Avri Doria: Okay, this is Avri Doria. I believe 21:00 UTC has come and gone as it is now one minute after the hour so I’ll start by reviewing the agenda and then we’ll go into roll call. Following that we’ve got completing the objection procedure draft for RALO review on the schedule. If that’s the only thing we get done today I’ll be happy because that’s something we must get done today.
We’re already one day past what I marked as our end date for being able to get this done on the ALAC’s delivery schedule, so one day after drop dead it’s a little bit more awkward. It means we have less than a week to process any comments but that’s still doable. So anyhow we’ve got that, and that will cover any changes since the last meeting and any last-minute issues. Hopefully that’s a fairly empty set at this point because I haven’t seen any on the mailing list, but just in case there are; and then to get a decision if we can from this group to proceed with the ALAC, At-Large, RALO review.
Then assuming that completes in good time, moving on to Item #4 which is planning for the upcoming meeting, and just start talking about planning for our agenda for that meeting. I think our next phone call meeting we’ll probably get into that in more detail. Then an update on any Applicant Support Program issues that I have picked up or that anyone else has picked up; then an update on gTLD issues that Cintra or anyone else may have picked up. If there’s none that’s fine.
Then just to go through any of the pending action items that weren’t covered on the list and then any other business. Does anybody have any other business that they wanted slotted into the “any other business” slot at this point? If not then I’ll ask again at the end of the meeting but I’ll note that none was brought up now.
Okay, any objections, problems, issues, additions to the agenda in general? Hearing nothing we’ll proceed on this agenda, and Gisella, could you do the roll call please?
Gisella Gruber: With pleasure. Good morning, good afternoon, good evening to everyone on today’s New gTLD call on Monday, the 13th of February. We have Avri Doria, Cheryl Langdon-Orr, Tijani Ben Jemaa, Dev Anand Teelucksingh, Didier Kasole, Yaovi Atohoun, Alan Greenberg. From staff we have Silvia Vivanco, Heidi Ullrich and myself, Gisella Gruber.
Apologies noted from Hong Xue, Olivier Crépin-Leblond, Sebastien Bachollet, Rudi Vansnick and Rafik Dammak. I hope I haven’t left anyone off the list. If I could please remind you to please state your names when speaking for transcript purposes. Also please note that today we do have the audio via the Adobe Connect room, so if you are not speaking, if I can kindly ask you to mute your speakers. Thank you, over to you, Avri
Avri Doria: Okay, thank you. This is Avri speaking again. Okay, for the next item – Item #3 – it’s the objection procedure. Dev has once again done an amazing amount of work since the last meeting and we now have a written explanatory note. But first I want to cover the cover letter we discussed at the last meeting. As I understand it’s translated, it’s ready to go. I’ve seen no comments pending on it, so does anybody have any views, comments, etc. pending on the cover letter? Okay.
The last thing we had as of the last meeting was also the procedure itself and all of the figures. At that time we had no open issues on it. I believe it has also been successfully translated. I have not heard any new issues. Are there any issues on the procedure itself that we need to cover at this point? Oh yeah, I don’t have my hands in front of me. I see a hand up, yes, Cheryl?
Cheryl Langdon-Orr: Thank you, Cheryl for the transcript record. I did put my hand up before you said “the procedure itself.”
Avri Doria: I’m sorry, I was on the wrong screen. You may be right; we should ask for multiple screens.
Cheryl Langdon-Orr: It’s not a procedural issue because I think the procedure as outlined is robust, although I do think we should probably note for the record some of the concerns on human bandwidth that Olivier Crépin-Leblond raised but that can happen later. It’s an extremely minor piece of edit: there is a word that says “then” when it should say “the” on Page 4. So with that, that’s the only thing I’ve noted. I just thought it might make it odd during translation with that sort of “then” and “the” business. So if you want me to copy it into the chat I will; if not I’ll just shut up and put up with it.
Avri Doria: Okay, thank you. And it would probably be good to have a specific location just written up so that it can be corrected, but thank you. Any other… Interesting how you look in the Adobe Connect and it looks… I know there are microphones but it looks like everybody has a little cactus.
