FINISHED TRANSCRIPT
NINTH ANNUAL MEETING OF THE
INTERNET GOVERNANCE FORUM 2014
ISTANBUL, TURKEY
"CONNECTING CONTINENT FOR ENHANCED
MULTISTAKEHOLDER INTERNET GOVERNANCE"
02 SEPTEMBER 2014
MAIN HALL
ORIENTATION
***
This is the the output of the realtime captioning taken during the IGF 2014 Istanbul, Turkey, meetings. Although it is largely accurate, in some cases it may be incomplete or inaccurate due to inaudible passages or transcription errors. It is posed as an aid to understanding the proceedings at the session, but should not be treated as an authoritative record.
***
>> VLADIMIR RADUNOVIC: Good morning ladies and gentlemen. We’ll take two more minutes before we start but we’d encourage those of you, especially those of you that are for the first time at the IGF, to join us at the table because it is more intimate and closer discussions so please take the empty seats if you wish to sit with us. We just need two seats over there. Everything else is free to be filled. Thank you.
>> VERONICA CRETU: Good morning everyone. Good morning everyone. Thank you. It’s fantastic to have you here this morning for the orientation session. We are very delighted to see so many wonderful people in the room and thank you very much for joining us.
My name is Veronica Cretu. I come from Moldova. I am a Mag member and I have been involved with the Internet Governance Forum ever since it was created.
Today we are going to have I hope something that is going to be very interactive and a dynamic session co-moderated together by myself and Vladimir Radunovic who will very shortly introduce himself.
A couple of aspects that are very important related to this session. We have a hashtag for – for the Twitter. Those who are keen to tweet and use the social media, please do so. Orientation or newcomer, these are the two hashtags for the session.
Those on Facebook, please also share through your Facebook accounts, your impressions, questions, and views from the session.
Also a very important point in the IGF, we really care about multi-lingualism, diversity, and creating the opportunity for people to express themselves in at least the official UN languages so if during the session you would like to make an intervention in your language, you would be able to do so. We have translation provided.
Otherwise, today throughout the one hour and a half, we are going to discuss and share with you a wide spectrum of issues related to internet governance so that you have a broader, holistic picture of what IGF is all about.
In this journey of the session, we are going to be accompanied – joined by really distinguished colleagues, panelists who have been around in the IG debate for many years now.
Before we move ahead, I would like to ask Vladimir to quickly introduce himself. He’s one of the co-moderators so you should know he is. Vladimir, please?
>> VLADIMIR RADUNOVIC: Thank you, Veronica. Welcome everyone. It’s really a pleasure to see that many people. I saw that earlier though but still it’s a good beginning of the IGF.
My name is Vladimir Radunovic. I’m from the Diplo Foundation. I live in Serbia. I have been involved in the internet governance for quite some years and IGF and I am also a member of the MAG and that is one other acronym that we’re going to go through throughout today’s discussion. Veronica, off to you.
>> VERONICA CRETU: Thank you, Vladimir. Before we move ahead, I would really, really want to know how many of the people who are in the room are for the first time at the IGF. Please raise up your hands. Wow.
(Applause)
Thank you very much and those of you who are here for the first time and by the way, there are microphones both around the table and we have walking microphones.
Those of you who are here in the room for the first time, we would really want to know what is something that motivated you to join the IGF, to attend the IGF, to come to the IGF? Any volunteers to share thoughts, you know, thirty seconds, one minute maximum. What is something that made you interested in the IGF this year?
>> Here comes the microphone.
>> SARAH LUDFORD: My name is Sarah Ludford. Until May, I was for fifteen years a member of the European Parliament. I am now in the UK Parliament and I was kindly invited to attend this by nomination from the UK and I seized the chance because as a legislator, I was pretty involved on data protection legislation, the updating of in European parliament, and became more and more, you know, obviously implications for internet use.
And really I am trying to fill my ignorance but I haven’t actually met another parliamentarian yet here and it seems to me there is a serious need for a cohort of parliamentarians to be involved in IGF.
>> VLADIMIR RADUNOVIC: Anymore parliamentarians in the room? You’re alone it seems like. Well we’ll work on that I hope.
>> VERONICA CRETU: One more comment, one more reflection on the motivation that did drive you to the IGF this year. Any volunteers? Yes. Please.
>> Good morning. My name is [00:58:27]. I am coming from Lebanon, Beirut. I’m from Arab NCC. I used to be a member of the NCC community working for the internet governance and multi-stakeholderism. I was so excited so I joined recently, RIPE NCC, and then I am working in the Near East Region. In this region, we need to do a lot for this internet governance process. So I am here to share with you the ideas and take the experiences. Thank you.
>> VERONICA CRETU: Thank you very much and I think we are going to pick one more comment, one more reflection. Yes, this gentleman.
>> YASSER AL BORHAMY: Please. Okay. Good morning everybody. I’m Yasser Al Borhamy from Egypt. Of course you know everything in our region, we suffer so much. We have a lot of problems with the internet and everything – we suffer. The internet, especially the IGF systems and the multi-stakeholders, we need to know more about the – the internet governance and all of these types of things. That’s why I came here.
I want to learn. I want to know more. I want to share also and – and have the views of the – all of the participants about the internet governance and how we can improve especially in our region which needs more and more for the future. Thanks indeed. Yeah.
>> VERONICA CRETU: Thank you. Thank you very much and I see two gentlemen right here, right in front of us. Please very, very quick and kindly introduce yourselves as well.
>> Good morning ladies and gentlemen. This is [01:00:11] from Bangladesh. Actually we are encouraged to join this program because our honorable Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina declared that Bangladesh has a vision for 2021 [01:00:25] Bangladesh.
And actually at this moment, we have 160 million people and out of 160 million people, 110 million people are using mobile phones and five million people are using the internet with internet connectivity and 500,000 people are using Facebook.
By 2021, we want to connect all of the people of Bangladesh by Wi-Fi internet connectivity for encouraging everybody to establish a [01:01:04] also. So we want to connect 160 million people by 2021 as a digital people and that is why we were encouraged to come here as how can we improve ourselves and to build up our nation in the future as a digital nation. Thank you very much.
>> VERONICA CRETU: Thank you very much. It’s good to have ambitious dreams as developing countries and thank you very much for joining us in the session of the IGF and I hope that you are going to find answers to those interesting questions for you so that you take them back home to Bangladesh. Thank you very much.
Yes?
>> Yes, thank you very much. I am also from Bangladesh. My name is [01:01:54]. I am working with the government. I am here to convey my thanks and good wishes to all of the people of Turkey and also the participants from my part and also from all of the friendly people of Bangladesh.
