The following are the outputs of the captioning taken during an IGF intervention. Although it is largely accurate, in some cases it may be incomplete or inaccurate due to inaudible passages or transcription errors. It is posted as an aid, but should not be treated as an authoritative record.
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>> ANNE‑RACHEL INNE: Good. Welcome, everybody. I'm Anne‑Rachel Inne. Welcome and thanks for being with us.
We have several speakers. Theresa Swineheart, and she's the director of UNESCO for digital policy on the memory of the world register. Theresa is a senior Vice President of global domain and strategy at ICANN.
Then we'll have a panel where Valts Ernsteits will be the first speaker. Then we'll have Elizabeth Bacon, Senior Director Of Policy And Private And Public Internet Registry. And Amrita Choudhury who is the Credit Consultation President of India. We have Kristy online looking at the participants. This is how the discussion is going to go. Before we start, as I said, we're going to have introductory remarks from Tawfik Jelassi, the UNESCO's assistant director‑general.
The floor is yours.
>> SPEAKER: Good morning, everyone. Especially thanks for all of the early birds that are here with us. So you should ‑‑ you are supposed to Cardinal, my boss, Tawfik. You got a priest. I'll try to do the best job possible in the configuration. Of course, the topic of the panel is very broad and close to UNESCO's heart. There will be many ways to approach the idea of stakeholderism in the technical discussions in the Internet. I decided to focus on zooming with a particular cross-cutting example of a multilingualism aspect. I could speak about all of this. This is in the DNA of UNESCO.
Although we're an intergovernmental organisation, from the outset of the existence 80 years ago UNESCO was one of the organisations that they decided to send experts for building different document. If you see the idea that was approved by the general conference in the ten years ago during the previous WSIS review process, the concept of the interuniversity is associated with a set of indicators. UNESCO is recommending how the development of Internet should be assessed in a particular country. You remember that set of indicators is established and organised around the five pillars that's called Rome X, rights, openness, accessibility, and the M is multistakeholderism and the X is cross-cutting issues, like gender and so on.
Just to say from the outset, the message of UNESCO is if you want to assess the level of development of Internet in the particular country, most stakeholderism is one of the pillars of the assessment. This is the overall umbrella. Then let me focus very briefly on the example of multilingualism. UNESCO is the UN organisation among other things that are very first paragraph. To promote the free flow of ideas.
As you can imagine, there's no expression of free ideas without multistakeholderism. The free flow of ideas is not being guaranteed. This is the philosophical principle behind the UNESCO mandate to protect and promote multilingualism everywhere, including, of course, in the digital spaces. One of the intergovernmental programmes that I'm the secretary since 2001 has the group for information for multilingualism.
Although it is an intergovernmental programme, this specific group is confirmed by stakeholder configuration of experts and academics and Civil Society and so on and obviously governments. Then even before the Geneva agenda of the WSIS process in 2003, the UNESCO general conference approved the recommendation on multilingualism in the cyber space. Although it is an intergovernmental document, we do every four years with member states, we do ask specific questions about the integration of the different stakeholders on that. And then to finalise it for other concrete things that they expressed the importance of the multistakeholderism on that. When we did the process that many of you know, the guidelines for the governance of digital platforms was a massive multistakeholder endeavor. We received 10,000 comments. One of the specific pillars of the document is also about multilingualism. Then we have a world Atlas of languages that we invite in the multistakeholder community.
Finally, we are the secretariat of the different languages with the strong participation of the indigenous communities which is paramount for this. Currently, we are consulting and please participate and a global road map on languages and technologies, which include this conversation. I'm sure that will also speak a bit for that. Finally, before I guess there's I will also mention that we are very proud to partner with ICANN on the idea of universal acceptance for UNESCO and I'm sure for ICANN. One of the central aspects of the partnership is also try to be as inclusive as possible in the multistakeholder way, inviting the different actors to engage with the idea of universal acceptance and therefore implement what we are looking for on that.
So, I will stop here. As you saw, I could have chosen another example. I think the example of multilingualism is super interesting to also measure the idea of multistakeholderism in the technical space of the Internet. Thank you very much.
>> ANNE RACHEL INNE: Thank you, Guierllma.
[speaking a language the CART provider does not understand]
>> ANNE RACHEL INNE: Thank you very much. Theresa, you have the floor.
