[comments-review] Conclusions -- Part Two

["Babybows.com" <webmaster@babybows.com>]

The overall lack of participation on the part of the Constituency Members of
the Names Council in the Review Process is a major cause for concern.  While
the ICANN Board is to be commended for its efforts to promote accountability
by seeking a critical review and self-assessment, the management capability
of the Names Council is again called into question when its Review Task
Force succeeds only in obtaining a handful of comments from the member
Constituencies.
     There are over 180 accredited Registrars, yet only one, register.com,
actively participated in this Review by offering a number of insightful
comments and a well-formulated position paper.  Why did we not hear from the
other Registrars?  There are 245 country-code Registries.  Where are their
comments to be found?  The Business Constituency has at least 66 members on
their roster.  The ISPCP has 38 members; the NCDNHC has 162 affiliate
members, and the IPC while not yet listing their members publicly assuredly
has a large roster of participants.  Where are all their comments?  One
might conclude by their relative silence that perhaps they are so satisfied
with the status quo and their own status as Special Interest Groups that
they felt no need for any change.  Why this lack of participation?  Where
was the outreach on the part of the Names Council's Review Task Force to
pro-actively obtain comments?  Neither the interests of the ICANN Board nor
the interests of the public are being served by this failure to communicate.
     As more than 700 groups are collectively represented by the Names
Council, the limited contribution offered to this review process by comments
from less than 1 percent of these groups cannot easily be used as the basis
for any consensus conclusion.  This reticence to engage in meaningful
dialogue almost throws into jeopardy any recommendations that the Review
Task Force may seek to put forth.  Fortunately, a treasure-trove of comments
by interested parties is available to the Review Task Force.  At least one
set of participants, the Review Working Group, took its mandate seriously,
generating over 2700 postings in less than 40 days.  Conclusions are
obvious... if you are serious about getting the work done, create a Working
Group and give it enough time to get the job done; the Task Force approach
should forever be scrapped as an abject failure.
     Clearly, we have one group that has enjoyed a plethora of
participation, and another group that has enjoyed almost none.  What
accounts for the difference between these two groups?  The latter group is
comprised exclusively of members drawn from Special Interest Groups with no
particular penchant for change; the former group consists primarily of
members of the public that recognize the need for change.  The ICANN Board
has been asking for change... you might start by limiting the role of the
Names Council (which has shown a clear inability to get the job done well in
a timely fashion) and offering greater responsibilities to the General
Assembly (which through the Working Group process has shown itself
repeatedly to be more than capable as a project manager).