I am here to share my experiences, how internet or easy internet, people, especially the civil servants, are providing better services to all of the stakeholders, so especially the best practices here and all over the world. I am very much keen to know how can I provide the best form of services to my people by using the internet, especially the e-governance. Thank you very much.
>> VERONICA CRETU: Thank you very much. You mentioned best practices and we are going to touch upon this aspect and thank you very much for mentioning it.
I will pick one more – one more reflection here, the lady at the table.
>> DIANA PROTSENKO: Hello everybody. My name is Diana, Diana Protsenko. I am from Kiev, Ukraine and here I am because we need to find very important answers. I hope that a lot of people here now know what is happening in the Ukraine and we are thinking about wide implementation of e-democracy in Ukraine but it is now not currently [01:03:15] by the state so this is an initiative from the bottom, from the society, and for us it is important to find out how we can use this idea of multi-stakeholderism in making this public dialog of how we can do this e-democracy with the help of the state but not under the coordination of the state. So I really hope that I could find those answers here. Thank you.
>> VERONICA CRETU: Thank you very much. Indeed, I think the whole world is watching and knows exactly what is happening in Ukraine and indeed, it is important to be part of this debate so you could bring the different perspectives and different views back home.
Thank you all for these reflections. I see a very desperate gentleman there in the back. He keeps – raising of the hand. This is really the last comment for this part of the session and then we move ahead with – yes?
>> CHRISTOPHER BANDA: Yeah. My name is Christopher Banda from Malawi. Basically Malawi, we just launched the IGF in July this year. My coming here was just to experience and learn more and especially how best we can apply it at home in Malawi. Thank you.
>> VERONICA CRETU: Thank you. Thank you all very much. These are very valuable reflections for us. It’s important to know what is something that drives the interest towards IGF, what is that something that interests and motivates you to come and participate. [01:04:46].
Emerging or issues that we address at the IGF, why the IGF is important. I think these are some of the starting points for us to start exploring and building on.
>> VLADIMIR RADUNOVIC: Well I think that’s – that’s the point of this session so the reason why we try to put up the whole session and it’s I think the second year in similar format and we are still improving is exactly that, to try to bring everyone who is a newcomer to the IGF to the idea. What is IGF? What problem does it solve? Does it solve any problems? What is the point of it?
And as all of you were very eager to talk and that is the point of the IGF. In the next five days, please don’t be shy to jump in any session that you will be at because that is the point, to discuss and share the opinions.
Now that is one point to discuss today, this morning, why we need the IGF. So we will run quickly through the mandate of the IGF and what we can expect politically from the IGF.
The second thing is I remember when I came to the first IGF and it was really the first IGF in 2006, it was a space not as big as this one but it was also scattered around. I had quite some trouble to run around and find where to go and this is the least of sessions that you can see over there.
I’m sure you have gone through that and I’m sure many of you were confused. Like there are I think over one hundred workshops and there are a number of plenary sessions and flash sessions and roundtables and many other things. So which session should you follow? How do you interact? How do you jump in? Can you ask for the floor? How does it work? That is one of the ideas.
The third part of the session, we’ll try to go through how to stay involved because we do hope that you are going to show up next year as well whether [01:06:37] in Brazil or remotely. That is also a very valuable option.
So that is what the idea of the session is. We’ll try to link. There is a number of people with us today who are the members of the Advisory Committee, experienced, other friends experienced with the IGF, who have tried to bring their experiences closer to you and of course allow you to put up the questions that you might have about dilemmas.
Now the first thing maybe to start with is how did we end up here? Istanbul is a nice city and the UN has a great habit of moving the IGF around the world so in that sense of a cultural enrichment, that is a nice thing, but how did we come up to the IGF and why IGF is here.
And [01:07:26] is there with us today. He was from the beginning of the WSS which is – and you’ll notice all of these acronyms and abbreviations which we use. WSS, the World Summit on Information Society. He was the member of the WGIG, the Working Group for Internet Governance which basically tried to define what internet governance was back then and why we should have IGF.
So [01:07:52], why are we here? How did we come from Tunis, from the World Summit, to Istanbul this year? Why do we need the IGF?
>> Well I – good morning everybody. I can tell you rather a few reasons why I am here and definitely to rediscover this lovely city and probably it is the right place to host the IGF because this is a city of bridges. This is a metaphor of Istanbul, not only a geographic one between Asia and Europe but between like different cultures, between different societal issues.
When you see the history of the city, you can see that people have been trying to – to bridge different divides. This is the underlying message that we, that this place with its spirit carries.
I think it’s the right place for hosting internet governance discussions at this point because we have quite a few divides that we have to bridge.
Now what is the ancient history of the Internet Governance Forum? If we go, we may start in the 60s when the engineers created the internet and what was very interesting – and I am sure there are quite a few engineers and there is debate on it – but the internet was created to connect computers, not people initially.
Then people discovered that they could communicate and this probably, like, for Istanbul, the metaphor is a bridge. For internet it is discovery. People have discovered new possibilities to send email, to chat, later on with the web until today with the Skype, e-learning, and other things.
When they started moving, they needed to create some sort of governance of – not governance at that time, management of the internet. They have to create an address book which is today’s domain name system.
It was a small community mainly at the US universities. They managed it easily in the 60s, 70s, and later on with the growth of the internet there was increasing need to have more robust governance.
And the 90s US government, the guardian of this early development of the internet, decided to privatize or to change the nature of that early community and to ultimately create an icon.
This is when the issue of internet governance in the 90s started moving more from technical, small communities towards more political discussion.
Then governments realized that there is something important going on and in the early – at the beginning of the century, exactly in the 1998 in Minneapolis ITO (ph) meeting, they said okay. We need a summit on ICT.
If you can recall, at that time there were big summits starting with the Rio Summit in 1992 on the climate change, on the housing, on human rights, on the gender issues. There was a whole series of the big UN summits which was the idea that you raise the issue by bringing people together and you make some sort of policy [01:11:03] shock and then people start discussing the issue.
When this came in 2003, the preparatory process started in 2002, the first World Summit on Information Society was held in 2003 in Geneva. Internet governance did not exist at that time prominently in the discussion and it was a bit strange, you know.
You come to the meeting discussing ICT but you don’t have any mentioning on the – even at one meeting, even mentioning the word internet. In a preparatory meeting in Bucharest, we analyzed the text of the final declaration. There was no single reference to the internet and everybody was discussing the internet obviously.
Therefore in 2005, at the second leg of the WSIS, WSIS was hosted in Geneva 2003 and 2005. Governments, civil society, technical communities and businesses discussed the conclusions on the Working Group on Internet Governance and they decided to establish the Internet Governance Forum.
Politically speaking, the Internet Governance Forum came as a compromise and we always call it Tunis compromise. On one side you had the non-governmental actors working to keep the non-governmental governance of the internet. On the other side, you had governments who wanted to have more say and more role of the UN.
