IGF 2010
VILNIUS, LITHUANIA
15 SEPTEMBER 10
SESSION R/N 1
1630
EURODIG
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Note: The following is the output of the real-time captioning taken during Fifth Meeting of the IGF, in Vilnius. 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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>> LEE HIBBARD: Hello, everybody. Good afternoon. We are going to start in a minute or two, in a few minutes. To be very clear, this is a session on EuroDIG, European Dialogue on Internet Governance, the European IGF, to avoid confusion with any other events, so that you are clear, if you want to leave now. We will start in a couple of minutes.
(Pause)
So, good afternoon, everybody. I hope you can hear me.
>> Yes.
>> LEE HIBBARD: Yes, thank you. I'm Lee Hibbard from the Council of Europe. This is --
>> ANA OLMOS SANZ: Ana Olmos.
>> LEE HIBBARD: Ana was the part of the host delegation in Spain who hosted the EuroDIG in Madrid at the end of April this year. And together hopefully with Serbian friends and colleagues, we are going to have a very sort of loose, constructive discussion about EuroDIG, European Dialogue on Internet Governance, European IGF.
We are going to break it into two parts. The first part we are going to look at what is EuroDIG, briefly, what happened in Madrid. You may have seen the messages from Madrid, some copies around on tables. If you don't have one, it's online. If you don't that, there will be paper copies available on the Council of Europe stand in the plaza.
The first part will be dedicated to what happened, what worked well, what were your feelings, those of you who took part, those of you who connected remotely, to sort of assess the added value of EuroDIG this year, the third edition; and then taking stock, and then moving to the second part which will be about the future.
The future will be the fourth edition of the EuroDIG, which will take place at the end of May, in 2011 in Belgrade -- excuse me, end of April. No, no, excuse me. The foreseen date is the end of May. But we can talk about that.
The second part will be looking at the future, asking you, what is the added value of future work together, European IGF? What do you want to get out of it? Ideas, themes and your participation most importantly. I'd like to also invite remote participation. We have Sandra over there, who is taking remote feed. So I welcome any remote participants to the EuroDIG discussions.
And this is going to be a loose session about what you think. It is taking stock and moving forward. Let's start with the first part, just a few facts about EuroDIG. EuroDIG started really, bottom/up, a few people discussed the idea. We have Wolfgang Kleinwachter, one of those people, we have Rolf Weber with us too, talking about the need to do something at the European level as regards Internet Governance. It took root.
The Council of Europe hosted the first EuroDIG, first edition, in Strassburg in 2008, and it moved -- there was messages from Strassburg. It then moved, second edition, to Geneva, with the help of the European Broadcasting Union who hosted the second one in Geneva. And we had messages from Geneva.
And this year, thanks to our Spanish hosts, to Telefonica, to the Spanish national IGF, to the City of Madrid and from the help of European Union to some extent, we together hosted and drove forward the EuroDIG in Madrid, the third edition.
There were messages from Madrid which you have here.
I want to open the floor to discussion. The first part is what worked, what worked in EuroDIG 2010. I will start the discussion by saying I think the added value of EuroDIG was that we had more participation. There were over 200 remote participants connected at different times throughout the day, the two days together. And we for the first time brought together national IGF platforms to come and speak. We had ten in the room at any one time.
That was very exciting to connect these national initiatives together. Maybe that was quite a lot of added value. I think that is something to think about for the future.
I also think that we crossed a wide range of discussion. We had six sessions over two days, and a number of workshops. And we had a couple of side meetings as well, besides that. We had lots of intense discussions. I think from my own point of view, there was quite a lot of focus in EuroDIG 2010 on business, the role of business, business models. And there was an event driven by Google which was Google Spain, which was interesting. We talked about IPv6 transition, new gTLDs, etcetera, amongst other themes.
I think it had quite a business angle to the discussions. I want to stop there, because this is not a, this should be a dialogue between us. I'd call upon some of the people who were at EuroDIG to tell us, to share with us what worked. What do you think worked? What were the strengths? What were the weaknesses? How can we do better? Does anyone want to start the talk? The discussion? I'm talking about substance, but also about the way it was covered, the way EuroDIG was delivered. Does anybody have any comments? Does anybody want to kick start the discussion? Wolfgang.
>> WOLFGANG KLEINWACHTER: Thank you, thank you, Lee. And when we look, what worked fine, and that we are moving in the right direction, I would support this.
But there is a lot of things to do, so that the IGF Europe, the EuroDIG really becomes more representative. And that means that we have to have to do more outreach, so that we get real the player who are playing in this various arenas, the key stakeholder from Europe, from Government, private sectors, civil society and the technical community together.
We have a lot of very good people. But it's not enough. I think what we have seen also in Europe, and this is achievement, is that we have now around ten or 12 national IGFs. But we should look how we can create a better linkage between the national IGFs and the EuroDIG.
I also see that the various European institutions headquartered in Brussels and elsewhere are not yet so deeply involved. This includes the European business organisations. We had part that was okay, but other European business organisations which are dealing with the Internet and are not yet involved.
I would also see if this is possible, greater involvement of the European parliament; though we have a linkage, but the linkage is still low. We have 13 members of the European parliament here in the IGF. I would hope that we have more members of the European parliament in the forthcoming EuroDIG. And also engagement of the European Commission could be further enhanced.
All these are things which should be done, when we are moving forwards to prepare the EuroDIG in Belgrade. Thank you.
>> LEE HIBBARD: Thank you, Wolfgang. Let's keep it going. Who else has comments? I would point out actually, what is very good is, you may know that the European parliament made a resolution in June about Internet Governance, the next steps, in which they talk about EuroDIG. So it is now referred to in the text of the European parliament. It is very important that that is a recognition of this space. I think it's demonstrating the sort of value of this platforms.
So I'd like to know from others, what were the take-aways for you from EuroDIG process? Anyone want to comment? Ana, Portugal.
>> ANA NEVES: Thank you very much. Well, I think that this third edition of EuroDIG was very important. And we are in a completely new context, because from the very first one, this is the one that was held this year, we had several national IGFs.
