chance to run workshops in the IGF and, therefore, be given more priority than those who have already been organizing workshops in the IGF.
If that be the case, I would like to support and urge proposal for holding a discuss with these workshop organizers, proposers to clearly understand whether they would be able to allow their workshops to be main session meetings and the outcomes reflected in the main sessions. Thank you.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you very much, Tulika.
George?
>>GEORGE PAPADOTOS: I keep hearing about breaking into groups tomorrow. But I would like to find out what the agenda is for tomorrow. There is no agenda. And the point that was made by several participants here is the state of play of where we are. And I think that that should be discussed as well and also in regard to the report that will be submitted to Secretary-General, I don't know who is going to prepare at that because there is no representative from UN-DESA. But we can talk about it.
Thank you.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Chengetai is just bringing up the agenda for tomorrow. But the main objective is to break into groups so that we can select the workshops; even weight them, reduce them, if possible. You know, perhaps look at that meat that we would want to suggest merging. That would be the specific objective. And he is just coming up with the agenda.
Again, I think regarding -- I think you are asking the format tomorrow's meeting takes on, we have said it will be open because of the nature of what the current MAG -- the uncertainty about the MAG.
So I think I would like to suggest that it is an open meeting and all of those IGF participants can attend and participate and contribute to selecting the workshops.
While we are waiting for Chengetai to come up with a specific agenda, are there any other questions or comments?
>>CHENGETAI MASANGO: Sorry, I will just say it from my head. I'm sorry, my e-mail is rather slow. Basically, when we start tomorrow morning, we will just start in a general plenary session. Any leftover business we'll discuss. And then the plan is to break out into groups with a facilitator/coordinator. Fouad has graciously volunteered to be the lead for the Internet Governance for Development group. The purpose of these groups is to look at the mission, identify possible feeder workshops and, basically, look at the workshops that are associated with that main session and also look at the questions and provide more context around those questions so that people can begin to attack them because at the moment, it is just a single sentence question most of the time. So we need more context around those questions. And, also, identify possible speakers for the main sessions, for the main sessions.
Then the plan is to come back at lunchtime in the afternoon. And the individual facilitators/coordinators will report back to the meeting as a whole and if there is any comments or discussions from anybody else who was not involved in that group are welcome, and then we will hit that.
All these will go back into the program paper because the program paper is the document, basically, that we use to plan the meeting. And if we can fill in as much information as we can about the main sessions and about the feeder workshops, these will also go into the schedule. So we'll begin to fill out the schedule and getting us closer to a more completed program.
That's the plan for tomorrow. I have missed something, can somebody please remind me. I'm sorry. I just can't find the e-mail. Nope? Okay, thanks.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: There was a question about the report after tomorrow, the report to the Secretary-General. I think that's the IGF Secretariat. Together we do with UN-DESA.
>>CHENGETAI MASANGO: There is going to be a report about tomorrow's meeting. It is just a summary which has always done by the Secretariat. The Secretariat is going to do that and post it on the Web site and also send it up the hierarchy. So that's taken care of. UN-DESA doesn't really do that. We submit the report of the summary once it is approved.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Yes, Nominet. Thank you. Martin.
>>NOMINET: If I actually press a button, it might actually help. Thank you, Chair. Martin Boyle from Nominet. As I'm not going to be here tomorrow, can I just remind you of the comment I made earlier about proposal 125 which appears in the Internet Governance for Development list and which I seriously hope will cover some IG4D issues, but I would also expect to be over other issues as well. So perhaps needs to be considered just a little bit apart from the other workshops in that list. Thank you.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you, Martin.
Any other comments, especially regarding the weighting of the workshops so we at least have a common understanding of how we deal with them, even for tomorrow's sessions?
Perhaps, Chengetai, you can start us off by giving us an idea.
>>CHENGETAI MASANGO: Basically, the problem is -- as I've said, is that we have an uneven number of workshops for each theme. Internet governance for development, we have 22. Emerging issue, we've got 16. For taking stock and the way forward, we've got five. Critical Internet resources, we've got nine. And, basically, what we wanted was if you had any comment on whether or not we should just stick to saying that each team has a set number of feeder workshops because there is this important for tomorrow's instructions, or we should do some weighting because not all topics are equal. I mean, each IGF meeting can also concentrate on a particular track. I mean, that's possible as well. So at the moment, the two with the most are security, openness and privacy and access and diversity. That is my question. If you have any comments, please feel welcome.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Anriette, U.K. and European Commission. Anriette.
>>ANRIETTE ESTERHUYSEN: Thank you, Alice. I think I've heard -- I'm striving to follow, by the way, and dealing with very poor connectivity. So I apologize if I missed some proposals.
But I did hear proposals earlier that political workshop workshop proposal format constrained us because we could only select one main theme.
Maybe in future, I think as Martin or the U.K. proposed, we should be able to have a dropdown option for other main themes that the workshop is relevant to.
But wouldn't one device be -- I think Ayesha mentioned, sometimes even though the workshop proponents identify the workshop is being rated into a particular theme, the substance of the discussion might also be relevant to another theme.
So couldn't that be a device that could be used by the working groups tomorrow to assist whether a workshop might, in fact, fit into another theme? And then communicate with the workshop proponents to consult if there would be an agreement with that. I know it is not the entire answer, but I think it would be a device that could provide a more even spread.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Chengetai.
>>CHENGETAI MASANGO: That's a very good suggestion. So, if the working group thinks that particular workshop does not belong in -- or could belong in another group, they just contact the other group's coordinator and suggest that. And he or she accepts it.
>> Great.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you. U.K.
>>UNITED KINGDOM: Thank you, Chair. I was going to very much speak to that as well. I mean, if you look at, for example, 109 and 192, these are not answering or addressing questions that have been framed on IG4D, but they're more related to where similar proposals under emerging issues. And maybe when -- with this reallocation, if you like, of proposals -- another one I was curious about was 183, global framework for net neutrality. I mean, is that in the right place? I do wonder. And 89, East African ICT sector, could that be handled within a regional open forum, I wonder. I don't know.
But, overall, I'm not surprised, really, about how the numbers have worked out, even with these -- with these apparent anomalies that maybe some would fit under different headings. The numbers work out roughly as I would expect. I mean, obviously, some of the critical Internet resource issues are very specific, maybe related to emerging issues. And so the small number on CIR is not surprising. And relate -- some would relate to issues that are going to be addressed under emerging -- under the emerging issues theme and the taking stock.
Well, that was bound to be a rather limited number of proposals, because -- because of the nature of the issue, I guess, the way forward for the IGF and so on rather than burning issues of access security, privacy, and so on, which can, obviously, generate a lot more concern for stakeholders from whichever constituency.
So I think, as I say, a reallocation of some of these might well resolve the problem. Thanks.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you, U.K.
European Commission?
>>EUROPEAN COMMISSION: Thank you, moderator. I would actually support a position taken by APC, I believe, that workshops can actually belong to multiple themes. If you take, for example, cloud computing, which is one of the workshops that we proposed, the reality is that the topic of cloud computing can be easily tackled from many different angles and from other themes. So I wouldn't be surprised if different proposals on the topic had been put under different themes.
On top of that, we should be mindful of the fact that at the end of the day the fact that a workshop proposer puts his or her proposal on a specific team is the opinion of the workshop proposers. And opinions are bound to differ. So I very much value and would support the idea, which, I believe, is again from the APC, to let the MAG or the open meeting or whatever it will be, suggest to the workshop proposers whether it would be fine either for a reallocation or for being considered under multiple themes. Concerning the general points on the balance weighting between the different teams, I have decided I missed a bit. I don't understand very well what would be the implication of having different -- a different number of workshops or widely different number of workshop themes. But, anyway, the point is that if we assume that the proposers chose the right theme for their workshop -- and let's assume that -- and there are less proposals for a particular theme, that simply reflects that the community has less interest in that particular theme. And I do not think that we should force upon the community the choice that all themes are equally important or one theme is more important than another. The number of the workshop is one idea to which the community expresses its appreciation for a particular theme. One of the criteria, not the only one.
As a last point, this will be for the next meeting, I guess. I think it will be useful, especially considering the Internet situation in this room, is for the Secretariat to print the list of workshops and distribute to participants. Because, following the discussion, I actually had it on my laptop. I'm not sure everybody had it. Just following the discussion by workshop number is extremely challenging. Thank you.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you very much. I have remote participant. And then Theresa.
>> Thank you, Chair. Ms. Olga Cavalli is supporting what APC said, that some workshops are not so specifically defined for the different themes. So they could be moved to other group of workshops.
And another participant, Ms. Nnenna from Nigeria, is saying the workshops may be moved into appropriate themes in the consultation.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you. Theresa?
>>ICC: Hi. This is Theresa for ICC. Just a few things. One is, with regards to tomorrow and the discussions of the workshops, will there be transcription or some sort of mechanism for transparency of the dialogues? I just raised that question because I know that's been an area we've been trying to improve on in the context of the MAG's work.
With regards to the weighting question, I think our preliminary thoughts are that, really, it's premature to be focusing on that in the discussions tomorrow, in particular because of the dialogues now about the merging, potential merging of different workshops, reorganizing them into different groupings. I think we need to get further input from the stakeholders in the room on the different workshops and participating in -- to look at a weighting based on the submissions to date as opposed to the complete workshops that people have time to do I think would be better.
If I may, can I touch on a few comments that ICC has on emerging issues, if that's appropriate?
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Yes, please.
>> ICC: Just quickly. On that, the question, the highlighted question on that is was governance different for the mobile Internet from the wired world? And in that category, we actually -- there's 17 workshops, as has been pointed out. And I think as context, it would be very helpful to be identifying the feeder workshops that elaborate on the issues that had been identified as complementary. So, for example, the strong mobile penetration in developing countries, policies and regulations in the context of mobile Internet connection and impact, and policy and governance choices to maximize the Internet for economic development.
