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Agenda
Agenda
October 2013 – August 2014 Oct 2013 – Aug 2014
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Oct
19
Sat
Best Bits 2013 @ Mantra Nusa Dua
Tickets
Oct 19 – Oct 20 all-day

In a year when the confidence of Internet users in the Internet governance status quo was shattered by revelations of systematic and indiscriminate governance surveillance, there is a greater need than ever before for civil society organisations engaged on Internet governance and Internet rights freedom issues to come together to share and strategise. The 2013 meeting of the Best Bits network will address key issues at the intersection of Internet policy and human rights, for direct application over the next twelve months.

Through the shared outputs of this meeting and the indirect benefits of participation, we expect to empower civil society organisations and individual activists to create more informed, effective, inclusive and complementary advocacy outcomes, in which the public interest is better reflected in high-level policy discussions and in the outputs that these discussions produce. The meeting will also place Best Bits itself on a firmer institutional footing, in order to enhance its legitimacy as a broad-based civil society advocacy network and improve its long-term sustainability.

Objectives

  • To raise the level of shared understanding about related groups, initiatives and issues and their political contexts.
  • To broaden and diversify participation in the initiatives that participants are undertaking individually or in smaller networks in the areas of Internet governance and Internet and human rights.
  • To amplify the voice of global civil society at upcoming multilateral Internet governance and Internet rights meetings.
  • To strengthen involvement from civil society from the Global South in particular in global Internet governance and Internet rights debates and to dissolve North-South divides.
  • To produce tangible shared civil society outputs addressing pressing current issues that can be used in advocacy at important upcoming Internet governance and Internet rights events.
  • To develop an inclusive and sustainable civil society network for Internet governance and Internet rights issues.

Day 1, Saturday19 October 2013

9:00 — 9:15

Welcome, introductions, logistics, and meeting opening


Jeremy Malcolm

9:15 — 13:00

Global Internet governance principles, enhanced cooperation and the IGF
Facilitators: Parminder Jeet Singh and Joy Liddicoat, background documents

  • Outline of session one – group agreement on discussion objectives and proposed outputs [15 mins]
  • Understanding Multi-stakeholderism, and bringing out key issues: [1 hour]
    • some of the best bits of MS definitions, and key issues involved:
    • facilitated discussion of definitions, and key issues: group discussion and, if need be, split into small groups for discussion and report back of shared inputs
    • summary of these by facilitators
  • Break (30 mins)
  • Developing a shared civil society position on reforms and the evolution of IGF (1 hour)
    Discussion questions:

    • What is the state of the IGF?
    • IGF plus – how can IGF with powers to make soft law recommendations work in a multi-stakeholder environment?
    • How can we ensure the legitimacy and sustainability of the IGF? – protecting it from corporate capture, finding a sustainable funding model, reaching out to under-represented groups and constituencies.

    If required, divide into groups of 3 and then report back.

  • Focus on session output: statement to the IGF (1 hour)
    • What is MSism and what are the key issues involved?
    • Are there some agreed principles of IGF reform and evolution?.


13:00 — 14:00

Lunch and networking break

14:00 — 18:00

The ITU, the WSIS+10 process and other IG-related spaces
Facilitators: Joana Varon Ferraz and Matthew Shears, background documents

  • Overview of governance themes impacting the WSIS process and the ITU including enhanced cooperation, surveillance, role of governments and recent initiatives for progressing Internet governance.
  • Visualisation of Internet governance processes towards WSIS+10 and the ITU Plenipotentiary.
  • What next for the Brazilian proposal on operationalising the role of governments in Internet governance and impact on ITU and WSIS
  • Civil society participation and substantive issues for the ITU Plenipotentiary 2014.
  • Civil society participation and substantive issues for the WSIS+10 review and the Multistakeholder Preparatory Platform.
  • Engagement plan for IG

Output: Set of draft recommendations based on the following questions:

  • Looking at the evolving IG landscape what is the relative importance of 1) the WSIS+10 process, 2) the ITU WTDC/Plenipotentiary and 3) other IG spaces?
  • What are civil society’s key priorities/goals within these issue spaces?
  • How (and where) can civil society best focus and build on/achieve those priorities?
  • What is the best use of civil society’s limited resources and how can they be maximized?
  • What counts as a ‘win’ and what counts as a ‘loss’ (what are our red lines)?

Output Setting up of task forces (as necessary) with the aim of building appropriate engagement roadmaps.

