Agenda:
1)
.eu as
a specific new TLD / new gTLDs in general
2)
delegation
transfer of .pn
3)
outreach
4)
active
participation
5)
DNSO
finances
6)
AOB
Chair:
Michael Schneider, EuroISPA
Attending:
Antonio Harris, Cabase
Siegfried Langenbach, CSL
Hirofumi Hotta, NTT
Mark McFadden, CIX
Tony Holmes, BT
Grégoire Sénéclauze, France Telecom
S. Subbiah, i-dns.net
Ali Dribba Badiel, Onatel, Burkina Faso
Pierre Ouedraogo, Onatel
Don Mason, NSI registry
Bruce Beckwith, NSI registrar
David E. Young, Bell Atlantic
Saleem Al Balooshi, Emirates
Telecommunication
Ann DiSilvestre, Info Avenue
Internet Services
Henning Grote, Deutsche Telekom
André Zehl, Deutsche Telekom
Arne Litleré, Telenor
Nomeddine Boudriga, Mincom / Supcom,
Tunisia
John Montjoy, CIX
Livia Rosu, ETSI
Wael Nasr, i-dns.net
Robert Blokzjl, RIPE / ICANN Board
Wolfgang Kleinwächter, University of Aarhus
Adice Akplogan, Cafenet / Afrinic
Kouma Cyriaque, CDK / Afrinic
Linda Gu, Beijing Internet Institute
Jonathan Cohen, ICANN Board
Monika Ermert, freelance Journalist
Short intro by chairman, Hirofumi
Hotta delayed
Short intro of Officers and
attendees
No quorum was present. It was
decided that the constituency would have to figure out how to avoid situations
like this in future meetings.
1)
Schneider:
.eu – discussion began in 1997 in
EuroISPA – several good reasons to establish a European ccTLD – at that point
several ideas of having .eu for the EU, .eur for general purposes, .euro for
financial purposes. The issue came up again a few months ago, ICANN has not
taken position on this as no official application for the creation and
delegation of the TLD has been filed.
Really just
FYI, be aware of it so check homepage of EU, can provide input until March 17th
Langenbach:
power of root still with US department of commerce, so right now not solely an
ICANN decision, agree that diplomats on both sides will proceed only once
details have been clarified
Holmes: some
open issues like impact on registries and registrars, response back needs some
further iterations even though positive, additional issues will come up
Schneider: yet Christopher Wilkinson was highlighting the agreement of people to have it created, process will not be delayed for more than several weeks or few months; who will run the registry (some associations in the discussion) – Officials pushing to have it done soon
1) Schneider: delegation transfer of .pn – summary: Domain was run by private orga (ccTLD for some islands) and administrator was Nigel Roberts – question of who should run it was raised in 1997, but ICANN (then IANA) didn’t intervene until now (details on homepage). important issue of redelegation is really that NC was told that it was urgent and that it hence needed to be dealt with without consulting anyone. NC had brief discussion about the importance ICANN Board gives NC, as currently the influence of the NC and hence the influence of constituencies is rather limited. NC dealing with few issues in its WGs. Be aware of this – discussion will surely recommence tomorrow.
Montjoy: correct, concern about a lack of process (ICANN Board taking all the decisions by itself) – it’s a precedent that needs to be reacted upon, among the people here:
unanimous vote (some abstentions) that concern among those present.
arrival of Hirofumi Hotta: 14.00
1) Harris: outreach: everyone’s been asked to help, put logo on website and alert members of presence of ISPCP – needs to be worked on with more impetus this far to reach ISPs and their associations across the world. Further suggestion: realise importance of participation in ICANN process, encourage everyone to put link on homepage.
2) Schneider: active participation: several elections in last two months, not a lot of interest of people to vote or nominate candidates; too few votes, would be concerned about lack of interest in my person. All members agreed to actively participate according to the articles, need more of that. If we don’t achieve more activity, ISPCP will not survive, DNSO overall already not taken seriously enough. NC was not consulted for NSI contracts either (like for .pn) and NC was informed at the same time as the public, shows lack of interest on level of ICANN Board. Need meeting between Board and NC to discuss the issue.
Holmes: right about concern, good to hear Board intends to make it better, need interaction back INTO the constituency as well, put that process in place as well.
Schneider: Not a lack of interest, rather a lack of work being DONE in the NC – still dealing with internal issues like how to treat reports of WGs, whether to take substantial decisions at all. Not that we need new gTLDs, just everyone has expressed their opinion in past 3,5 years, hence should have it on agenda of NC meeting, will not hear new opinions now. NC needs to concentrate on substantial issues
Blokzijl: one of the reasons that Board feels a little unhappy with work of DNSO at large: there are a couple of well-defined issues that have been floating around for several years like the new gTLDs, and the DNSO has not made any progress on that. DNSO hasn’t come up with rules for TLD delegation or redelegation – hence nothing to use as a basis by Board. More cans of worms like this will pop up soon.