But, in noting the workshops that have been submitted also for that section, there's really some very good ones that relate to other topics but are emerging issues. So I think we should, in our discussions tomorrow, very much take into context there's sustainability in ICT, ICT for green. There's other issue areas and where those might be appropriately put or how to look at the emerging issues section in that context.
Just to note, also, some of the workshops are fully multistakeholder, and some are less so. And we have an opportunity with people here to try to reach out to ensure diversity and multistakeholder participation.
For the overall session and for the workshops, I think it's important to hear about the new innovation and developments. Issues are very specific for the region in particular. And not only to focus in on the governance issues but also to address advantages and opportunities that exist in the emerging area, such as cloud computing and mobile opportunities overall. On the area of mobile services and in particular for the region, it's really an entry point to the Internet for many points of the world. There's a leapfrogging, in essence, into this space. And I think examples of the mobile banking have been really exemplary in that. And I think we can highlight in some of those dialogues what makes the successful, what has enabled that opportunity, what are some of the challenges overall?
But, back to the workshops, we have some that are fitting into that, some less so. But we should look at how to balance that out, because they're very good workshop proposals. Thank you.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you very much, Theresa, ICC.
Any other comments? I suppose even on the next one, taking stock and the way forward. So any comments on any of the three themes?
ICC again. Yeah.
>>ICC: Thank you, Madam Moderator. On taking stock and way forward, I just have a few brief comments. I wanted to inform that we have had discussions with a few of the other proposers -- ICC basis, the technical community, and the IGC, around the proposals for an IGF improvements workshop. And we would be pleased to support the IGC's workshop proposal going forward. And we're pleased to say that ICC basis and the technical community will merge their proposals. So we're working out details, but we have had expression from a few different governments, including Portugal and Egypt, to participate in the workshop. And we would also like to emphasize that it's going to be -- we would like to see cross participation between those two workshops. So at least we can tell you before lunch that there's one merger down.
I also just wanted to point out, regarding the main session and the categories, when we went in to put this in, it's not really our sense that the taking stock and way forward session and the main session is going to address IGF improvements. We were under the impression that it's going to really address taking stock of Internet governance issues and moving them forward perhaps some of the emerging issues of the past and see how they're going to move forward. So, just a note for the future, we had trouble knowing which category to put our proposal under. And offering an "other" choice in the future would probably be helpful. Thank you.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you, ICC.
There was a question regarding transcriptions for tomorrow's working group sessions. I think I'll let the IGF Secretariat respond to that before we break for lunch.
>>CHENGETAI MASANGO: Yes. There's transcription available in the room. But, if we're breaking up into groups, people will spread out. So not everything is going to be covered. Unfortunately, we can't have a transcription team for each theme.
Also, I would just like to ask everybody to please sign the sign-in sheet we have circulating. It's important for us to know how many people attended our session. Thank you.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you very much. It's already 1:00. We'll have a lunch break until, I think, 1500 hours, until 3:00 where we discuss the rest of the workshop themes. So thank you very much and see you at -- oh, there's -- well, African Union, before we break. Thank you.
>>AFRICAN UNION: Yes, Madam Chair. Two minutes to remind you about the announcement I was asking for and just to make the community aware of the fact that the African Union Commission has launched a process to implement the dot Africa project. The support of the community to make it well-known is required and that the African has selected an open process to do so and will not support the need to implement that. That's all I wanted to say. And thank you for your attention, Madam Chair.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you. Thank you very much, everybody. And also thanking the scribes. We'll come back -- we'll resume at 3:00. Have a good lunch.
(Lunch break)
(No audio for scribes.)
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Please go ahead.
(Speaker is inaudible.)
>>ALICE MUNYUA: I think it is about getting clarity on exactly what we want out of the IG4D session. I know we will have time to discuss it tomorrow morning in more detail, but I think from the program people where we have -- what we have here in the development agenda, we had said it should be a cross-cutting issue in each of the key themes with cross-cutting focus. We represented at least one question for each of the other key themes. Is that still feel that is the way we want it to go so we can give direction to the sessions tomorrow?
There are some comments on the other themes, emerges -- we had good comments on that. If there are no comments on the development agenda, then we will move on. I will go straight to providing a summary and reflections of the morning session.
So there was a reiteration that development issues should be central to the IGF, and more opportunities for developing countries should be created. We noted that there was wide range of proposals which, of course, is a reflection of the Internet community interest.
There was consensus around mergers being useful but to avoid overlaps it should not be forced. (inaudible). The issue of capacity (inaudible) as a foundation for the IGF.
Diversity of opinions, diversity of views, again, enforcing debates was noted as critical and that should be carried through the various workshops and the whole event. And then the existing criteria for workshop selection (inaudible). We have 114 proposals.
(inaudible).
There was no -- yet, we feel there was no clear view on (inaudible) in terms of -- between the sessions, between feeder workshops and other workshops. Is that still clear? And there is useful for the Secretariat an important idea, the Secretariat should come up with guidance in facilitating a briefing session (inaudible), which is useful for the event and often critical for the participation. There was a portion that it should not be associated with funding or (inaudible).
So I think then we move on. The key points for this afternoon session are, again, what questions are critical, especially under managing critical Internet resources -- the three themes -- the three remaining themes: Managing critical Internet resources; security, openness and privacy; and access and diversity.
Which question should we place as the most important one in terms of what we really want to get out of that session? What value? And then given the proposals, again, which are the key question areas that have not been well covered by the workshops that have already been proposed.
I think this morning the APC had actually started a way of framing the questions and the development agenda.
So another question for this afternoon is: Are there any key questions that we should (inaudible).
(Audio is unclear for scribes.)
>>ALICE MUNYUA: For now we are dealing with critical Internet resources and then we'll go to security, openness and privacy and then access and diversity. But for now it is critical Internet resources. Thank you.
Yes, you can go ahead.
>>ANDREA GLORIOSO: Thank you very much for the clarification. We tend to agree with the previous speaker that it will be interesting to start talking, start discussing about critical Internet resources in a broader sense. In the EU, we have had extensive discussions -- we are having extensive discussions on the topics of interdependencies. And, of course, the Internet is dependent on a lot of other infrastructure and a lot of infrastructure is dependent on the Internet.
Just as a word of caution, the IGF is potentially a wonderful tool to discuss these issues. We should make sure that we don't put all eggs in one basket. There are many other fora where these issues are discussed.
We should make sure -- And I'm sure the previous speaker implied this. We should make sure that if we discuss this issue at the IGF, the necessary bridges and links with other processes and fora are ensured. On our side, we can certainly help from that point of view from our perspective at least.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Katitza and then Emily.
>>KATITZA RODRIGUEZ: Thank you, Madam Chair. I just want to get back to your initial question about ICT4 development -- IG4D. I confuse it for ICT for development.
I just want to make clear what we are talking here, if it's -- we want to make clear that we would like to see a revision, yeah, of the actual paper, problems, questions.
In the morning session, it was a proposal that the themes be divided by process issues on IG for development and process issues on IG for development.
And on the substance questions on development, it would be nice to have a group of experts who work on key questions that can be addressing in the main sessions, to not duplicate efforts.
So, for instance, one main question on development that will be discussed in the main session of security, openness and privacy, one question on development that will be discussed in the access main session.
It is idealizes that we can ensure that not only the developing countries, the voice of the global countries will be taken into account but also questions on the major concerns.
So at the end, on taking the stock forward, we can evaluate whether or not we comply or we fulfill the objective of the main IGF this year, which is a catalyst for change on development. Thank you.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you very much, Katitza, for that.
Emily, please?
>>EMILY TAYLOR: Thank you. Thank you, Madam Chair. I wanted to make two comments on the critical Internet resources issue.
First of all, looking at the program paper, it seems that there are three workshops which quite closely reflect the themes identified in the program paper under critical Internet resources. Those being 18 ccTLDs in Africa which reflects, I think, the capacity-building theme; 70 which reflects the issue of accountability, transparency and inclusiveness; and 165 which talks to the issue of IPv4 to IPv6 transition.
That said -- and I think this echos one of the points that Patrik made and one of the issues that was talked around this morning, I think the workshop proposals have also highlighted other themes which are not reflected in the program paper which we should do well to consider. One of those being -- in fact, is not listed under critical Internet resources but 181 is on disaster preparedness and is exactly one of the themes that Patrik was talking about.
There were a number of proposals relating to the deployment of idn.idn, the IDN in the first level, a year on looking at the real experiences. And these might do well in critical Internet resources as well.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you very much.
Any other comments on critical Internet resources? All right.
Oh, yes. Adam.
>> ADAM PEAKE: Good afternoon. I think on critical Internet resources in particular, what's interesting is the lack of proposals on this particular theme given that it is one, as Patrik said, of great importance, both to the function of the Internet and also to the IGF itself.
I wondered if the MAG would might like to consider taking a more proactive role particularly on something like IPv6, looking for an extra workshop or larger workshop. Obviously, it is important this year. We are running out -- or have run out -- or there is no further allocation of v4 addresses.
So what can be done to discuss that to make it relevant to local stakeholders in East Africa? Would it be possible to expand a workshop out so that you had the experiences of KENIC, of the Internet exchange point of some of the operators. How important is it to the mobile Internet providers in East Africa? So that on an issue that is of obvious importance, then we are more proactive in developing a workshop -- I'm not saying the main session, but developing workshops that could be useful to the community locally. That would be one thought.
But it is interesting there is very few proposals on this particular theme, given its importance. Thank you.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you.
Any other comments? Yes, China and then European Commission and George. The other George, okay. China, please.
>>CHINA: We would like to emphasize that critical Internet resource is the core issue of Internet governance. We propose that (inaudible) continue discuss a resource such as the root server and the IPv6 issue and this agenda items as Paris meeting did.
In respect to the subquestion of key themes except for the cross-cutting issues such as development, human race issue, for example, there are subquestions of three subthemes: Namely, emerging issues; security, openness and privacy; and access and diversity involving the human rights issues. We highly recommend that the subquestions and the one key theme should avoid overlapping with the ones and the other key theme.
