Contribution to the Working Group on Internet Governance (WGIG),
first consultation meeting 20-21 September, 2004. Geneva
Sep 13, 2004

IGTF-J (Internet Governance Task Force of Japan)
www.igtf.jp/eIntroduction:
Internet Governance Task Force of Japan is a joint group, established in August 2004 by
individuals and organizations from the Japanese Internet Community and Private
Sector to engage in the activities of the Working Group on Internet Governance（WGIG）
called for by WSIS to achieve safe and trusted global framework of Internet operationand application through maintaining and further developing private sector-led
management. We welcome the full and active participation approach adopted by theDeclaration of the Principles and Plan of Actions of the WSIS Geneva Summit. We
believe the WGIG process offers us a tremendous opportunity for the international
community to achieve full consensus on this difficult and important subject and we areexcited to be able to work together with the members of the Working Group to produce
its fruitful and constructive outcome.
1 Scope of WorkTo achieve the objective described in the WSIS Geneva Documents, the Working Groupshould carry out the following tasks:a) Identifying the issues around Internet operation and application that require
world-wide discussion and examinationb) Collecting the basic facts and relevant data and informationc) Stocktaking the activities already in place, evaluating what is and what is notworking, and analyzing their reasonsd) Prioritizing the matters of importancee) Enlisting possible options and solutions where improvements and innovations arefound to be necessaryf) Defining the roles of actors in each sector (Government, Private Sector, Civil Societyand International organizations) in relation with the above options and solutions
The Working Group should stick to the subject of Internet Governance in its accurate
and clear scope, concentrate on core and/or urgent issues that require international
cooperative activities only, should refrain from expanding or interfering with otherareas of policy concerns already addressed in reasonable degree.

12 Basic Principles

Be Independent
The Working Group should be an independent body organized directly under theauspices of the Secretary-General of the United Nations. We believe that the very ideaof asking Secretary-General of the United Nations to setup this Working Group as theoutcome of the WSIS Geneva is to provide an independent process outside the WSIS’s
intergovernmental political negotiation of the PrepCom.

Be objective and rational
The nature of this Working Group should not be regarded as a political negotiation, but
it should be an objective study of the issues relevant to the Internet Governance. The
result of the activities of the Working Group should be based on facts and technological,
economical and social reasons outside political biases.

Be Transparent
We expect the Working Group should operate in a fully open and transparent manner.
All minutes and other outputs of the official Working Group meetings should be madepublicly available in major languages. The drafts of the reports at their interim andfinal stage must reflect the consideration of comments received and explain how thosecomments were taken into account.
3 General Structure1) General Composition
We request that the structure of the Working Group should be composed so that theopinions of the following various stakeholders would be fully reflected.
a) Governments, the private sector, civil society and international organizations.
b) Developing and developed economies of the world.
c) People in all the regions of the world.
d) Users and providers/operators of Internet services.
e) Women and men.
The size of the Working Group should be a reasonable one to encompass the diversity
and balance required as above, but in order to be effective and efficient to produce theresult within the given limited time, it should not be too large to accommodate
everything.
We suggest to have 15 to 20 members for the efficiency, but in order to accommodate
diversity, some 15 to 20 more people can be added as subcommittee members in theirfields of expertise.

2We suggest that the WG will have three co-chairs, one from each sector for mutualconsensus and good division of labor.

2) Qualifications of the members
We suggest that members of the Working Group should have expertise in at least one ofthe following areas:a) Technical fieldb) Policy areac) Internet development and operationd) Business development by Internete) Social service activitiesf) ICT for development in developing economiesg) End-users perspectives
They should be able to sincerely devote sufficient amount of time for the real work
themselves and to communicate with many parties interested in participating theprocess outside of the Working Group.
We also expect that upon selection of the members, a brief descriptive statement will be
published that explains how each member meets the qualification requirements.

4 Working Methods

Open and closed meetings
We expect the Working Group will have face-to-face meetings as its core activity,
supplemented by conference calls and online discussion among its members. While we
recognize that closed meetings are the way to concentrate and produce actual work, we
also strongly suggest holding an open consultation meeting prior to each major WG
meeting. Regional and sub-regional open consultation meetings and other processes arealso recommended.
Languages
We suggest the following measures to be taken to involve the broadest possible
participation and promote mutual understandings overcoming language barriers.
a) Real-time capturing of the speeches in Open Consultation meetings and displaying
them in the large screen, which is similar to the one exercised at ICANN meetings, inaddition to the simultaneous interpretation to the major languages, as they are very
helpful for non-native speakers of the working language.

3b) Translation of official documents
We expect that the working language of the WG is in English (or major UN languages),but translation of official minutes and documents into major languages including
Japanese should be provided.
c) Contribution in any language should be accepted
Any language of the world should be accepted for all the comments and contributions
submitted to the Working Group. The secretariat should publish them at the official
website as their original form and translate them into major languages.
d) Voluntary translation platform
In case the above-mentioned translation of the contributions is difficult for the financial
constraint, we suggest that the secretariat will select most important contributions
through appropriate selection measures and translate them in full or summarizedversions, and then provide a common platform that would allow voluntary translation ofany document to be shared over the website. We are ready to suggest more specifics ifrequested.
Internet Governance Task Force of Japan
Chairman: Prof. Shumpei Kumon (University of Tama)
Full Member:
Japan Internet Providers Association (JAIPA)
Japan Network Information Center (JPNIC)
Japan Registry Services (JPRS)Internet Association Japan (IA Japan)
Associate member:Internet Users Network
New Institute for Social Knowledge and Collaboration, University of Tama
Institute for HyperNetwork Society

For more information, please contact:
Internet Governance Task Force Secretariat:
Tel: +81-3-3402-8180 E-mail: sec@igtf.jp www.igtf.jp/e4