[council] Review Task Force Recommendations

[DannyYounger@cs.com]

Dear Council members,

I am trying to better comprehend the implications of the Review Task Force 
recommendations, and I want to make sure that my understanding is correct.  
Under this proposal, a group of petitioners would present a request to the 
Board to establish a new DNSO constituency, and the Board would then refer 
the matter to the Council for their considered input.

As it is sometimes hard to envision in the abstract, perhaps we could use an 
example to see how this would work…

Let's say that a large group convened calling themselves "Stakeholders 
Thoroughly Ignored by the Names Council", a group that consisted of the 
majority of the General Assembly and the bulk of the institutions represented 
within the Non-Commercial Constituency.  According to the Task Force 
proposal, they would probably fill out some paperwork that looked like this:

1.  What need would the proposed new constituency fill?  -- 
"The membership would constitute a necessary balance in the Council ensuring 
that the opinions of the General Assembly and the Non-Commercial Constituency 
are not routinely being thoroughly ignored by Names Council Task Forces"

2.  What would the proposed new constituency bring to the DNSO that is now 
lacking? --
"The constituency would bring a commitment to respect the opinions of others 
which is sadly lacking in Task Force reports that do not even cite minority 
views or document the degree of reasoned opposition."

3.  What commonality of interest would the members of the proposed new 
constituency share? --
"Constituency members would share the goal of eliminating the currently 
dysfunctional and totalitarian Task Force approach."  

4.  How much overlap in membership is there likely to be between the proposed 
new constituency and existing constituencies, the General Assembly and other 
parts of ICANN? -
"It can be expected that there will be as much overlap as now exists between 
the Intellectual Property Constituency and the Business Constituency - why 
should we be any different?"

5.  How representative of the stated common interest would the proposed new 
constituency be? -
"As virtually everyone (with the exception of a few Council members) believes 
in the value of Working Groups in the ICANN process, the constituency will be 
quite representative of the stated common interest."

6.  What steps have the petitioners taken to establish a hierarchy of 
representativeness and openness within the proposed new constituency? -
"Unlike other constituencies that don't even have publicly-archived mailing 
lists and only offer lip-service to openness, this constituency will actually 
adhere to the ICANN bylaws.  This constituency will not have a hierarchy, as 
it prefers to "elect" its representatives rather than to "appoint" them 
without a vote."

7.  Are there alternative means of fulfilling the stated need besides 
recognition of a new constituency? -
"Sadly, there appears to be no other way to ensure that the comments of the 
General Assembly and the Non-Commercial Constituency are recorded in Task 
Force reports."

8.  Are there other places within the ICANN structure where this need could 
be fulfilled? -
"If memory serves, the Council was previously severely chastised with regard 
to their initial Review Task Force report (authored by Theresa Swinehart)… I 
believe it was described as vacuous as "air".  Perhaps the needs of this 
constituency could be served by having the ICANN Board continually reprimand 
the Task Force Chairs."

9.  What steps have the proponents of the proposed new constituency taken to 
organise the proposed new constituency? -
"The proponents have assembled their very very large membership and have 
already created a charter (which like the Charter presented by Joop Teernstra 
at the General Assembly session in Montevideo won't even be acknowledged by 
the Council)."

10. Has the proposed new constituency demonstrated the capability to command 
the financial and human resources required by a constituency? -  
"The constituency has more than a thousand members; each has committed $15 
toward the goal of not having their positions routinely ignored by the Names 
Council."

11. What steps have the proponents of the proposed new constituency taken to 
seek support from existing constituencies? -
"The constituency believes that it is more important to secure the support of 
all those constituencies that are still not properly represented in the DNSO, 
such as small business and individuals - why should we attempt to seek 
support from those that routinely ignore and refuse to document our views?"

12. What would be the impact of the proposed new constituency on existing 
constituencies? - 
"The existing constituencies might have to scramble to find new creative ways 
to deny their peers a voice."

13. What would be the impact of the proposed new constituency on the finances 
and administration of the DNSO? -
"The new constituency will be at least as financially responsible as is the 
ISP constituency, the ccTLD constituency and the NCDNHC, and thus will pose 
no new challenge to the Budget Committee.  With regard to the new 
constituency's impact on the administration of the DNSO… well, it can't get 
much worse, can it?"

14. What would be the impact of the proposed new constituency on policy 
formation within the DNSO?  --
"sorry, but we haven't noted any recent policy formation… perhaps you could 
offer an example?"

After the Council has reviewed the answers to this above "questionnaire", it 
will then offer its considered response to the Board enthusiastically 
welcoming the new constituency to the DNSO… is that a correct understanding?