Therefore compromise was made that the Internet Governance Forum was established under the UN umbrella. Therefore UN Secretary-General is conveyed into the Internet Governance Forum while it, in its nature, it is multi-stakeholder as you will discover over the next four days. This was some sort of Tunis compromise which launched the Internet Governance Forum.
Today in Istanbul, we have the ninth edition of the Internet Governance Forum and I can tell you, it has been a great experience. It has been a great learning experience. It has been a great discovery experience and sometimes you have on multi-stakeholder issues, you have ideological discussions. But what I always say is that this approach is enormously powerful because it brings learning, it’s practical, it connects issues, people, gives people an idea of how to address the issues.
Yes, it is not a negotiations forum. It doesn’t have the – so far the final communications of the decisions that are discussed currently but that bazaar element I will introduce the second method for later related to Istanbul. That bazaar element is extremely powerful.
You have people meeting, discussing, exchanging, getting out of their silos, you know. When you go to ITF or you go to the UN meetings in Geneva, people are always in their silos. They spend the time discussing the specific issue here. You have this bazaar element.
Now after ten years and I’ll just give you one time context. When the IGF was established, Facebook and Twitter didn’t exist. We have completely, completely different ICT in the internet world.
And the IGF is in the soul searching, trying to find – to address these new needs in the policy space and continue this discovery while addressing some important public policy issues which are coming more and more into the focus of the global world. I hope I have managed to make sort of to the horizon.
Three metaphors for Istanbul, bridge and bazaar and for IGF, discovery. Thank you very much.
>> VLADIMIR RADUNOVIC: Now that means that the IGF is not a decision-making body. It means that it’s just about discussion. Does it make sense – I mean, does it make sense in a diplomatic circumstance, for the governments, for – why do we need a body which is not decision-making? What is the merit? How would you put it?
>> We can call it a decision-shaping body because quite a few decisions which are discussed at the IGF later on got their life in the various decision-making bodies. The professional organizations, ITF, and other bodies or they are inter-governmental.
This is a real question in that I am based in Geneva. We try to bridge another divide between internet and diplomacy which is getting smaller and smaller but then diplomats when we discuss IGF, they ask a common sense question. We have to convince our governments to send us to the IGF and one of the most difficult parts of convincing the headquarters of governments is they cannot explain what would be the outcome of the meeting.
This is one of the realistic challenges for the IGF and we shouldn’t underestimate concerns of different stakeholders. Sometimes these concerns are easily dismissed but this is a real concern for officials that they have to go back to their country and to write some report or to present something.
Therefore the question of the outcome, probably that decision-making process of some sort of normative decision-making process is the issue that should be discussed in this soul searching phase for the internal governance forum.
>> VLADIMIR RADUNOVIC: It’s a very good thing that you mentioned is the soul searching. In the sense of the IGF has been changing throughout the years and it has a mandate from the World Summit on Information Society from the Tunis agenda and it has setup the multi-stakeholder advisory group, the MAG, so-called MAG. You’ll hear it around.
I think around this table, there are quite a number of people which are members of the MAG. But for the past couple of years, there have been changes introduced through the MAG and MAG is really a multi-stakeholder composed body. It has an equal number of representatives of government, civil society, corporate sector, technical community, and so on.
One of the things that have been changing in the recent years because the internet governance is coming on top of the – well, political and diplomatic agenda as well is trying to come up closer to tangible outcomes or tangible outputs of the IGF as we used to put it.
We’ll talk later on a little bit about the best practices as one of these. So there are certain things that governments, private sector, civil society can take away, especially governments who really need to have some takeaway, but we’re trying still to shape it. What is the takeaway of the government?
Now [01:17:53] was from the beginning also in the IGF process. How would you put the merits of the IGF and even the mandate?
>> Thank you, Vladimir. I wanted to make a point about the takeaways. I think that it’s very interesting, in fact very illustrative, the dialog between you. But I think this is the place – IGF is the place where we set the international agenda on internet governance.
So despite the fact that we don’t take decisions here, I think that the things that are discussed here influence many things, influence the things that are happening in other environments, other forums, other intergovernmental organizations.
The donors, organization that give money for funding projects in many cases come here and when they leave the IGF, they have an idea about what are the priorities for the year. So I think that the discussions in IGF are important and influence a lot of things.
But – so this is one of the important takeaways in my view but the other thing is that some people expect the IGF to be more – more influenced in the policy making and I think that the work that is being done this year with regard to the best practices is very good and it’s a good step forward in the – in having more complete outcomes.
But don’t forget that maybe 90% to 95% of policy making happens at the national level. So the IGF by itself will never have full impact in the policy making around the world. What is important is that I think this is the feeling of many people here and you will hear this impression a lot in this week is that we need to work more in developing a national experience like IGF.
So this will be really the biggest step forward if – when we come to the IGF, we have very good discussions, and we feel that we have very good things in our hands when we go out from IGF so what we need is IGF-like models at the national level where we can go and bring the – the – all of the – the things that we capture in IGF for discussion and how to adapt, how to influence the policy making at the global and local levels. Thank you.
>> VLADIMIR RADUNOVIC: Thank you. Two excellent points. One is on the global level; IGF is the agenda setting mechanism, right, on the – about the internet. The other one is the other layers, not just the global layer. We have the levels at national and regional levels and we are going to talk about what are the opportunities and what exists when we talk about how we can continue being involved in the IGF afterwards.
Now I’m just curious. We have a couple of people here from different stakeholders and this model of multi-stakeholderism and that is probably maybe the third component that IGF contributes a lot is changing the understanding of how the internet policy should be dealt with, bringing the multi-stakeholder dialog, and what are the roles of different stakeholders in this dialog.
We always recall what the UN Secretary-General at the time said that finding the mechanisms – I’m paraphrasing – finding the mechanisms for governing the internet, we should be equally creative as those that created the internet. So that is where the multi-stakeholderism came as a kind of the upgrade of the current system where internet can feel best.
Now [01:22:13] is with us. She is from Nepal and how do you see this interplay of stakeholders? Why is multi-stakeholderism – why is the role of stakeholders, not just governments, very important in this process?
>> Thank you very much, Vladimir. I think that when we look at the IGF and we look at internet public policy, the issue of multi-stakeholderism becomes important because as we all know, the internet affects our everyday life. It is something that has permeated and continues to permeate everything that we do and so it is very important that we’re able to create a space and a platform where we can actually listen to each other, where we can actually exchange views and give everybody that opportunity to actually express the concerns that they have, express the views that they have around certain issues, and through that dialoging, begin to maybe also arrive at points of agreement and points of disagreement as well.
