Subject: GA-DIGEST V1 #1518
From: [email-masked] (GA-DIGEST)
To: [email-masked]

GA-DIGEST         Thursday, December 5 2002         Volume 01 : Number 1518

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Date: Tue, 3 Dec 2002 14:00:27 -0800
From: "Asaad Y. Alnajjar ( Millennium Inc.)" <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: [ga] Public comment period

Dear Marilyn & Tony

Time extension would be beneficial to get us all to review the final 
reports and will provide many of us ample of comment opportuinity 
in order to get all the angles covered well.

Regards,

Asaad Alnajjar
CEO Millennium Inc.
Los Angeles, CA, USA

At Monday, 2 December 2002, [email-masked] wrote:

>We have had two major task force final reports released on the same 
day.  We 
>have been given a mere week to offer up public comments.  This is 
>inappropriate, and I would ask Marilyn Cade and Tony Holmes to voluntarily 

>extend the comment period so that it accords with the recommendations 
in the 
>proposed bylaws -- twenty calendar days.  
>
>It comes down to this -- is it more important to respect the public's 
right 
>to proper notice-and-comment provisions that offer a sufficient 
amount of 
>time to digest and respond to material that has been prepared over 
the course 
>of eighteen months, or is it more important to meet an extremely short 
>arbitrary deadline that has been established for the sole convenience 
of 
>those who seek to deal with these particular issues at the upcoming 
Amsterdam 
>session?
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Date: Wed, 4 Dec 2002 00:07:52 +0100
From: Thomas Roessler <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: [ga] Public comment period

On 2002-12-02 15:33:26 -0500, [email-masked] wrote:

> Marilyn Cade and Tony Holmes

You are confusing Tony Holmes and Tony Harris.  (The latter one is
the WHOIS Task Force's co-chair.)

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Thomas Roessler                        http://log.does-not-exist.net/
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Date: Tue, 3 Dec 2002 18:34:27 EST
From: [email-masked]
Subject: Re: [ga] Public comment period

Thomas,

Thanks for pointing out the misidentification.  My apologies to Antonio and 
Tony for the confusion.
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Date: Wed, 04 Dec 2002 01:33:28 +0100
From: Alexander Svensson <[email-masked]>
Subject: [ga] FYI: ccTLD/government relationship study

Michael Geist has published an overview of the relationship
between ccTLDs and governments in 45 countries at
http://www.cctldinfo.com/ (which is a framed version of
http://www.michaelgeist.ca/cctldinfo -- use the latter URL
to link to specific pages).

According to Geist, there are
  10 countries where the ccTLD is part of the government,
   9 countries where the ccTLD is private sector,
  20 countries where the ccTLD is a non-profit corporation,
   4 countries where the ccTLD is academic and
   1 country where the ccTLD is managed by an individual.

Fortunately, these high-level categories are broken down
further and even include information and links for each
country/ccTLD. It's highly interesting -- some relationships
are described as "casual and ad hoc at best", some are
based on verbal understanding, and I'm surprised about the
number of countries which already have passed ccTLD 
legislation (although in some cases, it's only a fall-back).

This kind of research puts the issue of quasi-gTLD ccTLDs
in perspective: Taking the numbers from Domain Worldwide
at http://www.domainworldwide.com/, the #1 ccTLD is a
non-profit, #2 private sector, #3 academic and #4 another
non-profit. It's very helpful to understand the
complexities of ccTLD decision-making and negotiations.
(Thanks to Bret's http://icann.blog.us for the link.)

Best regards,
/// Alexander

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Date: Wed, 04 Dec 2002 13:12:11 +0000
From: "Roberto Gaetano" <[email-masked]>
Subject: [none]

Marc Schneiders wrote:

>Are the ICANN offices located near the coast?

Is your question related to this announcement?
http://www.icann.org/committees/exec-search/ceo-search-announcement-20nov02.htm

;>)

Roberto

_________________________________________________________________
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Date: Wed, 4 Dec 2002 11:58:50 -0500
From: "John Berryhill Ph.D. J.D." <[email-masked]>
Subject: [ga] ICANN vs. Reality

L. Touton:

"In fact, the offering of defensive registrations appears likely to minimize
some of the start-up issues that can arise in a TLD's introduction. Giving
those with registered trademark rights a simple vehicle to block conflicting
registrations should minimize the potential for one type of lawsuit that can
complicate a TLD's introduction."

Reality:

ICANN AND REGISTRARS SUED OVER SUNRISE PERIOD OF NEW TLDS
An Orlando Business Journal report suggests that ICANN and
registrars including Afilias have been sued by a Florida man
over the use of sunrise periods for new TLDs.  The suit
claims ICANN required registrars to include the sunrise
provisions in the new TLDs.  ICANN declined comment.
http://orlando.bizjournals.com/orlando/stories/2002/12/02/story3.html

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Date: Wed, 4 Dec 2002 12:49:04 -0500
From: Allan Liska <[email-masked]>
Subject: Re: [ga] ICANN vs. Reality

- -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: MD5

Hello John,

Wednesday, December 4, 2002, 11:58:50 AM, you wrote:

JBPDJD> L. Touton:

JBPDJD> "In fact, the offering of defensive registrations appears likely to minimize
JBPDJD> some of the start-up issues that can arise in a TLD's introduction. Giving
JBPDJD> those with registered trademark rights a simple vehicle to block conflicting
JBPDJD> registrations should minimize the potential for one type of lawsuit that can
JBPDJD> complicate a TLD's introduction."