Day 2, Sunday20 October 2013

9:00 — 13:00

State surveillance and human rights
Facilitators: Andrew Puddephatt and Deborah Brown, background documents

  • Opening/plenary [20 min]
  • Break into working groups [45 min]
    1. A technical/engineering group to look at the feasibility of establishing technical responses to blanket surveillance eg.
    2. A group to work on a series of asks for business
    3. A group focused on the implications for IG processes. (which might pick up on statements developed on the previous day)
  • Report back in plenary [30 min]

Potential output from group 1: A list of important upcoming standards discussions and RFCs; sketch out a timeline of more technical meetings where these issues can/should be discussed.

Potential output from group 2: A concrete requests for the private sector- internet companies and telcos- that would outline what actions from corporations civil society would like to see in light of surveillance revelations

Potential output from group 3: Outcome might be a series of action points/ a working group/ a short statement aimed at IGF and potentially other bodies. We will have to take our cue on this one from the previous day, whether it looks like people want to focus on Brazil2014, IGF, a broader statement that can be repurposed, etc.


13:00 — 14:00

Lunch and networking break

14:00 — 18:00

Best Bits
Facilitator: Jeremy Malcolm and Anja Kovacs, background documents

  • What are our goals – short presentation and discussion. [20 min]
  • What is the best way to organise the network? [45 min]
  • What working procedures do we need to adhere to? [45 min]
  • Presentation from Web We Want [20 min]
  • Launch and demonstration of new website features. [20 min]
  • Research interest in Best Bits. [10 min]

Output: Agreed statement of objectives.

Output: Procedure wiki.


19:00 — 21:00

Joint Best Bits/Web We Want dinner at Nusa Dua Beach Grill (own cost of IDR 200.000, transport provided)


[participants event=”81910″]


Background papers

[backgroundpapers event=”81910″]

Reports

[eventreports event=”81910″]


Message from Best Bits participants in Bali, 20 October 2013

Best Bits participants gathered in Bali agreed on these basic principles that should guide the development of a planned Rio summit on Internet governance:

  1. The event should discuss what Internet governance architecture is required to support an inclusive, people-centric, development-oriented information society. We believe that this requires at the very minimum that such a structure is democratic, in that it should be inclusive of all countries and all stakeholders, and that it protects and promotes human rights.
  2. The full participation of civil society stakeholders in planning and in the meeting should be guaranteed and resourced.
  3. A strengthened Internet Governance Forum could play a role in the future Internet governance arrangements to be discussed at the event, and it should be linked with the CSTD WGEC process as appropriate.
  4. The event should extend beyond speeches and presentations, and modalities should be developed to allow all stakeholders, including remote participants, to participate on an equal footing.


Read more
Categories: Best Bits
Dec
9
Mon
Global Congress on Intellectual Property and the Public Interest
Tickets
Dec 9 @ 4:45 am – Dec 13 @ 5:45 am
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Categories: Non-institutional Forums
Mar
3
Mon
Rights Con Silicon Valley
Tickets
Mar 3 – Mar 5 all-day
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Categories: Non-institutional Forums
Apr
13
Sun
High-level meeting on the overall review (WSIS+10)
Tickets
Apr 13 – Apr 18 all-day
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Categories: WSIS Review
Apr
14
Mon
WSIS Forum 2014
Tickets
Apr 14 – Apr 18 all-day
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Categories: WSIS Review
Apr
22
Tue
Civil Society pre-NETmundial Coordination Meeting @ Centro Cultural São Paulo
Tickets
Apr 22 all-day

Motivation

Well-funded and well organized interest groups from within the technical and business communities will be advancing their agendas at the Global Multistakeholder Meeting on the Future of Internet Governance, with the intent of securing outcomes that favour their perceived interests. Civil society’s responsibility is to ensure that these outcomes do not conflict with the broader, long-term public interest. Our challenge is therefore to be equally well organised as the other stakeholder representatives, even though we do not enjoy the same funding and staffing resources that they do.

This meeting is a joint initiative of

  • Association for Progressive Communications – APC , Global
  • Article 19, Brazil
  • Best Bits, Global
  • Center for Studies on Freedom of Expression – CELE, Argentina
  • Center for Technology and Society (CTS/FGV)
  • Derechos Digitales, Chile
  • Global Partners Digital, UK
  • Institutito de Defesa do Consumidor – IDEC, Brazil
  • Instituto de Tecnologia e Sociedade – ITS, Brazil
  • ICANN’s Non-Commercial Users Constituency (NCUC)
  • Web We Want, Global

Registration is now closed.