>> THERESA SWINEHART: Thank you. Thanks for being here. I was struck last night that people who play different instruments come together and create something and create an evening. A bit of an analogy to that, digital cooperation, multilingualism, the languages bring people together. It allows each other to be heard, a allows each other to engage and cooperate and to have that as part of the fundamental anchor in digital cooperation is essential, if we want to have the Internet really reach everybody and enable them that opportunity to communicate together.
So, it is an important part of the multistakeholder aspect. People come from different sectors and groups and come together. It is good to hear what they are saying and engage with that. As has been mentioned, we are pleased that we have a long‑standing partnership with UNESCO and MOU with them also on some very specific project areas. With that, the two organisations ‑‑ well, our mandates are quite different. The mission is quite different. We have a common goal of including enhanced linguistic representation, including in the domain name system to enable the full experience online as individuals in indigenous‑speaking populations have offline. That's quite important.
This year we started an additional partnership with UNESCO. That is on the universal acceptance day and this is an event that we have annually. This year, we had a good event with UNESCO as well. It is usually on or around the 28th of March. We've just two days ago published the report of all of the events that were held on 28th of March or around that date to demonstrate the approach and the results of all of those events that were held globally. I would encourage everybody to take a look at that recent report.
As I'll talk about later in my other remarks, universal accept stance is the concept that all valid domain names and e‑mail addresses work. In all Internet‑enabled applications, devices, and systems. Now this might sound quite straightforward. Actually on a technical level, it is feasible to do. We just have to make sure the applications and the platforms and all of that can deliver on those results. UA day is a chance for us to work together and create awareness around the fact that it is possible to have to the left or the right the eligibility to solve the useful representation in the tools that we're using in the digital environment. I'll touch on some of those later today in the session. In the meantime, thank you very much. We look forward to the conversation.
>> ANNE RACHEL INNE: Thank you very much, Theresa. I know that one of the thing that is I have noticed were for example, lately is that in the African region, particularly universal acceptance, is really picking up. So, yeah, being one of the places where we have the most languages, I think it is very important. It is even more important when you have 60 to 80% of our populations depending on the countries that will still in rural areas. That do not speak the French and English that we're speaking here. Great to see that happening. We're going to now open the panel discussion.
The first question is: how does participation in technical Internet governance contribute to more diverse and balanced stakeholder engagement in broader multistakeholder Internet governance? I'm going to give the floor to Valts first.
>> VALTS ENRSTREITS: Thank you. Thank you for giving me the floor. I come Latvia. In the indigenous communities. I've been working on 35 years hands on the ground. For the past year, I've been part of the international deacon on the international languages and global task force and currently co‑chairing on digital equalities and domains. Working hands on the ground. One thing that I've learned throughout this time is that sometimes, unlike in the real world, if you want to go one floor up, it is easier actually and faster than you go all the way to the roof and then come back down, down again. Let me give you an example from our own experience in Latvia. The language has indigenous status for 34 years already. Seems like locally, it should be developed. However, it is still a problem to use Livian in data systems. It basically leads to the fact that you cannot register your name or business name in the Lavoian language and use it in official domains. Now having the international dialogue and bringing that back whole. This has language and initiated the big changes throughout a couple of past years. We have been working internationally. We see the domestically. We now have our parliaments and state institutions look through the technicalities and using Livonian on official data systems. This is one example how you really truly involving and participating in the kind of global issues actually changed quite a lot domestically. Languages and generally a good example for involving multistakeholderism. They were developing the global road map and multilingualism. That is quite a task reaching multilingualism. Because getting all of the languages into digital domains was actually a complex task. Language is not just like the translation; languages are everywhere in every aspect of our lives. It is language in the car. So there's a need for very big stakeholder involvement, very diverse. Because it requires really the participation of government, academia, developers, general public, and language community themselves. What these documents like these and these initiatives they help to build awareness and also a dialogue bringing all of the stakeholders to the table and also helping to get the message out in explaining, explanations of why this is necessary and how we can actually tackle this.