So the context is completely different from the very first one. But still, we have several weaknesses. So we need to make EuroDIG more robust. We need more commitment from Governments. We need the more commitment for, or involvement from the national European and even from the Council of Europe parliaments.
Them we have to see how we can or cannot involve the European Commission. Then I think there is something that we could reflect and take advantage of the national IGFs, that is, what EuroDIG and plus the national IGFs changed in national politics, attitudes, legislation. I think that is very important.
You can see here the message from Malene. We have messages from Lisbon. And I admit there is so many other messages from the other capitals where the national IGFs took place. I think from these messages we have to reflect, and EuroDIG could reflect on what changed with EuroDIG and with the national IGFs. And this work is really a deep valid work, and I think EuroDIG can be different and can make the difference in European arena.
When I'm speaking about make EuroDIG more robust, of course I'm talking about financial support, not only human resources but financial support as well. Thank you.
>> LEE HIBBARD: Thank you, Ana. Maybe I can ask you also to introduce yourselves.
>> Thank you. I used to be a Finnish representative, but I'm now retired so I'm at large. Anyway, I think that the biggest thing, the most remarkable thing about EuroDIG to my mind is the fact that it was really born from a loose conversation in a street cafe in Paris, among a few of us, so, in the sense it was really sort of bottom/up operation. To my mind this is better than EuroDIG started by a huge organisation, whichever it would have been, which would have claimed ownership.
I also think that the advantage, one of the advantages of EuroDIG is that it is a pan-European operation. I hope that we can involve more of our partners in the list. Thank you.
>> LEE HIBBARD: Thank you. Yes, Roxanne from Ukraine.
>> I would like to add two points from the discussion. First of all, it is impactful. I remember first EuroDIG when representatives were all eastern Europe at this event. The second EuroDIG, other organisations had maybe some representatives. Third EuroDIG, participants from eastern Europe, and now fourth EuroDIG in eastern country, European country.
Then I would like to tell you about our Ukrainian result which is child of EuroDIG because it was personal involvement, of one who came to Ukraine, met the right people, who propound the idea of EuroDIG. Then President over Ukrainian association -- at this moment was not governmental involvement, but remote participation in the third EuroDIG; it was done in the university, and very great success. During this remote participation, was announced organisation of our own Ukrainian IGF, and our great success with involvement in organising statute and representative of our governmental community. Now we would like to have governmental participation in the fourth EuroDIG from Ukraine. Thank you.
>> LEE HIBBARD: Thanks, Roxanna, thank you very much for that. I was in Ukraine only ten days ago with you. As I said to you earlier, it was a pleasure to be there. There was real dialogue. I've been to Ukraine many times. There is only a dialogue from the States, it is not always...
(Music)
Okay. Thank you. Did I say something wrong? But it was a very, very interactive dialogue between states and nonstate actives in Ukraine about Internet governance and the policy for that. It was really a great exchange. I was very happy to be with you. I do see personally the linkages.
I'd like to ask others who were involved in other national IGFs who are here, including Spain, has it had an impact? You created your platforms. Is EuroDIG influencing directly, indirectly? What is happening? How is it having an impact, an influence on the way that you think, the national, local and regional levels? Does somebody want to -- Ana?
>> ANA OLMOS SANZ: Yes. Our position is of particular interest because we hosted the last EuroDIG. We have seen the influence of EuroDIG in previous years, but also bigger impact this year precisely because it happened there.
One of the main things that we wanted to point out was the fact that Telefonica got so involved. This is representative also of the bigger role that businesses are taking in EuroDIG. This is something that we welcome, and that is key for the dialogue. Another thing is that stakeholders are owning the process. This is very important. They are taking responsibility for what happens there, and they are bringing the dialogue back. This is something we have seen happen in Spain.
Not only driving from EuroDIG, also this has happened through the local, the national sessions. But EuroDIG really boosted this, gave a boost to this process. And that is something we also appreciate.
Also EuroDIG got the involvement at high level of Government representation, that is something we also appreciate. And EuroDIG has also helped involve people, Government representatives, in such a way that they don't only, they don't only participate in EuroDIG but they continue to participate in subsequent events.
As far as the relationship between EuroDIG and European IGFs, we have to work on that and figure out exactly which ways we can benefit one another. There is one way, there is no doubt about that, like case of Ukraine, which EuroDIGs, national IGFs are born under the wings of EuroDIG. But then once they are running, we have to find the right ways for this to adapt. That is our take. If there are national IGFs here, please contribute, with not only what it meant for you, but what you would expect from EuroDIG.
>> LEE HIBBARD: It's very noisy. I apologize for the noise. That is the way it goes. Looking around the table, I can see the Portuguese IGF, German IGF. Next Monday there is going to be a Finnish IGF, Ukrainian IGF, Serbian IGF, as I look around the room.
>> Russian.
>> Belarus IGF. Yes. And the Russian IGF, yes, Russian IGF, I've met colleagues from the Russian IGF. That is a lot. Does anybody want to comment on what is happening in your national IGFs? Yes, Belarus IGF, please.
>> I would say that we recognize participation -- can you hear me? Okay. So we organise remote participation in April, and there are only six enthusiasts participating. But it unexpectedly, this remote participation accelerated interest to Internet Governance issues before and after remote participation. We organised a number of round table discussions. We invited businesses, but no governmental officials expressed any interest into Internet Governance issues and EuroDIG discussions as well.
But the delegation or European Union to Belarus unexpectedly or expectedly appeared to be interested in Internet Governance discussions in Belarus. And with their help, we have prepared to conduct a round table discussion on Monday in Minsk. And there we will have representatives of the parliament, of Government, and we have a body which is called operative analytical sensor under the President. And they also maybe will come to participate in terms of this Internet Governance issue.
My experience shows that education is very important thing, because even in partly repressive regimes like Belarus, many bad decisions are made, not because of bad will but because of ignorance. And you can easily notice that there are Government officials who are really interested in knowledge sharing. And I hope that the next EuroDIG meeting will have representatives of Belorussian Government. Thank you.
