RE: [registrars] Whois

["Michael D. Palage" <michael@palage.com>]

Rick,

I had a meeting yesterday afternoon in DC where a group of people got
together to discuss Whois. In fact this was the second meeting for most of
the participants, although this group was larger than the first. Everyone
was taking notes, and I have no problem sharing the ones that I took.

The participants in this meeting included: the CDT and EPIC two of the
prominent players in connection with privacy rights, Steve Metalitz from the
IPC, Becky Burr from Wilmer Cutler (she explained historical 99 contract
negotiations and the current GNR Whois proposal); registrars in attendance
were NSI, BulkRegister and MarkMoniter (GoDaddy was invited but unable to
attend), the USPTO, the FTC, and myself.

Regarding meetings in DC they happen on a regular basis and I am not even
invited to some of them :-) By way of example a couple of weeks ago, Paul
Twomey was in DC. During the day he had a "meeting" with Brian Cute, Elana
Briotman, and Donna McGehee. Later in the evening there was a welcome
"reception" for Paul Twomey at AT&T offices in which if I remember correctly
Elliot Noss (TUCOWS) was one of the co-sponsors of that event. At that
"reception" Paul Stahura and Ross Rader were some of the additional
registrars that were in attendance. However, I do not believe BulkRegister
was invited to this event.

This highlights a culture in which some big registrars tend to gravity
toward Washington in an attempt to curry favor among some of the decision
makers. Surprise, surprise. This does not even taken into account the
regular number of times that some of these larger registrars call Robin
Layton and other DoC/NTIA members on the phone. Ask yourself this question
Rick, why in Marilyn's email did she only reference consulting with Brian,
Elana and Ross, although you were fortunate enough to be cc's on the first
email. I believe that either you or myself should have been contacted as the
representatives of the Executive Committee. Also note in Marilyn Cade's
email that Ross Rader has "agreed" to interact with the GAC's liaison.
Again, I think that this is a responsibility that you personally or another
elected Register representative should have been assigned, but then again I
was never asked.

At no time during this meeting did I every state that I spoke on behalf of
the registrars, in fact at the begging I stated that I represented "me,
myself and I".

I think the community call proposed next week is the chance for some
additional progress in the right direction.

Any other questions please free to give me a call over the weekend, I will
be working :-(

Mike



> -----Original Message-----
> From: owner-registrars@dnso.org [mailto:owner-registrars@dnso.org]On
> Behalf Of Rick Wesson
> Sent: Friday, May 23, 2003 4:39 PM
> To: Cute, Brian; Michael D. Palage
> Cc: 'registrars@dnso.org'
> Subject: Re: [registrars] Whois
>
>
>
> Private meetings on whois? could you explain mike? did anyone take notes
> and can you post those, was anyone from the USG there?
>
> -rick
>
> On Fri, 23 May 2003, Cute, Brian wrote:
>
> > All,
> >
> > I have begun to contacted registries to solicit their
> participation in the
> > call next Friday and echo Ross' point that now is the time for
> registrars to
> > get out front on this issue.  Mike held a meeting yesterday to
> discuss bulk
> > whois, anonymous regisrations and potential models for
> providing modified
> > access to whois data.  Although IP, law enforcement, privacy
> advocates and
> > certain registrars participated in the meeting (and some constructive
> > discussion took place concerning the GNR tiered access model), the RC
> > initiated call next Friday presents a real opportunity for the RC to
> > establish a framework of discussion that can lead to a positive
> treatment of
> > this issue in Montreal.
> >
> > Brian
> >
>