It will be good when each key theme has not been focused to forced constructive dialogue. Thank you, Chair.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you, China. I have got the European Commission.
>>EUROPEAN COMMISSION: Thank you. I'm not entirely sure that I have understood -- or am able to read fully the intervention of my esteemed colleague from China.
If it is about not creating cross-cutting dialogue between themes, we will disagree. We will think it is important to ensure that there is that kind of links between the different themes. But it is highly possible that I misunderstood the intervention.
On the point to the previous speaker, Adam, yes, it is striking that there are not that many proposals on critical Internet resources.
I wonder -- And I offer this as food for thought. I wonder if that is because those discussions on critical Internet resources are actually happening elsewhere. And if it is so, if they are happening elsewhere, why is it so? Is it because the IGF is not providing the appropriate venue for that kind of discussion? And I would like to stress these are open questions that I am offering here on the floor.
And if so, what can we do to make sure that some of those discussions happen at the IGF.
I think it is important to keep in mind that in our humble view the IGF is frankly not the most appropriate place to discuss operational issues because of the wide diversity of stakeholders, because of timing constraints, because of the format, et cetera.
In our view, when we talk about critical Internet resources, it is very important to focus on the accountability item, on the transparency, on the process in which critical Internet resources are managed or not managed. Who are the stakeholders involved? How much are they involved? What is their level of their influence over the process? There are certain entities which have more or less influence over the process. That is the kind of discussion that might very well benefit from a global forum such as the IGF.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you. George and then Bill Drake. The other George.
>> SURESWARAN RAMADASS: Okay, my name is Sureswaran, not George. I would like to state that I agree with what Adam has stated and should be more emphasis given on IPv6. I think most of us have already stated that, too.
And, if possible, maybe hands-on workshops running in parallel with the IGF for people within that region to be trained. With the growth of the Internet within the African continent, I think this would be important. Thank you.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Okay. Bill?
>>BILL DRAKE: Thank you. I would return to the question of why there aren't more proposals. I think part of it is not just that these issues are being discussed elsewhere, although in some venues obviously they are, I think it is also that we've managed to turn critical Internet resources into something that's borderline boring in the IGF.
The main session we had last year in Vilnius was so bloodless and lacking in ability to address the big issues that people are actually concerned about, that the moderators found themselves standing on the podium sort of expressing astonishment that nobody wanted to say anything or raise any questions. They were almost begging for people to say something controversial just to get people to wake up.
So I think we have to think about how it is we have managed to position these issues in such a way that people feel like they can't bring to the table the kind of main outstanding questions that are actually -- need to be addressed more effectively by the international community.
I will make one suggestion. I mean, I'm not on the MAG. I wasn't involved in deciding on, you know, a lot of these things. When I look at the list of questions that are in the program paper here, to me this is astonishingly generic. And I would think that there is some concrete things we could actually be talking about.
Adam suggested IPv6. Certainly that's one. Here is another one that's pretty obvious to me being on the GNSO Council: New gTLDs. Pretty big thing going on in the Internet environment, hopefully within this year, that has a lot of interesting implications that are not necessarily discussed much outside of ICANN. And even within ICANN, the ways in which they are being discussed is often in a framework that doesn't allow for the exploration of certain types of considerations.
For example, developmental aspects, we've launched in ICANN this working group that's trying to put forward recommendations to the board about how to make new gTLDs more affordable and attractive to developing countries.
Personally, I think it is a very important thing to broaden participation in the generic TLD environment and get more people involved. Why we can't, with something like big like that on the horizon, use the IGF to promote dialogue around those issues, particularly in the context of a meeting in Africa is to me puzzling.
I think all that's going on to go to Nairobi and talk about these topics in this manner would be really quite a pity personally.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you, Bill. And I think that's what Adam and one or two other people were saying about trying to really trying to be proactive, knowing that some of this -- the workshops and the focus is relevant and valuable at the same time. So it's important that we think along those lines even as we go into our working group sessions tomorrow.
U.K.
>>UNITED KINGDOM: Yes, thank you, Chair. I think it comes back to the point I made before lunch, that you have got workshop proposals listed under different headings. But there is 174, new gTLD program, an opportunity for development or a means -- I think that's supposed to be for more digital divide. I think that's spot on. That hits on the discussion we have had within the Governmental Advisory Committee in our engagement with the board about the launch of the new gTLDs round, not addressing the needs and opportunities of stakeholders in developing countries.
So you've got -- I haven't read the detail of that proposal, Number 74. But it looks from the heading exactly spot on. I mean, there are other workshop proposals listed throughout which hit on critical Internet resources and resilience and stability and addressing the threats, cyber-terrorism, security, cyber attacks and so on.
So dotted across this landscape of workshops, you've got a greater number of workshops which could very easily be listed under managing critical Internet resources. So I think it's perhaps, I think, an overstated worry.
I do very much sympathize with the desirability of the IGF to address the issue of global inclusiveness in issues relating to the critical Internet resources. I think that is a very important part of the agenda as the Internet continues to evolve and become a fact of life socially and economically in all countries.
And another key issue is the engagement of stakeholders, governments and so on from all countries in the fora and institutions that deal with the critical Internet resources.
So I do sympathize with the view that the IGF is the ideal forum for addressing the problem why many countries and stakeholders are excluded willingly or by accident or through lack of capacity, resources, finance, investment, whatever. That is a vital role for the IGF, certainly.
Thanks.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you, U.K. If there are no other comments on critical Internet resources, we can move to security, openness, and privacy. And, again the questions would be -- Katitza, you wanted to talk on critical Internet resources? No. Okay. Okay.
Yes, Katitza.
>>KATITZA PEREDA: Yes. On critical Internet resources, I'm talking on behalf of our members of the IGC. Some of them gave us questions to make and comments to make on this session. So, in answering the comment, the question posed by the representative from the European Commission about why there are not too many workshops and there are a lack of maybe hot pepper debates or interesting debates on that area, some of our colleagues have said that maybe the questions need to be a little more varied or maybe more interesting or controversial questions. So, for instance, in IPv4 and IPv6, it's always talked about which are the burdens and impacts and opportunity for developing countries. That's a question. But they said that why we should always talk about transition. Why aren't we talking about coexistence of both? There were -- they said that many of them were having based a lot on IPv4. And, therefore, there's no assurance that IPv6 even works on a global scale. And, maybe having this kind of dialogue might increase how interesting the session will become.
The other fact is the problems of the new gTLDs. That also could be very interesting. For instance, maybe more about process and how ICANN is working, for instance. They said, if the GAC and the at-large viewpoints are really taken into account, for instance, is this really a multistakeholder process, is working, is not working. If it's not working, why? This can create a little more of an interesting debate within the IGF. Thank you.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you very much for those suggestions. Foaud?
>>FOUAD BAJWA: Thank you, Madam Chair. From last year's session, obviously, IGF is very much talked about and covered throughout the Internet as well. And there was some articles I was reading on the -- in the course of the past few months which, actually, didn't target anything else but, actually, were focusing on sort of boredom coming out of the critical Internet resources section. Which is very, very -- what you call it? It would be amazing for me. Why? Because it was so much -- so much planning and focus went into the session. But, still, I think it's critical -- addressing critical resources in the context of where we are heading is important. We're going to Africa now. Strengthening Africa's Internet critical resources is a very big attraction, at least for the continent. It further also emphasizes that it's an opportunity that a global community would be looking at a very important example. Various case studies, various best practices, and so forth in the context of Africa.
That also clears some major interests back into the issues of CIR. And the interesting thing about CIR is that it does touch into emerging issues as well. The current state of things, the future state of things, how we're headed there. As my earlier colleagues have shared, the issue is about gTLDs. Now, why does this issue come up? There's also -- currently, there's also a cross constituency working group in ICANN which is looking at gTLDs, its fees, and so forth in the context of developing countries or maybe underprivileged regions who cannot afford the fees for the gTLD program. That's a very important aspect for future innovation with regards to the Internet. And that's a very important critical Internet resource subject as well. It may be an implication which might develop in IG4D as well. It may be an implication which would go off into access and diversity.
But, still, the space for it, these hard questions and these opportunistic questions, the space is in CIR. So I think it's the attraction that we have to actually work upon. And it's to actually name those issues particularly right in the questions. And maybe this might be food for thought for tomorrow's working groups, that the region we're going to is a continent. And the -- apart from being global, it has a lot of interest in Africa and its critical Internet resources. So that would be a very good area -- if the question was originally framed within the context of Africa, as an example, not undermining the global needs and implications, but Africa as an interest to dole out the issues, to see what can possibly be discussed, what can be done over the future. Thank you.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you very much. APC. Behind. Yes.
>>APC: Thank you. Joy Liddicoat from APC. I just wanted to echo the statements made about critical Internet resources and both comments in particular about the very complex discussions that are happening in other fora where the IGF definitely has a contribution, I think, to make beyond the examples that we use. For instance, the contracting requirements for registrars that are either under review that include their obligations for law enforcement engagement, the standards that need to be set. These are critical issues in terms of human rights.
Similarly, with the Pacific IGF, which took place in Noumea, the regional Pacific IGF in April just last month, the issue of IPv4 and IPv6 definitely arose in terms of for developing countries, the different structures of their markets, the way in which the registrars and the ccTLDs operate. And these are very much issues relevant also in the wider African continent. So I think there are some complex and difficult issues that are not getting enough airing in other fora on critical Internet resources and where the IGF could definitely make a contribution.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you, APC. European Commission?
>>EUROPEAN COMMISSION: Thank you. Just as a reaction to the very formative comments and points that I heard, during my intervention, I was not specifically referring to ICANN, although it is, of course, an entity. And I don't think it should be treated as the elephant in the room. It is an important entity when dealing with critical Internet resources. But it is not the only one.
I would suggest that, first of all, it is not completely clear to me what would be the process through which the importance that is being underlined in this room about critical Internet resources could possibly be reflected in new workshops or modified workshops, keeping into account that, if there had been certain proposals keeping also into account what the colleague from U.K. said. But, if there had been certain proposals, this reflects the interest of community in certain topics. And, if it is concluded that critical Internet resources are not very high on the list, we might be disappointed about it. But I'm not sure how fair it would be to change this fact.