>> LEE HIBBARD: Thank you very much. That is very interesting to note. We should try to foster those connections. We should try to make sure that we have the outreach to Belarus, to bring you into that discussion. That is very very important, amongst many other countries as well, in that region.
Does anybody else want to comment, what worked well, what didn't work well? We are trying to look, before we go to the second part of this discussion about the future, what are we going to look to for in the Serbian EuroDIG next year? Have you any other comments? Have you any other feelings about the added value about EuroDIG in 2010? From DiploFoundation.
>> The comment on what happened in Belarus, to make this short intervention, Marina joined EuroDIG Geneva last year. She was part of the capacity development programme. Although she is a very experienced lecturer and academic and intellectual on the local scene, Internet Governance was a new issue for her. Marina, if I'm correct, you came to Geneva and after that you worked on the remote hub, and now the next step is IGF.
It is a good example how learning process and capacity development process can have very concrete and tangible impacts. For example, Russia and a few other countries, we can see that the keys, the key is the process. Not even event, event is of course important, but process before event is essential. This is also the way to broaden the knowledge skills for participation, understanding awareness building. That element should be highlighted throughout the event. It is important to have expert discussion, of course.
But I would say in this phase of the Internet Governance development, we still need a lot of awareness building. We can use climate change analogy. We have to increase IG footprint in Europe definitely among parliamentarians, Government officials, academia and other place.
>> LEE HIBBARD: Thank you. I want to hold that thought about how to do that for the next time around, how to do that in a new construct. We need to make EuroDIG have more added value, fresher face, and keep making it evolve. It shouldn't just sit on what it already is. It should move. Creating those new ways of that capacity building is something we need to build upon. I definitely agree. We have comments from Mike and Christoff, first the gentleman over there and then Christoff. Michael first, please. Thank you.
>> I have to take off my earphones in order that I -- my name is Michael Roader. I'm from the German association Eco, but also from the European ISPS association. Coming back what you asked on what the good or bad things, normally I understood the process should work like you have the national IGFs, where they discuss the national issues, in terms of where the national Governments, and passing them normally messages off to the European to condense them more, to get at least a European voice within this arena where we have the United Nations Internet Governance Forum.
I think this process is not really synchronized yet, as the national IGFs are not in synch to send off messages to EuroDIG. And EuroDIG, it was not prepared to condense messages, as they didn't have some, and to push it up to this Forum here.
So I would like to get this process starting, let's say starting next year in a much better synch to see.
Coming back to the messages from the German IGF, we had some, we printed it out, and as I said before, the process was not in synch. We just passed the messages directly from the German IGF to this round here, which normally should not happen, because there are a lot of issues I guess which are discussed in the various other IGFs as well, like net neutrality, or the multistakeholder issue, which is I guess the strongest one which came up with the first EuroDIGs we had before.
And it was very much proposed with very heavy support from Lee Hibbard and the Council of Europe.
I don't want to read this, but you should. With a microphone, with all the noise around, this doesn't make any sense. But what you can see here, we had the stakeholder contributions from the civil sector. We had the freedom security on the Internet. Those are all topics you find here as well.
I would wish to have really not only a multistakeholder, but also a multi-step process, and stepping up, and to make even the voice stronger if we speak as a European voice.
>> LEE HIBBARD: Thank you very much, Michael. The gentleman there, please. Thank you.
>> Thank you very much. My name is Joe Dabohn and I represent Malta on the HLIG and on GAC. And I was very fortunate to attend, it was my first introduction to EuroDIG last year, and -- or this year, rather. And as it happens, I also happen to be in this ironic position where I chair a commonwealth IGF, which has had enormous amount of support. This is by way of a statement of intent, that on the purpose of setting up a national IGF for Malta. I'll be working around launching this by way of event. And I would like to talk to you after this, to see what type of support by way of resource support that we could secure for EuroDIG in order to enable this in the next two to three months. Thank you very much.
>> LEE HIBBARD: Thank you very much. Another IGF to connect to, very important. Christoff Velasca.
>> I'm the director general, also a member of IGF Spain. Well, just a few thoughts. Last year in Madrid, I had the opportunity to be the moderator on crossborder Cybercrime under cloud computing, and it turned out to be a good workshop. There was very little research, little material available on this important issue. So one of my thoughts is that this workshop really enable us to bring this issue up international and at the national levels, so that like policymakers and legislators realise how important is to take this issue into consideration.
Also my thoughts on EuroDIG is, just to me, it is a very relevant inclusive process at the European level. But it is also a platform, but much more important, it is a platform for dialogue between the technical, the scientific and civil society community, and also, a very very valuable academic resource. If we are advised the different EuroDIG sessions that have occurred during the years, to me they have improved a lot, way way way better.
This is an important platform also to raise issues related to what the Internet Governance Forum needs to be addressed also at the national and international level. But also one of the things I realise, this is that we need to have high involvement of policymakers, legislators and politicians, particularly if we want to make the conclusions that emerge from each of the workshops and the sessions be meaningful. Otherwise the Forum would be, or would have the risk to fade away in time. It is important to involve all those stakeholders.
That is all I wanted to say, and to share with you. Thank you.
>> LEE HIBBARD: Thank you. I meant to pass to Anna, but before I do that, the thing about involvement is very important. What I think I'm taking away is that involvement is not just a one-off meeting each year. It is involvement throughout the year. It is inclusion in a group of people, like here physically or in a teleconference call, or shaping a theme for discussion in an event, or having a teleconference call to talk about how to set up or how to drive a Maltese IGF for example. That is one of the roles of EuroDIG. If we can create capacity building in that sense, it can be useful.
I think that means resources though a little bit. It means a little bit more sustainability. We need a little more in the way of financial commitments from different stakeholders, because everybody in the EuroDIG process is doing this on top of their every-day job. The Council of Europe is providing Secretariats to sustain the EuroDIG process. But it is a minimum really, because there is so much work to do. If you count up all the national IGF meetings over the year, it is a lot of travel for a very few number of people. It shouldn't be the same people. It should be all sorts of people taking part.