Linguistic diversity is ‑‑ what is, for example, specific if we start catering instead of 200 languages, the technologies actually are working currently we need to cater to the other 70,000 or more languages and what is special in those cases. Those cases are extremely diverse. How GDPR and open science policies, for example, actually limit the use of the language in digital domains or how to reach representation of languages not just in the Internet, but on the cloud computing and cloud programmes that are gaining more and more popularity. How to do it there. Therefore ensure the universal acceptance. Starting from the top is relevant and especially it is one option how to get wide number of stakeholders involved especially in the world that's extremely diverse.
>> ANNE RACHEL INNE: Thank you very much. Absolutely. We need everybody. We need the linguists Beth, what do you have to say about how we come together to make this happen?
>> ELIZABETH BACON: Thank you, Anne‑Rachel
Am I ‑‑ can you hear? Every time. Thank you. He was the most awake. He volunteered to go first. I appreciate him. I'm a little bit less there.
So I think the question is about how participation in the technical Internet Goff can contribute to balanced stakeholder engagement and governance. You hear about the multistakeholder model is effective because of the technical nature of the Internet infrastructure. That makes it the most effective way to make sure the stakeholders are represented and involved. However, if that participation doesn't also mirror the stakeholders of the Internet governance and policy impacts, then we aren't using the model to the fullest extent. And really getting the most out of it that we can. While I think there are a few layers to participation in technical governance that can really contribute to the success of the model and the success of representation. As Valts and Theresa noted, things like UA and diversity of language representation is vitally important. But also key to that is including the diversity of views and skill sets. For me, I would focus on my participation in the digital and technical community not as an actual technical person. that can lead to the means to increase participation. If you not only have the diversity of languages and participation in that way. But if you have technical and policy and legal all of the universe of things that Internet governance and the use of the Internet can impact. In addition to the pure technical knowledge, I believe the diversity is vital to making sure that as you engage in technical Internet governance in the space, that you then have that A) broadens the stakeholder engagement, and it also really leads to rich, comprehensive policy. I used to work quite a lot with the U.S. government. We would have technical folks come in. We want this result. This is going to do the opposite. That's not how the Internet works.
If you don't have people bridging that gap and building that translation, because not everybody is good at everything, you end up with not a quality product. Getting folks to participate in the technical layer is having the translation there. I think if we can focus the foundation is the technology. And if the intergovernance has the business type, legal, and policy, and all of the things, I think it does result in a more comprehensive quality product that kind of stands the test of time.
>> ANNE RACHEL INNE: Thank you very much. I admire the translator part. In my first job I was a translator. Sitting between two people making sure you don't say it the wrong way at risk of provoking a world war was definitely my job.
>> AMIRTA CHOUDHURY: To start with a question, I'll give you a few examples. I work for CCUI, which was not that was mentioned there. We work on tech policy. The background and involvement in ICANN is to represent the end user communities especially from developing countries and Asia‑Pacific and India. If we are talking about participation and non‑technical people participating in the technical Internet governance, I'll cite a few examples. All of the panelist had been speaking about multilingualism and the universal acceptance has the domain names have to be compatible to the regional languages. How does it translate down when you go down to the grassroots? There have been some initiatives where volunteers have not only been building capacity off of the technical community as in the language communities as well as technologist who actually make products or services. Similarly, if you want the companies to listen to you, you have to have skilled people. If you wanted them to develop the programmes in technical undertaking in colleges, et cetera, so the skills can be built up. The younger generation of engineers can actually, you know, involve those things. They can go back to the jobs and at least to a certain extent they are equipped or aware these are things that you have to take care of. We can come back with feedback. There's a feedback loop. They can tell the technical community this is working or this is not working. It developing the ecosystem. It cannot be you say this is good. There has to be a system. That's where the different stakeholders come in. Similarly, the other thing is, you know, the domain name abuse is something which is spoken about in various ways. Now it has various dimensions. There are certain things that the technical community can look after and certain dimensions that are content related and some dimensions which is very social or which is, you know, normal day‑to‑day interpersonal. How do you break the silos, or the problem, and try to address it at a different level. At ICANN, they have been trying to come up with certain ‑‑ you know, working on how to address the domain name issue thing. At large, we're trying to simplify it or, for example, develop the module. It is a small module which we're developing on phishing which we want our community members to again educate their end user communities as to what they need too really take care of and how they need to, you know, the awareness part of it.