Anyway, so that leads us to the latest piece which is the explanatory note that Dev wrote over the last week, and so I’d actually like to ask if Dev would basically like to give us an overview of it. I don’t think he needs to walk through it unless others believe it needs to be walked through. But would you like to speak to the last work you did?
Dev Anand Teelucksingh: Thank you, Avri, this is Dev Anand. Just to make sure, you’re hearing me?
Avri Doria: I can hear you.
Dev Anand Teelucksingh: Fantastic.
Avri Doria: I can’t speak for everybody else but I do.
Dev Anand Teelucksingh: Okay, well then it’s being recorded. So okay, well thanks for the comments on the last call which were quite thorough and with that I have already gone back and listened to the audio, and as I was making changes I decided to also redraft certain sections so that it flows better. So now I hope we have done a proper introduction leading into overview, summary, and then trying to explain each [header], and then moved to the appendix certain things like groundswell objection and who can file an objection to a gTLD application.
So I think it flows better and I think it incorporated all of the questions and changes that were mentioned in the last call. It was mentioned, for example, that the titles from Figure 6 onwards was referring to three or four weeks to several months after ACP, and what I later decided was that okay, we really should call that the objection period. So we have two clear periods – the application comment period, or the ACP; and the objection period. And then I tried to explain that in the introduction, why we are doing it this way.
So I don’t think I need to step through it but of course I just want to open it up to questions and any comments, if it’s still too confusing or whatever.
Avri Doria: Okay, thank you – this is Avri. So it’s an 11-page document, and does anybody feel… I see a hand up. Yes, Yaovi, please.
Yaovi Atohoun: Thank you very much. Sorry if my question is too late. I’m referring to your third page where you have all your summary. Can you hear me?
Dev Anand Teelucksingh: Yes.
Yaovi Atohoun: Yes, my question is on Paragraph #5. It’s not very clear for me with reference to community grounds because it is ongoing as to what [the term that ALAC has grounding to object in], etc. Am I (inaudible) ongoing, I don’t know when this is (inaudible). It’s not clear to me because in the previous paragraph, it is here that ALAC has grounding to object on matters of public interest, but I’m judging that [in the community we don’t have a decision yet]. So it is not clear for me, if you could explain that Paragraph #5.
Dev Anand Teelucksingh: Okay, alright. Shall I try to answer that, or I see Alan’s hand is also up. I don’t know if he is trying to…
Avri Doria: Alan, do you want to address this issue?
Alan Greenberg: No, mine’s a different issue. Thank you.
Avri Doria: Okay, so please, Dev. Or I can maybe quickly address it and then, Dev, you can have it. I think part of the issue is that there is an ongoing discussion as to the scope of At-Large’s ability to comment on these issues if I understand correctly. Is that what you were referring to?
Yaovi Atohoun: Yes, that is right.
Avri Doria: And when I read that, I guess knowing the discussion of the ongoing discussions as to what the scope is… Let me see, this is Paragraph 5 on Page 2, was that it?
Yaovi Atohoun: Page 3.
Avri Doria: Page 3, okay. Oh yeah. And I was wondering whether there is one word that could be added there that could make it easier – I don’t know, but…
Dev Anand Teelucksingh: This is Dev. I could go into the explanation as to well, what the Guidebook says is that you must have a standing to object, and therefore…
Avri Doria: Yeah. Well, first of all I don’t want you to leave this meeting with anything to do. I’m hoping that we can resolve any wording here and now so that at the end of this, because to send you away with more work means A.) you were sent away with work again which should not happen, but B.) it means we will not get this thing out in time. So I would like to look at any of the changes that people need to make on grounds, remembering that this is just a draft but still… It’s funny, I can’t find that paragraph. Why can I not find that paragraph?
