SEEDIG 2017 Ohrid — In-Depth Report: Minutes Digest & 3-Line Summary

The 3-Line Summary

1. On 24–25 May 2017 the third SEEDIG met in Ohrid, in what is now North Macedonia, under the theme 'Digital development: Turning challenges into opportunities' — its first two-day edition, held jointly with the International Regulatory Conference (IRC) 2017.
2. Fake news and media literacy, broadband, IoT, open data and cybersecurity dominated; the takeaways became the SEEDIG 2017 Messages, and the first Youth School and Fellowship Programme ran alongside.
3. By bringing the Internet governance and telecom-regulatory communities into one room, Ohrid tested a bridge-building formula that regional forums elsewhere still cite.

Welcome — this is the Japan IGF Support Organization. This in-depth report on SEEDIG 2017 in Ohrid draws on official outputs, session records and on-site reporting. In a hurry? The three lines above and the diagrams carry the gist.

📍 Held in Ohrid as catalogued; at the time the country was known as the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (renamed North Macedonia in 2019)

Conference at a Glance (from official records)

(See the source list at the end of this article.)

Discussion Digest — from the Session Records

Key exchanges extracted from session records and transcripts.

1. Internet Governance: A Puzzle or a Tower of Babel? — Rebuilding Trust

Sessions: Session 'Internet governance: A puzzle or a Tower of Babel?' (policy day)

• Restoring trust through multistakeholder models was the central thread, with participants affirming that preserving the openness and network neutrality of the Internet is important [2]
• The session flagged the tension between fast-evolving technology and slower regulatory processes, calling for collaborative action to modernise governance frameworks [2]

2. Fake News and Media Literacy — A Remedy for 'Fast Food Media'

Sessions: Session on fake news, misinformation and media literacy

• Propaganda, fake news and poor journalism should be distinguished from one another [2]
• 'Media literacy consists of digital skills, critical thinking, and communication skills' (SEEDIG 2017 Messages) [2]
• Countering the problem of 'fast food media' requires addressing socio-economic environments, not education alone [2]

3. Broadband, IoT and Open Data — Scaffolding for Digital Development

Sessions: Sessions on broadband, IoT and open data

• Competition is important for broadband deployment, but government support for market conditions remains essential; clearer definitions of access speeds were a practical recommendation [2]
• IoT benefits were acknowledged across sectors, but privacy and security concerns ran deep — the Messages recorded the warning that 'data can be protected, but people will always find a way to misuse it' [2]
• On open data, participants urged involving non-state actors and having public institutions use platforms to increase citizen understanding, flagging centralised architectures and inconsistent data standardisation as obstacles [2]

4. Cybersecurity and IDNs — A Region Short on Policy Consistency

Sessions: Sessions on cybersecurity and internationalised domain names

• Education, awareness and a good security strategy were affirmed as the foundations of cybersecurity, with high-level stakeholder coordination proposed to fix policy inconsistencies across countries [2]
• IDNs, which support multilingualism in this diverse region, face implementation barriers; the primary recommendation was an awareness campaign involving all stakeholders [2]

5. Merging with the Regulators — Joint IRC 2017 and the First Youth School

Sessions: Overall format (24 May: capacity development; 25 May: policy discussions)

• The meeting was held jointly with the International Regulatory Conference (IRC) 2017, deliberately bridging the Internet governance and telecom-regulatory communities [1][3][4]
• The host was the national regulator, the Agency for Electronic Communications (AEK); planning stayed bottom-up, with 74 open proposals and public online organising meetings [1][3][4]
• The first SEEDIG Youth School and Fellowship Programme ran here, launching what became flagship capacity-building tracks [1][3][4]

Three-Minute Short Talk — Your Questions Answered

Q. So what did the meeting decide?

A. It's a dialogue forum, not a decision-making body — but the takeaways were documented as the SEEDIG 2017 Messages and circulated to governments, regulators and international processes.

Q. What was the most debated topic?

A. How to deal with fake news. Participants separated propaganda, fake news and poor journalism, and argued that education alone won't fix it — the socio-economic environment behind 'fast food media' needs addressing too.

Q. Why should I care?

A. Ohrid's experiment of fusing an Internet governance forum with a telecom regulators' conference is a template for connecting technical policy communities that usually talk past each other.

What Is SEEDIG? (for first-time readers)

SEEDIG is a National or Regional IGF Initiative (NRI), aligning local internet governance discussion with global IGF principles.

Why It Matters to You

What was discussed here becomes the baseline for national digital policy, platform rules and AI regulation worldwide within a few years. The principles confirmed at the 2017 meeting are the foundation of the "next rules" for the phones, social platforms and AI services you use every day.

Sources & References

1. SEEDIG 2017 — SEEDIG（公式） (accessed 2026-07-11)
2. Messages from SEEDIG 2017 — SEEDIG（公式） (accessed 2026-07-11)
3. SEEDIG 2017 — DiploFoundation (accessed 2026-07-11)
4. SEEDIG Annual Report 2017 — SEEDIG（公式） (accessed 2026-07-11)
5. South Eastern European Dialogue on Internet Governance (SEEDIG) — APC (accessed 2026-07-11)
6. South Eastern European Dialogue on Internet Governance — Wikipedia（英語版） (accessed 2026-07-11)

Quotes are translated or condensed from the records listed above. Bracketed numbers [n] refer to the source list.

Related links

• IGF official (NRI list): https://www.intgovforum.org/en/content/national-and-regional-igf-initiatives
• Japan IGF: https://japanigf.jp/
• Yuki Nakazawa's blog: https://nkzw.jp/category/igf/

Revision History

Rev. 1 — published 21 May 2017, 16:00 (Article published)

Rev. 2 — updated 11 July 2026, 02:14 (Fully revised into the in-depth edition: added the 3-line summary, minutes digest, short talk, source list and diagrams (all quotes verified against the listed sources))

— 中澤祐樹