[ga] [Fwd: [ALSC-Forum] FYI: Business Constituency Position Paper on ALSC Draft Report]

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

All assembly members,

  FYI from the BC on the ALSC report.  I hope that some of you will
have comments...

--
Jeffrey A. Williams
Spokesman for INEGroup - (Over 118k members 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:  972-447-1800 x1894 or 214-244-4827
Address: 5 East Kirkwood Blvd. Grapevine Texas 75208

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• Subject: [ALSC-Forum] FYI: Business Constituency Position Paper on ALSC Draft Report
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• Date: Sun, 28 Oct 2001 14:05:14 +0100
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Business Constituency Position Paper
Business Constituency Statement on the ALSC DRAFT Report
October 15, 2001

On September 9, 2001, the Business Constituency (BC) published a
draft set of comments and questions regarding the ALSC Draft
Report on ICANN At Large Membership.  We have taken further
consultation and comments from our membership. This document is
the final BC position statement on the Draft Report.

The BC commends the ALSC on its efforts to address a very complex
set of issues related to ICANN and organizational structures
involving participation and representation of individuals (users).
We appreciate the involvement of the Committee and the extensive
commitment to a practical outcome, which the draft report embodies.
We commend both the committee and your executive director on the
ffort you have made to understand, listen, synthesize, and suggest.

The BC had many questions and concerns regarding implementation of
the concepts recommended in the ALSC report.  Through further
dialogue with the staff and members of the ALSC both before and
during the ICANN meeting in Montevideo, the BC has been assured
that the ALSC recognizes that much remains to be done to convert
the recommendations into workable and affordable implementation
plans for an "ALSO" and related functions.

As noted in our draft statement, whatever the final outcome of the
recommendations and the Board's decisions, the BC looks forward to
working with the ALSC and others in the community, first to
contribute to a final consensus report in November, at the ICANN
annual meeting, and beyond, in developing the implementation plans.

As you read our comments, you will see that there are many areas
where we can offer support, some which require further elaboration
and where we have significant questions, and some, which we find
troubling and, at this point, do not support.

The Concepts of Participation and Representation: In general, the
BC has been concerned that those who participate in ICANN
understand and support its narrow, technically oriented mission,
and that those who elect board members are engaged in a sustainable
manner in the processes and issues which ICANN is responsible for.

Overall, our view is that the ALSC has achieved a remarkable step
forward - in offering a roadmap to at last address the concepts
of participation and representation in a coherent manner.  We note
many involved in ICANN stakeholder community will want to make
changes, including ourselves, but overall, we believe that the
structure and framework for achieving a workable solution is
provided by the ALSC report.

________________________________________________
Areas, which we can support or have minimal questions about:

-Individual [users] with a sustainable and definable interest in
ICANN's areas of responsibility should have a place in both
participation and representation in ICANN and should be represented
by an organizational structure [hereafter referred to as entity].

-The new entity should have board representation, reflective of a
regional structure. [Note all existing SOs have five regions, with
3 board seats].

-We agree that at its launch, it may need some initial support but
that which is provided should be limited and every effort should be
to move to self-funding.

-The BC agrees with the concept of a "council" who takes
responsibility for forming and ensuring the success of the At Large
entity on national and regional levels.

-We support that the responsibility for managing the affairs of the
At Large entity and representing the At Large members to the ICANN
board should be assigned to an elected At Large Council.  [It is
possible that the entity might chose to initially launch with
appointed representatives, who could then replace themselves with
elected representatives.  Given the difficulty of bootstrapping an
organizational structure and elections for national and regional
seats, such an approach could be considered.]

________________________________________________
Areas where we have questions, or need further elaboration:

-We are interested in exploring further the use of the 'holder of
domain names' as the initial membership, utilizing an "OPT IN"
approach. We also agree that there should be some mechanism for an
ALSO to accommodate discussion with other interested and involved
individuals who do not own domain names, but who are actively
engaged in ICANN's activities, while reserving voting rights for
individual domain name holders. .  At the national and regional
level, consideration can also be given to develop the ability to
support other interested individuals as members, including how to
assess a reasonable fee to support such membership.   It is
important to start with the practical, and the BC supports the
"holder of domain name(s)" as the practical approach to getting
started.  These issues can be further developed during the
implementation phase.

-We understand the interest, and potentially the need to utilize
the registrars in an initial part of the function of reaching
registrants but have many practical concerns and questions.

-Many, if not most registrants, register through a third party,
either an ISP or a corporate support service provided by a supplier
who provide other essential services {DNS hosting, web site
consultation, ISP services, etc.} Registries and registrars cannot
speak for the operational impact on these organizations. We highly
recommend that during the implementation phase, consultation with
representatives of these entities will be important.