But, on the other hand, I think that just like, as I understand, development should be an underlying theme for the whole IGF of this year, I will suggest that there is one of the aspects I mentioned before concerning critical Internet resources, which is the process aspect. I'm not a fan of process. But process is important in terms of who has a voice, who has influence, who has a stake in what is strategically important for him, her, or for that particular entity, be it Africa, be it the U.S., be it a stakeholders group, civil society, et cetera.
This concept that there are strategic interests at play and that we should discuss them could possibly be a part of the kind of gentle nudging that might be provided to the workshop organizer so that we kill two pigeons with one stone and make sure that the discussions are also -- sorry to be blunt -- are interesting and they cover real points with real influence.
So, to summarize, maybe it is a necessity to enlarge the critical Internet resources team as much as it is necessary to remind the issue of criticality and also strategic interests is important in all the other workshops and all the other themes or it should be.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you, European Commission. Marilia?
>>MARILIA MACIEL: Thank you. Just a reaction from the comment just made by Andrea. I don't think that we should change workshop proposals. Because something that's always been very clear is that workshops are the bottom up part of the IGF organization. If there are not many workshops proposed under critical Internet resources, I think that it reflects something that the community's thinking right now. Maybe next year it will be different. But this year the community didn't want to propose many workshops on this area. I think that what we can do is maybe to address the things that we believe are lacking in the proposals in the main session. So maybe this main session will take a different shape, and maybe we try to change the questions that we propose in the beginning in order to be able to see these things addressed in the main session. So the main session would not only be a reporting back of the workshops. It would have some point of reporting back. But then we would address what is lacking. But do not change on the principle that workshop proposals always comes from bottom up. And I don't think it's a good idea to reopen a deadline for new workshop proposals. Thank you.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you. Any other comments on -- yes. U.K.?
>>UNITED KINGDOM: Thanks very much, Chair. Just very briefly, as I understand it, ICANN will have an open forum, won't it, in Nairobi. So that will provide a viable opportunity for some of the issues that we've touched on here in this very useful discussion -- it will be very useful for that open forum to engage on some of these important topics, particularly from the developing country angle. So thanks.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you. All right. I think with those very useful comments and suggestions under critical Internet resources, we can move to security openness and privacy. And, again, to repeat, what we're looking at are -- the key points are what questions are critical, which ones should we place emphasis or importance on? Given the workshop proposals, which of the key question areas are not well covered. And, again, are there any new key questions that we may want to add? And security, openness and privacy are open for discussion. Yes. Sorry. I can't see.
>> Hello, my name is Christine Hansen. And I'm president of CIEL, which stands for Connect in Every Life.
And I work with eGovernment policies around the world.
The -- to me, the elephant in the room or the -- if you're oceanically involved, I suppose it would be a porpoise, is that without national laws and national policies, these rare Internet resources have no value whatsoever.
And the -- I don't want, certainly, from my policy point of view, another international treaty. However, without consistent national policies and policies that can be shared from country to country, the openness, security, and privacy, especially, within a country and then cross country is virtually unachievable. Several countries I've worked with no longer use proprietary software because of security issues. And they now use what is usually called open or free software or Linux and find that to be preferable. Other countries prefer to use proprietary software. Some of this is paid for. The proprietary is. The free software isn't. Again, when you're talking about rare Internet resources, one of the things we talk about is financial. Of course, rare also doesn't just mean financial. Rare also means having to do with the people in your country who are educated and the other things that we all know about.
So, to me, the -- and, of course, I'm also an intellectual property attorney, so it's close to my heart. The key issue in privacy, openness, and security is that the countries have to have an eGovernment policy towards the Internet and -- actually, I don't even call it the Internet any more. Whatever you want to call it -- without that coming from whatever body it is, I'm afraid that all things we do are good, but they're not going to get to the places we want them to go and that's to every person in the countries. Thank you.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you very much. Any other comments? We're on security, openness, and privacy. Yes, Patrik. And then European Commission.
>>PATRIK FALTSTROM: This is sort of in between security and critical Internet resources, sort of a reflection of both of them. When I hear what people have been saying, I must say that I agree that there are lots of elephants in the rooms here. And some of them walk backwards into the town, and we still don't see them.
But -- no, I haven't been enough in Africa to really understand what that means.
Anyway, to be a little bit more serious, if we look at the workshop proposals for CIR, for example, I see workshop number 18, policy issues affecting ccTLDs in Africa. That is, for me, a very good example of a workshop that looks like oh, no, this is not global. This is too local. This is not multistakeholder, whatever. But maybe it is the case that we need to have those kind of hands-on workshops, just like Bill Drake said, where we try to build workshops discussing very concrete issues and try to do it in a constructive way without doing any finger pointing. Instead, we're doing it in the form of a changing experiences, learning from each other in all directions. And 18 is an example of policies affecting ccTLDs. We also have, of course -- we have other, like, workshops also in security, openness, and privacy which are similar. But maybe this is the case that what I hear now is maybe the next step of the kind of workshops and discussions that we're trying to have in the IGF. Thank you.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you, Patrik. (inaudible) and then Nominet.
>> Thank you. General comment on the theme. And we actually went through all the workshops. But I don't have the full list here in front of me, so I'm not going to comment on specific workshop, which I believe is not the purpose of the -- of this discussion any way.
But, as a general -- as a general point, it is true that it is useful to have exchanges or points of view of information. And we do not have anything contrary to have regional experiences or even local experiences in the IGF if there are the case of best practice or, frankly, they might be the case of worst practice depending on what we find. It's all good information. What we see as priority -- and I think I echo one of the comments that were made before -- is that, since we are in the global setting, in the global IGF, we should make sure that at least a considerable amount of attention is paid to the global issues. And the global issue that we see at the moment is what you could call policy regulatory divergence. Put it in other words, there are different rules in other parts of the world but we have one Internet, for the time being at least and, hopefully, for the future. And this means that we need to have some kind of process and some kind of discussion how to ensure -- I'm not talking about global harmonization here. I'm not talking about a global treaty. We, frankly, do not think that would be an effective way to solve the privacy and security problems. But we need to find a way. And probably the process is to ensure that globally there is some kind of convergence toward certain baselines, toward certain standards, toward certain practices to make sure that the Internet is a trustable place to be. And, back in Brussels, we like to talk not specifically about security, not about privacy, not about safety. We like to talk about trust. Because the reality is that, if people do not trust citizens, businesses, public administrations, if they do not have trust on what they do on the Internet and what they can do on the Internet, they will not use the Internet. This is very true for public administrations. You're never going to promote a project using the Internet if you do not have the trust that you're going to be adopted, that the privacy of your citizens is going to be protected, et cetera. That should be something that I believe should be the discussion tomorrow and the discussion in the workshops should duly take into account.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you. Nominet.
>>NOMINET: Thank you, Madam Chair. Yes, my comment was very much in the same direction. I think, when I read the list of questions, I was actually just a little bit surprised at the flavor of the questions, which just reserved one single question right at the end for how you protect people, how you preserve their trust, how you build their trust. Because, eventually, what is happening is that certainly in the U.K. we're seeing a lot of people who are disenfranchised from the Internet because they are scared of the Internet because of the lack of trust that they have in it. So, certainly, I would like to see some emphasis that looked on this idea of how do you protect people's privacy, protect their freedom of expression, protect their access to knowledge and protect them from or help protect them from things that can cause them harm. And I think, certainly, one of the things I found particularly useful through the concept that the Internet Governance Forum has taken of dealing with security, openness, and privacy as a trinity that they are together, is just very much -- you know, here is almost the only forum I know of that provides that platform for that exchange of issues, that exchange of ideas between those different rights. Thank you.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you, Nominet. Yes.
>> Anjan Bose from ECPAT International. This question is more of a comment. In relation to the child protection workshops that had been proposed for this year's IGF, traditionally, you know, even last year, they were grouped -- like, they were highlighted as something standing out, even though they were -- I understand, many of the workshops that were proposed were under security. Some were under openness and privacy. But they were kind of grouped together, and they were standing out separately.
We know from the child protection point of view some of the things that's inherent to the development of the Internet like security and privacy. They're interlinked. And the implications on child protection comes directly from the development happening in those sectors. So, by a way of treating these proposals or workshops separately, I don't know if we are doing justice to kind of integrating these efforts, you know, with the other things happening at the same time.
So my proposition is: Are we -- in this Kenya IGF, are we going to discuss how the things that we list with child protection are dealt at the same time within those workshops as well, not really having a separate workshop that kind of confines the discussion within the limit of those workshops and bring it out and maybe look at issues that can impact on the simultaneous developments? I'm not sure whether I made it clear. But what I want to highlight here is that we don't really want to have the child protection workshops just for the sake of it at ITU is promoting cybersecurity and child protection, just to acknowledge that, but to really see what are the real issues and how, you know, in all the discussions, all the proposals that had been put forward, has an implication on child protection. Thank you.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Please, can you clarify that. Are you asking that we look at child online protection under all the themes? Because there are quite a lot of child online protection proposals under security, openness, and privacy. Just clarity, please. Yeah.
>> ANJAN BOSE: Sorry. Can you just repeat it? I didn't have my headphone on.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Is your proposal to have child online protection as an issue that's taken into consideration by all the other themes? Because under security, openness, and privacy, we have quite a number of child online protection workshops that have been proposed. So just to understand where you're coming from.
>>ECPAT: Almost similar to that. What I wanted to say is that, rather than having a similar child protection session that only draws from the experience of people working on it, we also have to see how it fits back to the other issues. So in the past, like in the year when we looked at the workshops, there were child protection-related workshops grouped together. That necessarily kind of secluded them in one group. But, I mean, there might be other areas within development sector as well where child protection issues can be raised. And I say this because I fear I have a concern that, you know, the connections might be lost.