Personally, I think there should be a fund created, so we can outreach to different groups, so if you set up a national IGF, you say we need to have the business sector from different countries, in particular, this field, we should be able to reach out and connect them to you. If we want society to take part, the same thing.
The youth colleagues, they should also be able to take part. But youth don't necessarily always have the means to be able to finance their trips -- thank you for that -- to finance their trips. So inclusion, on average, means some financial commitment. I don't want to keep going on about that. But it's very important.
If we can think about that too. We have Ana Neves, and we have Julian. Ana.
>> ANA NEVES: Thank you. Well, the sound is really terrible. Well, I just would like to make three or four comments after what has been said here.
One thing we felt that is really really important from EuroDIG and international IGFs, that we are giving a strength to this global IGF that is impossible to destroy.
So it is remarkable that all these processes, all these bottom/up process is done to this global IGF.
Second, it could be very interesting to match the themes that were discussed in the national IGFs, because the themes I think that, at the end of the day, we will see that maybe the themes are more or less the same, even if they were national oriented. But it could be interesting to match and to discuss why we chose those themes, etcetera.
Another important thing is to involve people from other countries. We have the involvement of Wolfgang, and it was really, really important. We had the involvement of someone from Skype, and that was very very valuable as well, because it gives to the nationals that something is going on outside.
So it's not only a national IGF. It is a national IGF with people from the other countries, and all these matching will reach all the process.
Regarding the Portuguese IGF, I just would like to say one thing. We were able to put together Government officials, the technical community, the private sector, the Telecom operators, the regulator, the responsibles for active protection, responsible for eCommerce association, youth, students. But it was not possible to involve yet national parliamentarians.
So, this political part is really really important, because at the end of the day, who is going to make legislation, laws? It will be the Government and the national parliament. Something that Ana Olmos from Spain said, she said it was interesting to have some association of the Spanish Government, but in fact, these liaison, these connection between all these stakeholders and the Government is essential. Otherwise, it will be impossible to change the paradigm, because we need to enact new laws, new legislation beyond, to have new minds, and new ways of doing things. Thank you.
>> LEE HIBBARD: Thank you very much. We have Lulea and the lady there.
>> Thank you. I would just, I'm from the Cybercrime organisation based in Strassburg. I would like to support what Michael said about multi-steps procedures and raise the question at the original level. We will volunteer to organise small regional IGF, and because it's also important and involve the local authorities, local civil society, and to bring the messages out to the national -- I don't know if it's exist in France, I don't think -- but so the European level, to the EuroDIG.
>> LEE HIBBARD: Thank you very much. Yes.
>> BRIDGET COSGRAVE: Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. My name is Bridget Cosgrave, director general of Digital Europe. We are an industry trade association in Brussels, with representation among our members from every member country of the European Union.
This is my first meeting of the EuroDIG group. And I find the debate and discussion most interesting. However, I am perplexed by one aspect. The European Union has launched fully with the support of all the member states, President Barroso administration as his first policy platform, the digital agenda for Europe.
You will find documentation on this at the brochure at the booth, as well as on the Web site of Commissioner Cruz, commissioner for Info Soc. And it strikes me that there are tremendous synergies between the activities of the EuroDIG and the public outreach and stakeholder activities of the European Commission.
Attendees here may be interested to note that on October 25 and 26, the European Commission DG Info Soc will hold its first stakeholder Forum to bring civil society into the digital agenda for Europe dialogue, and to look at how the initiatives can be implemented in the member states.
It also is perhaps interesting to note that under the Spanish presidency of Europe, there was a dialogue with industry that included 18 industry associations from the ICT sector who came together with a common policy platform that was input to the digital agenda; and indeed, this engagement continues. It will continue under the Hungarian presidency of Europe in the first half of 2011, and it will also continue under the Polish presidency in the second half of 2011.
So really an invitation and suggestion to be tabled that your energies be channelled and harmonized with some significant initiatives that are being funded by all of our tax dollars as European citizens.
>> LEE HIBBARD: Thank you very much. I would point out -- thank you for that. It is very important to know that. I would point out that the European Commission and the European parliament are involved in the EuroDIG process. They took part in the third edition in Madrid, and there is some synergy. Maybe we should be talking more about more synergy as you are suggesting, so thank you for that point.
Any more comments? Yes, the lady there, thank you.
>> Good afternoon. I'm from the European Commission, so I work for the safe Internet programme. I would like to say that from the perspective of safe Internet for children, we have been involved in the EuroDIG for a number of years. Certainly we want to continue to be part of this process. I think we will be looking at ways to be involved in the preparation of the agenda, and also to of course be part of the EuroDIG. So our commitment is obviously there. I think for the wider, I mean for the rest of the commission and for the digital agenda, I will report on this, on this point.
>> LEE HIBBARD: Thank you very much.
>> A short intervention. Of course, I'm all in favor, but we should not forget European Union is not Europe. There are many countries, there is a good number of countries not being members of the European Union from Switzerland, to Russia, and if Europe is taken over by the European Union, we are losing a couple of countries.
>> LEE HIBBARD: Thank you, Rolf, to say the least. Is there any more, any more points to be made, before we pass on to the second chapter? Sebastian.
>> Yes, thank you. I'm Sebastian, I am a member of Zurich and I am on Zurich committee in ICANN. I have not been able to come to Madrid for schedule and many reasons, but I try to follow some part of the work remotely, and I think it's a very important tool. It was working quite well. I want to stress that it is a tool and we need to make more publicity around that.
I didn't hear myself anymore. Okay.
I think we need to involve more and more people participation. But I think the fact that there are some meetings in different countries, it is very important. And you have people not participating, and it was my guess this year, but talking a lot with my peers about Internet Governance in Europe, and I am sure that when you put figures, don't forget all those people who are not present with you in the discussion, but who are aware and interested in the subject.
I think it's, it was really a very good success this year and these four years of course. Thank you very much.