-We are concerned that there may be significant start up costs to
launching the new ALSO, and that further exploration is needed on
how initial funding is to be obtained, and managed.  We consider
this a primary activity during the next phase of the work effort.

-ccTLDs may find that the proposal of the ALSC either seems to
exclude them, or might create competition to their own efforts to
represent their Internet community.  We suggest that, given the
diversity of the ccTLDs, that further consultation and elaboration
is needed on how they fit in and how they participate.

-Development of the terms of membership, fees, process, etc.
remain to be worked out, and the BC suggests that it would be
useful to get some examples from other multi-national organizations
involving individuals, including ISOC, computer societies, consumer
organizations, etc.

 -Enabling one member, one vote, seems to be a fair and balanced
approach to prevent capture.  Further work is needed to determine
how to ensure that each registrant, regardless of number of names,
or TLD registered in, ends up with only one vote.

-The BC is not yet convinced of the feasibility or need to change
the number of regions, although we are open to further consideration
of this issue and recommendation.  However, we would seek to
understand both the need for an increase in the number of regions,
and the rationale for a particular realignment.  In any event, if
there is a determination of an additional region for the ALSO, then
it should be clearly noted that there is no intent to change the
regional alignment of ICANN overall, at this time.  IF ICANN's
stakeholders recommend the consideration of realignment of regions
across all ICANN functions, such a discussion should be undertaken
across the three existing SOs.  It would be difficult to have
different regional structures across the SOs.

-The Draft Report does not clearly explain the need for the use of
the "Supporting Organization" structure as the mechanism for
organizing the At Large Membership.  SO's have many responsibilities
beyond ensuring participation.  The BC would like to have further
dialogue about the selection of the SO model, and any alternative
structures which may have been considered or could be considered,
keeping in mind that the BC supports the need for both participation
and for board representation based on one board member per region.
In short, we support the need for a structured approach for
organizing participation, holding elections, etc.; we seek further
discussion on whether different models other than the SO model could
be appropriate.

________________________________________________
Recommendations which we have concerns about:

-There seems to be no clarification of what the "interests" are which
the At Large Membership should represent.  We know that the ALSC has
given some preliminary thought to this and we are looking forward to
further development in the final report.  We urge further
clarification in this area.

- We took particular note of the approach of segregating participants
into three categories, because it could appear that the ALSC was
using a narrow definition of "provider", which would exclude the
business users, organizations, ISPs, and IP Constituencies.  Through
our face-to-face meetings and through further dialogue, we have made
our concerns about this issue clear.  We seek assurance that the
ALSC recognized the concerns expressed by the user community and that
there was no intent to use a narrow definition of provider,
restricted to the registrars and registries.  This is an area of
particular concern to the user constituencies.  We can accept the
three categories, assuming that the non-commercial users, business
users, ISPS, IP community, and registrars and registries are
included in the category: Provider.

________________________________________________
The concept of "Users", "Providers", and "Developers"

It is not surprising that the Committee struggled with definitions of
who has an interest in ICANN's policy formulation and in various
entities' interests in the election of the board members.  It is
indeed challenging.

While the concepts of "users", "providers" and developers" seems
somewhat simple; in fact, these distinctions are more complex than
the report conveys.   The conceptual development of "users",
"providers", and "developers" should more clearly describe the place
for organizational/institutional/non-commercial users, businesses,
ISPs, and the IP Community to participate in ICANN's policy formulation.
In the view of the BC, that place is in the provider category.
Further, and significantly, the final report must also recognize the
importance of the role of the ccTLDs and their involvement in the
local Internet Community.

Even as we plan for the future, any formulation of participation and
representation must take care not to leave behind the interests of
those who are building the Internet, using the Internet for business
purposes and to serve other users, and who are key to the success of
the Internet and to ICANN.

The BC recommends that the "provider" category be clearly defined to
include those entities, along with the registrars and registries who
are supplying a service in one aspect of the use of domain names-the
domain name registry and registration service component.  A narrowly
interpreted definition of  "provider" will limit effective
representation of stakeholders within ICANN and the support from the
broad set of those who today ensure the stability and support of
ICANN.

In addition to the organizational/institutional uses, businesses
large and small, ISPs and the IP community, the  "provider" category
must also include the participation of the entities that supply the
registration process and manage the interface to register names. In
the set of functions involved in bringing users onto the Internet and
supporting its functions and operations, the domain name and it's
registration process are part of the critical elements in the value
equation, and must be understood in relevance to other functions,
such as IP addresses, DNS hosting, access, content on web sites,
delivery of services to users, etc.  In short, all of these entities
are  "critical players" in the value chain of building, supporting
and using the Internet.  Together they make up the provider category.