Organisation

The “CS pre-NM” is a gathering of over 90 civil society groups from around the world involved in internet governance and broader internet-related public policy debates regionally and globally. This is an action-oriented group with the aim to facilitate the expression of civil society views and feed them into the discussions at NETmundial and beyond.

The agenda is focused on setting points of consensus, discussing strategic action and distilling key messages for members of civil society that are able to pursue common goals, based on 1) defending fundamental Human Rights; 2) ensuring the Open, Decentralized and Interoperable Architecture of the Web and 3) fostering an Open, Inclusive, Democratic and Decentralised Multistakeholder model of Internet Governance.

Based on these three pillars, in order to have a clear mapping of the state of consensus within Civil Society, we are convening 3 working groups (Principles, Roadmap and IANA transition) of resource persons that will be focused until the day of our meeting on analyzing CS contributions and comments posted at NetMundial platform to deliver: a) a set of bullet points of possible ground of consensus and b) a set of questions around key issues that will require us to have agreement on during our meeting. Our hope is to honor different CS points of view presented so far, and quickly air disagreements and the arguments for each approach.

We hope we can count on your collaboration to achieve our goals and, in the end, have a clear message from civil society that enable those who seek to refine their tactics and strategies for the Conference to do so.

Tuesday22 April 2014
9:00 — 9:15

Welcome coffee

9:15 — 9:45

NETmundial 2014 introduction and Goal of our meeting

  • Welcome and goal of the meeting presented by organizers: Joana Varon (CTS/FGV, Brazil), Jeremy Malcolm (Best Bits), Valeria Betancourt (APC), Veridiana Alimonti (IDEC, Brazil) and Laura Tresca (Article 19, Brazil) (3-5min)
  • Briefing by EMC CS reps: Marilia Maciel, Adam Peake, Carlos Afonso

9:45 — 11:00

Principles: Guaranteeing protection of Human Rights and Ensuring the Open and Interoperable Architecture of the Web

  • Facilitator: Anriette Esterhuysen (APC, South Africa)
  • Goals: clarify and set the common ground regarding core principles for IG that this group of CS will defend at NetMundial and in talks among other stakeholder groups
  • Resource persons for Internet governance principles: Matthew Shears, Carolina Rossini, Anriette Esterhuysen/Valeria Betancourt and Veridiana Alimonti.

11:00 — 11:15

Break

11:15 — 12:45

Roadmap: towards a coordinated, decentralized, inclusive and open multistakeholder model of Internet Governance

  • Facilitators: Matthew Shears (CDT)
  • Goal: clarify and set the common ground regarding a coordinated, decentralized, democratic, inclusive and open multistakeholder model of Internet Governance
  • Resource persons for Roadmap: Anja Kovacs, Jeremy Malcolm, Joana Varon, Carolina Rossini, Deborah Brown. On IANA transition: Niels ten Oever, Rafik Dammak, Stephanie Perrin.

12:45 — 13:30

Lunch

13:30 — 14:30

NetMundial: The rules of the game: how to maximize civil society impact in the interventions and the meetings to follow

  • Facilitator: Bia Barbosa (Intervozes, Brazil)
  • Brief Notes by Daniel Fink (Executive Director at NETmundial 2014) [TBC]
  • Goal: By this time, resource persons from the previous sessions shall deliver a set of bullet points as final agreements and names who have volunteered to deliver the bullet points in NetMundial plenary. These documents will serve as input for this session that have to goal to build the strategy about how to deliver these points, vis a vis NetMundial dynamic for interactions in the floor, so we end with a clear, consolidated and final matrix of interactions at NetMundial plenary (which shall be made public soon).

14:30 — 16:00

Transfer to venue: Upstairs Lounge, 2nd floor (next to restaurants), Grand Hyatt São Paulo, Av. das Nações Unidas, 13301, São Paulo – SP (transport provided [TBC])

16:00 — 17:00

Open session with technical community

  • Facilitator: Avri Doria
  • Comments: Fadi Chehadi (ICANN)
  • Goal: learn core issues for technical community and communicate core CS concerns/positions. Explore opportunities for collaboration.

17:00 — 18:30

Meeting with invited governments (bilateral or mixed – TBC)

  • Facilitator: Marilia Maciel (CTS/FGV, Brazil)
  • Goal: Learn core issues for governments and communicate core CS concerns/positions. Explore opportunities for collaboration.