So my proposition is that whenever we are looking at child protection workshops, we may want to connect it with other relevant workshops with other teams, not necessarily as a child protection team, which emerged very quickly in the last IGF.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Okay. Thank you. European Commission?
>>EUROPEAN COMMISSION: Thank you. Specifically on this point of child protection, we are very sympathetic with the points made by the previous speaker. We also have to be aware of the fact that you can connect everything with everything; but then, in the end, you don't talk about anything. So we need to maintain a bit of focus. What I think would be useful is, again -- and I don't have the process in mind. Might be in the main sessions. Could be by the gentle nudging that I referred to before. It is important to remember that as Jon Postel once said, the Internet is for everyone. Everyone also includes minors. We always talk about children. A child of eight years old is a different thing than a teenager of 16 years old even though they're both minors. Maybe the dual track approach should be kept in mind. One way to look at it would be, rather than focusing on the protection, would be focusing on the empowerment of children. And empowerment is a very horizontal theme that touches on many other workshops. I'm not suggesting, for the reason I explained before, that proposals are changed, other proposals have changed. As I think the colleague from the AJC confirming her opinion, there are proposals that come from the community. It's not up to, frankly, the MAG or others to abruptly change them. They can suggest. They can try to merge, et cetera. But we shouldn't denaturate the nature of this process. But, again, it might be useful to remind everybody that we'll be channeling the discussion in the main session, the workshops, that the issue of empowerment of everybody, including minors, is an important issue that should be kept on the back of our minds.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you. Any other comments on security and stability? Okay. Then we can move to the next one, which is on access and diversity. Again, the key points for discussions are -- under access and diversity, what questions are critical? Which ones should we play more emphasis on? Which key questions have not been covered or areas that have not been covered? Are there any new key questions we should add on access and diversity or take out, actually questions that we can take out?
Comments, please?
If there are no comments on access and diversity --
>>CHENGETAI MASANGO: There's one.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Theresa, please. Thank you.
>>THERESA SWINEHART: Thank you. I will just give ICC-BASIS' comments on access and diversity. Again, that there's a lot of very good workshops on this topic so it will be very helpful to have a conversation tomorrow around the themes that we had discussed earlier today.
And then in particular we just wanted to note that the transporter data flow is a fundamentally important part of the global Internet. And I think that will be an underlying theme with regards to this. And I think that's an important part for all regions of the world to keep in mind as we are looking at this topic.
And as noted in the IG4D section, that access is really contingent on legal and policy frameworks that promote market entry, investment, development of services and applications and that we should look at having some of the discussion focused on successful strategies and practical issues and challenges in this -- in all regions of the world. And I think that's very important. In the Pacific regions, the issues are quite different than, let's say, in the African region or in Latin America. I think we should look at the spectrum of issues that exist.
The value of access and particularly broadband in the fostering of education and innovation and social and human development is quite high. And there are examples in all regions, so we should have that as an important area to look at the success stories around that.
The ability to access through all languages, the implementation of IDNs and the continued focus and work in further online content and local languages.
And then really looking at -- with this session towards what are the items of work for tomorrow and what ingredients do we need to find today to make sure that tomorrow looks as successful as possible with regards to access and what's available online. We would just highlight those areas as useful topics, and I think many of the workshops tie into those quite nicely. Thank you.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you very much. Any other comment?
Brazil.
>>BRAZIL: Thank you. I think I remember our open consultations in February, when there was a lot of great -- a large audience and we came to a convergence where we should focus discussions in one -- towards one or two questions and focus on one or two areas or issues to be discussed in each main session.
Regards this main session of access and diversity, I remember we had a great convergence on the issue of access to knowledge. I believe we should keep this in mind and take this as the main focus theme.
Other themes -- other issues may be tackled, but this should be, I believe, one -- the main question to be addressed in this main session. Thank you.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you very much, Brazil.
ICC?
>>ICC: Thank you, Madam Moderator. My comment is not to really address the substantive issues for the workshop, but I wanted to share an idea.
Each year the ICC -- the IGF has continued to innovate in different ways. And so I wanted to share an idea based on some of the discussions that are going on around ways in which to build the IGF and to build on the experience each year.
I did an experiment with my intern, and we went back to look at all of the chairman's summaries of the past five years on the access and diversity issues to look to see if there were some common themes or themes that were built upon.
And it is really an interesting exercise to see the issues that seem to emerge in this particular issue area as being viewed in a fairly common way.
And so I wanted to suggest as the group that helps support the preparation for this main session and also looks at the workshops, if perhaps they would want to consider, since it would be a multistakeholder group, to go back and look at the chairman's summaries of the past five years, which are already very balanced and a neutral assessment of the discussion points that have emerged in each one of these sessions, and to pull them out and perhaps use those as supplementary discussion points during the session.
They may also help to inform some questions about where are we on this particular issue. One that I will just pull out of the bag that we identified was multistakeholder cooperation to address access issues. Maybe there is a good discussion around is this something we all think is a fairly commonly held belief, that this takes multistakeholder cooperation?
I mean, access is important to everybody. Clearly, it is important to business. It is important to the Development Goals.
So I thought this might be an interesting area to do an experiment which actually may help us to see if we have an innovative way of capturing some messages over the course of time, some kind of common themes.
I know there is a lot of different views on what a message is, what a recommendation is. Everybody has different fears and concerns. So I don't want to be really stringent about this idea. I just want to put it forward as a possibility to help us be a little bit innovative in trying to address some of the fears and concerns around how do you capture all the really substantive ideas and possibilities that come out of each IGF session and somehow get buried in a lot of text. And there might be something that could be done this year to focus the main session discussion with a view to what has emerged over the years and what possibly could be good questions to think creatively for the future. Thank you.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you. Tulika.
>> INDIA: Thank you, Madam Chair. Looking at the number of workshops proposed under access, I would like to revisit our old pattern of having main sessions on the topic of multilingualism of the Internet, accessibility and standards.
This will allow us to not only focus, bring in focus on what we are trying to do and, like Ayesha has just mentioned, we would like to then assist as to where we have reached and what further we need to discuss in these areas.
And, lastly, it is very important for many of the developing countries to understand the global policies for access. And, therefore, an intervention from that angle would also be very helpful for us to really get the aspect of access behind many of us now.
Access is a very old topic. We have been discussing since 2006. It remains to be important to many of us. And, yet, we have been revisiting the same issues again and again.
There was a topic on Internet exchange points earlier, which is not so well mentioned now here. There are issues of the accessibility in terms of people who are differently abled. And there are standards for it.
However, what I observe and from my own country experience, we are still not aligning to those standards. And, therefore, maybe a discussion on that, too, would be very helpful under the topic of access.
So the workshops would naturally become more aligned if we are able to divide the access into these three or four subtopics. Thank you.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you.
I have remote participant, then APC and then Council of Europe. Remote participant?
>> Thank you, Moderator. A quick suggestion from Yuliya Morenets, together action against crime talk. He would like to suggest that you should take into account the specific needs and concerns of the more marginalized people and vulnerable people with regard to ICT and the Internet.
We have another contribution from -- or question from Ms. Disselkoen from the United States.
She said: I'm an advocate for human rights and mental health. I know mental health is not stressed in Kenya or throughout the continent. However, she is always interested in how to incorporate the health care system and the growing mental health needs of the country's people.
So would a topic such as this be incorporated into a topic related to health care or community awareness or even government and how government can assist the community in their health care access and needs? And she's sure that this issue has been discussed in the U.N. Millennium Development Goals in New York in 2009. Thank you.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you. APC.
>> APC: Yes, thank you. Just taking an opportunity to mention on access, that APC is looking to have a pre-event for the IGF focusing -- building on the pre-event last year with the dynamic coalition, human rights and principles, focusing on the issue in particular of access and looking across wider human rights frameworks where access and access rights are already embedded, including various international human rights instruments and bringing that to the issues of access within the IGF in order to perhaps deepen and strengthen the discussions around access and access-related rights, which are permeating not only in this theme that we're currently discussing but aspects of other themes as well. And we will be providing more information about that pre-event in the upcoming month or so.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you, APC.
Council of Europe?
>>COUNCIL OF EUROPE: Thank you, Madam Chair. Lee Hibbert, Council of Europe. Three short points to concur with the remote speaker regarding the importance for access for marginalized and disadvantaged persons, something that is an area which I think needs exploring more and more.
It is quite clear that I think the added value of meeting and discussing in places like the IGF is to go further than the discussion -- the current discussion.
And I can say, for example, from the EuroDIG experience that he we are trying to bring in different types of groups of the populations like the elderly, for example, into the discussions. So going further, tapping into new sectors is extremely important for the added value and the forward-looking aspect dynamic of the Internet Governance Forum.
As regards access, also regarding disruption to access and the stability, I'd like to concur with what Theresa said about transport data flows and access to them. So from a point of view of human rights and freedom of expression, Internet freedom which Council of Europe had a conference on recently, that is also very important from that point of view. I'd like to underline that.
But one last thing I would like to -- from my own personal experience is that we -- at least in the past, access has been access to the Internet, just access, pure technical access, particularly in developing countries. I don't think -- that's no longer the discourse that needs to run.
A lot of people in all areas are talking about access which is unlocking access to jobs, to growth, to well-being, to rights and freedoms.
So to put it in a poll as just being access to the Internet and developing country angle no longer works for me.
And so connecting it to Millennium Development Goals of the U.N. and just the general what it facilitates, what are those things it facilitates, bringing that out for me is much more interesting for the IGF this year. Thank you.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you very much.
I've got Marilia and then Nominet.
>>MARILLA MACIEL: Thank you. I think that Oliver made an important point. We tried in the last consultations, we have tried to come up with a few specific questions and the session of access and diversity maybe is the session that has the larger number of questions, which is not necessarily bad because, I believe, that these questions are very much in tune with the workshop proposals. I think it happened the other way around that it happened with critical Internet resources.
Maybe the people who proposed workshops really took this as an inspiration.