So that you can at least to a certain extent, reduce the harms. You can completely remove them, but at least at certain levels. Similarly, the domain name security which is important. The technical communities in part the training in the ISP or teleco or whoever does it. The ICANN or the community in ICANN is designing something. You need the acceptance from the community this is working or this is not working. For this kind of engagement is important. The other thing is important it builds skills looking for jobs. There are new avenues that come out for them.
For example, working on internationalised domain names, there may be a lot of other avenues of work coming up rather than the clichéd work. Jobs are scars today. AI is taking away jobs. Those are certain things I think we need to take care of. I hope I've been able to answer with these examples. Something of why this is important.
>> ANNE RACHEL INNE: Thank you very much, Amrita. I'm in agreement with you. One of the things we don't read in general is you spoke about teleco and ISP, for example. Even inside the technical community, there's a lot more people that we need to co‑op that are not like the regulars of the Internet per se world. And those are part of the stakeholders that we absolutely need to co‑op in the world. Thanks for that. We are going to now continue with the second question. How can digital cooperation be leveraged to build awareness in the capacity for underrepresented groups to engage in technical Internet governance. Beth, may I start with you?
>> ELIZABETH BACON: All right. I'm happy to. I think that one of the ‑‑ again there's maybe two prongs to this.
One is the existing folk that is are participating in the models and in the groups to be much more intentional about coordination between the groups. The IGF is a non‑decisional space. You can have big things and big ideas and run with it and do the conversations and ask hard questions in the safe space. You are not necessarily coming out. You don't have to agree at end. It is what it is for. It is a huge value. Then you go to the policy spaces, and it is a huge leap. We miss the leap for things that have been thought about and matured in the IGF‑type space with the really ‑‑ with a diversity of views. How do we intentionally push those things into other spaces when they are ready and when it is appropriate to the other space's scope? I'm just using ICANN. We also know IGF. We are here. I think the programme that brings in youth participants. I don't think we have any youth in the room. Sorry, you all look young. Geev raises his hand. Sorry, you aged out. There's a lot of policemans like that across the communities and groups that we work in.
So, if we lever only those well and dedicate the time to making that value as opposed to the box check, that could be very helpful. There's other things especially I'm going to ‑‑ I live in a little bit of an ICANN space, ICANN land, fellowships for when you are not a youth and you are trying to expand your views. There's fellowship and newcomer programs and they exist. Can we do a better job of making them robust and bringing the diversity of views and also really reminding ourselves it is not just about the participation; it is about humans and also taking those ideas and making sure we're cooperating and moving those into the right space.
>> ANNE RACHEL INNE: Wonderful. Thank you very much. May I ask you to also give an insight into this question?
>> SPEAKER: Sure.
I think we need to acknowledge how important it is the inclusion of underrepresented groups in the conversation. But we also need to acknowledge that we are far from guaranteeing it. Because it is difficult, because it costs money, because we are not fully prepared to do it. But we are happy, for example, having the discussions about multilingualism and the inclusion of the indigenous languages with the minor participation of the indigenous communities unfortunately. I'm very glad that Valts is here. It should be many more. We need to ‑‑ the first step for solving the problem is acknowledging that we have a problem and not put it under the carpet.
So, the entire technical community and Internet community needs to start recognising the idea of multistakeholderism also implies diversity within each stakeholder group. So when we look to Civil Society, it can't be the usual suspects of the digital rights communities. Nothing against them. Always present and around the table.
Again, it is easy to say, but it is not easy to do. Before I finish with that, before joining UNESCO, I worked with children's rights. With UNICEF and so on, we were trying to see the best way to include children in the conversation. It is super necessary, but it is not an easy thing. You need other methodologies and ways. I can finish with that. We just did in February the language and conference and we tried to actually bring indigenous communities.
Even our procurement systems are not adapted for that. You need to have a bank account to pay the per diem. The indigenous community is saying we don't have that particular bank account in the community. If we are going to be serious that, we need to take the high‑level titles and go into the specific of how to guarantee the participation. Thank you.
>> ANNE RACHEL INNE: Thank you very much. This is really, truly resonates. Just because I come from a place yesterday that we were talking about several things. Like how to make artificial intelligence and the work that's being done around that globally more diverse and in underrepresented communities. I come from a region that is very young. To be able to have very young people into the conversation is a challenge. They have to be there. It is their present and their future.
