Internet Society India Kolkata Chapter organized a talk on ‘Activities and Opportunities for Engagement with the IETF’ held by Internet Society Fellow Vinayak Hegde, on Saturday 26 of February, 2011 from 16:30 to 19:30 IST at the Calcutta Club.
This was probably the first time that the IETF had been introduced to the netizens of Kolkata and attendance consisted primarily of academics and CIOs of local organizations. Vinayak talked about how the IETF works, the work it does, his personal experiences with the IETF and the ways in which Internet Society members can participate and contribute to the Internet protocol standards process.
In response to Vinakay’s statement that ‘everyone must play nicely’ for the Internet to work, the audience was particularly interested in the IETF and the Internet Society’s stance and response to the Internet outage in Egypt. Anupam Agarwal, Anand Raje and Niel Hirjee provided input from time to time on issues which fell outside the scope of the IETF discussion.
An Internet Society member from Ghazipur, Sri Narendra Kumar Rai of Ashok Sansthan was invited to say a few words about his organization and its activities. He outlined the diverse, award winning projects undertaken by Ashok Sansthan and invited the Internet Society India Kolkata Chapter (and also other Internet Society Chapters in India) to collaborate with Ashok Sansthan to spread awareness about the internet in the Ghazipur region of Uttar Pradesh.
The entire event was streamed live, a first for the Chapter. Five registered users and a few unregistered users viewed the event remotely.
After the formal conclusion of the talk a small group of participants cornered Vinayak and continued their discussions until we were politely reminded that the hall was required for the next event.
Travel and accommodation expenses for Sri Narendra Kumar Rai and Vinayak Hegde were reimbursed by the Chapter. More events of this kind should be conducted to spread awareness and encourage participation in the IETF from this part of the world.