This is apart from the question of the large number of consultations limited to stakeholders.

I agree we should be watching this (and I'm sure you'll have noticed there's a mailing list for notification of new consultations.) What we need is a certain degree of method in working towards policy recommendations or position statements (no, I don't think I'm telling you anything new).

What Alex referred to above, that we discussed with Alexandra in WMass during the Toulouse meet-up, had more to do with bringing together an informative synthesis of work we have already contributed here, and which is now parceled out in numerous diaries that are not necessarily easy to dredge up with the Search functions. The Wiki is useful, and Colman's Archives addition at pagehead too, but we were thinking of ways (and this links with your discussion some time back with Colman of different types of interactive software enabling community work on a document, for example -- that's in Community network technology ruminations) of pulling together information, links, and an overview (including summary of diverging views where necessary) of some major topics we have already quite extensively discussed.

My feeling is that groundwork of this kind would greatly help in formulating policy proposals.