>> LEE HIBBARD: Thank you very much, Sebastian. I want to ask one question to those involved in the network neutrality discussions. I do think that as a subject, it has matured over the last 12 months, maybe the last 24 months.
I'm looking at Vlada. But before he speaks, I know that this particular theme as an example was really well-developed in the EuroDIG. I think it moved the discussion further. I think it very much helped the discussion here in the IGF. I'd like, I know you are involved in the neutrality discussion in IGF. I'd like to ask you what you think. Thank you.
>> Well, certainly I think it was a very good step that we had the plenary session at the EuroDIG in Madrid on that. I find -- Michael was also there at the session. I found it was quite successful one, that it opened a lot of new questions, but also somehow crystallize the things where we can meet all together.
And yes, there are some new questions posed about net neutrality, and now we have moved more into the business models, and what is the impact of business models when it comes to network management and so on. So there is a lot of space. I tend to think that we should keep it as a plenary session again. Whether it can be a highlight session, we will see.
But one thing that I liked about that session and also most of the other sessions at the EuroDIG, and I think we should really give our best to keep it, is interactivity. That is something that May EuroDIG needs, to my opinion, even more efficient than IGF, because we have a lot of interactivity and a lot of really well-moderated discussions around. So that is something that I would like to see next year as well.
>> LEE HIBBARD: Thank you very much, Vlada. I'm going to Nadine from the European Youth Forum. I'm going to pass the floor to Annetta. But I would like to know about the youth involvement and what you took away from it. Annetta.
>> Hello, my name is Annette Milburg. I'm working for the trade union United Services Union. I'm the head of eGovernment there. We were taking part in the national German IGF as well as in the EuroDIG.
I'm very glad and happy to see that there are so many national initiatives now taking up this issues, and I would like to go back to the proposal of Mr. Hibbard. I think now it's the time that we think a little bit more about procedure and input, so that we have a procedure in place where all these regional, national initiatives in a multistakeholder approach, that they formulate some ideas that they want to give to the next EuroDIG next year.
So I think it is extremely helpful if we have from all these regions some ideas and proposals, what to discuss, what are the issues at stake, so that we can have real successful and productive EuroDIG. And in the end, the vision is that the EuroDIG gives proposals to the global IGF. I think this, to have this in place, I think this is really great.
I'm proud to be part of it. I want to give one information. On Friday, there will be a meeting on -- oops, where is it? Wolfgang? At Friday morning, early morning. 9:00 in room 4. In Germany, there is also a new instrument of multistakeholderism that the Government actually implemented, a commission on issue of Internet and digital society in a multistakeholder approach. So that there are representatives of the parliament, as well as business, as well as civil society, academia and so on.
I'm part of that, and I think it is really an interesting approach. And you can listen and view it in room number 4 on Friday morning. Thank you.
>> LEE HIBBARD: Thank you, Annetta. I'd like to wrap up this first part, because we only have a half hour left, more or less. I'd like to ask Nadine to give us a few thoughts. We will pass to Vlada and go into the second part of the discussion. Nadine and then Vlada.
>> NADINE KARBACH: Thank you, Lee. Hi, everyone. This is Nadine talking on behalf of the, representative of the European Youth Forum. We have the great pleasure to be involved in EuroDIG in 2009, and also this year, Madrid, which was a great experience.
Already in Madrid, we started dreaming about what young people could do in upcoming EuroDIGs. We started, like maybe we have a couple of youth workshops, just dealing with issues which are in particularly relevant for young people. And besides, we would like not to limit ourselves just to a delegation of ten, 20, 50 people, but to come with a bold delegation and make some rumble in the jungle.
We keep on dreaming. And we don't want to leave it always dreaming. So we are currently assembling ourselves; like for example, also globally in the Dynamic Coalition on the youth, on Internet Governance, which had a meeting just one hour ago. You will definitely hear from youth also during this IGF much more.
Yeah, we definitely from my point of view, and speaking also on behalf of many other young people I know in Europe, we would like to take actively part in shaping EuroDIG and taking a stand, and making an active contribution also on the preparation part. Thank you.
>> LEE HIBBARD: Thank you very much. Sandra, any remote coming through or not? Not at all? Okay. Vlada, please, briefly.
>> Two short reflections; first, one on what Annette mentioned, and before that, Michael. Very good, very good thoughts. I have one idea. If we can gather all the national IGFs that thus far we had, to prepare a short report in some easy form, then we can -- when I say "we" I mean Diplo -- we can offer to our students as an exercise, to do a kind of cross-analysis of these national reports, and try to fit topic by topic what is happening in which country, and possibly use it as a background for preparing the sessions and so on, so that can be an easy feed into the preparation process. That is just an idea we can discuss further.
But that is one thing.
The other thing, what Nadine mentioned is very important. I don't see Elva here now, but she mentioned, she had the great idea that we extend a little bit the participation of youth, also with asking them to come up with suggestion of activities they can do, involving maybe the European student organisations, or the regional ones, not only on the panels of course, number of panels, but maybe they can mingle around the corridors with some chats with experts and so on.
This is something to think about. But more than that, we would all probably say yes, we have to think about how to secure some funds that we can bring to the youth over there, because all of us can manage somehow but they cannot. We need to have it in mind. Thanks.
>> LEE HIBBARD: Are there any more comments on this first chapter? Yes, Oxana, briefly.
>> I would like to provide you some input from Ukrainian IGF just now. We have very difficult situation with our ccTLD management, and as far as I know, a lot of country has the same problem. So the proposed, proposal to work out recommendations on the level of our international NonGovernmental organisation, and to discuss them, for example, during next EuroDIG, and to start this discussion, this work on these recommendations, we can, just after this session. Thank you.
>> LEE HIBBARD: Okay, that is great. Thank you. Yes. Yes. We are connecting. I can see that. It is very important for us to discuss here and to keep on discussing.