Theresa, do you want to say something ‑‑
>> THRESA SWINEHART: Sure. I think the youth is critical to be involved. They come from the era where it wasn't about the dial‑up and opening to connect, but the assumption the app is going to work. It takes something to make work. We had the opportunity recently in Bahrain actually to do a hack‑a‑thon with university students around designing a web site that could take universal domain names. We had 50 students to help solve the problem. We had to create a web site that could respond to questions that were posed and it could respond to questions in English or Arabic. It had to be able to process certain information in relation to the web site.
So, that sounds like a very simple task in principle. You design a web site; right? There's actually quite a bit of work that goes around it. It was amazing to watch these students. For two days, they were dedicated and spend time trying to solve this. They were incredibly creative and genus in all of their attempts. But it is a really good example of bridging the cooperation. The students are the future of the engineers and companies. They come in with awareness to your point solving the problems.
Just an example of how we can bridge in the next generation around that. But more specifically, if you have just few seconds. In relation to moving forward, there's more awareness and opportunities for ensuring underrepresented communities and indigenous languages and communities that may not be online at this point in time. That also relates to the opportunity to have your presentation online. In what we refer to as the next round top‑level domain. The chance to have to the right or the left of the dot depending upon if something is looking in character scripts.
With that, internationalised domain names will clearly provide an opportunity for further opportunities for different language groups and for that bridging of digital cooperation from the technical side but also then into the policy side and potentially even political opportunities for regions communities to be represented fully in the way that they are and that they want to do. The opportunities there are multifold. There's also the opportunity for community‑based, top‑level domains and that is quite common. We have seen that in the context of different communities coming together. We hope to see that opportunity really for communities that currently may want to have also their digital presence online. We've seen it in the context in the past also with regards to cities or communities. You know, dot Amsterdam or dot Vien. It is not always about the digital model, but having the presence online and bridging the cooperation from the technical into the community and into schools and education and health care and all of those.
Part of the programme also provides applicant support for communities that qualify. I'll do a shout out to my colleague, Kristy over here. If you have any questions, she can provide you with anything that you may want to know. And that is very much open to non‑profits, indigenous groups, small businesses, and NGOs that might not have the resources to participate fully in the application process. We want to make sure there's opportunities afforded there.
These are some examples of very practical things that we're undertaking right now to bridge the digital cooperation into other areas and create awareness for anybody that wishes to be participating in any of the endeavors. That programme will start early next year in April.
>> ANNE RACHEL INNE: Wonderful. I look forward to it. Valts, do you want to add anything around how to bring underrepresented communities here?
>> VALTS ENRSTREITS: A little bit. Because I have a couple of points. They are somehow in concordance what is what already sounded.
Again, many of my examples, good or bad, come from my own experience. We had an expedition that went out to one area. The other colleagues are going through the different solutions asking the same questions. Do you have any and all of the institutions said no, no, no. A week later what happened is the local newspaper found out. They went through the same places. Asking the same question, basically and in one week all of the institutions started to say, well, yes, we have plenty of it.
It took a week to see if the situation completely changed. This is something similar with the kind of digital cooperation that we have at international deacon of the languages. There was a survey that went out in March. A survey of indigenous languages. The task was to collect data, so that we could make informed decisions and we could better understand actual position of the indigenous languages. There's a big part on digital domains and digital issues, including what kind of technologies that you have, so what kind of technical issues that you have or how do you see them?
On one hand, this is data collection. On the other hand, this is actually an opportunity for communities to look in the mirror and maybe to ‑‑ for the first time to consider. There are those things out there. Should we have there? Can we build it? And this is something that initiates the process. The first way to leverage is being or making underrepresented groups noticed and kind of giving them the idea that we can do something or there's out of something. There's something that we could be involved. This kind of launches the process.
The next level of leveraging is the consolidation and accumulation of knowledge. One thing that we need, especially now talking about multilingualism, we need the designated networking platforms to connect the dots like repositories or forums like this. This is also something that is planned in the road map. But more focused way. Because if we think about underrepresented groups, this ‑‑ those subjects or these are not kind of mainstream subjects. These are not mainstream. This is not mainstream knowledge. And at the same time, we're entering the new era in technology‑wise. So the era of tailored solutions. We need those kind of niche platforms that we can talk cross sectors and innovate. And bring more solutions.
