From Robin Gross of IPJustice, one of the CS nominees who was selected to the
Internet Governance Forum Multistakeholder Advisory Group, who is in Geneva for
some IG consultative meetings
----- Original Message -----
From: Robin Gross <robin@ipjustice.org>
Friends,
Some news from the IGF Advisory Group meeting in Geneva:
The 30 Oct. - 2 Nov. 2006 inaugural meeting of Internet Governance Forum
(IGF) in Athens will have a lot of opportunities for discussions on a
wide variety of Internet governance topics. This is my call for
participation from civil society for contributions to help shape this
meeting in a positive way.
The four main themes for the Athens meeting are:
* 1. OPENNESS*
- Free flow of information, ideas, and access to knowledge
*
2. SECURITY*
- Building trust online
- Protecting users from spam, phishing, viruses
- Maintain security while protecting privacy
* 3. DIVERSITY*
- Multilingualism including IDN and promoting local content
- Respecting geographical diversity
* 4. ACCESS*
- Internet connectivity, policies and costs
The agenda and schedule is shaping-up as follows:
http://www.intgovforum.org/table.htm
A call for papers has been issued on these 4 main themes and I'd like to
encourage people to make submissions. *THE PLENARY SESSIONS AND
WORKSHOPS AT THE ATHENS MEETING WILL BE BASED ON THE CONTENT OF THESE
SUBMISSIONS. * So, please, contribute to this process and help to shape
this meeting in a positive way by submitting papers to the IGF. The
deadline is 15 July 2006 for your submission to influence how the event
is programmed.
Here are the details:
http://www.intgovforum.org/athens_outline.htm
Additionally, there are two over-arching themes that should be taken in
consideration in each issue that the IGF discusses: (i) development /
capacity building, and (ii) civil liberties / human rights.
I would suggest contributions on some possible (in no way exhaustive)
sub-issues within these 4 main themes of openness, security, diversity,
and access:
1. OPENNESS:
- Freedom of expression rights
- Free flow of information
- Access to knowledge
- Impact of intellectual property rights to free expression and free
flow of info
- Promotion of accessible public domain
- Government censorship on Internet
- Corporate censorship on Internet
- Impact of technological protection measures and anti-circumvention
laws on free flow of information
- Impact of software patents on freedom of expression
2. SECURITY - building trust online, protecting users from spam,
phishing,
viruses, maintain security while protecting privacy:
- Civil liberties concerns from government surveillance programs
- Privacy rights and consumer trust of Internet
- Role of free and open source software in promoting information security
- Impact on freedom of expression from spam and content filtering
- Publication of WHOIS database on Internet and privacy and consumer trust
3. DIVERSITY - multilinguism through IDN, local content, and
geographical diversity:
- Ability of ICANN to meet needs of international Internet community
- Role of Creative Commons licenses to promote local content
- Ability of non-proprietary development and licensing schemes to meet
local needs
4. ACCESS - Internet connectivity, policies and costs:
- Open standards
- Interoperability of technology
- Role of free and open source software to provide access
I hope you will consider making a contribution to this dialogue. Please
let me know if you have any questions.
Be sure to check out the IGF website for many more details:
http://www.intgovforum.org/index.htm
Thank you,
Robin