JBPDJD> Reality:

JBPDJD> ICANN AND REGISTRARS SUED OVER SUNRISE PERIOD OF NEW TLDS
JBPDJD> An Orlando Business Journal report suggests that ICANN and
JBPDJD> registrars including Afilias have been sued by a Florida man
JBPDJD> over the use of sunrise periods for new TLDs.  The suit
JBPDJD> claims ICANN required registrars to include the sunrise
JBPDJD> provisions in the new TLDs.  ICANN declined comment.
JBPDJD> http://orlando.bizjournals.com/orlando/stories/2002/12/02/story3.html

I don't think those two statements are conflicting at all.
Specifically, the first quote says "minimize the potential for one
type of lawsuit".  It does not state that there will be no lawsuits.

Where domains are concerned it seems there are always people willing
to file lawsuits, and of course there are always lawyers willing to
take people's money -- whether or not the case has any validity (not
saying this is not a valid case, I don't really know the details).

No matter how a new domain is introduced you are going to have people
who don't get the name they want, there is no way to prevent that from
happening, and inevitably someone is going to sue -- I hardly think
you can blame people's propensity to file lawsuits on ICANN.

allan
- - --
Allan Liska
[email-masked]
http://www.allan.org

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Date: Thu, 05 Dec 2002 13:33:07 +0100
From: Vittorio Bertola <[email-masked]>
Subject: [ga] Nominating Committee procedures

I am posting here another comment I just sent to the ERC.
- ------

Dear ERC members,

I would like to reinstate my proposal about the procedures and
timelines for selections by the Nominating Committee that I submitted
in September:

http://forum.icann.org/reform-comments/implementation/msg00016.html

(A text copy is attached below for your convenience.)

Particularly, I would like to stress the point about the need for a
supermajority requirement for NomCom appointments, as justified in the
document, and exposed again during the public forum in Shanghai. This
idea has obtained support in the community during the last weeks; it
could be worth adopting it at least as a transition requirement for
the very delicate work of the first NomCom, in view of its evaluation
for final adoption in the Bylaws or in NomCom's internal procedures.

I thus propose that the following section is added to the Transition
Article:

"Section 11. NOMINATING COMMITTEE APPOINTMENTS

Any appointment made by the Nominating Committee before the end of
annual meeting 2003 will require approval by at least [two thirds |
four fifths] of the voting members of the Committee."

Regards,

======
Comments to "Tentative timetable for the NomCom Process"

Vittorio Bertola
September 13, 2002

This document contains my personal comments on the "Tentative
timetable for the NomCom Process", a sub-section of the "Second
Interim Implementation Report". These comments are personal and do not
reflect the view of any of the entities I am involved with (i.e. ISOC
Italy, icannatlarge.com, or the At Large Organizing Committee). While
I have comments on other sections of that Report, and specifically on
those regarding the At Large Advisory Committee, I will contribute
them to the discussion of the ALAC Advisory Group of which I am a
member, in view of a group document about them.
 
While it is desirable that the NomCom preserves some degree of freedom
about the way it wants to organize its work, the practical
implementation of the selection process is way too crucial to the
effectiveness and accountability of the new ICANN structure to leave
it to the tastes of any particular instance of the NomCom. For
example, if, as stated in the draft timeline, "NomCom meets as needed
by telecon, pursuing consensus and/or taking votes until its
selections are completed.", then the order in which potential
candidates are put to votes might deeply change the outcome. This is
why, in my opinion, there needs to be some more degree of
formalization of the process the NomCom will use for determining its
selections.

Personally, I hope that voting won't be always necessary; that each
NomCom member will propose candidates that can show broad vision and
act super partes, rather than people who would only defend the
specific interests of their constituency; and that the NomCom as a
whole will be able to reach by discussion an agreement on the complete
set of appointees, rather than end up running a small scale replica of
an electoral process among its members, or fostering public and
private bargains among the constituencies to gain votes for each one's
favourite candidate. However, real life shows that not all
disagreements can be taken to a compromise, and not all specific
interests can be put aside, so provisions for a fair and open
selection process must be inserted in a solid way.

If any instance of the NomCom ever ended up, for example, by showing
up an alliance between a majority of the constituencies who selected
its members to exclude candidates proposed by the remaining minority,
that would end up as a hard blow to ICANN's credibility. This is why I
believe that, as the last step in the process, the final set of
appointments should be put to votes as a whole, and approved with a
very qualified majority (i.e. 80% of the voting members); this would
reduce risks of capture and force the NomCom as a whole to come to an
agreement. If this majority cannot be reached, there should be a
"cooling period" of at least three days, and then another vote should
be called by the Chair (possibly on an updated and more agreeable list
of appointments), requiring the same qualified majority - and so on.