Dev Anand Teelucksingh: Page 3…
Avri Doria: And it’s the Overview Summary, and Paragraph 5? One, two, three, four, five: “With respect to community grounds discussion is ongoing as to what extent…” Would it be clearer if it just said “With respect to community grounds, discussion is ongoing as to the scope of ALAC’s standing to object,” and leave it at that? Would that still be confusing? Yaovi, would that help at all in that paragraph?
Yaovi Atohoun: Yeah, yeah, that will help. Yeah.
Avri Doria: Okay. So if we can make that edit: “With respect to community grounds discussion is ongoing as to the scope of ALAC’s standing to object given that ALAC is responsible for considering and providing advice on ICANN activities as they relate to the interests of individual internet users – the At-Large community.” And so that’s something that we will need to work on.
I think going beyond that, trying to explain the scope of that issue, is almost out of bounds for this. This could almost have been a footnote here but it’s part of an explanatory suggestion so I think it works. And then that’s a separate job that we need to work on between now and the publication of this, I mean the final publication, is we need to have determined that scope.
And perhaps if there is an issue I can certainly explain the scope problem to people, I can write up something on the scope. I think I’ve already discussed it with the ALAC because that’s really who needs to deal with that scope issue and I’ll talk to Olivier just to make sure that that scope issue is on their plate, because it’s not something that we can handle and it’s not something that even the RALOs can handle. They can certainly have an opinion on it but however ALAC wants to handle that scope issue, we have to pass that off to them I believe. Does that work for people? Anybody object to that wording change that I just recommended?
No? Okay.
Heidi Ullrich: Avri, would that be an action item that you would like to ensure that you speak to Olivier about this issue and that it’s on an ALAC-
Avri Doria: Yeah, yeah, please. I think I’ve already done it but yes, that I should speak to Olivier further on the scope of an At-Large ALAC objection, because basically just so people remember, we had the most narrow objection scope which says “Only if it applies to ALAC/At-Large itself”; then there was a medium sort of scope that said “Or it applies to any of the ALSes, per se”; and then the widest scope was suggested by Hong which sort of said that “Anything that may have been a problem with an At-Large user community should be within scope,” and that really is an issue that’s beyond this particular group.
Okay, any more on that one or I’ll pass the floor to Alan? Alan, please.
Alan Greenberg: Thank you. On that last issue, we really don’t have to worry about what the scope is until the time comes to start formulating objections. It doesn’t even have to be, our procedure doesn’t change based on what the scope is so there’s plenty of time to do that. We need not to forget it but there’s plenty of time.
Avri Doria: Right. I’d sort of like to have it resolved if possible by the time objection season opens as opposed to objection season closing.
Alan Greenberg: Yeah, certainly. Okay, just a formatting issue: I know we discussed in the last meeting that we would not try to interweave the explanatory notes and the diagrams but I thought we were going to be including them in one document – the text followed by all the charts.
Avri Doria: Is it a real problem?
Alan Greenberg: Well, only to the extent that you want people to be able to download or look at the document that has everything in it, as opposed to being told they have to assemble this laundry list of pieces so they can read them. It’s just a matter of convenience.
Dev Anand Teelucksingh: Okay, this is Dev. I can append the flowcharts as a separate PDF so it’ll be immediately after the text. Would that be sufficient?
Alan Greenberg: As I said, we talked about last time that maybe it would be better to have them interweaved – the text and then the flowchart, the text and then the flowchart – but we wouldn’t do it at this pass. But I think they should be put into one PDF.
Dev Anand Teelucksingh: Understood. That will be easy to do.
Avri Doria: Okay, if that can be done easily please do it. Are you also suggesting that the cover letter should be or is the cover letter fine separate, and it’s then two pieces.
Alan Greenberg: If the cover letter is an email that’s fine. If the cover letter is going to be a document…
Avri Doria: It’s a document that’s been translated.
Alan Greenberg: Then it should be part of the same document.
Avri Doria: Okay. Is that something that Dev should do or is that something that staff can basically take these places while they’re assembling to start this, and actually take it and be responsible for putting the pieces together? Heidi, can you tell me?
Heidi Ullrich: Yeah-
Alan Greenberg: May I comment?