I think that in as much as we talk about the IGF being a place where we dialog and we don’t make decisions, I think there is value in being able to have a space like that, a space where you can actually come and express your views, hear the views of others, and not feel bound to – to any decision that is taken.
Rather you are able to take those discussions back with you and use them in whatever way you feel that they are beneficial to you to actually shape the processes within your own context.
So I think it is for me, a valuable space to have because it allows you to have that opportunity where you are there on an equal footing regardless of whether you’re government, private sector, civil society, technical. You have that opportunity to hear and to be heard.
>> VLADIMIR RADUNOVIC: Thank you. Okay, we know that on the national level, it is still mostly the governments that are bringing the decisions right? On an international level, we have a number of institutions which are dealing with different issues, UNESCO, [01:24:27] and so on. But civil society, corporate sector, technical community is also very relevant in the discussion.
Subi, you’re coming from civil society. Do you have the impression that someone hears you here at the IGF?
>> SUBI CHATURVEDI: Thank you, Vladimir. Good morning everyone. My name is Subi Chaturvedi and I am a member of the MAG. I represent two stakeholder communities, media and civil society.
From a country like India, emerging economy, developing countries, underrepresented community groups, and stakeholders, I think the IGF has created value and great merit.
2012, the IGF at Baku was my first IGF. I have – I am yet to see a space which is more bottom-up, transparent, and inclusive and gives you the opportunity to communicate, learn, engage, inform, grow, collaborate, and grow with each other.
In terms of policy making, when you come to this space and Vladimir and my colleagues on the MAG and everyone here is absolutely right. A lot of issues related to access, local content, creation, dissemination, internet as an enabler of human rights, decision-making happens at the national level.
But this is the space where it is also a safe space. I am yet to see a space where you will have governments queuing up behind civil society. You will have private sector, technical community engaging with each other in free conversations.
So a lot of people have said that the IGF needs to step back, reflect, introspect, and next year in Brazil and I hope to see all of you there, is going to be the tenth edition of the IGF. We are very close to the renewal of the mandate and this is also the time when the community is asking more of the IGF and rightly so because this has been a space where you’ve been able to initiate ideas and conversations how to make sure that the internet retains its core values which is interoperability, enabler of human rights, connecting universal conversations.
So does anyone listen to us? I think yes. When governments come in here and – I agree with the lady here from the UK. Thank you for making the time and joining us. We need to see more of them here but it’s not that decision-making doesn’t happen so there is no value in being here at the IGF. I think it’s very important.
This kind of engagement and conversation tends to multiply, has a ripple effect, and when you go back and you take a decision which is not in consonance with what the world is asking of you, it’s difficult without doing it through public consultation.
The process here at the IGF is equally important if not more than outcomes so I believe we’re being heard. I believe that our inputs are being taken into consideration. There is a lot more that we can do and a huge welcome to all of the newcomers who are here for the first time. You will see great merit and I believe you will take away the same warmth, energy, and ideas to make sure that your national initiatives fructify and go to the next level of conversations on internet and IG will be heard.
And it’s – it’s up to us to take it from our stage at an individual level from our Facebook pages and Twitter handles and replicate these conversations.
I will make my substantive intervention on the best practice forums later in this segment but we’re listening so thank you for being here and engaging with us.
>> VLADIMIR RADUNOVIC: Thank you, Subi. That’s really motivating. I even found myself motivated again.
>> SUBI CHATURVEDI: I’m so glad.
>> VLADIMIR RADUNOVIC: But as you all see, it’s a little bit more complicated to put into practice because of this [01:28:30] which is very complicated but there are many, many ways and we’ll go through that.
Before that and before we open the floor, we had, what was it? Latin America, Africa, Asia, Europe.
>> VERONICA CRETU: Thank you, Vladimir. Before we move to the questions from the floor, I just wanted to make a point on the value, probably the value of the multi-stakeholder model. From my perspective I think this is an exercise which is not easy for the stakeholders that are a part of it.
This is getting out of the comfort zone and believe me, there are several stakeholders engaged in this debate that feel uncomfortable with being part of a new – of going out of their comfort zone which requires more openness, more transparency, more inclusiveness, more participation, more accountability if you want.
This is very relevant especially for countries with young democracies like Moldova, part of Eastern Europe, and we heard our colleague from Ukraine mentioning the importance of bringing and infusing those models if you want at a national level because this is something that is going to change or that is going to become a new paradigm, a new way, a new model of designing policies regardless related to internet or other sectors.
So that is why I think that within the IGF, we are seeing how this model is working in practice, what are the pitfalls, what are the successes, and from the – from the model itself, we can take the lessons and we can see what can really work out well both in regards to the ICTO internet related policies or other sectors as I mentioned.
We’ll – we’ll take some questions from the floor as Vladimir mentioned, up to three questions formulated and designed in line with the issues we have been addressing until this very moment. So if there are any questions from the floor, we are more than happy to take them.
I see a gentleman over here. And please kindly introduce yourself.
>> Hello, my name is [01:30:49] from ISOC Sudan, the Internet Society of Sudan, so I am from the civil society field. I just wanted to talk about the future of the IGF.
We all know that the mandate will – what will happen after 2016 and will it be a new shape of the IGF. Will we go just talking, discussing, will there be recommendations that go deeper into policymaking?
Even – we all know that about there is a lot of things happening today like what is going in [01:31:33] accountability. Now they are talking about even ICANN accountability. So what is the idea of the IGF? Will it go like this or there will be a new shape and it will go deeper into policymaking? Thank you very much.
>> VERONICA CRETU: Thank you very much. I think we are going to take the other two questions and then we are going to reflect on them. Anyone else? Any other question? Yes please and kindly introduce yourself.
>> Thank you. Good morning. My name is [01:32:09]. I am talking on a personal capacity. Do you have a bill on what you have made during the last nine years? Do you have a bill on something to present what you have done during the last nine years?
Next year, same question to the gentleman from Sudan, in the General Assembly of the United Nations, they will decide on the future of IGF. What do you present as a result of nine years of work? Have you achieved the objectives which is in paragraph 72 to 78? To what extent have you achieved that? Thank you.
>> VERONICA CRETU: Thank you very much and one more question.
>> YASSER AL BORHAMY: Thanks indeed. I am Yasser Al Borhamy again from Egypt. I am asking about a mechanism or a certain way of who – which the states or the nations of the world should comply with the internet governance systems. Thanks indeed. Thank you.
How to apply the countries or order them to comply with the internet governance mechanism. Thanks.
>> VLADIMIR RADUNOVIC: Okay, thank you. Now if we were in any other forum, we would probably say okay, now we are turning to the next part in the agenda but the questions are really hot and tough. I was looking around who is going to take the hot potatoes that you put but there are a couple of people who are ready.
So I’ll start on my left with Subi and then we’ll go to Raul and [01:34:00] and I don’t know if any of the others want to respond from the table but Subi, briefly.