1) See with concern that another level of complexity is added by at-large council
Blokzijl: added by USG to get it through congress
Schneider: GA already is supposed to reflect general interest, is not designed to work properly with structure, senseless, several suggestions, means and methods made to channel input made in GA without having few noise-makers disencourage everyone. At-large will only double the GA – if USG really insisted on this, then do we still need GA?
Blokzijl: Other two SOs had their “at-large” meetings over the past ten years, well-established and focused. GA/DNSO should possibly focus on Name-delegation and registration
Schneider: Focus not the only problem. IETF-participation of 1000 is not really a general public either, just specialists – should universities etc. not be interested as well? Unlike in DNSO you are expected to provide substantial input, we are different, you can just subscribe to a mailing list. Policy is different from providing and designing code, everyone can say what they think. Many interests being pushed by large entities, politics not technological, more direct return on the money involved – therefore decision making harder, different level of interest and influence. Overall: NC not very successful in handling issues handed to it, the way Board hence treating NC not fairly either. What’s happening there is duplicated here so long as there is not enough active participation by members, few making their time available. Pity we now have to find ways of reducing the quorum to be able to take decisions at all.
Harris: should be paying more attention to this as domain decisions will change and affect the ISP business substantially. ISPs provide services to their customers, need a broader awareness for the ICANN on-goings.
Holmes: need to get more people involved on the other hand NC not very effective. Participation will increase when dealing with real-life, substantive issues. Share a lot of the concerns shared about at-large, already having trouble making it work right now. Intend to discuss at-large here?
Schneider: have discussed the issue several times (whether by-laws provide enough participation by industry or whether having ½ the Board elected by public will hinder work) – in L.A. emotion was negative from our constituency, yet NC and Board not willing to open up the issue again, no result would be generated to change the bylaws.
Montjoy: at-large as it stands now is very flawed, serious risk to ICANN that half the Board could be captured by relatively small group. Process as it stands now does not seem ready for implementation
Schneider: no one objects, but unfortunately as ISPCP set up to deal with issues related to names rather than general set-up of ICANN.
Montjoy: no issue more important than possible instability of Domain Name administration! Why go forward if the risk is there?
Schneider: try to provide a common statement of ISP industry (not necessarily from ISPCP but rather from constituency)
Blokzijl: to get it out of USG-hand we had to make compromises, that’s life!
Harris: Could end up with nine directors not well informed at all – scary concept
Langenbach: was in MAC (Membership Advisory Committee) thinking about possibility of capture, real question is whether we generally object to the idea or just believe we have new ideas? Must find proper way of doing it as probably we cannot object generally.
Schneider: if it weren’t of interest to ISP-industry, we all wouldn’t have to be here. Are committed to contributing to process in creative and constructive way and expect organisation to come up with reasonable decisions and results.
Holmes: first saw at-large idea as way of involving normal Internet user to check ICANN and prevent it from being taken over by corporations. If it isn’t working properly however, then no one is getting out of this process what they want, now throwing in the possibility of instability, making it unbalanced. Don’t think we have to make a decision about totally pro or con, need to ensure sensible process.
Montjoy: not the first time congress has been wrong about something – too much too soon! ICANN itself not ready and sufficiently stable to proceed with at-large at this time.
Harris: confess that I would feel better with people in suits and aged 60 on that second half of the board; demand for Domain Names mainly comes from the business sector, need influence commensurate with the money they are putting into making this business work.
Schneider: should work on formal statement later, handing this over to NC will lead nowhere. Should have a drafting team to come up with a draft within two weeks or so.
Blokzijl: to show concern about in the near future having half the Board made up of unknown people. Maybe have two iterations, like having 6 at-large members elected and then see how it goes, can fix the problems that pop up. Would be a Board decision.
Holmes: might be too late for a drafting team, needs to go to the Board during this conference as well so that concerns are addressed straight away. Would also be a good signal to members who aren’t here that substantial decisions are being taken at these meetings.
Langenbach: don’t have the hope that these concerns will be fruitful. Another possibility would be to be more active ourselves and prevent crazies from taking over. Believe that at-large in part created to ensure US-influence, up to all of us to recruit people in our own regions to participate.
Harris: in L.A. it was mentioned: candidates had mostly educational background, their community is better networked. Will be very successful unless commercial community gets their act together
Schneider: just signifies capture by one or the other community, does not solve the problem. Should find a way of coming together and compiling a statement by tomorrow – meet right after this.
1) Harris: Finances: was on agenda in L.A. as well, even NC didn’t come to any conclusion on how to finance DNSO. Budget proposal by Ken Stubbs and Elisabeth Porteneuve splitting the ¼ million half and half between constituencies and ICANN (what interest would ICANN have in financially supporting the DNSO?). Definitely need to split the portion allocated amongst members, will each have to pay somewhere between several hundred to a few thousand USD per member per year. Will need to provide a certain amount in near future. Will forward the proposal to the list. Substantial changes will be discussed at NC meeting tomorrow. Talking of about 30thousand USD per constituency.