Avri Doria: Yes.
Alan Greenberg: Given the quality of our people I think anybody could do that.
Avri Doria: I was just hoping… Once again, I’m on a kick to walk out of this with Dev not having any assignments if possible.
Heidi Ullrich: Yeah, this is Heidi. I’m happy to do that, to put that together. I wouldn’t mind working with Dev on that. The only thing is currently we do have the translated text from the cover note and the charts but we do not yet have the translations to the explanatory text. But what we can do today, I mean later today we can send out the English version in one document but not to the other languages-
Avri Doria: Right, assuming we get through this and assuming we have the group’s approval to proceed I would like to do that so that we can start the period. I understand that the others will follow. That is something we had talked about at the beginning if it became necessary.
Dev Anand Teelucksingh: Okay, this is Dev. I’ll work with Heidi and get the PDFs done, not a problem.
Avri Doria: Okay. I just don’t want to impose further on your work schedule and I know your work schedule can have a priority given how much time you’ve got for this, and I really do want to make sure that it gets started today. I know I’m being pushy but what else is new? Tijani, yes, I see your hand. Tijani, please. Yes, Tijani, the floor is yours.
Tijani Ben Jemaa: Yes, it’s only to get… Yes, do you hear me?
Avri Doria: I hear you, yes.
Tijani Ben Jemaa: Okay, so it’s only to say that I agree with Alan on this, to put the text and the charts together. And I think it is possible… I don’t know but I think it’s very possible to put the explanation next to the right chart so that it will be very easy to follow. A [cover letter] can be lower, a cover letters so it gives us the [flowcharts], the cover letter and the document together.
Avri Doria: Tijani, I don’t think it’s that easy to get it done today unless I’m wrong and someone can speak up, to actually do what Alan was calling the interweaving and having the Figure 1 explanation, Figure 1 chart. I do think that they can put the three documents appended to each other, and then after this review, before the final publication to do that full interweaving. Does that seem okay to you, Tijani?
Tijani Ben Jemaa: Yes, please.
Avri Doria: Okay, thank you. So we’ve got a decision to do that. I guess that’s an action item, sort of an immediate action item. I see now hands up – I only saw when I was reading it just one typo, and that was in the first line of Figure 1, just so I can be picky, too: “to join an At-Large New gTLD Review Group.”
Dev Anand Teelucksingh: Oh, point taken there. Okay.
Avri Doria: I minor thing but… And it’s very ironic for me to be giving people typo notes – I understand that. Does anybody else have an issue with the explanatory note? I see no hands up. I see no comments in the chat. Okay.
Given the corrections that have been mentioned – Cheryl had one, I had one typo and there was Alan’s issue about making a single downloadable that was cover letter, explanatory note and then charts. Do we have approval for sending this out to, and I would also like to indicate to… Well first of all I’ll ask the question and then I’ll go back: is there approval for sending this out for review, understanding that we can continue to refine it during the review process and of course we’ll have almost a week at the end of the review process to take in the comments and make any necessary changes?
I see Alan and Cheryl. I’d like to point out that Hong did say in her email message that she was supportive of continuing. Tijani, I see your hand up – is that a new hand? If so, please speak.
Tijani Ben Jemaa: Yes, only to agree that we have to post it to the review immediately because the schedule is very tight now.
Avri Doria: Okay, thank you. So I see approvals, I see no disapprovals. Is there anyone that disagrees with the notion of sending this out for review at this time? Please put up a big red “NO” if you disapprove of sending this out. Okay, I see no disapprovals so with great thanks to Dev for the work he’s done and for the work that he and Heidi will do to put it into its final shape I say thank you, and thank you to all for review and approving sending this; getting this done in a short amount of time – it was really an exceedingly short amount of time. It’s a real achievement and I thank everybody.
So what I’d like to recommend assuming this has gone out, we start to see comments, is that we don’t necessarily have to wait until after this. If we see a comment we can start discussing how to deal with that comment and also the work to do the interweaving, whoever – whether it’s Dev who remains editor or someone else takes on an editor shape to pull this stuff together into the final version – that work can be done in the meantime. It doesn’t have to wait for the last week.