>> SUBI CHATURVEDI: Very briefly. Thank you for thought provoking questions. I think they go to the heart of the matter so here is a small plug.
On Thursday which is day three on the fourth of September right here in the morning, same time, we’re going to be doing a session which is looking at IGF, the evolving internet ecosystem, the way forward for IGF, and how is it that you can strengthen the IGF.
It’s a fantastic panel of speakers. We intend to keep the session interactive and we’re looking at ideas, problems, opportunities, challenges, and solutions, so I invite all of you to be there.
Some of these answers will come through but these are important questions and I don’t want to make light of this opportunity.
As far as what is it that we have achieved, the Chair of the MAG, Ambassador Jānis Kārkliņš, put out a call this year asking the entire stakeholder group and the entire IG community to come back to us with learnings and experiences about what is it that they managed to translate from the IGF at their national, regional, and local level. Was it of some value? Did it bring about some change in internet governance?
That report is going to be shared during the course of this week. I think those are the most important lessons that we can take away from here.
In terms of what we have achieved, Ricardo is on my right and he has been at the core of leading the national and regional IGF initiatives. There are about forty currently and if you log onto the website, you’ll find a dedicated page. There are only three parameters for starting a national or a regional initiative.
You must have a website. It must be multi-stakeholder with at least three stakeholder communities, private sector, industry, governments, media, academia, technical community.
Any three people together can start an initiative at a national, regional level. And third most importantly, you must be able to publish a report.
I think to be able to give a leg up to national and local initiatives where governments come into the table and sit with other communities is a fantastic achievement that the IGF has been able to inspire but I do agree we need to link up and link down better with these initiatives so that we can feed into each other and take away from that.
As far as the last point in my short intervention, can there be a mechanism for internet governance? Well the internet is unique because it was created outside mechanisms and systems so we would like to see less governments – less governance so that permission-less innovation and core values of the internet can flourish and organically grow.
But I do recognize that there is a need to address issues because the same human rights that exist offline must be able to exist online and we need to get governments who will legislate and create these policies to come together and understand this medium better that we all love and cherish.
So I think there will have to be unique solutions across verticals and across horizontals that will have to come locally and this is what we want to do, create best practices so that people can take them away and move these initiatives along at their local levels. Thank you.
>> VLADIMIR RADUNOVIC: Thank you, Subi. Very brief reflection to this question about the IGF mechanisms. At a national level, exactly there is no one size fits all. That is the experience we have from all of these years. Even if you go through the regional inter-governance forums like European EuroDIG or Arab IGF or African IGF. You’ll see Asian Pacific, Latin America, Caribbean IGF. You will see very different modalities, how they work, and it really fits to the culture, fits to the shape of the – I mean, the specific aspects of the area. So it’s something that as Subi said, needs to go through the probably best practices or sharing the experiences, how to build on regional and national levels.
I won’t touch upon the second two questions. They are too hot so I will leave it to Raul to start with. What can we present out of the nine years of IGF? What did we really achieve?
>> I think that – I didn’t introduce myself last time so my name is [01:38:21]. I am vice president for global engagement in the Internet Society and I have served in the MAG for many years until February this year, from the beginning of IGF.
I think that the IGF exceeded the expectations that probably could have existed ten years ago. But it’s difficult. The question is very interesting because it’s – I don’t think it’s easy to measure the impact of IGF because the IGF itself has evolved very much and is very useful as a place for discussions and meeting with the – everybody else.
I remember that in 2006 when we held the first IGF in Athens, the – I was arriving to the – to the venue so there were some governments asking what was the – the place reserved for governmental delegations and the other thing that I remember is that I met people that were very active in the governmental – in the governmental sector, people very active in the community, people very active in the civil society, and they didn’t know each other.
I was very surprised and I remember having asked someone. How do you know each other? You don’t know each other? Both of you are everywhere but they were not everywhere together. They were in different – in different circles, working in different circles.
So I think that now we have a meeting that is attended by three thousand people. There are a lot of workshops discussing very interesting topics, main sessions, but we have a lot of exchange between individuals that belong to different stakeholders.
The impact of IGF can go much beyond IGF itself because now we know each other and we have good relations with all of the stakeholders. I think that the [01:40:34] is an example of the maturity of the relationship among the stakeholders.
It means that we take advantage of the relationships that we have built through IGF for doing more collaborative work in many other places, even at the national level but not only at the national level, also in other environments.
So when we go to ITU or UNESCO or WIPO for discussing other things or ICANN, we meet with people that belong to other stakeholder groups and we continue working together because we have – we know each other and we have developed the – the habit of working together and this was thanks to IGF.
So I think that the impact of IGF goes much beyond the IGF itself but the IGF itself is very – is very – has been very successful and has exceeded probably the expectations.
I think that when we created IGF, the only expectation was to have a place for having some simple discussions. In fact if you remember, we avoided to discuss critical internal resources in the first IGF in 2006 because we were not looking for having discussions on controversial topics.
Now there is no topic that cannot be discussed here. It was very difficult to introduce the perspective of human rights in the agenda. Last year we had a special session for dealing with internet surveillance issues, the most controversial topic of 2013, and it was the first place – IGF was the first place where different stakeholders including governments and including the United States government met for having an open discussion on that issue.
Of course, no – I think that it is difficult that everybody get satisfied with the results of the discussion because there are different positions, different views, but this is part of the game. Thank you.
>> VLADIMIR RADUNOVIC: Thank you and before I give the floor to [01:42:41] for a final comment on this part, memorize throughout the IGF what are the achievements of the IGF that you can feel and share it with the others because that’s really something. Measuring the effects of the IGF is probably one of the biggest challenges because there are no documents coming out of it.
There are a lot of achievements that we can notice on a national and global level but it’s hard to measure that so keep notes and share with – share around you. One last final comment and introduce yourself because I forgot to introduce you before.
>> JOVAN KURBALIJA: He works for the Diplo Foundation and he promotes such important information – I am joking. My name, I am Jovan Kurbalija. I am the Director of the Diplo Foundation and head of Geneva Internal Platform.
I like Vladimir’s last comment. I think perception – well, it’s ultimately the individual. We tend to extend our perception to our group nation, whatever. I will tell you what is my perception of the Internal Governance Forum.
When I started in 2004 ten years ago at the Working Group on Internal Governance, I asked forty members of the working group one question. Can you explain what you are doing at the working group to your cousin, relative, partner, wife, children?
And four of them raised their hands. I was among those who couldn’t explain what we were doing. When I was mentioning it to people, what I was doing, they were calling me to fix their printer, to install software. You’re doing something with computers.
Now ten years later, there is a huge, huge evolution. I think we tend to underestimate – overestimate what can be done in a short time period – it’s very human – and underestimate what can be done in longer periods.
