[ga] Re: Observations from the Peanut Gallery

[DannyYounger@cs.com]

Sotiris has asked for a response regarding the necessary margin of victory 
needed to pass the motion put forth by Patrick Corliss.  Our rules state:  
"In the case where the question is a new rule or rule change for the GA, the 
number of votes in favour of the winning alternative must be at least 2/3 of 
cast votes, with a minimum number of cast votes being the lower of 20% of the 
registered voters or 100 votes."  
http://www.dnso.org/dnso/notes/2000.GA-voting-rules.html

As the motion calls for amending the current rules, this is not a matter over 
which the Chair may declare "rough consensus"; a vote is required if we are 
going to have our existing rules changed.   

If enough members indicate through their discussion that such a change should 
be considered, then the Chair has reasonable cause to accept the motion as a 
ballot question.  This does not imply either agreement or disagreement with 
the motion; it is simply a decision to let the Assembly, after sufficient 
discussion, come to their own conclusion through the voting process.  

I agree with Sotiris' observation that, "As it stands, there are obviously 
disruptive influences which would impede the achievement of work in this 
assembly."    A good example of such diversionary efforts may be noted in a 
post to our list today from a Names Council member that represents the 
Registrars constituency.  In his comments, Mr. Stubbs noted that he would 
like to see substantive movement on matters such as, for example, 
individuals' constituency... 

Those of us that paid attention to the discussions of the Board in Stockholm 
noted that the ICANN Board explicitly referred the matter of an individuals' 
constituency to the Names Council for resolution.   I have yet to see Mr. 
Stubbs acting to push this issue through the Council.  As yet, the Names 
Council Review Task Force has not published their Terms of Reference, has not 
established an archived mailing list, and has not begun its work on the 
promised "web-based forum".  Attempting to shift discussion on this topic 
once more to the GA, after we already voted by a margin in excess of 80% to 
support the creation of such a constituency, is purely diversionary, and 
serves to do no more than to attempt to distract us from the fact that the 
Council has been sitting on this topic since March, and has done nothing. 

Mr. Stubbs has indicated that unless the GA stops "talking to hear 
themselves", he will try to find other venues to work within on issues like 
those he has advocated and supported here... excellent idea.  He may wish to 
begin by using the Names Council as the appropriate venue to pave the way for 
an individuals' constituency.  He may also wish to prod the registrars to 
deal with formulating policies regarding Code of Conduct, Best Practices, 
Warehousing, Speculation, Transfers, Expired Domains, etc.

Consider the following excerpt from the Core Secretariat to the registrars 
list:

- Verisign uses loopholes in the transfer rule it has written itself
  in its registry role
- The auto-nack policy hurts precisely those registrars who abide by the 
  prior documentation rule
- Verisign causes large numbers of domains to expire by rejecting
  transfers, thereafter refuses to transfer invoking "non paid" status
- Many transfers are rejected despite confirmation, or no confirmation 
  request is sent
- Most of the domain names involved are legacy registrations
- A number of facts leave little credibility to a "customer protection" 
  motive:
  -- Verisign's time to confirm is unreasonably short
  -- Verisign's confirmation method unreasonably cumbersome
  -- Verisign's confirmation requests are difficult to understand, 
     difficult to tell from spam 
  -- Verisign generates additional revenue with the auto-nack policy
  -- Verisign has not caused less erroneous transfers than other registrars
     in proportion to the number of transferring customers
- Verisign clearly has a dominant market position 
http://www.dnso.org/clubpublic/registrars/Arc01/msg00821.html

There are issues in front of us that the registrars community should be 
bringing to the Council.   Even Louis Touton has written to the Council 
suggesting "the DNSO may wish to begin consideration of possible development 
of a policy for handling expiring names."  
http://www.dnso.org/clubpublic/council/Arc05/msg00657.html

And yet a Names Council representative berates the GA for not attending to 
substantive matters.  At least we are discussing "Bandwidth and Session 
Limits to be Deployed within the SRS" to a degree far greater than it has 
been discussed by the registrars or by the Council.  At least we have raised 
the issue of expired domains, a Registrants' Bill of Rights, etc.  What has 
the Council done?  The GA has been developing questions to pose to the Board 
candidates; the Council can't even decide on a date for their own vote.  The 
GA has noted the lack of Secretariat resources which hamper our ability to 
vote --  a substantive issue.  The GA has already voted to request that the 
ICANN Board fund the DNSO; the Council merely decided to deny voting rights 
to constituencies that couldn't pay.  Members of the GA have prepared a BEST 
PRACTICES document to improve the efficiency of our organization, and members 
of this Assembly (myself included) have posted requests to the NC Intake 
Committee dealing with substantive matters... when was the last time that an 
NC member put a new item on the NC agenda through the Intake Committee?  

At least we work on a daily basis... perhaps the Council and its 
representatives could consider convening more often so that the DNSO actually 
has a chance to get some meaningful work accomplished.  Complaints about our 
lack of progress at a time when there has been almost no progress on multiple 
Council initiatives is disingenuous and diversionary.  If we need the time to 
fully debate a proposed motion on our own rules, and even if it takes 500 
posts to do so, then we will have our comments noted -- if this annoys an NC 
member, too bad...  The GA is making forward progress.  We have already 
started nominating candidates for the ICANN Board position, and we will be 
happy to sponsor a candidates debate in Montevideo.  Soon we will have 
another elected representative to a Council task force, and doubtless we will 
bring bring other issues to the attention of the Council (as it appears that 
the registrar constituency seems to be reluctant to do so).

I am proud of the efforts of the membership, and consider remarks to the 
contrary by Council members to be just another diversion.  Keep in mind that 
the ALSC will soon be putting forth restructuring recommendations... a 
"dysfunctional" Council will probably be the first institution to fall into 
the recycling bin.  The GA is on track.  Keep up the good work.




  
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