But I think that we should maybe point one or two questions that would serve as a catalyst of discussions in this thread. And I believe that maybe if we try to come out with what are the policy options to address obstacles to access in terms of access to infrastructure and access to knowledge, to try to identify policy options and concrete proposals to address the problems, because as I read the description of workshop proposals, I saw that there are many good ideas. But some of the workshops don't have a specific focus.
So, for instance, a workshop on multilingualism, what is a concrete proposal? What is the policy behind it? What could foster multilingualism? So maybe if we give the suggestion to workshop organizers, it would help us to have more focused and specific discussions.
In terms of what lacks to be addressed, I believe that the questions that have not maybe reflected that well in workshop proposals is fight for poverty and promote social and human development.
So, of course, human development is always on the background of the proposals. But we have not been very specific in the terms of fighting poverty and how it relates with promoting access to infrastructure and knowledge. So maybe we could address this in the main session and make it a permanent topic on the main session. It would be interesting if we could do it.
I just would like to say that I agree very much what has been proposed by ICC in terms of going back to what we have discussed and trying to identify what are the issues that are, like, more mature and that are repeating themselves over the year.
I believe the transcripts are a good starting point, but the IGF focus well -- there are articles that have been written about it are also a very good point.
And I'm all in favor of the proposal, and we are available to work together in this particular group to try to identify this and maybe cross it with the things that are coming now from the main session this year and try to consolidate some of the issues that we have advanced more on the debate, in a way that is more concrete and more easy to communicate to the people that go to the IGF. Thank you.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you very much. I have Nominet.
>>NOMINET: Thank you, Madam Chair. Yes, I certainly can welcome a lot of the comments and suggestions of the need to bring in focus to the topics. But I do, under this particular overall heading, have a practical comment that I would like to make.
I note that in the list of proposals, there are two specifically designed to get dialogue with young people and look at issues that are affecting or impacting young people's engagements on the Internet. There's 92 which comes from Child Net International and Number 76 -- sorry, 76 which comes from Child Net International, and 92 which comes from an organization that I don't actually know called Practical Participation.
The Child Net one looks at case studies, and the other one is looking at the impact on young people. And my practical point is if we want to get the voice of young people involved in the Internet Governance Forum, then we do actually have to find areas and issues where they have a certain expertise. So I would hope that as we focus and specialize, we do not forget the young people.
That having been said, I must admit I have a lot of sympathy with the approach of focusing quite hard on the development angle and on fighting poverty because there is, as other speakers have said, so much still to be done.
And just on a slightly lighter note, as rapidly approaching old age myself, I greatly welcome the person who suggested that there should be a focus on older people. Thank you.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Okay. Fouad and then UNECA and European Commission.
>>FOUAD BAJWA: Thank you very much, Madam Chairperson. I was, even last year, during -- I'm coming from a developing country perspective now and my own.
We've -- as a citizen, we've been through a lot in the last three and four years. This includes disasters and conflicts and so forth.
And what I'm referring to is climate with regards to access and diversity, and that climate really affects the possibilities for a country to move forward with any sort of Internet development activity, telecom infrastructure whatsoever.
And this would include the broad spectrum of, like, across all sectors of telecom and I.T.
And when, for example, the flood left us last year nearly 1/4 of the country totally damaged. And this would include our whole optical fiber networks, our information flows. And the result we see in that climate is the country going vulnerable. This affects everything. This even affects our basic hopes to access. And I'm not talking about just technical access. I'm talking about every perspective.
The disaster climate itself is a very big issue for developing countries at the moment. I -- even being a strong proponent of disaster issues, national disasters or due to world conflict -- and we face both -- I wouldn't place these in other main sessions. I would like to bring it in to access and diversity because it interlaces so many things.
If I just go into the issue of multilingualism, those communities that we had set out to be on with us in the information society, they have been so affected and they have actually been dislocated. They have moved on to other regions. The whole plans and hopes for that get affected, obviously the amount of people injured and so forth.
So I think that the issue about the climate after disasters and conflicts in war, that is also a major issue which somehow relates to many of the questions being asked because it affects all policy activity. It affects all stakeholders. It affects the future of that country's participation in the broader Internet development. So I think this should be an important inclusion from the side of the developing country perspective which actually faces these in today's critical environment. Thank you.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you very much.
I've got UNECA.
>> UNECA: Thank you, Madam Chair. I've gone through the list of workshops, but I don't know if it is voluntary or not, but capacity-building, I don't see very much focusing out.
And as you know, the lack of experts in capacity in relevant Internet governance issues is hampering participation of developing countries, especially Africa, on the policies, standards and also critical issues.
We are talking about critical issues about IPv6 and so on. We really need to have something on capacity-building. Thank you.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you, UNECA.
European Commission?
>>EUROPEAN COMMISSION: Thank you. First of all, we have great interest on the pre-event on access that APC has mentioned, and we are looking forward to receiving more information on it.
I would like to strongly support the point made by the Council of Europe and others that access should be -- is and should be more than access to the Internet. And that's it.
It is about empowerment to all segments of society, to businesses, to public authorities, et cetera.
To be honest, I think this is a point that's quite well captured in the questions that were proposed to workshop proposers. I think in general the point of empowerment is well captured by the general theme of the IGF. But I think there would be value to make sure it is stressed specifically in the session -- in the workshops for the session of access.
Concerning the point made by Nominet about the involvement of young people, about involvement of old people, I'm not really sure where I personally stand. But in any case, I think it is about empowerment.
There are, of course, different needs of different segments of society, and probably the workshop discussion should somehow help us disentangle what are the specific needs of specific segments. But at the end of the day, the underlying concept is about empowering everyone.
Finally, about the point made by IGC, I believe, supporting the point made by the ICC, we fully agree there should be an effort to focus on things that have matured, things that have not matured, and to identify where we can move forward, where we can start to move forward and perhaps also not repeating certain things over and over.
And I can certainly offer the support of the team of the European Commission in practical terms. Whether we can help in that process, we are here and we are very happy to help.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you. Council of Europe and then APC.
>>COUNCIL OF EUROPE: Thank you, Madam Chair. Just a very small and practical, technical question about access to Internet in this room. I'm finding it very difficult to access anything.
[ Laughter ]
And it is making it very difficult for me personally to look at workshop proposals. I don't print out all the things to bring here. And it's hampering my ability to interact with you in this session. Thank you.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: IGF Secretariat will answer.
>>CHENGETAI MASANGO: Yes, we do apologize for that. It is hampering our work, too.
Just for the accessing of the workshop proposals, we did make a compilation of all the workshop proposals into a Word document. So I encourage you all to download that tonight when you leave this place and get Internet access so that tomorrow we can actually discuss the workshops and you can look at it. Thank you.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you. APC.
>> APC: Thank you., Madam Chair. I think just in response to Ayesha's question or point about review and reflecting what's been covered, what's been achieved and what remains, there are the Chairman summaries. I'm impressed she has read through all of them. She has probably done it repeatedly.
But the other -- well, it is a book that attempted to do this, was Bill Drake's book of the IGF proceedings that was released last year. And I know for myself, myself and my colleague Willie Curry, wrote the reflection of the first five IGFs on access.
And we went through the proceedings, and it was very interesting. I think Ayesha is really correct. It is a very valuable exercise to do that kind of reflection.
So possibly we could look at that book because it covered all the main themes.
I just wanted to also then stress what Makan (phonetic) from UNECA mentioned. Capacity-building is a cross-cut. And I am also struggling to download documents. But I don't see the program paper addressing the cross-cuts.
So I'm wondering if that's not also something that we should reflect on at some point IN the overall structure of the program, IS how we are addressing or considering or giving attention to the cross-cutting areas.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you. Did UNECA want the floor? No. No other comments?
We can, I think, move on to the last agenda item, which is a way forward, next steps for tomorrow, how we deal with tomorrow's session.
And, as Chengetai had suggested this morning, the idea is to have an open meeting tomorrow with MAG members and those present who are going to be available tomorrow on equal footing. You know, branching off into various working groups and the six themes. The development agenda, emerging issues, taking stock.
So I would like volunteers. I think we already have someone, Fouad, who volunteered to lead on the development agenda. And critical Internet resources there's Emily.
And then would like other volunteers to lead on the -- to lead the working group on the other session. Katitza? Yes. Okay.
So we're going to be -- I mean, we're going to be focusing on the feeder workshops for each respective theme for the main session. And also, you know, fleshing out the context around each of the key issues. Again, I think that -- and I think that will speak to Andrea's issue here around providing an introduction to each issue. And, as well as taking into consideration the cross-cutting themes and how they relate to the other themes. And then already begin to suggest speakers, the format, and were there any gaps. And, as had been suggested this morning, begin to refine the questions asking ourselves what exactly we want out of the sessions, the real objectives. So that's going to be -- you know, yeah, where we're going -- what we're going to be dealing with tomorrow. I'll just let the Secretariat just add on to that.
>>CHENGETAI MASANGO: Yes. As Alice said, and also to note repeating topics that you think are -- have been done or you think that they should be moved to another setting. And also, if it would also be helpful, to note workshops that could be merged. So we're just backing it up into themes, so it's easier to handle.
While you're doing this, it would be helpful, if you could, write up something, a page, which could fit back into the program paper. We will be distributing clearer instructions tomorrow morning on a piece of paper to each theme, to each group, to each group so that you can work on it and then provide a uniform format which you can report back. You may not be able to complete it tomorrow. But we -- hopefully, you will have a good solid start to completing the program paper.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: I was thinking, perhaps, that it would be valuable to already have identified the leads or the chairs for the various sessions so that at least they can go to -- tonight go about thinking about how they're going to moderate the sessions. Because we've got the morning. We're hoping to have the entire morning just discussing those topics and then come back in the afternoon and wrap up and look at the way forward. So so far we've got volunteers -- yeah, start from the top. The development agenda, again, it's Fouad. Emerging issues. Any volunteer to Chair that session?
>>CHENGETAI MASANGO: The facilitator of that group.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Emerging issues. Someone to coordinate or facilitate the working group's work. Can we dictate?