While the Committee should be free to work out its own process, its
phases should be better identified; one risk, for example, is to have
a long unsorted list of people under consideration up to the end, that
would not allow real and deep analysis on each individual, so that in
the end decisions are taken at the last minute in a hurried way. The
difficulty of reaching a very short final set of appointees from a
very long list of candidates in a meaningful and rational way has been
evident in past processes - for example, in the first round of the
2000 At Large elections. In that occasion, more than 150 names were
submitted as potential Board members, only for the At Large
constituency! If the Committee has to work on a list of 50-100 names
or more, either it will come to conclusions based on preconceived
opinions, or it will make superficial choices. On the other hand, it
seems impossible to find reasonable and objective criteria for
pre-qualification, to avoid having an excessively high number of
candidates right from the start; for example, individual endorsements,
in the absence of a verified At Large Membership, can be faked or
captured quite easily.

This is why I would devise a process in which there is a free-entry
initial list, then a first round of analysis and decisions to reduce
the list to a manageable size, then the final round of decisions. So
the process should be subdivided into more detailed phases:
1.	Collection of nominations and endorsements of candidates (Day
35-50)
2.	Analysis on the initial list of candidates (Day 50-65)
3.	Reduction to a pre-final set (ie, 2-3 times the number of
seats to be filled) (Day 65)
4.	Deeper analysis on the remaining candidates (Day 65-80)
5.	Reduction to a final set and final approval (Day 80-90)

In the first phase, every individual (or constituency) should be free
to submit names to the NomCom, or even to nominate himself. I don't
think that there should be particular entry barriers at this stage;
there should be a public endorsement mechanism, for example a web
forum, so that candidates can gather and show their support, but there
should not be a binding condition such as a minimum number of
endorsement to enter into this first list. However, there should be a
standard submission form, so that each name is accompanied by an
uniform set of documents, including a personal statement, a CV, and
any information that could show the person's suitability for the
position; even candidates that have been nominated by someone else
should supply themselves this material by the deadline of phase 1, as
proof of acceptance of the nomination.

In the second and third phase, the NomCom would take into
consideration the whole list of candidates, with a first round of
liaisons with the SOs, the Committees and the community in general, to
then reduce it to a fixed size, according to the skills of the
candidates and the support they have received. At this stage,
diversity requirements should already be known, so that the Committee
can ensure that there are candidates in the remaining list that can
meet them. The NomCom should try to approve the new list with a single
qualified majority vote (ie 80%); this should force the Committee to
have a discussion on the candidates and try to agree a good set to be
approved. If this majority can't be reached, the Committee could then
pass to a preferential vote, so that the candidates with the highest
number of preferences will stay. The result of the vote should be
immediately made public.

In the fourth and fifth phase, the NomCom should repeat the process,
again collecting input and preferences for the remaining candidates
from all the community, the Advisory Committees, the SOs etc., and
then would come to the final vote as described above, with qualified
majority votes separated by cooling periods. During the fourth phase,
the endorsement forum should be reopened, so that endorsements could
be shifted to those candidates who are still under consideration.

I also note that, given the introduction of the At Large Advisory
Committee, the list of Advisory Committees that are to be consulted by
means of mandatory teleconferences ("Day 35-80") should be updated by
adding the ALAC to the list. I think that, even if the process is not
formalized as described above, there should be more than one mandatory
telecon with any liaising entity - at least one at the beginning, to
get input and suggestions for names, and one at the end, to get
opinions on the appointments under consideration.

Finally, I would like to add here some comments about the criteria of
selections to be adopted by the NomCom (section 2.B.3 of the main
document).

About item b., I would add that not only the set of appointees as a
whole should have familiarity with the different constituencies and
issues that ICANN has to deal with, but that the fact that a possible
appointee has experience in more than one of these constituencies and
issues, even if participating to ICANN for one constituency only,
should constitute a significant plus in favour of his choice.

About item c., I would stress more clearly that diversity must not be
limited to geographical diversity. In ICANN discussions, due to
geopolitical reasons, often diversity has been automatically intended
as geographical diversity, also because this form of diversity is easy
to guarantee by simple rules referring to an individual's nationality.
However, other types of variety among the users, the professionals and
the Internet industry must be taken into account. Thus I would mention
other types of diversity, such as diversity in career, in social
outcome, in gender, in age; all these factors should be considered.

Finally, I would add another item, which is "Support by ICANN and
Internet communities". Even if Board members could be found outside of
the usual ICANN communities, and thus be completely new to the ICANN
environment, I personally think that the ability to build profitable
personal relationships with a number of ICANN constituencies and
participants, and with Internet users and participants to other
Internet bodies, should be considered as a plus; this ability could be
demonstrated by a past history of participation in ICANN and by
explicit statements of support by individuals in a public forum.
Though this should not be the sole or the main criterion used to
select the appointees, it should definitely be taken into account.
- -- 
vb.            [Vittorio Bertola - v.bertola [a] bertola.eu.org]<---
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End of GA-DIGEST V1 #1518
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