[participants event=”94489″]

Background papers

[backgroundpapers event=”94489″]

Reports

[eventreports event=”94489″]

Read more
Categories: Best Bits
Apr
23
Wed
Global Multistakeholder Conference On the Future of Internet Governance
Tickets
Apr 23 – Apr 24 all-day
Read more
Categories: Non-institutional Forums
May
27
Tue
Stockholm Internet Forum on Internet Freedom for Global Development
Tickets
May 27 – May 28 all-day
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Categories: Non-institutional Forums
Jun
9
Mon
New Media Summer School
Tickets
Jun 9 – Jun 14 all-day
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Categories: Non-institutional Forums
Aug
31
Sun
Best Bits 2014 @ Lares Park Hotel
Tickets
Aug 31 all-day
Following the NETmundial Global Multistakeholder Meeting on the Future of Internet Governance, there is increased awareness of how civil society’s participation in and shaping of multi-stakeholder Internet governance processes can reorient them towards promoting an open, neutral and free Internet that promotes social and economic development and upholds human rights. The 2014 meeting of the Best Bits network moves forward from NETmundial to share analysis and strategy on a range of key Internet policy processes that civil society groups plan to influence over the coming year. Through the shared outputs of this meeting and the indirect benefits of participation, we expect to empower civil society organisations and individual activists to create more informed, effective, inclusive and complementary advocacy outcomes, in which the public interest is better reflected in high-level policy discussions and in the outputs that these discussions produce. The meeting will also place Best Bits itself on a firmer institutional footing, in order to enhance its legitimacy as a broad-based civil society advocacy network and improve its long-term sustainability. Registration is now closed.
Objectives

  • To raise the level of shared understanding about related groups, initiatives and issues and their political contexts.
  • To broaden and diversify participation in the initiatives that participants are undertaking individually or in smaller networks in the areas of Internet governance and Internet and human rights.
  • To amplify the voice of global civil society at upcoming multilateral Internet governance and Internet rights meetings.
  • To strengthen involvement from civil society from the Global South in particular in global Internet governance and Internet rights debates and to dissolve North-South divides.
  • To produce tangible shared civil society outputs addressing pressing current issues that can be used in advocacy at important upcoming Internet governance and Internet rights events.
  • To develop an inclusive and sustainable civil society network for Internet governance and Internet rights issues.

Sunday31 August 2014
9:00 — 9:15

Registration

9:15 — 9:30

Welcome and introductions (moderation: Andrew)

9:30 — 11:30

Highlights and tactics for IGF (moderation: Nnenna)

  • Ministerial event
  • Renewal of IGF mandate
  • IGF evaluation report
  • NETmundial Alliance (moderation: Carolina/Jeremy)

11:30 — 13:00

Policy slam – people have 10 min to present or discuss something they find relevant

  • Civil society coordination group (Jeremy)
  • African draft Declaration of Internet rights and freedoms
  • Latin American learning platform (Francisco Vera/Claudio)
  • ICANN (Jean-Jacques Sahel)
  • Multistakeholder definition – presentation of online discussion (Jeremy)
  • TPP and the impact of trade on IG (Burcu)
  • Internet Ungovernance Forum (Niels)
  • Feminist principles for the Internet (Joy)
  • Network of Centres case studies on multi-stakeholderism (Jeanette)
  • Preparing for ITU-Plenipot (Carolina)

13:00 — 14:30

Lunch and networking break

14:30 — 16:00

Follow-up to WSIS+10 and tactics moving forward (moderation: Deborah + Anja)

  • Modalities
  • What we know of the process by then
  • What we know about the big substantive issues that will likely dominate the government agenda
  • What we can start doing even without knowing what the process will look like

16:00 — 17:00

Best Bits way forward

  • Recap of 2013 annual report
  • Working group on review of procedures
  • Staffing and funding
  • The way forward and priorities for next year

[participants event=”134671″]

Background papers

To add a background paper, click the Upload button above. [backgroundpapers event=”134671″]

Reports

To add a report, click the Upload button above. [eventreports event=”134671″]

Consensus output from the Best Bits meeting, 31 August 2014

We call for the establishment of the IGF as a multistakeholder forum within the framework of the United Nations with an open-ended mandate, that should be reformed and strengthened.

See also this statement which grew out of discussions at the meeting and is endorsed by a subset of participants.

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Categories: Best Bits
October 2013 – August 2014 Oct 2013 – Aug 2014

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Best Bits has closed

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Best Bits was a global civil society network on the topic of Internet governance, that was formed in 2012 and closed in 2019. Many of the former members of Best Bits participate in the Internet Governance Caucus.