A narrow view of the provider category/constituencies of ICANN would
negate the involvement, participation, and support of the broad set
of businesses, ISPs, and others presently involved in today's Names
Council (DNSO) and the BC would not be able to support it.

The BC supports utilizing a broad definition of "provider", to be
inclusive of the entities noted above and consider the clarification
of this definition a priority.

________________________________________________
Board Seat Allocation for the ALSO

We are interested in further discussion about the concept of 6:6:6;
with an assumption on our part that the middle category remains broad
and inclusive.  At this point, we are not adopting this formulation
but are interested in further dialogue.

Should this formulation become broadly accepted, the alignment of
board representation of the six seats designated by the Report to
the "Provider category" within that broader set of players would
become the work of the DNSO and the Board in a next step of consideration.

There may end up being some duplication between the broad provider/
business/ISP category, and the individual holder of domain name
category. Reliance on the 'domain name' holder as individual member
would by necessity include anyone/entity who held domain name{s},
if they chose to register and become a member.  However, that
broadly available participation where the individual participates
AS an individual in the ALSO, does not replace the need for
participation on behalf of organizations, ISPs, IP representatives,
and businesses in the provider category.

________________________________________________
Aggregation: Managing to Prevent Capture

The general consensus position of the BC is that individual voices,
like other voices in constituencies, must be aggregated.  Therefore
we support the ALSC recommendations regarding the creation of
regional at large councils.

Direct membership without a meaningful and sustainable structure of
some kind is neither practical, nor manageable. For now, a national
base, utilizing existing organizations, and building into a regional
structure is optimal.   Our view has been that the At-Large
membership should have a structure so that they can both elect
regional members and have an effective communication mechanism for
regional opinion. As noted above, the Study Group Report has made
some progress in advancing a conceptual framework that must now be
further elaborated.   From reading the report, it is clear that much
work remains to be done on developing concepts into a framework,
which can be implemented, and then sustained and grown.

We believe that the ALSC has made significant preliminary
contributions in this area, and that their continued contributions
should be welcomed.

________________________________________________
Balancing Participation in ICANN and Board Representation across
Involved Parties

The BC accepts the concept that a well-defined and sustainable
At-Large Membership built on a model of self-funding and aggregated
participation, should have regional representatives on the Board.
However, board representation does not equate to participation at
the policy level and should not be allowed to become a substitute
for the bottom up policy development process.  The BC is
particularly cautious about any efforts, which result, even
accidentally, in moving policy development from the SOs.

________________________________________________
How should At Large Members to the Board be elected?

We found the concept of the "council" useful and believe it has
considerable merit.  A process, which enables candidates to self-
nominate or to be nominated by groups/organizations, should be
supported. Geography is the most effective method to ensure that
regional concerns are dealt with. We do not support the concept of
issue-oriented organizational structures, or elections and consider
this a path to disaster on many fronts.

For instance, issue oriented elections could easily leave some
regions behind.  Further, any interested individual in ICANN will
undoubtedly have multiple areas of interest. Issue oriented
representation or elections would require an individual then to
participate in multiple, globally distributed initiatives.

While we continue to believe that indirect elections by regional
groupings are the best method for election at this time; we are
more concerned with integrity of the election itself, and
affordability.  The implementation process must address these
critical areas of identification, validation, accreditation of
identity.

We note that the path to elections in the Supporting Organizations
is an indirect approach, based on consultation with the members.
This allows a vetting of candidates, building of supportive
mechanisms, opportunity to learn about the positions for the
candidates, and ensures that candidates are familiar with the
issues.

Regardless of whether the elections are direct or indirect, it
will be essential to ensure that the nomination process ensures
that future At-large Board candidates have both a breadth of
vision and familiarity with the range of complex issues that
require decisions, and that they are aware of and understand
ICANN's narrow technically oriented mission.

________________________________________________
Maintaining the Focus and contribution of the At Large Study
Committee:

The BC notes with appreciation the significant and extensive
investment of time and thought, which has gone into the
preparation of the draft Report and commends the Committee for
it's work to date.  We have appreciated the opportunity to meet
with the ALSC both before and in Montevideo and to provide comments.
We look forward to the final report, and expect to provide comments
on that document by the time of the ICANN meeting, when the ALSC
will discuss it's final report on November 12 in Marina del Ray.

And, we look forward to and welcome the commitment of the ALSC to
remaining active and involved as implementation considerations are
developed.   In summary, again, we believe that the ALSC Draft
Report has achieved remarkable progress and that we should all
now turn our thoughts and attention to how to undertake final
comments, reaching consensus, and planning toward implementation
analysis.

On behalf of the Business Constituency

The BC Reps

Marilyn Cade
Grant Forsyth
Philip Sheppard

[http://www.bizconst.org/positions/BCALSCposition.doc]

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