protocol

	The Goals of ICN The aim of the international competition network is to provide the readers of of partner's web site with the most up to date international competition listing. To achieve this goal, a network comprised with a site by country or region is being set up. Each site is in this association charge to survey and report to the ICn all the competition of international interest of his/her country. That is the informative goal. As a result of the network created by association, traffic is generated on the partner site through posting of the ICN partner list on each sites. In this regard, a broader goal of the ICN is achieved: promoting each country's distinct architecture and design related field on the international level by the use of the internet.
	The qualities of the partner sites According to those two goals the qualities of the partner sites should be: 1. Informative source The site must provide regularly updated news including the competition listing. The website owner must have access to competition information sources within the part of the world he/she is responsible to survey. The site must be established on the web for at least six months and have proven to be a reliable and frequently updated information source. 2. A local contemporary architecture, art and design showcase. The site must promote or present local or regional contemporary architecture and related fields. This can be done through news, link directories, cyber-exhibition and other relevant means The site must be presented in a professional manner and be acknowledged throughout the web as a high quality website. Only one website by country will be integrated to the ICN.
	The profile of the site owner The ICN is a volunteer association of Webster providing architecture related information. The profile of the owner should be one of these: a ".org" Non-profit organization dedicated to promote art and architecture in their respective country; a ".com" organization providing more than 80% of the information on their web site freely to the readers. Note: The owner cannot be a student own web site due to the temporary nature of their activity.
	The responsibilities of the partner site Survey his/her part of world for competitions in architecture and design related field; present the formatted information on those competition to the other members of ICN through the private mailing list; post the list of the other members on the website. The member is free to organize its presentation in a manner that suits the graphic design of his/her website. update this list when new members are added; Post in a listing the competitions that are of interest to the potential readers of his/her website; post the ICN partner logo on their their front-page.
	Exclusion procedure Silence - that is lack of input to the network and lack of updating - is the basic reason a website could be excluded from ICN. Here's the procedure that will ideally never be undertaken: 3 warnings will be made to the silent website owner, each separated by a one week period. if no improvement have been made after those three weeks, The website will be submitted for discussion by the moderator to the other icn members. The exclusion will be submitted for discussion for a two week period to the icn members including the silent website owner. At the end of this period, if the negative comments outnumber the favorable ones, the website owner will be asked to take down his ICN links. The links to this silent site on the partner pages will also be taken down. That is the procedure that will ideally remain a theoretic one.
	The ICN MODERATOR The moderator is in charge to keep the private ICN mailing list up to date and to animate the debates relating to ICN affairs ( new partners, special events, ...). The ICN is a network based structure. There is no hierarchy among the partner sites. The moderator is named after a discussion in the month of January for a one year period. The current moderator of ICN is jean Beaudoin of Z.one Architecture, Canada.

There are two ways that an invitation can be made :

The website is submitted for discussion by an icn member to the others for discussion.
The website owner's or one of their readers submits the URL for consideration to the ICN moderator at jean.beaudoin@z-1.org

The moderator will check for the 6 month of existence of the website and for the information source and promoting tools of the web site.

The eligible website will be submitted for discussion for a two week period to the icn members. During this period, alternative web site of the same country can be submitted for study. At the end of this period, if the favorable comments outnumber the negative ones, the website owner will receive an invitation to join icn.

if the owner agrees to take part, he will have two weeks to prepare a competition listing ( if it does not already exist) and a partner page.

When all those actions are prepared, the other member will be advised by the moderator to post the link of the web site as the new flag bearer of his/her country of origin.

	Québec, Canada Zone Architecture
	SWEDEN Archihub
	Denmark ByggeInfo
	USA Death by Architecture
	Ireland ArchEire
	Argentina Arqa
	Colombia Arquicol,
	Spain iAz
	U.K. Archinet
	The Netherlands Architektenwerk
	France ALEPH Kubos
	Austria Nextroom
	Korea INDIWORLD Indiworld
	Australia Australian Architect
	China Design-online
	Italy Archi'it
	Caribbean Periferia
	Mexico Arquired