I'd like to move into the second part. I'd like to move into the future. We have our Serbian colleagues here who are going to be hosting EuroDIG, fourth edition, and looking into the future, what we can do. We have already started discussing that, how to do the better job, what is the added value, connecting national IGFs more and more participation, creating more remote hubs, attending more national IGF meetings, assisting in the preparation for these meetings.
I think it means lot of teleconference calls. It means shaping themes. It means calling out the themes, reaching out to different groups that you are mentioning from now onwards, from the end of IGF until the EuroDIG fourth edition really. That takes quite a lot of work, quite a lot of Secretariat and planning and commitment.
That is the added value for me. I mention I think also that it's very important, we will have of course, I guess, series of plenary sessions, and parallel workshop sessions too, like before. But I wonder whether we can do more. Maybe we need more days. But at the moment, it's two days long. Creating a way for people to discuss outside of main sessions and workshops, connecting people in a dynamic fashion, I'm thinking aloud really.
But if you need to connect, like was mentioned for Ukraine and ccTLD, if you need to know certain people, you can go to the side and have a discussion and create something for yourself at the same time; so to create the space, but create introductions as well, so you can move your project forward. So that is something else, it is like a third track I think we can try to develop.
I want to open the floor to all of you, to ask you what, in terms of looking to the future now, what is, what do you see the added value, the increasing added value of EuroDIG?
Also, let's divide into two things: Process, which is what you say is very key, the process is key, and also the substance. I'd like to start with process, finish with that, and then go to themes. We have approximately 30 minutes left.
So, process. Are there any things you would like to see, what is the added value for you for the next fourth EuroDIG? Any comments? Slobodan.
>> SLOBODAN MARKOVIC: Maybe it would be, make sense for me to start, because let me introduce myself. I'm Slobodan Markovic from Serbian Ministry of Telecommunications and Information Society. We will be hosting the next -- it is turned on? I don't know. Okay. So, okay. I see that the translation is working. So it's okay.
We will be hosting the next IGF in Belgrade, at the end of May next year.
Of course, this event will be organised in cooperation with the Serbian IGF, DiploFoundation, and of course all the others which are sitting around this table.
I have to tell you that I'm particularly pleased because this event is going to be organised in Belgrade, because it is as far as I can remember the only event of its kind organised in this part of the world in the past, I don't know, at least eight years.
If I recall correctly, the last event of this kind was ICANN meeting which was organised in Bucharest in 2002. So that was the last time that our team of usual suspects came in the vicinity of this region.
I think this may be the biggest added value that we can add this time, this is this central and eastern European perspective to the Internet Governance issues, because they are always, I think, a bit shifted, you know, in the past, from the issues that are basically emerging now. They will emerge in central and eastern Europe a bit later.
So it is really a good opportunity to share lessons learned, and to share good practices of what works, what doesn't work, with local community, and especially to build more awareness around all these issues, especially with the politicians, because this is also a thing that I see as a common in all of the countries around the region. And it is generally lower level of political support for dealing with all these issues.
I think that many of you know the guys from Diplo, Vlada and Yovan and Nicola and myself included; our colleague Mya is on next, on one of the parallel sessions, so she is not able to be here with us. But we will be basically the core of the organising team. And we will do our best to basically motivate people from the region to come to Belgrade to participate and to get as much as possible out of this event.
>> LEE HIBBARD: Thank you very much, Slobodan.
It's very reassuring to hear that. Thank you all again for helping to get the agreement to host this next, fourth EuroDIG.
Vlada, you want to say something? I'd like to go to some theme discussion. But please.
>> I wanted to reemphasize what Slobodan mentioned, our interest in making this really a regional, having the regional emphasis. We have a lot of, lot of stakeholders from western Europe already in it. And our experience with Diplo in the past few years, when we had the trainings for also the stakeholders from east and southeastern Europe, with assistance of Swiss mostly, was that there are brilliant people over there who didn't have contact with IGF.
They have had expertise in many of the IGF issues, but they didn't know what is happening. There is a process. Now we have a lot of them here. We have a lot of them in Madrid. We have a solid base to really bring the stakeholders from southeastern and eastern Europe into this game.
It is a benefit for eastern and southeastern Europe because this is clear invitation for cooperation when it comes at least to Internet, and crossborder cooperation, if you want it. It is a clear benefit for the European Union as well, both because of this integration of Balkans to some extent through the Internet and also because of business because of the new markets over there.
This is a chance to bring it maybe, that is maybe an idea for thoughts, to bring it as Slobodan mentioned on high level, politically higher level where we can involve parliamentarians and ministries more into the decision-makers, at least in this part of the Europe, but I guess also from the European Union, so that we bring it to the higher level, and get them involved as well.
We do our best through our contacts in the region. I wanted to emphasize that this could be a great value added to the whole process.
>> LEE HIBBARD: Thank you.
Michael?
>> In order to be able to raise some funds for next year EuroDIG, it would be worth to have not only high ranking politicians from the host country showing up -- there was a lack in Spain on this -- but also from the European area, parliamentarians or maybe even from the European Commission -- well, yeah, let's see -- but also from Council of Europe parliamentarians. The more from these high ranking politicians you have, the easier it is to raise some funds from globally acting or Europeanwide acting companies to attend to show up. This is just something I want to give.
>> LEE HIBBARD: Thank you, Michael. I want to point out we have somebody from the European Commission, and also somebody from the European parliament. You are there. You moved. Before we go to you, I would like you to take note of the need, that need, and to try to take it back with you and try to make a point of it in your notes, your meeting report, try to bring that in.
It is a two-way process. It is important to reach out, but important for you to feed back into the process. You know who we are; the EuroDIG people are in and around. Some of you are here. So I would like that you take that back to the commission, to the European parliament, and see how we can bolster the high level politicians, etcetera.
Slobodan, you want to make a point.
>> SLOBODAN MARKOVIC: Yeah. I wanted to make response directly to this. We have a tentatively confirmed appearance from, of course, the Serbian Minister for Information Society and President of Serbia at the event.
However, our minister will meet with Miss Cruz towards the end of this month, and she will mention this and extend an invitation for her possible appearance in Belgrade at the opening of EuroDIG next year.