When you see this perspective of almost ten years with WSIS and IGF, you can notice the huge, huge progress in raising awareness, in raising understanding, in developing this trust and empathy among different players, that they can engage with the other side and the other side can understand what are their priorities.
I think we underestimate that and for this human aspect, social aspect of IGF, we need time. It cannot be fixed as a technical solution quickly and this is in my view, the major achievement. It’s like sediments in the river. Every year you have an additional layer of the understanding.
IGF is in the soul searching phase. This is the other question and there is now the real question, what is the next step? For me the key challenge is how we keep this great legacy of the IGF and add a layer which we’ll address real or perceived concerns of some players that there is no place where some sort of decision-making on the global level will be made. Are these the real or perceived needs?
In global affairs, it’s not only – reality is also a question of perception. With that element of the smart evolution where we will preserve in a novel way this great legacy of IGF as awareness building, the great bazaar, and some sort of an element of, well, [01:46:07], you know, famous metaphor of cathedral and bazaar.
That sort of is the main challenge for the IGF, how to make that balance right between decision shaping, space, and some sort of space where the various stakeholders could address their needs and make some sort of recommendation or some sort of forward looking guidance. Thank you.
>> VERONICA CRETU: Thank you. Thank you Jovan very much and it’s indeed interesting, this concept of bazaars and you know, the way it fits into the multi-stakeholder approach. Again, it is a zone where you have to get into and this is not a very easy and very comfortable exercise.
Just a brief comment on the value, on the results of the IGF from what I have seen back home in my country was the fact that even in 2005, 2006, whenever I would approach a government representative to discuss about internet governance, they would perceive it as something being e-governance, something that wasn’t the agenda of the government at that point in time.
These days if you go and you discuss with them, everything is clear, the agenda is very clear, and I think this has been also due to their exposure to the discussions around internet governance and bringing government representatives to the IGF itself.
I think the more people from governments we are going to have in the upcoming years, the better results we are going to have back home.
Now it is time to clarify a little bit how do we – how do we manage ourselves through this IGF. This is day one and as you see on the screen, there are several workshops, different colors, different codes if you want, timings and so on and so forth. It’s really a huge space and we would like to ask Nicholas who is from the IGF Secretariat to give us a brief overview, some tips on how to manage, how to handle yourselves better during these upcoming days. Nicholas, the microphone is yours.
>> NICHOLAS DAGOSTINO: Thank you. My name is Nick Dagostino and I’m with the IGF Secretariat and actually this is my first IGF as well so it’ll be good, yeah.
So on the screen we have one version of the format of the schedule which you can see all of the various types of sessions that you can go to and the rooms that they are in at the certain times.
So we also have a different version of the schedule which I’ll go into later but just to start, we have basically – we have various types of sessions here. We have workshops, we have open forums, we have dynamic coalition meetings, we have best practice forums, main sessions, and it could be a little confusing.
So we’ve color coordinated the schedule, the schedule that you see here depending on various types of sessions so you know which one is which.
An example of the one that is on the screen right now is the green indicates an open forum. So open forums are sessions by major organizations and institutions that are wanting to discuss their activities over the last year.
So this later on around 11:00, ICANN Governmental Advisory Committee Open Forum which is in workshop room four. There are also workshops so workshops are arranged in various sub-themes which are also indicated at the bottom of this particular schedule of the different color coordination.
At the IGF this year, we have – we have eight sub-themes. Internet as an engine for growth and development, policies enabling access, internet and human rights. They are all available. They’ll show at the bottom of the schedule as well as the program paper and yeah, as well as on our [01:50:25] which is the alternative schedule which if we were to pull it up, that would be great but – okay.
So if you are looking to make your own personalized schedule for the event, you can go onto our interactive schedule and that is available at the website IGF 2014 dot int gov forum dot org. Alternatively you can use IGF 2014 dot sched dot org.
This is a fantastic tool that we’re using for the first time this year where you can track the various sessions, sub-themes, workshops, speaker bios for the various sessions are also all available on this – with their photos and bios. You can track sessions by – by various hashtags or themes and it will also tell you exactly where it’s happening, more information on it, the description, the agenda of the events, and that sort of thing.
As well, we have main sessions occurring on all of the days. Starting tomorrow we have a main session on – it’s called policies enabling access, growth, and development on the internet and that is happening in this room here and we have ten other workshop rooms which include the other workshop rooms as well as – the other workshop sessions as well as the dynamic coalition sessions and the open forum sessions.
So if you have any other questions, I’m very happy to answer. There are a lot of sessions. There are a lot of sub-themes. There is a lot of information. There are a lot of speakers and I’d love to answer any questions you might have so thank you.
>> VERONICA CRETU: Thank you very much, Nicholas, and if there are any practical, immediate practical questions, one or two, please raise it now. Yes please.
>> Thank you. I just got this paper. Part of it is shaded. I can’t read what is between some sides because it is on color. When it is on the black and white, you can see that. Why don’t you produce something like ICANN? They have a small booklet without any color, without any shading, give you where you can go. It is impractical.
I’m not criticizing anybody it is not. I have to ask what is this and somebody look at that. That is this one but please do something practical. Thank you. Muchas gracias.
>> VERONICA CRETU: Okay. Thank you very much. Criticism is taken, feedback is taken. I think there are different ways now to handle – follow what Nicholas suggested, you know, do the personalized agenda online. There is a tendency to be as digital as possible and everyone is using different gadgets but still. Subi, you wanted to comment on this or no? Okay.
Any other practical questions?
>> Thank you. I am [01:52:38] from Bangladesh, a people of 160 million, a developing nation. As the people – most of the people are poor and they are struggling for the improvement of their life and the government is trying to provide internet to different stakeholders and as we are not the manufacturer, so we need to import or procure from the developed countries.
So most of the government institutions at the moment with internet connections, these all are imported from our side. The next stage is to provide internet for the common people and first is for the educational institution that includes a huge investment.
All money are coming from the poor people, 160 million people. So I guess if I am not wrong, like Bangladesh, most of the African countries, some of the Asian countries have become the market of industrialized nations.
I mean, the resources of the poor people are being drained to the high end. That is the reality. So I am here from the government and also from the poor people of Bangladesh, how the drainage of money resources could be stopped or at least it can be decreased and on the other side, how the industrialized people and industrialized government can help the poorer nations for providing internet to the poor people of the developing nations. To find out, that is why I am here. Can anybody answer me? Okay, please.
>> VLADIMIR RADUNOVIC: The question is definitely very substantial and I think you’re at the right place at the IGF. I don’t think anyone here can respond at least not within the next ten minutes. But what I would definitely encourage you is to search for the sessions that are linked to the topic and especially tomorrow morning I think which has a connection with that, enabling access, right, tomorrow morning?
