With thanks to ISOC global we’re pleased to report back on our AGM held on September 19 2017. The event was a success and the chapter is rejuvenated with three new committee members. We welcome on board Enrico Calendro, an esteemed policy analyst who works at Research ICT Africa will lead the ISOC-ZA policy working group, and is involved in our WIDER project. Luke Neville, who is an interested computer science student at the University of Cape Town, will lead our youth initiatives and Kobie Hyman, a communications expert from Umbono Communications will assist in all ISOC-ZA communications and has kindly dedicated her time to assist with this meeting. Please see included the AGM report.

ISOC-ZA salutes Wikimedia South Africa http://www.wikimedia.org.za/ on some great successes in adding South African languages to Wikipedia. We recommend board member Ian Gilfillan’s blog post which highlights the main contributors. ISOC-ZA supports any member wishing to apply for a grant to assist to sustain and grow this activity.

We recently met ISOC Libya at the ICANN #59 and agreed to make an informal partnership as we did when meeting ISOC China some few years back. These local ISOC organisations are not yet affiliated with ISOC global yet have similar thinking to all of Internet Society. Our Italian contemporary recently referred to the term “Internet Orthodoxy”, a standards based open internet for everyone.

We’re sharing some of this web site analytics to show that of course our visitors are primarily from South Africa and we welcome more visitors from China and South Korea than the US!

ION Durban will take place on Thursday, 7 September 2017, alongside the South African iWeek. iWeek includes events with the ISP Association (ISPA), the South African Network Operators’ Group (SAFNOG), and the South African Domain Name Authority (ZADNA).

We’ll have a full-day program so we can cover topics including IPv6, DNSSEC, Securing BGP, and TLS for Applications.
ION Conferences bring network engineers and leading industry experts together to discuss emerging technologies and hot technology topics. Early adopters provide valuable insight into their own deployment experiences and bring participants up to speed on new standards emerging from the IETF.

The Internet Society’s 25th anniversary is a time to celebrate our global community and our collective actions to preserve the open Internet and defend its underlying principles. To commemorate this milestone, we are meeting to party and review many activities and to look ahead to the future. #thenext25

RSVP!

On the Facebook Event page here

If any members are interested to learn how the Internet is governed (i.e. not by ‘governments’ like the old telephone system was in the ITU) then those of us in Joburg have a fortunate once in a lifetime (free) opportunity to attend the 59th global ICANN meeting.

ICANN meetings are held three times each year in different regions of the globe to enable attendees from around the world to participate in person. One meeting each year is also the organization’s annual general meeting, during which new Board members take their seats.

ICANN meetings are free and officially run five days (Monday to Friday). There are also a few pre-meeting workshops and working sessions when the volunteer members of our supporting organizations and advisory committees initiate their work.

ICANN meetings offer the best opportunity for face-to-face discussions and airing of opinions among knowledgeable people dedicated to the continued stable and secure operation of the Internet.

ICANN meetings offer a variety of sessions such as workshops, open forums, and working meetings on the development and implementation of Internet policies.

We support the principle that Internet access is a basic human right. In solidarity with our ISOC Cameroon brothers and sisters, we call on the government to reinstate access in two regions. http://www.internetsociety.cm/

ISOC Cameroon calls government to unblock the internet

The Human Rights Council, guided by the Charter of the United Nations,

reaffirms the human rights and fundamental freedoms enshrined in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and relevant international human rights treaties, including the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights,

Noting that the exercise of human rights, in particular the right to freedom of expression, on the Internet is an issue of increasing interest and importance as the rapid pace of technological development enables individuals all over the world to use new information and communication technologies,

Noting also the importance of building confidence and trust in the Internet, not least with regard to freedom of expression, privacy and other human rights so that the potential of the Internet as, inter alia, an enabler for development and innovation can be realized, with full cooperation between governments, civil society, the private sector, the technical community and academia,

Recognizing that privacy online is important for the realization of the right to freedom of expression and to hold opinions without interference, and the right to freedom of peaceful assembly and association,

Emphasizing that access to information on the Internet facilitates vast opportunities for affordable and inclusive education globally, thereby being an important tool to facilitate the promotion of the right to education, while underlining the need to address digital literacy and the digital divide, as it affects the enjoyment of the right to education,

Expressing concern that many forms of digital divides remain between and within countries and between men and women, boys and girls, and recognizing the need to close them,

Stressing the importance of empowering all women and girls by enhancing their access to information and communications technology, promoting digital literacy and the participation of women and girls in education and training on information and communications technology, and encouraging women and girls to embark on careers in the sciences and information and communications technology,

Read the full document here.

iWeek – South Africa’s leading annual Internet industry conference – celebrates its 15th Year of existence at the Wanderers Club, Johannesburg, South Africa from 19 – 23 September 2016. This is such an auspicious occasion as co-hosts ISPA and INX-ZA look back on the enormous changes that have taken place in the industry since that first small gathering in 2001.

The conference and the audience have evolved along the way and for some years now, the event has been supported by a number of partners, which include the Wireless Access Providers’ Association (WAPA), the ZA Central Registry, the ZA Domain Name Authority (ZADNA), and South African chapters of the Internet Society. 2015 saw a bumper year in the number of delegates passing through the doors.

What’s more, ISPA will be celebrating its 20th birthday and WAPA its 10th birthday. INX-ZA will also be celebrating the 20th birthday of the Johannesburg Internet exchange. This is therefore the perfect occasion to represent and market your organisation as the industry comes together for this unique year of celebration.

A wide variety of tutorials, seminars, training sessions and workshops running in parallel to the plenary events will be provided by the partners, ensuring that a range of interesting and relevant topics are presented to industry.

Both ISPA and WAPA hold their Annual General Meetings as part of iWeek, attracting members from both organisations to the event. Other participants include the Wi-Fi Forum SA and the South African ICT Industry Associations’ Forum. Attendees to iWeek each year are ISP and WISP representatives, managers and business owners. In addition, iWeek also attracts a broad selection of Internet governance stakeholders, the legal fraternity, hardware vendors, academia, representatives from non-profit organisations working in the Internet space, and important government representatives.

There are a wide variety of sponsorship opportunities available to suit the pocket including a number of cost- effective exhibition tables. Sponsorship allows your organisation to market its services to the core Internet audience in South Africa, and position itself as an active player in the industry. It provides an excellent opportunity to network with leading industry stakeholders, developers and customers. If interested, please contact Elaine Zinn at iweek@ispa.org.za or call +27 83 327 4806. The information can also be found here: http://www.iweek.org.za/sponsor/

Remember to pre-register by going to the website: http://www.iweek.org.za/

The conference is STILL free to attendees. Please share this notice with your clients, suppliers and other interested parties. Thank you.

ISOC-ZA is proudly the first ISOC chapter we can find to have an IPv6 enabled web site.

IPV6 enabled