[WSIS CS-Plenary] this list is in trouble...

Wed Feb 11 11:17:28 GMT 2009

Dear all

Well, thanks to the "intruder" from Chandigarh we know now that this list 
is not dead! 

In the past, I sent all information about CSTD and the cluster of 
WSIS-related events to Philippe, who sent it to this list. I wanted to 
remain in the background, as I am not really "civil society" (at least not 
yet, I shall retire in November 2009 and maybe shall continue on some 
aspects of WSIS in my new capacity as a member of civil society...). 

There have been some changes in CONGO, and I shall discuss with CONGO 
about their future role in WSIS follow-up. If CONGO agrees, I shall 
continue, for the time being, to work through CONGO. 

There are some new developments here in Geneva. Regarding the cluster of 
WSIS-related events, ITU is taking over more and more responsibility, 
which is not a bad move, as I am retiring. ITU may not feel comfortable to 
send information to a "civil society list", but I think they would be 
ready to keep CONGO in the loop. This would alllow for better planning for 
those of you who intend to come to Geneva for the future clusters of 
WSIS-related events. 

Regarding the CSTD, the Secretariat did install last year for the first 
time a e-mail list for the members of the Commission, and I managed to get 
on this list also three persons from civil society, insiting on the 
multi-stakeholder character of WSIS follow-up (Ayesha from ICC is also on 
the list). The three persons are Philippe, Parminder and Anriette. There 
was no traffic on this list in the last few months,  but in the run-up to 
the next CSTD session (25-29 May 2009) I think that a draft resolution on 
WSIS follow-up may circulate again on this list, like last year. As 
Philippe is not anymore with CONGO, the draft resolution could be sent to 
this list by Parminder or Anriette (or a new person from CONGO). It is a 
good way to keep all of you informed, and you may also give feedback to 
those of you who are at Geneva attending the CSTD. CONGO has already 
contacted me (thanks to the "accident" on this list)  and we shall discuss 
what role CONGO can/will play in WSIS follow-up from now onwards. 

I use this opportunity to give you some advance information directly. It 
is not yet official, but very likely, that there would be a second round 
of open consultations in the run-up to the fourth annual IGF meeting in 
Egypt,  in the second week of May in Geneva, very probably on 13 May. The 
MAG of IGF would then meet on 14 and 15 May. ITU plans to hold a cluster 
of WSIS-related events (or whatever the new name may be) in the third week 
of May, in the ITU premises or in the CICG (behind the ITU) in Geneva. At 
present, it looks like as if the programme would be a mixture between the 
tradional Action Line Facilitation meetings and a meeting on themes (ITU 
is focusing this year heavily on child protection on the Internet). ITU 
and UNESCO will meet with the different Action Line Facilitators on 23 
February and it is possible (but not sure, we are running out of time) 
that ITU and UNESCO would do a short online multistakeholder consultation 
afterwards. 

The 12th session of the CSTD is taking place from 25 to 29 May. Like in 
the previous years, the first day will be at ministerial level, with a 
short opening ceremony (hopefully, like in the previous years, with a 
speaker from civil society). Most probably we will have on Tuesday 26 May 
a day with multi-stakeholder panels, organized jointly with GAID. There is 
a good chance that one panel would be on mobile phones and poverty 
reduction, but the themes are not yet fully fixed. 

Regarding civil society participation, we organized last year a nomination 
process in order to invite some participants from civil society. This 
process was very time-consuming, as the information about the nomination 
process was not only sent to this list, but also to more than 3000 
entities in consultative status with ECOSOC, and we received more than 100 
nominations from NGOs in consultative status with ECOSOC, but who could 
not show any relation to WSIS. We have therefore decided not repeat the 
process this year. We have some (few) money from SDC left to invite some 
(few) participants from civil society. Last year, Philippe and I had 
identified about 20 serious nominations for invitation from all over the 
developing world. We selected 9 persons, and 6 could finally attend (3 
dropped out for different reasons). We shall therefore use the same list 
of nominations like last year, and concentrate on those names that we were 
unable to consider last year. We plan roughly for 2 invitees each from 
Latin America, Africa and Asia-Pacific. The invitees may partly be from 
the same organizations like last year, but would very probably not be the 
same persons. I shall keep the members of this list (directly or through 
CONGO) informed about the invitation process. 

With best regards from Geneva

Charles Geiger
Special Adviser to the CSTD

karen banks <karenb at gn.apc.org> 
Sent by: plenary-bounces at wsis-cs.org
11.02.2009 10:57
Please respond to
Virtual WSIS CS Plenary Group Space <plenary at wsis-cs.org>

To
anriette at apc.org, Virtual WSIS CS Plenary Group Space 
<plenary at wsis-cs.org>, Virtual WSIS CS Plenary Group Space 
<plenary at wsis-cs.org>
cc

Subject
Re: [WSIS CS-Plenary] this list is in trouble...

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_______________________________________

hi everyone

Thanks anriette for responding.. nothing to add from me.. 

adam and i continue to check legitimate subscriptions when we can - but we 
provide no moderation (and to be honest - the list has never been 
moderated in the sense of moderating content - the list has always been 
self-moderated by the community of subscribed users). 

However, in this instance, we have removed the offending address.

I am going to ask our technical support people to look into the possible 
hacking of subscribed addresses

karen

At 19:47 10/02/2009, Anriette Esterhuysen wrote:
[Please note that by using 'REPLY', your response goes to the entire list. 
Kindly use individual addresses for responses intended for specific 
people]

Click http://wsis.funredes.org/plenary/ to access automatic translation of 
this message!
_______________________________________

Hello all

Just to confirm what has been said:

- APC is still donating server time and space towards hosting this list

- Subscription is public, so anyone can subscribe, but the request for
subscription is held for approval by the volunteer moderators who are,
currently, Adam Peake and Karen Banks

- However, the spirit of this list has been one of open and free
participation, and it is in no way linked to WSIS accreditation;
therefore the moderators are not under any obligation to spend too much
time on checking who new subscribers are.. as long as they appear to
have some interest in information society issues potential subscribers
are likely to be approved

- The purpose of the list has evolved, and while it is has been less
active, it could still play a role in sharing information, and, as
Charles Geiger has pointed out, to communicate specifically around the
WSIS follow-up process which for many of us is still important

APC is happy to continue to support this list, but we are not in a
position to monitor it closely. That we leave to the participants.. and
based on the discussion in this thread, you are doing a very good job at
dealing with inappropriate content.

Best

Anriette

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