So in this main room, that will be one of the sessions and what I definitely encourage you to do is to be active. That means take a microphone as you did now, ask the question and share your experiences because that’s important. Don’t just let the people talk on the panel.
That’s one thing. The other thing is remember the faces of people, especially from – you will find a lot of people from the internet industry including the silicon valley and US internet industry here, high level ones as well. Do approach them or anyone else to share the experiences, to discuss. That is I think my own experience of the merit of the IGF as well.
I didn’t respond to your direct question but I hope I helped you map where you can find the response but please do approach us later on as well and we can try to help you where to go and who to ask more about that.
One of the good things that we have new this year is a best practices forum and Subi mentioned it earlier. This is for the first time that we have very focused discussions on a couple of topics on best practices. Subi, very briefly, what do we have this year?
>> SUBI CHATURVEDI: Thank you for that question and I agree. That’s an important question and we will attempt at creating some responses in what is it that can be done at the IGF. So a lot of you are here and the global community on internet governance has been asking for a long time. What about tangible outcomes from the IGF? What is it that we can take away and what are the concrete deliverables that we can take home?
In response to that call, earlier this year when some of us members from the MAG and – sorry – I am Subi Chaturvedi and I come from India. For us, a lot of us, issues about internet governance are complex, they’re nuanced, and we need problems to be solved.
So talk has value and coming here and discussing and engaging in a dialog has tremendous value but we wanted to know what is it that we can go back home, replicate, and deal with issues and solutions.
So from community input, the MAG this year identified five key themes and I’ll walk you through those. The first was developing meaningful multi-stakeholder participation mechanisms. How is it that people who are not in the room, people whose voices are left out, can also engage in IG?
Second thing was about regulation and mitigation of unwanted communications, spam. How do you deal with that? Establishing and supporting computer emergency response themes or search for internet security which is a real challenge, a real issue, and creating –
The next fourth thing was about creating an enabling environment for the development of local content. A lot of us are taking to the internet and the next two billion users are likely to come in from Asia, India, China, a lot of developing countries.
One of the biggest impediments has been the availability of local content and its dissemination. How do we get to do that better? And the last and really important theme is best practices for online child protection.
Our people who will follow us into the future, how do we make sure that we keep our end users safe? And a lot of them are young. They are digital natives but we’re also trying to create a community which is responsible and responsive.
So this process was initiated. A call was put out. These themes were identified and then a group of experts was identified for every team. This has been participatory. It has been bottom up. It has been as transparent and as inclusive as possible. The links are up on the IGF website so if you look for the best practice forums on the internet governance forum website, you will come to a page that talks about all of these themes. There are going to be five ninety minute sessions which will feed into one main session which is on day three on the fourth of September on Thursday at 2:30 to 4:00 in the evening, right here in this hall.
I urge all of you to join in. Additionally, there is a draft that has been put out which is available online which is requesting everybody to comment and engage with that draft. The comments are open until the fifth of September so that this can be finally presented in the taking stock and closing session.
So what we wanted to do is make sure that we identify problems, issues, and challenges, convert them into opportunities, and take back solutions which are mapped to these problems, and they are real problems. They’re real issues.
So that is what the best practice forum has been able to do and I think this is a response also to the Tunis agenda that talks about bringing in more developing country perspective, being more inclusive, and actively responding to solutions.
I would be happy to respond to any questions that anyone might have. I saw and some members of the MAG have been able to devote time, effort, and energy to put this together, so these are some of the key themes. Any questions related to the best practice forums can be sent at questions at internet gov forum dot org and you will also find a community section on the website where you can look at all of these key themes and post your comments.
I urge all of you to please respond to the draft and engage with it. Thank you for your time and I would be happy to take questions or comments from the floor.
>> VLADIMIR RADUNOVIC: Thank you, Subi. Of course you can memorize her and just chase her afterwards for any further questions. Do that, I encourage you.
This is one of the innovations of this IGF but besides talking about practices, the IGF is a place as previously we heard from Raul, kind of an agenda setting, and this is the place where you can really talk about any aspect of internet governance including the process.
We heard on day four or day three morning, we’ll have a main session on the future of the IGF and the IGF – IG processes. But we also had discussions. Yesterday there was a full day, a pre-day, a pre-event, on Net Mundial. What were the achievements of Net Mundial? Will it follow-up with Net Mundial initiatives or is it possible in relation with IGF and so on?
There is another track which is highly important and relevant for many of you and it’s the ICANN and IANA processes linked to the top level domains and the transition – accountability of ICANN and transition of IANA in particular after the updates or the call from the US government that is going to relinquish the control over IANA so to speak.
Now we have Alicia (ph) with us. Yes, sorry. Subi wanted to jump in briefly.
>> SUBI CHATURVEDI: Thank you. On this screen you will see the best practice forums highlighted in red or coral. There is a red dot. On the IGF schedule that Nicholas just shared, you can look at tags that identify these forums. Also Constance Bommelaer from ISOC, you will see her here. Any questions, any comments, feel free to come to any of us. We would be happy to respond. Thank you.
>> VLADIMIR RADUNOVIC: Thank you, Subi. So also talking about the IANA transition, and we have Alicia with us who is going to give us a very brief update on what is happening on this IGF, where you can hear more about IANA and what are the recent updates.
>> Thank you very much. So I think people have heard a little bit about the IANA transition but just to level set, since 1998, the US National Telecommunications and Information Administration otherwise known as NTIA has contracted with ICANN to perform some key administrative functions for the internet.
Earlier this year, the United States government announced its intention to transition the stewardship of those functions to the global multi-stakeholder community and those functions are known as the internet assigned numbers authority or IANA functions.
The US government asked ICANN to convene global stakeholders to develop a transition proposal and ICANN in turn has created or initiated the creation of the IANA Stewardship Transition Coordination Group otherwise known as the ICG.
The ICG consists of thirty members and two liaisons who were appointed by a variety of constituencies including internet users, businesses, and operational communities related to domain names, numbering resources such as IP addresses, and the parameters used by internet protocols.
I am the chair of the ICG and most of the ICG members are here in attendance this week. The ICG will have its own face to face meeting on Saturday which will be streamed live on the internet but will not have public attendance but we’re mostly here all this week to engage with the community as well.
The ICG’s mandate is to deliver a proposal for the IANA stewardship transition to NTIA. The group’s charter outlines the process that will be used for this proposal development. The ICG will solicit proposals from the operational communities concerning their respective IANA functions.
The coordination group will hopefully by the end of today publish a request for proposals that can be used for this purpose.
The RFP requests that the operational communities consult broadly with all interested parties and the expectation of the ICG is that all interested parties will become involved early on in those community processes.