>> LEE HIBBARD: Thank you very much. We don't have that much time. We have about 15 or so minutes left before the next meeting starts. I'd like to go to the last point, which is about the themes.
I think what is going to happen after the IGF is that you will go back home, we are all going to think about IGF, think about what we took away, etcetera. We are going to reflect, also for EuroDIG I hope, and I think we should make an open call, an early open call after this meeting for EuroDIG themes, for EuroDIG ideas, process all substantive themes.
But I'd like to spend the next ten, 15 minutes asking you openly, what do you think should be on the agenda of EuroDIG 4? Michael again.
>> Well, I think in order to have the process as I mentioned at the beginning installed, it would be from very high value if we can get input from the various IGFs, what is on their agenda at the highest point, let's say by mail, after this IGF meeting, shortly after that, in order to see what are the problems, or what are the discussion, the topics in the various countries.
I think this would be much more worth than just looking for themes.
>> LEE HIBBARD: Yes, thank you, Michael. But this is just a little taste, a teaser for where you are thinking. This is just to give some color to the discussion to see where you think discussions are going for the future. But of course, we will do what you are saying. That is for sure.
I want to reassure you. I think it is going to be a very dynamic EuroDIG 4. I really do. Elda.
>> Thank you. I would also like to mention another dimension here. We are not only talking about themes. I think also it's very important and I would mention this because in Geneva, we had a lot of youth coming, for several reasons.
I think it was quite evident that these voices were lacking in the last EuroDIG, for several reasons. But these are voices that we, I think we need to hear again, and that was very positive. Thanks.
>> LEE HIBBARD: Nadine, please take note; take it back to the youth, bring the youth Forum, and make sure that you mobilize the youth Forum and any other associations, youth associations which are not associated.
Wolfgang.
>> WOLFGANG KLEINWACHTER: I fully support that we should start early to identify the themes. But I would recommend to follow what Michael Roader has said. This would be developed, but not -- while drafting in a committee like this one is complicated. I propose we create a mailing list and something like doodle so that we can identify what the majority wants to have, both as coming from the national IGFs but also from this community. And I would propose also that we have a small team, preparatory team which tries to channel this, and to be the, let's say the canal between the local organisers and the broader community.
All this could be done via the Web site. It means we should make use of the tools we have available and we have created. So far I would not start now to mention issues, because I myself have a long list of ten, 15 issues. But it makes no sense now, because everybody has their own agenda.
Let's do this via the mailing list, and let's have a timetable that we know until when we have to reach what. And I would say you know, that we should start here and now after the IGF, with the direct preparation of the EuroDIG Forum.
This would include all the consideration. In Madrid we had in January as more preparatory meeting, and it would probably make sense to have in Belgrade in January, February, or at least March, to have small preparatory meeting where we can oversee the venue, and discuss this more, more technical issues; I think it would make sense. I do not propose a committee but I propose we have a very flat mechanism, but we have to structure it. Otherwise, we ended up nowhere.
>> LEE HIBBARD: Very good advice. I'm sure that is what will happen. Thank you, Wolfgang. Very constructive. Let me ask you -- sorry -- let me ask you, are you trying to say that we should start with the national feed input from the national IGFs in building EuroDIG 4? Should we start with them, and then reach out for a wider consultation? Is that what you are saying, Wolfgang? Should we start, should we build the foundations of EuroDIG 4 in terms of themes and issues based upon the national IGFs first of all? And on top of that, we then reach out to a wider audience? Is that, yes? Does that make sense? Rather than the other way around? Yes? Okay. That is noted.
Vlada, you have something to say?
>> I want to add, one of the things that I think having the perspective of southeastern Europe, eastern Europe, would be good to do, is setting the scene as it was at the IGF, what is IG about and IGF and EuroDIG and so on about. We should start with that.
If we hope to target 100 or more people from east and southeastern Europe, it is likely that not many of them will know it. It is likely that, to be honest, that not many of the parliamentarians and others would know either. But I don't know if they would be there. But anyhow we should have it in mind, some kind of setting the scenes session.
>> LEE HIBBARD: Thank you. Sandra, you want to say something?
>> Yes. I want to step in, in the discussion about national IGFs. We have various people from national IGF sitting here. We already made this offer last year to give every national IGF a sub-page on the EuroDIG Web site. We asked them for input to fill up those sub-page, to link them to their special contact person, and to their own Web site and all that.
At the end, it was not working very well. We definitely have to improve that. And this is actually a question I'd like to ask here. I'd like to encourage you, of those people who are driving the national IGF initiatives, to send the input to the EuroDIG office, that we can also offer those information at our Web site, and that we can really have a close dialogue with those national IGFs as well.
This is to encourage you to do so. Thank you.
>> LEE HIBBARD: Thank you very much. The gentleman, the lady first, and then the gentleman, please.
>> Thank you. My name is Adele. I come from Romania where there is basically no national IGFs. There is maybe some initiative from some people. But just to go further on what was mentioned by Vlada and Sandra, if we limit ourselves just to the more or less organised forms of national IGFs, then we lose sight of the other nations, European nations, where such initiatives are not actually put together.
So I think that at least for the European IGF EuroDIG, we should take into consideration all European states, whatever their IG awareness level it is. So regarding your question about input, I should go as was said on a very flat input.
>> LEE HIBBARD: Thank you very much. I would point out that EuroDIG is openly inclusive. You are included. If you want to be included, you can be included. It is not excluding anybody. Let's be very clear. It is very flat. It is really flat.
I think that is the point, is that I think maybe for the future, with all these national IGF meetings, there should be exchanges between those who have IGFs and those who don't, so you can also advance from each other. That is another thing which we need to strengthen. The gentleman there, please.
>> DIETER CARSTENSEN: Thank you. I'm Dieter Carstensen from Save the Children Denmark, but also board member of the European NGO for child online safety. We through the safe Internet programme have represented a lot of the efforts that have been done over the last couple years within the European Union on child online safety, as well at the EuroDIG as well as international IGFs.
