ICANN/DNSO


DNSO Names Council Teleconference on 24 April 2002 - minutes



24 April 2002.

Proposed agenda and related documents http://www.dnso.org/dnso/notes/20020424.NCteleconf-agenda.html

List of attendees:

Peter de Blanc         ccTLD absent, apologies, proxy to Oscar Robles/ Elisabeth Porteneuve
Elisabeth Porteneuve   ccTLD
Oscar Robles Garay     ccTLD

Philip Sheppard        Business 
Marilyn Cade           Business 
Grant Forsyth          Business
Greg Ruth              ISPCP
Antonio Harris         ISPCP 
Tony Holmes            ISPCP    
Philipp Grabensee      Registrars  absent, apologies 
Ken Stubbs             Registrars
Bruce Tonkin           Registrars
Roger Cochetti         gTLD  
Richard Tindal         gTLD  absent, apologies, proxy to Roger Cochetti
Cary Karp              gTLD  absent, apologies, proxy to Richard Tindal, Roger Cochetti
Ellen Shankman         IP    
Laurence Djolakian     IP  
J. Scott Evans         IP    
Harold Feld            NCDNH  
Chun Eung Hwi          NCDNH  
Erick Iriate           NCDNH

17 Names Council Members

Thomas Roessler        invited as GA Chair
Alexander Svensson     invited as GA Alternate Chair

Glen de Saint Géry     NC Secretary
Alix Guillard       MP3 Recording Engineer/Secretariat

Invited ICANN staff and Board member

Alejandro Pisanty      Vice Chairman ICANN Board
Lynn Stuart            ICANN CEO
Louis Touton           ICANN senior Counsel
Joe Sims               ICANN senior Counsel

Due to a technical failure there was no MP3 recording.

Quorum present at 14:10 (all times reported are CET which is UTC + 2 during summer time in the northern hemisphere).

Philip Sheppard chaired this NC teleconference.

Approval of the Agenda
http://www.dnso.org/dnso/notes/20020424.NCteleconf-agenda.html

The Chair added two items:

1. Waiting List Service issue referred by the Board to the Names Council.
2. Request to the Names Council to comment on Request for Proposal (RFP) materials for Dot ORG.

The agenda was approved.

Agenda item 1: Discussion points on v6 conclusions

Ph. Sheppard proposed adoption of the clarifications made in v6 and started discussion on the e-mail input from the constituencies.

Agenda item 4: Discussion with Stuart Lynn, Alejandro Pisanty, Joe Sims

Philip Sheppard formally welcomed Stuart Lynn, Alejandro Pisanty and Joe Sims on the call, and asked Stuart what he hoped the dialogue would produce.

Stuart Lynn said that he appreciated the time spent, and careful discussion of the Names Council towards the future decision making process. The purpose of the reform document was to stimulate community discussion and move forward rapidly to debate. If there is criticism it is aimed at the process and not the participants. Divisions in the ICANN community are recognised. The concern with regard to the Names Council is that it brings together different kinds of constituencies greatly varied within which makes the task difficult. It is difficult for an organisation to change itself, and it is important to find out how a clearer view and a coming through process can be achieved to bring about change.

Alejandro Pisanty said that it was important to find out key expectations, to hear from Names Council members, read constituency positions and drafts and find out where there is agreement and disagreement.

Joe Sims said he was there to listen.

Questions from Names Council members:

Marilyn Cade: Could you share with us feedback on areas of support and no support?
Stuart answered that the diversity of private and public opinions made it difficult to answer. Most criticism and misunderstanding was about government representation, nominations, public interest representation and government funding. 

Harold Feld: The Non Commercial constituency is thinking along two separate lines:
a. delineate what lies outside the scope of ICANN
b. consider options such as the International Telecommunication Union (ITU).

Tony Holmes commented that his experience in working with the ITU did not encourage him at all to recommend this approach. Philip Sheppard commented that his experience in general with inter-governmental organisations was that they were universally slower and less efficient than even the present ICANN structure. There was no support from other constituencies for the ITU proposal.

Stuart Lynn said that it is important to arrive at a documented process that works. Functions that lie outside of ICANN can be considered if assurance is given that a changing internet can be anticipated. The concept of a thin ICANN concentrates on issues different groups care about. There is a need therefore to define realistically and flexibly what should be inside ICANN.

