Re: [ga] Letter from Mike Roberts re: gTLD Constituency Group

[william@dso.net (William X. Walsh)]

Read this carefully.  If I am not mistaken this removes the rules
about NC members from the same company/organization and is trying to
hide that it is doing that under the disguise of a "problem" with
NSI's actions.

This would seem to me to be more of a justification for their letting
CORE/ISOC capture the DNSO NC.

I maybe wrong here, so some of you who have a bit more time today read
it and check it out and let us know one way or the other.


On Fri, 9 Jul 1999 17:47:39 -0400, "Andrew McLaughlin"
<mclaughlin@pobox.com> wrote:
>
>July 9, 1999
>
>Mr. Jim Rutt
>Chief Executive Officer
>Network Solutions, Inc.
>505 Huntmar Park Drive
>Herndon, Virginia 20170
>
>Dear Jim,
>
>Thanks for stepping into the current controversy concerning representation
>on the DNSO Names Council from the gTLD constituency.  You can appreciate,
>given my prior correspondence with Don Telage, that ICANN is attempting to
>reach and maintain a position of fairness to all the parties concerned in
>this matter.
>
>As NSI's representatives at the Berlin ICANN meetings have surely informed
>you, there appeared to be a near-unanimous sentiment expressed at the public
>ICANN meeting on May 26 that no one company should be able to place more
>than one representative on the Names Council.  The peculiar situation of the
>gTLD Constituency Group -- at the moment, NSI is the only member -- means
>that, absent compliance with the Board's request, a single company would
>select one-seventh of the members of the Names Council.  It seemed clear in
>Berlin that the community consensus, with which I and the Board agree, was
>that no one company should have that level of influence in a body that is
>designed to be broadly representative of the various worldwide communities
>of interest that constitute the DNSO.
>
>Your letter of last week, which nominates an employee plus two of your
>lawyers to the Names Council, is not consistent with the views of the
>community. Since this is the second letter from Network Solutions which does
>not accept the consensus view, the ICANN Board must now do what it is
>supposed to do: follow the community consensus. In this case that means to
>proceed with its stated intention to amend the pertinent portions of the
>Bylaws in the absence of your voluntary agreement to limit your
>representation to one member.
>
>In the next few days, we will post the following proposed amendment to the
>ICANN Bylaws for public comment in accordance with our normal procedures:
>
>   RESOLVED, that Section 2(a) of Article VI-B of the Bylaws of the
>   Corporation is hereby replaced in its entirety with the following:
>
>   "The NC shall consist of representatives, selected in accordance
>   with Section 3(c) of this Article, from each Constituency
>   recognized by the Board pursuant to the criteria set forth
>   in Section 3 of this Article.  Any dispute about whether any
>   such representative is a proper member of the NC shall be
>   resolved by, or at the direction of, the Board."
>
>   FURTHER RESOLVED, that Section 3(c) of Article VI-B of the Bylaws
>   of the Corporation is hereby replaced in its entirety with the
>   following:
>
>   "Each Constituency shall select up to three individuals to represent
>   that Constituency on the NC, no two of which may be, except with the
>   consent of the Board, residents of the same Geographic Region, as
>   defined in Article V, Section 6.  Notwithstanding the foregoing,
>   no Constituency may have more representatives on the NC  than there
>   are members of the Constituency.  Nominations within each Constituency
>   may be made by any member of the Constituency, but no such member may
>   make more than one nomination in any single Constituency."
>
>   FURTHER RESOLVED, that Section 2(f) of Article VI-B of the Bylaws of
>   the Corporation is hereby replaced in its entirety with the following:
>
>   "Unless shorterned by the Board in its recognition of a Constituency,
>   the term of office for each member of the NC shall be two years,
>   subject to earlier removal by the Constituency that selected such
>   member or by a three-fourths majority vote of all members of the
>   Board."
>
>The other members of the ICANN Board and I do not believe that amending our
>Bylaws to eliminate avenues for the pursuit of special interest objectives
>is a useful exercise.  All of us have more important things to do.  As a new
>player, and one committed to making the system work for everyone by your
>recent public statement, it would be a valuable contribution to making the
>DNSO successful if you accepted the consensus view and voluntarily agreed to
>name only one member to the Names Council.
>
>Sincerely,
>
>- Mike
>
>Michael M. Roberts
>Interim President and Chief Executive Officer
>
>
>cc:  DNSO Names Council
>     DNSO General Assembly


--
William X. Walsh
General Manager, DSo Internet Services
Email: william@dso.net  Fax:(209) 671-7934

"The fact is that domain names are new and have unique
characteristics, and their status under the law is not yet clear." 
--Kent Crispin (June 29th, 1999)