In regards to usage of the bottom/up approach of the national IGF feeding into EuroDIG in terms of themes, you might face a problem. I can talk about the Danish IGF which is shaped around the themes that came for this IGF this year, but we don't know how we are going to shape national IGF in 2011 because we would look more towards the international IGF rather than possibly the EuroDIG.
There is a questions of timing. I think we are going to lose out on some countries.
I'm happy with what Romania said. Basically we don't have a national IGF. So the process of feeding into what can be done can't be solely based on bottom/up approach from what comes out of national IGFs. In terms of reporting back from national IGFs, if you want to be able to compare documentation, we all know this, and has to be some coordination or cohesion between what type of arguments we all talking about. We might have differences from countries. Within the same country, we have differences. But I can also see maybe a problem wanting to come forward with a closing document of national IGF.
I can tell you from the Danish perspective, there was absolutely no interest in ending up having a final document, a closing document, which some way or the other would appear to be a committing statement on behalf of the participants.
I think that was a danger that we were facing. If you go forward, I know what you have there in your hand -- I haven't seen it -- and we need to take care of not closing the doors on free initiatives that are actually just exploring themselves and finding ground for discussion and debate that has not happened before.
>> LEE HIBBARD: Thank you very much. I must say that this is, these messages, these are not binding. This is just the main lines of what was discussed. And where there was consensus, you may see that in the documents. You might find yourself in that document. But it is really a report of what happened. It is very interesting to read, I think. You don't need full consensus. You don't even need rough consensus really. It is there to reflect what was discussed.
If there are big, if there is a big polemic, you can write this was, there were two sides to this story, it was this and this, and whatever. But it is important to have a record. I do believe that. That helps to focus.
I do take the point. I think that maybe it should be, we should have an every two-monthly teleconference with all the national IGFs, just to touch base, and to see where, to discuss about what themes are, where you are going, and to keep focused. That way, in between meetings, we can talk together.
Again, it is a way to help and assist. Even if you don't have a national IGF, if you want to take part, you can do that. There are people in the EuroDIG process, people outside of Europe coming into the discussions. That also was a nice flavor to a European discussion. They were not, they were giving their experiences. So it was about experiences, not just about Europeans talking to Europeans. Everything is possible. It is open. It is flat. It is inclusive. Yes?
>> Thank you. My name is Andre from the European Commission. I'm actually taking over on EuroDIG from Elisabeth Markot, who many of you might know. I would need a word of clarification, in order to better report to my superiors about what EuroDIG is planning to do, because it was mentioned before by the DiploFoundation and also Belgrade representative that one of the ideas of hosting EuroDIG in Belgrade is to have a kind of regional focus on eastern and southeastern Europe. But on the other hand, I understand here that the construction, the process for constructing themes would be based on national IGFs, or not, would be over, would be inclusive.
So, I'm kind of confused on what would be the overall approach. Is it focused on eastern, southeastern Europe? Is it focused on the Council of Europe conception of Europe? Is it focused on the whole world? Thank you.
>> LEE HIBBARD: World domination, Andre. No, I think it's hybrid. It's like the IGF in a region in the world, it brings attention to that region. It should naturally, because it's close, it's proximate to neighboring countries. It brings in a regional flavor. I hope very much that the Balkans will be greatly represented, like in Spain there were many Spanish people at the EuroDIG. But I think the themes are both regional and pan-European. It shouldn't be exclusively for that region because we are in that region. That is not the game.
Vlada.
>> To confirm to some extent it was not the focus in southeastern Europe, but rather the chance to bring them in as well. But when it comes to topics, of course, no, no, it is the European focus, that is the point, yeah.
>> LEE HIBBARD: Thank you. Michael.
>> When I came up with the idea some minutes ago by feeding up the process with the input from the national IGFs, then of course, this was just a suggestion for getting at least a basis. All the others who don't have an IGF, or the Balkans countries, of course they will deliver much more input. And therefore, they can put the emphasis on being a little bit eastern Europe centric, or whatever.
It is up to them. I didn't say it that way as you said. It is open. Everyone can deliver. I just assume it.
>> LEE HIBBARD: Never assume, Michael, but thank you. We have reached the end of time. I want to wrap up I think. Thank you very much. But before you go, have you any final comments? Have you anything which we missed, you want to pick up before we leave? Vlada again.
>> May is amazing time in Belgrade, and there is a lot of fun. There is a lot of good beer, good music. And we will try to make it full of social gatherings -- is that the right term? Social gatherings during these days at EuroDIG. So you are definitely even privately most welcome to join us in Belgrade next year.
>> LEE HIBBARD: Thank you very much. I'm going to close the meeting. Before I do, if anybody wants some more information, if you want to connect, stay around. I would invite our Serbian colleagues and Ana, Sandra, anybody else for that matter, who wants to stay behind for a few minutes and connect and talk about these things further, then we are here. Thank you.
>> Olivier from ISOC England. I want to add one more thing which I think EuroDIG is particularly helpful in, and that is the collaboration between country IGFs. Many countries are trying to stage their first IGF or maybe their second IGF. It is very early, process that goes on very early. Sometimes they are facing the same problems in their countries. There are political problems. There are all sorts of problems which we cannot sometimes think of ourselves in western Europe.
(Microphone feedback)
I said something wrong, but fair enough
So, effectively, if they can actually help each other out, those countries that have managed to stage their first IGF that have gone through their first hurdle, could actually help other countries in Europe organise their first IGF next year. Thank you.
>> Thank you very much. The meeting is closed. Financial commitments, if you want to contribute or if you know somebody who wants to contribute, please tell us and stay behind. Thank you very much. Bye-bye.
>> There is going to be a ten-minute break to get a bit of fresh air and clear our ears a little bit. Then there will be a European At-Large organisation part of ICANN meeting. It is a General Assembly, and any civil society or individuals actually interested in the ICANN processes, and wishing to be able to have an input into the ICANN processes, should attend. I think it's an opportunity for you to see a little bit how things work on the individual input to the ICANN processes. Thank you.
(End of session)
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