Okay, any other comments on this objection procedure draft at this time? Okay. Moving on: planning for upcoming meeting. And so in some sense I see the planning for the upcoming meeting agenda as being very similar to our regular agenda. How long do we have for that meeting, by the way – an hour?
Heidi Ullrich: Yes, one hour on [Sunday].
Avri Doria: Yes, I saw the agenda item; I just didn’t remember whether it was 60 or not. So 60 means an effective 70 because unlike with phone calls where I can be rigorous and start on the minute, I know full well that in these meetings one does not actually start anything on the minute. However, assuming we have an hour, I’m looking at basically the same agenda that we have in the meetings, the main part at this point being given to question and answer on the objection process.
What I’m curious about is we will at that point have ended the comment period, we will have integrated the responses to the comments hopefully into the final version of it. We will be presenting this to ALAC for their approval at the meeting – that was what I understood was the required schedule. So I’m trying to understand what would be the best approach to… Certainly discussing it seems like that’s already been done. I’ll be available; I’m sure Dev may make himself available; others in this group who want to can make themselves available to help with various RALOs, especially the RALOs that they’re in or that they’re working with to understand it, and if there are questions or issues to bring them back.
So hopefully at that point there’s not really a need to explain the process too much. Is that a mistaken assumption on my part? Comments? Okay, seeing no comments, if that’s not a mistaken assumption then it should be sufficient. And this is the question: should it be sufficient for us to just basically talk through the changes that have been made since the comment period; that basically it would be a discussion of objection process changes made since the comment period? Is that an appropriate and adequate item for that?
I see Cheryl agreeing. Anybody think that’s inappropriate?
Alan Greenberg: It’s Alan; I’m not near my computer.
Avri Doria: Okay, please.
Alan Greenberg: Yeah, given the reality that people don’t necessarily do all of their homework properly I think a quick run through of the procedure is reasonable there.
Avri Doria: Okay. So I’m just trying to be parsimonious with time but okay. So basically a quick run through, and then perhaps a quick run through with notation of where changes are made; and perhaps Dev can do it or perhaps even I can do it or someone else so that we can actually do it concentrated and such, and do it in a quick time?
Alan Greenberg: It should be speedy, it should be done quickly but I really think we can’t assume that everyone has memorized it going into that meeting.
Avri Doria: Well, certainly not memorized it but okay, I take your point. They will have discussed it in RALO and already commented but yes, you’re right – we could have [null] comments which means that no one read it and everyone agreed. Okay, so there will be a quick walkthrough and an explanation of what has changed during that quick walkthrough.
Okay, anything else we should cover regarding this during that meeting? Obviously what we understand to be ALAC’s next steps on it, etc. Okay. Then a discussion will come up, I guess if we follow the chart of this meeting I see three other major items and people may want to talk. There’s then basically an update of what’s going on with the Applicant Support Program and there may be a few things to say about it. I don’t know if it’s possible but I’ll try to find out, for example, whether we can get someone from the New gTLD Application Team to tell us if there have been any applicants for support yet, for example.
We can find out about… At that point they should be well into the looking for the members of the SARP; perhaps we can get an update on what’s going on with that selection, whether they’re getting an adequate number of volunteers for that. We can talk about another issue that might come up there – and by the way, I’m not taking notes on this so hopefully someone else is: the issue of outreach. One of the open issues has been what outreach but I’ll mention more about that when we actually get to talking about that item, but looking at the outreach for this.
Anything else we would want to cover during the Application Support Program? Okay, I see no hands on that one. Then the third item would be update on any other gTLD application issues, and again, Cintra taking the lead on this on any new developments that have occurred – perhaps if there’s any news about how many applicants have come in, etc., whether everything is still going well, what have you just to make sure. Or, also looking and seeing if other people have noticed issues and problems on either of these two issues that they think this group should put on its agenda to discuss.
