Re: [ga] RE: Consensus on consensus?

[Jeff Williams <jwkckid1@ix.netcom.com>]

Danny and all assembly members,

  Long before you were ever involved, many of us knew that ICANN
was not going ot be about consensus, and it isn't.  In that sense
Bill's post yesterday was spot on.

DannyYounger@cs.com wrote:

> David,
>
> You have stated:  "I acknowledge that very few in the ICANN process have
> seemed to "get" the idea of consensus", and you have noted that "the point is
> NOT to make rules where there is substantial, principled disagreement from
> those with a stake".
>
> My question to you is this:  even if every single person in this Assembly
> "got" the idea of consensus, why would we want to function within this
> environment if the Board itself is incapable of "getting" the same concept?
> A case in point... the Names Council by unanimous vote passed a resolution on
> the reservation of geographical and geopolitical names.
> http://www.dnso.org/clubpublic/council/Arc06/doc00010.doc  Discussion leading
> up to this vote included the following arguments:
>
> Your comments assume that one can define "rights to strings" in a mechanical
> fashion; i.e., by preparing a list and then removing those names from DNS.
> That is wrong. It's bad policy, it won't work, ever.
>      We went through this in talking about a list of "famous trademarks,"
> remember? Such a practice was soundly rejected by the Internet community, and
> even the more intelligent members of the trademark bar recognize it as a
> disaster in the making.
>      We all know how governments behave. To governments, the name space is
> another piece of territory, and they want to carve it up and draw boundaries
> on it and stick their flag in the middle. That process is fundamentally
> inimical to the growth and development of the Internet.  We need to reject
> that whole mentality.
> http://www.dnso.org/clubpublic/council/Arc06/msg00138.html
>
> This was a clear case of principled disagreement with the views of the GAC.
> How did the Board react to this resolution?  Rather than NOT making a rule,
> they convened a joint Board/GAC Committee (the .info Country Names Discussion
> Group) to route around the DNSO, and followed up by passing resolutions in
> Accra in defiance of the DNSO position.
>
> If the Board remains at liberty to ignore "consensus" (whether you consider
> this example, or the rejection of the .org Task Force recommendations, or the
> blatant actions taken by the Board with respect to the VeriSign
> renegotiations), then why should the rest of us pretend that we are working
> within a "consensus framework"?
>
> You wrote that consenus "requires that those required to follow the rules
> must agree to abide by them".  Apparently the Board does not seem to feel
> that they are required to "follow the rules".  Rather than remanding policy
> recommendations back to the originating SO (if they have issues with the
> recommendations), the Board instead proceeds to craft it's own policy even
> when such decision-making is not justified by the need for "prompt action" as
> stipulated by our Bylaws.
>
> Consensus only works when everyone is on the same level playing field and all
> play by the same set of rules.  How do we reform ICANN in such a way that
> obligates the Board to respect consensus?
> --
> This message was passed to you via the ga@dnso.org list.
> Send mail to majordomo@dnso.org to unsubscribe
> ("unsubscribe ga" in the body of the message).
> Archives at http://www.dnso.org/archives.html

Regards,
--
Jeffrey A. Williams
Spokesman for INEGroup - (Over 121k members/stakeholdes strong!)
CEO/DIR. Internet Network Eng/SR. Java/CORBA Development Eng.
Information Network Eng. Group. INEG. INC.
E-Mail jwkckid1@ix.netcom.com
Contact Number:  972-244-3801 or 214-244-4827
Address: 5 East Kirkwood Blvd. Grapevine Texas 75208


--
This message was passed to you via the ga-full@dnso.org list.
Send mail to majordomo@dnso.org to unsubscribe
("unsubscribe ga-full" in the body of the message).
Archives at http://www.dnso.org/archives.html