For example, the five regional internet registries have already begun their processes to develop transition proposals for – for internet numbering. There is a cross community working group within the ICANN framework that is in the process of being formalized to discuss the transition of the domain names and he internet engineering taskforce is creating a working group to discuss protocol parameters and oversight transition there.
These community processes are where the bulk of the transition proposal work will be done and if you want to participate, all of these processes are open to you and they are all being launched right now.
The ICG is further chartered to solicit input from stakeholders broadly to assess the compatibility of the proposals that we receive from the operational communities, to serve as a central clearing house for public information about the IANA stewardship transition, and to assemble and submit the final proposal to NTIA.
The target deadline for the ICG to receive proposals from the operational communities is December thirty-first after which the group will move on to assess, assemble, seek broad public input, and finally compile and submit a proposal to NTIA.
The current contract between ICANN and NTIA expires on September 30, 2015. If you want to learn more about the ICG and about the IANA stewardship transition and how you can get involved in particular, you can visit IANA CG dot org. I, A, N, A, C, G dot org. You can come talk to me. You can come talk to any of the ICG members who are here this week and the full membership list is on the website.
You can also come to the main session which will be held in this room on Friday morning at 9:30 and in that session will be discussed both the transition and the related process of ICANN accountability which is ongoing. Thanks very much.
>> VERONICA CRETU: Thank you very much and I hope that this suggestion stems an encouragement for participation and these particular discussions have been useful for you.
We have been discussing a lot about the importance of anchoring the global IGF related efforts to the national level, the national and regional level. In line with this, I would like to invite our colleague Ricardo [02:08:58] who is sitting just on my right to share a little bit, his reflections on both national and the role of national and regional IGFs.
>> Thank you very much, Veronica. Good morning everyone. Just a few minutes to share with you that if you have been part of any internet governance initiative at your country or at the region you are living in, let me extend a kindly invitation to attend a session that is called inter-regional dialog tomorrow, Wednesday, at 2:30 in the afternoon in room – workshop two.
It’s just one floor down this floor and you will be able to exchange with other participants from national and regional IGF, what have been their main focuses, their main themes, and identify commonalities and maybe challenges you are facing at your local level.
So that is one of the purposes of the session and the second key purpose of that session is to identify in a jointly manner, what mechanisms contribute to the exchange between national and regional IGF and this global IGF or at this event and how this event could contribute to the discussion you are facing in your region or in your country.
That is my message. Please, you are kindly invited tomorrow at 2:30. Thank you so much.
>> VERONICA CRETU: Thank you very much, Ricardo. I personally encourage you to join, especially if you are keen to start something in your respective countries. Getting to learn about how did the others ago about is really, really valuable.
When we talk about the IGF, we also talk about sustainability of this initiative but for a sustainability to be in place, you need to have people who are capable, who have competences to address and engage meaningfully in the broad IG debates.
So I would like to go to Fatima who is on Ricardo’s right to share a little bit about the capacity building because capacity building is one of the components that is important in the broader IG ecosystem. So Fatima, sorry, on capacity building.
>> FATIMA CAMBRONERO: Thanks, Veronica. My name is Fatima Cambronero. I am a MAG member, a civil society representative, and I will speak in Spanish because I can and because we have remote interpretation so please use this.
(Continues in Spanish)
>> VLADIMIR RADUNOVIC: Thank you, Fatima, and thank you in particular for speaking in Spanish and I hope this will encourage other people to use other UN languages. IGF does have the interpretation in every session. Use that opportunity. Help us listen to other languages as well. The technology allows that.
Thank you for raising the issues about capacity building. It’s something that we are trying to push between the IGF so to map the capacity building programs and as Fatima said, Friday during lunchtime is the good opportunity to listen to what exists and what might be of interest to you.
Before we close the session, this part of the session, there are two more aspects of how you might continue being involved in the IGF from this time to 2015 in Brazil.
One is a very, very important component of the IGF and I think IGF has been instrumental for developing participation and remote participation.
For years, IGF has the mechanism to participate, not only to follow the webcasts, but to really participate, pose the questions and post the comments and be involved in discussions through remote participation.
There is a mechanism which exists and I think now we have the [02:16:34] so hello. They are many other cities which gather there. People gather in cities and join us and pose their comments.
So in case you or any one of your colleagues, friends in your country cannot participate at the IGF physically, there is a mechanism to do that. Use that mechanism and help us simulate the e-discussions in between the IGF to walk the talk, to talk about the internet by using the internet.
The second thing of how you might get involved and this is again encouragement for you, we mentioned the MAG, the multi-stakeholder advisory group. It is being renewed every year and the end of the mandate of the current MAG is end of this year.
So the new call for MAG members is going to be issued I think late this year and the new MAG members will be appointed by the UN Secretary General early next year.
It is an amazing experience being a MAG member. It is a chance to try not only to build up the agenda of the next IGF but also to try to lead the IGF towards future improvements like the things from best practices and other good options that we have.
So I do invite you to consider. It is quite a time investment, a personal time investment, but it’s a great pleasure and it’s a great experience.
And we do have some colleagues also here from small island states. We don’t have that much time to – to pass the mic now but there were some sessions about small island states so this is also a very important component of the IGF.
Now Veronica wanted to invite you to give a little bit of feedback.
>> VERONICA CRETU: Yeah just very quickly, what we encourage you to do, please every time you participate in a workshop, there is a workshop evaluation form, something that would help workshop organizers and us on the multi-stakeholder advisory group to get your input and to make sure that input and feedback is being taken into consideration for the next planning phases of the next IGF.
So on the IGF web page, int gov forum dot org, you will see the workshop evaluation form. You have the opportunity to choose the name of the workshop you just attended.
And if this particular workshop session has been useful for you, I would like to see your hands up. Has this been a valuable experience? Has this been a valuable session for you? Okay. Thank you very much.
Thank you all very much. Please enjoy the IGF and be as active and as dynamic as possible. Have a wonderful IGF.
>> VLADIMIR RADUNOVIC: Thank you, Veronica. So I hope you enjoy and really do give us the feedback on that. We go on with the session now. We are turning to the setting the scene session which will be instrumental to go through the topics and the hot spots of the IGF. Stay with us now. I’m turning the microphone to Jeanette Hoffman and our colleagues so we’re going more through the topics now. Thank you.
---
[The meeting continues with a new session - Topical Insight and Debate Related to the Subtheme of 2014 IGF. Transcripts of this session are also available.]
***
This is the the output of the realtime captioning taken during the IGF 2014 Istanbul, Turkey, meetings. Although it is largely accurate, in some cases it may be incomplete or inaccurate due to inaudible passages or transcription errors. It is posed as an aid to understanding the proceedings at the session, but should not be treated as an authoritative record.
***