>>CHENGETAI MASANGO: MAG members have . Okay. We'll get back to it.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Taking stock. European Commission?
>>EUROPEAN COMMISSION: The European Commission is not volunteering right now. I would just like a little bit more clarity on what coordinating or moderating or supporting would entail in practical terms. Because I'm asking this because I will want to follow certain other sessions. So I will not want to support the -- I mean, to go moderate another session and then I can't follow the session that I want to follow, the breakout session that I want to follow.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Yeah. I think it's exactly that. If you're offering to moderator or facilitate the working group, you'll have to see the working group finish the work completely. If the working group finishes earlier, then members of that working group are welcome to go join others. But I think that's the main task. So I think it will be impossible to be moderating and facilitating one working group and hope to jump to others. So it's a serious commitment.
Volunteer for taking stock and the way forward? We'll come back to emerging issues.
Yes?
>>EUROPEAN COMMISSION: May I suggest at least from my side -- and perhaps it's the same for other colleagues -- I will need to go again through all the working group proposals and the teams and the notes I took to understand which breakout session I would like, actually, to participate tomorrow. And then tomorrow morning I will be in a better position to confirm or not whether I could help in one of the breakout sessions. But right now it's a bit -- I would not want to commit at this stage and not be able to leave on that commitment tomorrow.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Okay, yeah. That makes sense. Apart from the ones that already have volunteers, I think managing critical Internet resources and development, we're -- yeah. Then we can leave the others up for tomorrow for people to volunteer to --
>>CHENGETAI MASANGO: Unless somebody wants one now.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: If there's anybody who wants to take another -- well, then, I think we can let everybody go through workshops and decide, you know.
And so we'll probably have volunteers tomorrow in the morning. Or is there anybody who wants to volunteer to lead any? Okay.
So we've got Fouad for development. We've got Katitza for security, openness. And we've got Emily for managing critical Internet resources. We don't have -- what's outstanding is emerging issues, taking stock, the way forward, access and diversity. Tulika.
>>INDIA: Okay. I'll take on access and diversity.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you.
>>INDIA: I have another small point to make with permission, ma'am.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Yes, please, go ahead.
>>INDIA: Before we start doing our assessment of the proposals for the workshops, do we come out with some kind of a format for weighting -- putting weights to what kind of weight we'll put for -- do we have a standard form whether the proposal does give importance to the agenda to the differently-abled, to the developing country presentation, to the -- and, if you could sort of bring that out for all of us, it would be easier for us to then be able to come back to you with the correct workshops. We need to discuss that. I understand that we need a discussion on that issue before we start to break out to look at different proposals under various heads.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Some of those were captured this morning. For example, you know, the diversity of -- ensuring diversity of opinion, multistakeholder participation, the equality, I think, gender and ensuring development. You know, those were discussed. But I think the IGF Secretariat will come up with --
>>CHENGETAI MASANGO: Yes, there is a scoring scheme.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Can I finish?
>>CHENGETAI MASANGO: Sorry.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: The Secretariat will come up with a scoring scheme and instructions for the working groups tomorrow morning. Chengetai?
>>CHENGETAI MASANGO: Yes. In the program paper there is a scoring scheme in it. And we also do have a scoring scheme that the Secretariat made, which the MAG members in your groups can share with you.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you. Any other comments? Yes, Marilia.
>>MARILIA MACIEL: There are many workshop proposals that don't have a list of speakers yet. We understand that it's hard to contact all the people in advance, but some of them have no list at all. So it's really hard for us at this point to evaluate multistakeholder participation and diversity of views and participation from developing and developed and even gender. So I'd like to ask if there is a way that we say okay, this proposal is good, but send a clear message to the organizer and say okay, you have to have some gender balance or you have to have developed and developing country participation and so on. Is there a way to send a message to the organizers to follow up to see if they have followed through and they have followed the suggestions?
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you. I'll have Chengetai respond to that.
>>CHENGETAI MASANGO: Yes, there is. And also tomorrow we don't envision that what is decided is going to be the final thing. We can have workshops which say these -- if this workshop changes, this and this adds this, it will be a good feeder workshop or it will be a good whatever workshop. And then we can get back to the workshop proponents and tell them that this is what they need to change or this is what they need to add. So yes.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Fouad, please. And then Adam.
>>FOUAD BAJWA: Thank you, Madam Chair. Just a point -- I just wanted to ask and be clarified that what will be our starting point for scoring again? Because one process has already been almost concluded, which was the MAG members doing the scoring. And then yesterday, obviously, the document was shared. So we have a score. We've got some scores for us. Should we use that as the starting point and -- because it's going to be much more inclusive and participative activity for all stakeholders that will be present tomorrow morning. So should we start from that document which has already been circulated? Or will this be from scratch again?
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Chengetai?
>>CHENGETAI MASANGO: Yes, I would. I think we have put a lot of work into that, and there's no use redoing everything again. That's just a good starting point to start off the discussion. And, if there are any other input that's to be made, then it -- it can be listened to and adjusted.
>>FOUAD BAJWA: Can that particular scoring be uploaded to the IGF Web site so the other stakeholders can download it as well on their machines tonight?
>>CHENGETAI MASANGO: Yes.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Adam?
>>ADAM PEAKE: Thank you very much. Adam Peake speaking.
Coming back to the point about workshops and being, well, incomplete, if they're incomplete at this stage, shouldn't that be a matter of scoring them down and excluding them? I thought that by now they were meant to be somewhat complete. So, if they don't have names of speakers, then why would we go out and ask them for -- you know, to complete what should already have been completed by now? Or am I misunderstanding what the workshop requirements are? I can't access the Web site, so I can't actually check what the workshop requirement was by now. But I thought they were meant to be complete by now. So incompleteness would be a reason for rejection and a very reasonable reason for rejection. That was one point.
Something I wanted to mention about merging workshops, we've done a lot of merging in the past. And one of the criticisms of the merged workshops that came through the taking stock section is they didn't do much more than merge a name. So in some cases there wasn't very much merging of the actual workshop to make a coherent new merged workshop. What you had was somebody, basically, doing the same presentation they were going to do in the old standalone -- the individual premerged workshop.
So I'd like to suggest that, after this process, the MAG gets involved more deeply in ensuring that workshops merge, do create a new structure, as it were, and monitor the actual proposal as it develops and goes forward. Because having -- you know, incoherent workshops with two or three different threads going on is one of the reasons we have criticism of the workshops, I think, from the last two IGFs. So some more stringent monitoring of how the merger process goes on would seem to be a good idea. Thank you.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you. Marilia.
>>MARILIA MACIEL: Just a quick comment. I don't think we made it clear from the start that we would require the complete list of speakers as we did with other issues such as the report. So, if we are going to take them out because they lack report, I do understand. And I think we should enforce the rule. But it was not clear from the start. And, because of that, I think that it's very complicated just to throw the proposal away because they did not present names. But that's what I wanted to ask, and Chengetai already answered. If they do not provide names with this kind of balance, then maybe we can do another evaluation later. But there are good proposals that don't have names at this point, and it would be bad to rule them out because of that.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: And we also need to make sure that we're enforcing a timeline as well. So yes.
>>MARILIA MACIEL: So, if I'm not mistaken, just there is one thing in the sheet that you proposed that says timeliness and completeness of the proposal. So maybe we could score down on this particular item but not all the items and not to just disregard a proposal because they did not present names. Maybe this is something we'll create a rule for next year and enforce it next year.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Chengetai and then Fouad.
>>CHENGETAI MASANGO: If there are good workshops and just using a scoring sheet that we use, they may score a 10. But, if there's something we plainly see that would improve the workshop, we should be able to go back to them and say please improve this just to make it a better workshop than it is.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Fouad.
>>FOUAD BAJWA: Thank you, Madam Chair. Just building upon what Chengetai and Marilia has chaired, one observation I had while going through the list of the workshops was that some of the workshops were making commitments about speakers to be decided from international organizations. And with that -- like this morning, even our representative colleague from UNESCO mentioned that they were being deferred references in X number of workshops. This is also an important aspect to go back and to at least check with them that the kind of commitment they have shown in the workshops with the speakers which have the TBD written in front of them, those have to be checked. There may be two or three speakers. But then there are too many TBD workshops to be decided -- or speakers for the workshops. So that has to be visited. I don't think we should just pick out those workshops and not let them be there. But it should also be a possibility to recheck. Because in certain circumstances, obviously, they need commitments. Some of the cases the workshops did mention organizers to be actually governments. In one case, I was looking at the ICT workshops, which is actually a government department. And the government -- and the department head is actually the contact point for one of the youth-related workshops. So this is important that we check back with them what is the current state. The scoring should not undermine the fact that they're still supposed to have an international representative and so forth. Thank you.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you, Fouad.
Brazil, please?
>>BRAZIL: Very briefly, I'd just like to share, to express that we share the opinion of Chengetai and Marilia about the matter of speakers listed in the workshops. We have still timeline to provide this. We have the same opinion so far.
I think it's very important the summary provided by you, Madam Chair, regarding the topics that must be addressed by each workshop. This could also help workshop organizers to provide the speakers inline with the interests of the MAG.
And one of the criterias you mentioned that we could also evaluate from now is how much the workshop is addressing the issue of development, is dealing with the questions of development. So this could be a criteria for evaluation and scoring also the workshops. Thank you.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you. United Kingdom.
>>UNITED KINGDOM: Yes, thank you, Chair. Apologies if I've missed a relevant discussion with regard to taking stock and the way forward. But I'd like to know what you're aiming to decide tomorrow with regard to the relationship between the six or maybe five workshops, if there is that successful merger, and the main session. Will, for example, the main session seek only inputs from those workshops? Or will the main session simply take note of what those workshops said in response to addressing the questions that have been tabled under that heading? Or will the main session have some other purpose? And what will your -- what will your -- be your expectation for the output from the main session on taking stock and the way forward? Will, for example, you expect it to formulate some statement or formulate some questions? I don't know about life beyond the Nairobi IGF and engagement with other institutions within the U.N. system that are looking at the issue of improvements and so on and the future of the stakeholder model, multistakeholder model.
