Re: [wg-review] We are in the starting line......

[Jefsey Morfin <jefsey@wanadoo.fr>]

Commenting on this:

On 07:07 27/12/00, Kent Crispin said:
>The current constituency structure is in fact a very hard-fought
>compromise.  Any significant change to the constituency structure will
>reopen a set of issues that I guarantee will either deadlock this WG for
>months, or doom it to total irrelevance.  Moreover, even if we reopened
>all those issues, the final result would be, I wager, not much different
>from the current one -- the current constituencies (except the NCC) are
>all here because their members fought very hard to be here, and they are
>not going to suddenly change their minds.  The TM interests have not
>suddenly become powerless; the registrars and registries have not become
>any less important in the ICANN structure; business still register the
>vast majority of domain names.  None of the basic dynamics that led to
>the current structure have changed all that much.

Kent seems to be unfortunately right. When you look into the DNSO it looks 
like an aggregate of different interests having obtained an NC seat. And 
once having reached that stage keeping it preciously as a way to the BoD.

The @large are therefore a thread and there is a lot of jealousy. The DNSO 
people had to fight a lot to get the hope of sharing one seat on three and 
the @large would be given "for free" 9 seats?

The result is "let's quickly report a statu-quo to the BoD before the new 
DoC team is in place and BoD start working on the @large Study. We will 
have protected our "stakeholder" seats and privileges". At least it is what 
an external observer understands.

IMHO this will not survive for a long, and it would be the duty of this WG 
to acknowledge it and to work out a good solution. The DNSO must not 
continue to be a substitute for the @large. This WG is to help working out, 
with the @large STudy Group as a partner over the whole 2001 year, a system 
where really interested parties (as Karl says) may consider the common 
global interest issues concerning domain names and the other interests may 
be represented through the @large representation.

In a nutshell, no need for us to fight for 3 BoD seats, when we have 12 
available.

The evaluation rule I propose is the following: to consider the priority of 
the concerns (not of the people as persons wear several hats). If the
priority is to protect identified interests the concern is @large, if the 
concern is to develop common netwide interests the concern will be
said "netwide". As Karl tells everyone is a stakeholder in the Internet: so 
the first level priority of one side has in background a second level 
priority which is the top level priority of the other side (what permits 
dialog). When I protect my domain name interests I certainly want the 
domain system to work properly. And when I argue about TM rights, I keep 
thinking about my own TMs. But clarifying the different "hats" permits to 
get rid of formulas like "TM lobby". There should be an interest group in 
the DNSO caring about TM handling. There are lobbies in the @large fighting 
for their TM rights. Then there may be an open and constructive dialog.

If you observe the entire Internet history and the ICANN organization there 
is an accepted balance between @large and netwide
representations and constituencies. In using these concepts the BoD is 
currently 9 netwide, 9 @large (or should be) and one Staff what
seems rather balances. Now within the DNSO there are three netwide Support 
Organizations and we are discussing the one concerned by
domain name issues.

I am frankly puzzled by the charter of some constituencies which have quite 
nothing to say about DNS and domain names. The election of
Mr. Katho is a good example that a lot of the concerns currently carried 
among DNSO constituencies belong to the @large. The result
is that the most basic points have never been addressed and that a normal 
control by external interests is not insured. Normal procedure
should be that the DNSO welcomes new concepts, filter them, help them to be 
better defined and accepted. Then DNSO should relate with
the different user groups (@large) and check with them the concepts are 
acceptable in real life. This duality offers R&D and Quality Control before 
joint decisions at the BoD level.

The result is that after all those years we have not yet a legally binding 
definition of what is domain name! We are building a lot of procedures, 
laws, agreements, contracts, sales, etc.. which will not stand and will 
create us many problems the day this basic question is addressed.

The access names, the member names, the multinational names or the TLD 
proliferation (among others) will impose us to do it quickly. But  when you 
think of it, how many of these issues have been considered by the DNSO and 
reported to the BoD?

The SSRAC site is quite half one year late in reporting what they do. This 
rises a lot of concerns about the domain name system management and 
development. Has anyone in this list asked them when they will update as I 
did (with no response yet for one month and one of the non@large Directors 
trying to help me getting an answer).

IMHO these are issues and duties for the DNSO.

Rather than the GA spending one year voting on the way they will vote and 
engaging into a new year to audit the way they have voted on the way they 
should vote. Or having as big issues that their Chair is selected by people 
they did not vote for instead of being elected by them; while the BoD 
Director representing them is the one they voted against. What is however 
interesting is that the most controverted and fought campaign at the GA was 
against the 4 BoDsquatters which is typically an @large issue (I have been 
clearly defeated there when I tried to make them understand it was not the 
proper place). Another example: the DNSO/BC took sides in the @large 
election and advised who to vote for. This is what we have to address as 
Review-Working Group. IMHO at least.

I am sorry if I was long and sounded iconoclast.
Have a great day.
Jefsey