So those are the three substantive issues. The other issue we need to review is the ongoing timing schedule of the meetings. I’ve done it but I haven’t asked anybody to put it up. I did do the first analysis of the attendance with the timesharing; basically noticed that there was pretty much an equal number of people who either made all the meetings or who either primarily made one or the other of the timings. And we seem to fall into three groupings in terms of those who come to all of them or almost all of them and it’s not time-based – they’re just there; then the people whose lives have a more time orientation to their ability to participate and either come in one slot or another.
So A.), we’ll look at the issue of just continuing to rotate and then B.), looking at whether the times we’ve picked for rotating are the most appropriate. That is an important issue but I see it as the fourth in this meeting. So that’s what I see as the agenda for the meeting and figuring out timings for the four thingies I’ll work on. Again, my tendency would be to give most of the meeting, at least half of it to the objection procedure because that is the most important deliverable we had at this point. All the other stuff is just as important but it’s not the driving thing on our schedule.
Anything else people think needs to be added to the planning for the upcoming meeting? Is there stuff we need to do in preparation before it comes other than getting the objection procedure updated? Do we need slides? Does… Anything, really, any comments?
Andrew Mack: Avri, this is Andrew.
Avri Doria: Yes, Andrew.
Andrew Mack: I think slides is a good idea, actually. I think people are pretty visual and so probably the quickest way for us to catch folks up – I really agree with Alan. I think that we’re going to have people, a whole group of people who are going to have a wide variety of fluency in this and slides would be the quickest way to put everybody on the same page.
Avri Doria: Okay. I was sure somebody would say that but I was hoping I could get complete silence.
Andrew Mack: Sorry, sorry.
Avri Doria: I’m a hand waver from way back – slides are work, and pictures and all that stuff. But of course you’re right.
Andrew Mack: I’d keep it super simple. I would not have them be very dense slides. It would be almost more like talking points so that people can kind of stay with it. I wouldn’t attempt to put on the slides everything; and the other thing that might be a suggestion is if we thought we could get some sort of bead on the number of people maybe to have handouts of the flowcharts. Those are really pretty important and that would be helpful too, I think.
Avri Doria: Okay. Unless the group really wants to do that I am very averse to distributing paper and chopping down trees to distribute paper when almost everybody has a computer in front of them, but how do other people feel? As I say, I’ll go with what the group does and Andrew suggested paper; again…
Andrew Mack: Avri, I’m okay with not doing it with paper because as you say, if everybody brings a laptop I think maybe then the best thing to do would be to start off the meeting saying “Here’s where we are and everybody dial in. Before we start, everybody dial in to this and this page,” that’s all.
Avri Doria: Okay. Anybody, yes Heidi? I see you have your hand up.
Heidi Ullrich: Yes, just a point on that. The At-Large staff generally prepare, well this time we’re going to be preparing a Dropbox with all of the materials, all of the At-Large meetings. So we can add all of these documents to that and just give any other person joining that link the Dropbox.
Avri Doria: Okay, thank you very much. I appreciate that because I have been fighting the paper distribution thing for a long time. Okay, thank you. Anything else on the planning for the upcoming meeting? As I say it’s an hour long, it allows a certain amount of time for discussion but it won’t.
One of the other things that I’ve asked, and this would be at some time during the week is if it’s necessary – and I know most of you guys, especially people like Dev, etc. – are busy with ALAC almost the whole time. But if it’s necessary for a group of willing volunteers to huddle together in a room to resolve any of our objections, or not objections but the comments we’ve gotten, I’ve talked to Heidi about the ability of requesting a space to go off and do that if necessary; and if we can’t find a space then a corner of the world can be found.
But I just wanted to alert people to the possibility that if we have many comments and if those comments are of a substantive nature that cause us to go into rethinking that’s where we’re going to have to do it, which means we’ll have to find a time and a space to go off and do that given again the ALAC request – I almost called it a “requirement” – but the ALAC request that we have something for them to vote on before the end of the meeting. So and I see Tijani put a green check on that one.
