[WSIS CS-Plenary] Re: Condi letter

[David Allen]

With all due regard for Milton's:
>There was a great deal of concern among the relevant [US + ...] 
>business and governmental interests.

recalling that Adam wrote:
>My first thought on reading the register article was "hoax". But 
>accepting it as real I am inclined to agree with Milton's clever 
>dismissal.
>However.
>Why would the US Secretary of State write to the UK Foreign Minister 
>and President of EU about this, was there as any other WSIS issue 
>that caused the US to contact any other govt at this level? I 
>imagine Condi and Jack usually discuss stuff involving billions of 
>dollars, pain, suffering and combinations of same. ICANN just 
>doesn't seem up there as an issue for these two to worry about. So 
>while I like to think Milton's right, I also wonder if we might be 
>missing something.

Seems to me Adam's observation is 'not small.'

By no means did the Rice letter 'win a war.'  But in that it was 
deemed worthy the effort to write and transmit, we see the [dramatic] 
effect that the EU turn on this subject did have.  Many on these 
lists had taken the entrenched behemoth to be blowing us off, 
completely - instead there really was something in play.  What was 
that?

I will suggest:  Elevating to inspection, then offering change for, 
the pictures carried around in the heads of those who will shape the 
policy process - 'consciousness-raising.'  The EU was only the most 
recent, prominent case.  There were numerous other evolutions, in 
policy-maker conceptual frame, if not so prominently publicized.  The 
Rice letter only confirms:  even the behemoth sees that process 
underway.

And this of course just follows on Willie's (sorry, not sure I get 
the name spelling right ...)
>What was interesting in WSIS Tunis was that the USG could not close 
>down the space entirely around internet governance just as the 
>Tunisian government could not entirely close down criticism of its 
>human rights record. This is something that bears thinking about.

Indeed.  The thing did move ahead - and the 'how' is the crucial 
learning to apply for the future.

That is our, and everyone's, challenge for the Forum.

David