Government Advisory Committee (GAC) involvement was discussed and Stuart Lynn hoped that there would be specific suggestions for strengthening the interaction with the GAC. Tony Harris said that not all governments by a long way represent public interests. Stuart Lynn commented that individuals talk on their own behalf to get things done and are not representative of the wider group. For example, it is odd that universities are hardly involved in the NCDNHC and a distinction should be made between representativeness and representative models. Stuart favoured a multiplicity of entities to represent users.

Tony Holmes enquired about the April 29 deadline and the envisaged planning thereafter.

Stuart Lynn and Alejandro Pisanty stated that an extensive and concrete proposal for Bucharest was intended.

Ellen Shankman asked about the role of the nominating committee and who would sit on the Board?

Stuart Lynn replied that the nominating committee was intended to focus on making ICANN an overall effective credible organisation that can move fast.

Tony Harris asked about funding saying that he saw good support for a model using a small proportion of registrant fees to fund ICANN. The BC had proposed this at Accra.

Philip Sheppard reminded the call of the NC recommendation that core ICANN funds should indeed come from the revenues of Registrants as they do today - all that is in question is the transmission mechanism and related contractual arrangements.

Alejandro Pisanty said there needs to be a clear model, how it should be implemented and what support it has.

Stuart Lynn was of the opinion that funding in itself would not solve the problems as such. He agreed with an analysis posted by Elisabeth Porteneuve that conference fees could only ever provide a small part of funding and they were not therefore a key issue .

Harold Feld raised the point of involvement in the ICANN process. Some saw no necessity to be involved as the reward for involvement was often unclear.

Stuart Lynn considered this an important point; some do not get involved because the ICANN process puts them off. The end user often delegates policy issues and the need for involvement is not great. If ICANN is successful, there should be little need for involvement

Philip Sheppard asked for opinions on the workable size of the Board, saying the key question is the balance between a board big enough to be representative and small enough to be workable. If the board is large and has an executive committee the key is to find a group that adds to efficiency while not concentrating political power unfairly.

Alejandro Pisanty said any input with regard to a Board with a smaller executive committee would be welcome. He agreed the concept could streamline and/or putt power in the hands of a few.

Stuart Lynn said that his concept of forums was to add flexibility and increase the diversity of voices advising the Board. Council members were sceptical about the process of unstructured fora and any meaningful impact they would have on policy development. How would forums add to efficiency? The GA after all was intended to be that broad group. If it does not work as intended, is it not better to reform it so it does?

Stuart Lynn, Alejandro Pisanty, and Joe Sims said that it had been an important, helpful discussion. Philip Sheppard thanked the invited ICANN members for their valuable participation.

Other Business

  1. Waiting List Service (WLS) issue referred by the Board to the Names Council.

    Louis Touton explained that on March 25, Verisign had requested a Registry agreement amendment for .com and .net. There have been increasing concerns about deletes. The Board is looking for assurance on the WLS recommendation that it will be made in the general context of the delete issue.

    Philip Sheppard said there were 4 options:

    1. ignore the request
    2. form a new task force
    3. refer it to the existing Transfer task force
    4. the whole Names Council to work on it.

    It was decided to refer it to the existing Transfer Task Force. It was agreed that the present work of the task force should not be slowed down. Timeline: Work Status report June 10, 2002.

    Decision 1: Refer the WLS issue to the Transfer Task Force.

  2. Request to the Names Council to comment on Request for Proposal (RFP) materials for Dot ORG.

    Philip Sheppard acknowledged the request to the Names Council on the RFP for Dot Org. He recommended reactivating the dot ORG task force with the addition of members to replace Milton Mueller NCDNHC and Guillermo Carey ISPC, and the ISP if they would like to nominate. Elisabeth Porteneuve was chosen as the task force interim chair to act as a facilitator to start the work immediately as the deadline was extremely tight.

    Decision 2: reactivate dot ORG task Force for the single task of providing comments to the NC on the Dot Org RFP.

AOB

Marilyn Cade proposed a work session on policy development to be scheduled for May 2, 2002.

Philip Sheppard concluded and confirmed the next teleconference on May 2, 2002 at 15:00 Paris time

The teleconference ended at 17:10

Next NC teleconference May 2 at 15:00 Paris time, 13:00 UTC.

See all past agendas and minutes at http://www.dnso.org/dnso/2002calendardnso.html
and calendar of the NC meetings at http://www.dnso.org/dnso/notes/2002.NC-calendar.html


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