So, as I say, I may have missed an exchange or clarification in one of the documents. But I would like to go away from this meeting with some sense of what the objective for that session will be and how it will take account of the dialogue and handling of the questions in the related workshops. Thank you.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you. When you look at the program paper, taking stock and way forward has three questions. They're looking at how the IGF 2011 has contributed to the development agenda and how the 2012 IGF could better advance that development agenda. And then it also speaks to the capacity building issue and how then 2012 advances that and some recommendations coming from CSTD and ECOSOC and how the 2012 IGF should be organized.
And we're also hoping that in one of the themes that the working group that's going to be discussing this particular topical theme is going to come up with suggestions and proposals around how we should handle it as well. So that's going to be the work of the working group tomorrow to discuss that. Thank you.
Unless you have any other suggestions on how we can deal with it. Yes? Mark.
>>UNITED KINGDOM: Yes. I was wondering if the overall objective is to produce some kind of a statement? Or is that one of the options that you haven't yet decided or are seeking advice on?
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Yeah, seeking advice on -- yeah, from the group, from all of you. What -- yeah, what options should we come up with a statement or -- you know, how do we deal with that? And whether we should discuss that now, or should we have the working group come back to us with a proposal on that? Marilia?
>>MARILIA MACIEL: Just wanted to emphasize that maybe this session will be more important this year than it was in any other year. Because we are very unclear about the situation of IGF improvement and, if the mandate of the working group necessity is going to be renewed or not. I hope it will. But, if it's not, I believe that this session, maybe it's crucial for us to put together all that has been discussed and not let it go to waste and try to find out our own ways of moving forward from the communities. I believe that we should have that in mind when we plan this session. I agree that the other topics are important as well. But maybe the organizers will try to give space for us to -- maybe to report back. Because I believe that the discussions in CSTD maybe have not been so much ventilated with the community. And it's important to have this moment to reflect about what has happened and to reflect about the proposals that have been advanced. And it will become even more crucial if the mandate of the working group is not renewed. So maybe one outcome of the session is to think about is what to do in case the worst scenario takes place.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Yes, thank you for that. And that should be discussed by the working group tomorrow. Right? Yeah. Okay.
Any other comments on the way forward, next steps for tomorrow? Okay. Yes, Council of Europe.
>>COUNCIL OF EUROPE: Thank you, Madam Chair. One particular thought look into the future, which other speakers have been mentioning, are there regional IGFs and other IGFs across the world and is there any room to think about or giving orientation of the IGF's four days together in terms of there will be lots of national regional spaces being had thereafter. What are the messages from IGF to those spaces? Is there a need to give some orientation or to communicate with them at all to have some sort of message to them, to invite them to consider issues or, in fact, feedback or create some sort of linkage in order to show continuity in many respects and to reinforce the importance of the community of spaces, national, regional and with the global space. Thank you.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Yeah. Thank you. U.K.
>>UNITED KINGDOM: Thanks very much, Chair. Just on that. In Vilnius, colleagues may recall we had a meeting to discuss this very issue of the relationship between national and regional IGFs and the global IGF. And the conclusion from those discussions was that the interaction, the kind of reporting and awareness promotion was a valuable role or there should be space for that in the IGF. But not for anything more formal in terms of issuing directions or seeking harmonization. There was too much diversity in the way that these national and regional initiatives are developing for that to happen. And there wasn't a sense amongst the participants there, which I was one, that the U.K. and the commonwealth that there was a desire for that, some coordination or formality of linkage and so on.
So I feel that's probably still the case. I'm not aware of any voices seeking to revisit that discussion. Thanks.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you, U.K. Brazil?
>>BRAZIL: Maybe the concern from Council of Europe could be better addressed if we left a bit more space from regional and national IGFs to contribute during this session of -- the beginning of IGF, the taking stock, at the very beginning of the IGF. And then it will help to contribute to refine the agenda of IGF main sessions in the following days. Thank you.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you. Adam.
>>ADAM PEAKE: Thank you, again. It's Adam, Adam Peake. There's a 3-hour session on the morning of the first day suggesting regional perspectives and setting the scene. So isn't that an opportunity when the national and regional IGFs get to report and discuss and do, perhaps, the things that are being suggested now? Or perhaps there should be a discussion saying what should that particular 3-hour session be discussing. Perhaps that's could be something that's also be addressed tomorrow. How is that three hours going to be used?
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Yes. I think we have about three hours with regional perspectives and national IGFs can report back. But I think it's regional perspectives and setting the scene. So it's reporting back from the regions, the regional IGFs. So we do have some time. And there's some regional IGFs that have actually requested for roundtable discussions as well. Yeah. Thank you. Chengetai? Marilia.
>>MARILIA MACIEL: Very quickly I totally agree with the Council of Europe and with Alvaro. And I just think that we need to be a little bit more proactive when it comes to reaching out to the regional processes. I think that the some of them have already scheduled their regional meetings. So maybe it's the case for us to compile what we have been discussing in the open consultations and the questions that are going to drive the main sessions. And, to the extent possible, ask that the regional IGFs, take into account these questions. And, if they do, they report back in advance, so we have a chance to know what was the outcomes of their discussions. Not only to report back in the session, but to really be proactive and to try to engage them on this discussion that we're having here today. I don't know if the -- if it's practiced that the Secretariat goes to the regional meetings. I believe that he does to the extent possible. So maybe it would be good to address this point and to try to poll them and to have them together in these particular things that we're discussing.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you. Adam.
>>ADAM PEAKE: Just to carry on this morning about this morning's session on the morning of the first day, it does actually say the session has two main goals. One of them is provide regional input on the thematic themes of the IGF 2011 and to give participants a cross-regional perspective. Isn't that what is being requested? Isn't that already, therefore, on the agenda?
I mean, I'm sorry if I'm misunderstanding what Brazil and the Council of Europe just asked for. It seems to me that THAT is kind of already there. Isn't that what we are talking about with that particular first bullet?
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Council of Europe?
>>COUNCIL OF EUROPE: Thank you very much. I'm sorry to have created some confusion, I think, with the discussion. I'm not talking about the need to control national, regional spaces. But the regional space at the beginning of the IGF is to inform the global space with what's happened over the last 12 months.
Something towards the end, if you are looking at the way forward, is communicating what's happened over those four days. And no one is giving any orientation, instructions by any means. It is rather just to create continuity and just to have a connection without any formal linkages and creating any sort of a hierarchy. Simply just to show continuity and coherence. That's as simple as that, and to communicate something that may be valuable for them and their work in their regional and national spaces.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Brazil?
>>BRAZIL: I'm sorry if I wasn't clear. I don't disagree with Adam. I'm completely -- I agree that this is already addressed in setting the scene program and session.
I just suggested that we could do it -- give more time, an extra hour or extra two hours in order to allow substantive participation from regional perspectives. But I agree with Adam. Thank you.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you. I think we've taken note of the discussions on regional IGFs.
Any other comment? All right. Any other business? Yes, Katitza?
>>KATITZA RODRIGUEZ: Thank you, Madam Chair. This is just a small comment. Maybe for some organizers -- workshop organizers who have completed the list of speakers and they have complied with all the requirements set up by the program, it would be good if we could give them some green light so they can confirm the speakers because funding to go to Kenya, it is already very difficult for many of developing countries in general. So it will be good if they can be confirmed and we can make sure they are going to the meeting. Thank you.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you. Anybody else with any other business? Oh, U.K.
>>UNITED KINGDOM: Thanks. Sorry, I don't want to delay everybody, but the ministerial high-level meeting, how does that link to the main IGF? Is there going to be a report back or something like that? Sorry if I have missed something. Maybe you covered this in the opening this morning, and I was a little late. So I apologize for that if that's the case. If you could quickly summarize the linkage. Thanks.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Thank you, U.K.
The high-level ministerial meeting is taking place on the 26th. It is going to be discussing four very specific issues, and the idea is to share the outcomes of that meeting with the IGF and to also ensure that the participants at the high-level ministerial come and participate and contribute to the IGF.
So that's the format it's going to be taking, that the discussions form part of the main IGF itself, the topics, developing-country specific requested by Kenya of broadband, local content and cybersecurity. Those topics we'll then try to fit into the main IGF over the four days as well. Thank you.
Yes, U.K.?
>>UNITED KINGDOM: Thanks. Will you be inviting ministers and other high-level speakers in the high-level meeting to participate in the first day, for example, in the opening session, to deliver keynotes or involve them in some other way?
I'm just wondering if a minister comes to the high-level session, what can we do with the minister to extend his involvement into, perhaps, the first day of the IGF?
It would be challenging to expect a minister to be able to stay for the full length of the IGF. But if I could indicate to my minister, for example, that on the opening day of the IGF, you would be able to do this, is that something you could say a bit more on, I wonder? Thanks.
>>ALICE MUNYUA: Yes, we are going to expect them to speak at the opening ceremony. That's why we are taking nearly three hours. But, yes, we are hoping that they will participate at the opening, some of the ministers and also for some Kenyan-specific activities as well. Thank you.
Any other business? Okay. So thank you, everyone. Thank you very much. We have managed to close the meeting nearly one hour in advance.
Thank you very much for the very productive session today. Tomorrow's session I think starts at 9:00. Is that correct, Chengetai? 9:00?
>> I said we could always discuss the IGF improvement process. It was a joke.
>>CHENGETAI MASANGO: Yes. In the schedule, it says 9:00. It was intentioned to start at 10:00 but we can start at 9:00. It is in Room 4 which is just across the hall. Does anybody have any objections to starting at 9:00? 10:00?
>>ALICE MUNYUA: 10:00. Okay. We start at 10:00 tomorrow. 10:00 tomorrow. And we already have the agenda, but we will discuss the agenda again in the morning and also finalize with the working group facilitators. So thank you everyone. Thank you very much. And good evening.