So, in this sense, I think that multilingualism is kind of our testing ground. So on the road, towards the customization. Because if we can't do it, then we can do everything. If we can't, then it is actually the question of how what good are we with all of that we know. At the end of the day, the technology is moving where it should be capable. Getting voices heard and getting the platforms. How they are not mainstream, but also underrepresented the different globes on being heard and being learned from is actually crucial.
>> ANNE RACHEL INNE: Thank you very much, Valts. Amrita, you were the member and someone when has participated in the national, you know, IGFs and regional IGFs. I want you to maybe bring out to the community here some of the ways that this digital cooperation actually works also on a regional and kind of local level. So all of this can maybe tie together and localise.
>> AMIRTA CHOUDHURY: Right. Thank you. I can mix a few things and speak now. I'll take an APEC example. That's where I belong from. If you look at it, there are fellowships which, for example, ICANN gives NextGen which is young. There are certain fellowships. Like the Asia Pacific region. We fellowship. Now we have a lot of diverse people coming in from different countries. As in we try to get people from places. We are ‑‑ it is not possible to get everyone.
For example, someone from Mongolia which is pretty under represented. Once you bring them, highway do you retain them? What we've been trying to do is create WhatsApp gripes. You have to meet the young people where they are, not the way we want. We have subcommittees form on many things.
We have the continuous improvement process, the subcommittee young people. We have someone that's mentoring them. They make and work and feel empowered. If the names are there at end, we have the newsletter and people working together to form something. If you get them into the system and empower them and keep on giving them information, this is the opportunity. This is what you can do. They also can think.
If they are interested in the rights, we encourage them to take it back from the communities and discuss, so they can get more people. This is the steps that have worked. There are many young people who have been funded or coming from a particular region. They are pretty shy. There are many newcomers in IGF. Trying to get them together, speaking to them, getting them introduced to people, or taking a picture with them helps them empowering them, so they are motivated. You have to keep the motivation on. They have jobs to think of and their careers. You have to excite them to be there in the space. It is not always despising. Thank you.
>> ANNE RACHEL INNE: Thank you very much, Amrita. I use one word, hand holding. It is really accompanied people into seeing and believing in how is it that they can interact with other people, because they feel empowered. They have the arguments know how to talk. How do we get technical people to talk to the regular people, like policymakers, so they understand, you know, why some GDPR, you know, decisions may break the machine or not? Those are really some of the issues that we are facing. It is all about making sure that we communicate in the right way. Let's make sure that nothing is being lost in translation.
Thank you all. I think we're now going to open the floor for audience participation. If you have questions out there or maybe online, Kristy? No? Okay. All right. You have mics on both sides. Thank you very much. Please introduce yourself. Go ahead.
>> AUDIENCE: Hi. I'm Dominick. I'm in the World Wide Web Organisation. We have an international programme that's about making web pages work across as many languages and cultures as possible for the ICANN for the domain names. One of the structural issues that we have in the programme is getting enough contact and input from the right expert across so many languages that exist. We already have some networks. I wonder if there's something that whether it is the original IGF or UNESCO that could help in providing the source of constant expertise.
We have the basic knowledge about what is needed, but unless you get to the right expert that has the deep knowledge about how the language needs to work for really make the web for the full potential, we can't do the full amount of work that we want to. Do you have any suggestions about how we can structure better the expertise?
>> ANNE RACHEL INNE: Well, you are at the right door. I'm pretty sure we have someone that knows how to respond to this. UNESCO is one of the place that we have a collective of linguists that can help.
>> SPEAKER: Thank you. Very interesting question. Two quick things. One, please do ‑‑ everyone here you, including you ‑‑ do look into the road map on the languages and technology that's currently open for consultations and make your contributions to the document.
What you said could be if it is not yet there I read and can't remember this kind of corporation. It is important to make sure it is there. Two quick things, you can come to speak with me and Valts at the end of the session. Organisations like the World Wide Consortium and similar, you can write to us at the secretariat of the indigenous languages and make this offer. We are ready to cooperate with these experts for improving that. We can connect you with the huge communities that are under the umbrella. We can connect you with the local national points.
