The WCIT conference officially began on Monday, 3rd December 2012 with over 1000 people registered from over 130 countries. At the opening ceremony, the ITU Secretary General spoke along with a recorded speech from the UN Secretary General, Ban Ki Moon, the WCIT Chairman, Mohamed Nasser Al-Ghanim, and ICANN CEO, Fadi Chehade. Speeches from the opening ceremony may be read here.
Monday afternoon’s opening plenary was largely (but not exclusively) a procedural and organizational discussion. The conference will have 5 committees, the bulk of the substantive work will happen in Committee 5, chaired by Ghana. Committee 5 is broken into two Working Groups. Within those Working Groups, specific issues are sent to smaller ad hoc groups to work out text. It’s a complicated process!