Montjoy: Just not enough people to get the job done, if it was more money that could help then good!
Schneider: several reasons it’s not working: staffing among them, another is disorganisation and definitely also discouragement, “won’t be heard anyway”.
Harris: large part of budget is webcasting, many feel that it is not necessary, often very few people that use it – motion that we object to having webcasting in DNSO meetings – 13 in favour, no one against, 2 abstentions.
Grote: remember that in L.A. it was discussed to limit the casting to audio without video streaming. No willingness to open up discussion again about openness and transparency.
Harris: there is live scribing by Berkman Center, don’t need additional voice casting.
Schneider: decisions are published in minutes a few days after the meetings the latest anyhow.
Ouedraogo: Some money should be used to translate the information on the homepage(s) to make it more understandable to people around the world – more efficient way of reaching more people.
Schneider: certainly correct, need to have outreach in terms of translation into major languages as well. This outreach effort was kicked off by ccTLDs and we should support it.
Harris: Latin America supports this as well, but generally this should be financed by ICANN.
Schneider: be aware that there is also a proposal to found a multi-lingual Working Group. Will forward this to list as well.
Hotta: jpNIC has a budget for translations like this.
Ouedraogo: French would be most important for Africa, many rely only on those organisations that they can understand. 29 countries of 52 speak French, some speak Portuguese and Spanish, very few English. Arabic only in the north, but most are bilingual with English or French. Having a link to ICANN website with little flags for languages or something like that would be useful.
Hotta: Maybe Japanese and Mandarin for Asia, but definitely more difficult as too many languages.
?: APNG and APNIC are doing a good outreach effort so maybe suggest to them to support the translations. Hotta could contact Toru Takahashi who has collected a large fund for translations.
Young: If it is difficult to get funding for the translations outreach will be difficult.
1) AOB: Holmes: 2 issues: gTLD issue – have discussed it before but no consensus has ever been reached, hence still concerns across whole area
Schneider: our consensus was that IF we had to issue new gTLDs, it should be hundreds – that was agreement in L.A., might not get through in NC; generally know every person’s opinion, hence NC should come to a decision.
Holmes: agree, but think it would be opportune to make our own decision public again!
Cohen: just wondering: fairly clear what this constituency thinks; given the possibility that this position is not carried, what concerns do the ISPs have, what’s your advice to the Board?
Schneider: In a democracy as I see ICANN to be one, we have to live with and support decisions taken by a majority, we’re not registrars, not our core business. No reason for us to provide additional obstacles if only several instead of hundreds are introduced.
Cohen: personally haven’t made up my mind, want a specific answer, what help can be provided, what obstacles / problems will there be?
Montjoy: big concern is existing administrative progress (like Whois database) – very carefully and prudently, preferably in a small test without destabilizing the network.
Harris: example could be the registration in Argentina: registration is published and 90 days given to make substantial objection. Nightmare would be that there will be tons of challenges in new gTLDs
Schneider: disadvantage of introduction of new gTLDs: generally it is said that name space is rare – only true for sensible names. There might only be a few days of opportunity to register interesting names, large companies are registering additional name space to avoid fraud etc. System will continue to be used as a directory.
Cohen: sunrise proposal: famous mark is difficult to define in different countries, hence there should be a 90 day-period when a new gTLD is rolled out in which people can prove trademark rights along certain rules to register Domain names before it is opened up to general public on first come first name basis. By contract, disputes will be referred to the UDRP.
Schneider: may be appropriate but only another means of dealing with the disadvantages – will help owners of trademarks to deal with the disadvantage to some extent, issuing 100s as well – because then not necessary to register trade name anywhere in the domain space.
Young: agree with the sense that these are just patches to a bad proposal.
Langenbach: do not really care about famous marks; millions of normal names cannot register their names right now because someone else has registered. Only Domain grabbers would register “normal” names, possibly one should only allow complex names like first + last name.
McFadden: two types of stability, technical and administrative. When this day comes (probably inevitable) ISPs will have to bear the burden of giving support to users. Administrative problems are born by registries and registrars, who are becoming ISPs. How can we help? Board should come back to us, the ISPCP, when rolling out gTLDs so that we can give concrete suggestions and recommendations.
Langenbach: Everyone should be heard with his experience and knowledge. In WG-C saw that many were just talking for the sake of talking. McFadden’s suggestion a process to define the enriching comments.
b) Holmes: 2nd: fair amount of dialogue with Board members wandering in and out of our meetings. Maybe next time should ask Board whether there are specific issues they want input and feedback on, so that they can either be there at a certain point in time, or be given consolidated input at the end of our meeting.
Schneider: surely a good recommendation, should be extended to the NC – not just relying on the reps but also asking the NC to come back to the constituencies with specific agenda items that they want discussed.