Dynamic Coalition on Open Standards (DCOS)

The DCOS was the very first Dynamic Coalition announced at the Internet Governance Forum (IGF) in Athens, Greece. The initial announcement is online here. The first discussions took place in Athens during the IGF 2006 workshop on Open Standards. FSFE is one of the initial partners of the DCOS, and FSFE president Georg Greve is part of the DCOS interim steering committee.

It is important to understand that the coalition is still forming, including partners from governments, industry and non-governmental organisations. The following information was distributed during the IGF workshop in Athens in 2006, and provides a first idea of the Dynamic Coalition:

IGF Dynamic Coalition on Open Standards 

IGF 2006, Athens, Greece

What: 

The IGF Dynamic Coalition on Open Standards (IGF DCOS) will frame and
define the most urgent problems related to open technology standards
and application interoperability and suggest straightforward, workable
solutions that can be implemented by all stakeholders. In support of
Paragraph 90j of the Tunis Agenda, which reaffirms the commitment of
all WSIS stakeholders to ``developing and implementing e-government
applications based on open standards in order to enhance the growth
and interoperability of e-government systems, at all levels,
furthering access to government information .... thereby furthering
access to government information and services and contributing to
building ICT networks and developing services that are available
anywhere and anytime, to anyone and on any device,'' IGF DCOS will
focus on best practices in government policy and procurement practices
for public documents and services.

IGF DCOS will pay particular attention to the needs of developing
economies, including capacity building, technology transfer, access
and other requirements.

The coalition will host an open mailing list and hold several meetings
(location and dates to be determined) before presenting its progress
at the 2007 IGF in Rio de Janeiro.

Who:

The IGF DCOS interim steering committee is tasked with some
organizational details, but substantive work will be done by the IGF
DCOS membership. The interim steering committee of the IGF DCOS
includes representatives from key stakeholder groups.

Government   Brazil, Rogerio Santanna 

Standards Organization   World Wide Web Consortium, Daniel Dardailler

Industry   Sun Microsystems, Susy Struble ;
           Free Software Foundation Europe, Georg Greve 

Civil Society   Consumer Project on Technology, Jamie Love ;
                IP Justice, Robin Gross 

Academia   Yale Information Society Project, Laura DeNardis;
           Bibliotheca Alexandrina, Professor Magdy Nagi

Other supporters and participants include the Library of Alexandria,
the Electronic Frontier Foundation, and the South Centre Innovation,
Access to Knowledge and Intellectual Property Programme (IAIPP).

Membership in the IGF DCOS is open. For more information and to join,
please visit the Consumer Project for Technology web site.

The IGF DCOS mailing list is open. For details and to sign up, visit
http://mailman.ctyme.com/listinfo/openstds

How: 

The IGF DCOS work will be based on the core principles of the Internet
itself and best practices established by the Internet's leading
standards organizations, the IETF and W3C: openness, rough consensus,
and when appropriate, ``running code,'' meaning existing best
practices.


Over the next few weeks, the interim steering committee will outline
the lightweight processes by which the coalition's work will be done
as well as participant responsibilities. As the IGF DCOS believes in
transparency and knowledge sharing, it will publish its work in an
open standard format and offer services based on open technology
standards.  Contributions to the IGF DCOS and discussions within the
IGF DCOS are not confidential. We expect the steering committee will
have some quality control over the group's content and process, but
divergent viewpoints on topics of study are welcomed. Should the IGF
DCOS not be able to reach a rough consensus, our goal will be to
provide clarity around the argument, the divergence and its origins
(who has different views and why) so that more informed decisions can
be made.

Additional Information

• The DCOS web page:
  http://igf-dcos.org
• The DCOS is listed as one of the Dynamic Coalitions on the official IGF web page:
  http://www.intgovforum.org/Dynamic%20Coalitions.php
• To join the DCOS, please subscribe to the mailing list at
  http://mailman.ctyme.com/listinfo/openstds
• Read FSFE's substantial contribution to the 2006 IGF:
  Sovereign Software: Open Standards, Free Software, and the Internet