Of course, it is ‑‑ we do this in the anonymous way. We sense to them your offer is for them to decide if they want to contribute or not. But please feel free to contact me. We can advance on that. Thank you.
>> ANNE RACHEL INNE: Wonderful. Before I give you the floor, Theresa wanted to add a little something.
>> THRESA SWINEHART: Yeah. They may touch on this. Happy to exchange contact information to compliment what UNESCO is doing in relation to some of the very specific technical areas. We also have the ‑‑ what's referred to as LGR, the Label Generation Rule set. They are working with very specific communities on the areas around the domain name system and the rules for that. That might implement ask security councils to yet another group that could be of help. Or at least know where to go. Happy to exchange information on that.
>> ANNE RACHEL INNE: Thank you very much, Theresa.
>> AUDIENCE: Edwin Chung. Just adding what Theresa said and the context around what is called the Label Generation Rules is looking at all of the languages and scripts around the world and defining policies for defining names that can or should be used on the domain name system. Therefore, ICANN and the community spent the time developing all of the policies for the different languages to deal with the abuse issues and so on. The group has basically gone through all of the scripts and languages that are live. I guess in terms of the actively being used. You can look at the ‑‑ what is called the ‑‑ it is called the generation panel. That doesn't mean anything.
They are local communities and local experts of linguists. They include linguists as well as technologies and engineers to look at what the policies need to be. So that group might be, you know, actually it is readily available on the ICANN web site. You can check it out. That should give you a good sense of all of the people around you.
Thank you.
>> ANNE RACHEL INNE: Thank you very much, Edwin.
Kristy, do we have any questions online? Okay. All right. Beth wanted to chime in.
>> ELIZABETH BACON: I wanted to ask a question that maybe we cannot answer your question. LGRs are great. That's important for the technical aspect. You were asking about actual translation and content. I hate to run right by it. I don't necessarily have an answer. I think that's something that we have certainly run into at PIR.org. We have several IDNs. It is incredibly difficult to translate as we all well know. Just making sure we're answering your question; you can tell me we're very wrong. Maybe that's something we take away. That's a very universal issue.
>> ANNE RACHEL INNE: Thank you very much, Beth. You are absolutely right on that point. So you wanted to add a little something?
>> AUDIENCE: Just to clarify, we are happy to hear ideas in strengthening the support for the technical community. Again, another way we can better involve as many communities as possible is by making our specifications available in the many languages of the old. We have a programme for that. But again it is a voluntary map and the more people that we have that can contribute to the programme or maybe there's something you need that we could work as a group on.
>> ANNE RACHEL INNE: Wonderful. Communication. Communication. Communication. Valts, you wanted to add something to this one too?
>> VALTS ENRSTREITS: Yeah. Just to add a little bit about contact. I do really understand the problem of getting the right person. Especially when it comes to languages and the diverse landscape of language situations. That was previously mentioning this survey of indigenous languages. One part of the survey of one function of the survey is that we also ask for those people who are responding for the future involvement. We are doing through the survey; we're looking precisely through finding the right persons who are pro-official and answering questions about the language and who can be a contact point directly for that particular language community. I would encourage to follow up all of the developments regarding international of indigenous languages and the road map and, yeah. Just contact later.
>> ANNE RACHEL INNE: Thank you very much, Valts. We have less than two minutes left. I know they are going to stop the mics very soon. Whoever wants to jump in to talk about the one action maybe that we can take in the next 6‑12 months. We haven't talked about the dictating of indigenous languages and real participation, and meaningful participation in technical discussions coming from everywhere. We can't leave anybody behind. And all of this.
Who wants to add that one little bit that we need to do? To make sure that we have a real participation in multistakeholder participation?
>> VALTS ENRSTREITS: Maybe I will jump on this. In the next 6‑12 months, I think that, I know that I was talking maybe multilingualism. There's one thing that is very much beginning the future. It will happen somewhere in the period is the road map on the multi lingualist in the area. There will be the development of the action plan above the concrete actions and practicalities and how to bring it to life. I would call everyone to participate in that as well together with us.
>> ANNE RACHEL INNE: Thank you very much. Eight seconds. I guess I'm just going to say thank you very much for coming here this morning. Thank you for braving the morning and being here with us. Thanks to all of my panelists. Have a great day.