Okay, so Heidi, your hand is still up. There’s a new comment? I guess not a new comment. Okay. Okay, so moving on then – anything else on the upcoming meeting before I move on?
Moving on then: update on the Applicant Support. It looks like they did post the call for people; I hope that there are volunteers. I think the only issue that I’ve heard discussed… I’m in Geneva, I spent the day with a bunch of different GAC folks at different points and I’m picking up a concern from them on not having seen any outreach into their corners of the world, not having seen any outreach by the regional ICANN people that they’re used to seeing doing outreach on things.
And so there’s a concern starting to build within certain quarters of the GAC on where’s the JAS/ASP outreach. So I just want to bring that I certainly haven’t seen outreach. I know that when I posted a question to Rod on Twitter about “Where’s the outreach for this?” his response came back saying “I mentioned it in my speeches.” And I thanked him for letting me know what outreach had been done.
So that is an issue. I don’t know what our position is on it. I don’t know what ALSes’ positions are on it. I know ALAC did ask for staff, the New gTLD staff to give an update on the entire notion of outreach and also specifically on the ASP outreach, but I don’t know if anything has happened on that or if anything is going to happen on that. I do mention that there is a GAC concern. If there is an ALAC concern perhaps appropriate people from the two groups should talk to each other.
And I’ll pass that message on to Olivier also so that he knows who to contact within GAC about the issue, but the point person would again be the Vice-Chair who’s been responsible for JAS/ASP stuff and that’s Alice Munyua from Kenya. Yes, Tijani?
Tijani Ben Jemaa: Thank you, Avri. You remember the reply of Karla about our issue of outreach?
Avri Doria: Yes, she said-
Tijani Ben Jemaa: …it should be done. But I don’t see anything done now.
Avri Doria: Exactly.
Tijani Ben Jemaa: We need to do something. We need to do something more energetic about outreach, because without outreach we will not have the real needy applicants to come and to apply.
Avri Doria: Okay. I have been pestering people – what more energetic thing do you suggest we need to do?
Tijani Ben Jemaa: I don’t know.
Avri Doria: (inaudible) sent a letter. I’m not sure what more we can do at the moment but perhaps that’s a reason for a few people to talk to the GAC and see whether there’s perhaps a more energetic joint thing that needs to be done, to say “outreach.”
Tijani Ben Jemaa: We may ask ALAC to send a reminder saying that time is running and if outreach is not done now it will be useless afterwards.
Avri Doria: Okay, I see several hands up… Well actually I see Tijani’s hand who is talking, okay. So that’s a suggestion that I can certainly communicate from this group to ALAC, or of course those of you on ALAC can just take this directly as ALAC as a group will do. And I can send letters to Olivier about ALAC; those of you on ALAC can take direct action. Alan?
Alan Greenberg: Time’s rather short on this. I think this is the right time for anyone who has personal contacts on the Board to use them and point out that this is going to be a shambles unless someone does something real quick. And mentioning what Rod’s answer was certainly is indicative of the problem.
Avri Doria: Okay, that’s a good suggestion. I know I’ve already contacted a couple but I suggest that people who do have them follow your suggestion.
Alan Greenberg: It’s unfortunate that Sebastien’s not on this call; he’s certainly one of them but there are others. So I think we need to use them.
Avri Doria: And I’m sure he knows but we certainly should communicate this to him. Okay, so that’s two actions. Now, should I specifically ask Olivier about this or should we just rely on the personal communication of ALAC members here to just push it directly? Any comment to that?
Tijani Ben Jemaa: I think the best step is that you send a letter to Olivier.
Avri Doria: Okay. So does anyone disagree with that?
Alan Greenberg: This is Alan. This is one of those where we’re better off doing too much and be criticized for redundancy than not doing enough.
Avri Doria: Okay. Now question, that you bring up contacting Board members – should I also contact the Chair of the Board’s Committee on this, Chris, and bring up the problem with him as well? Actually I’ll probably see him in the next day but that’s beside the point; I can also send a letter.
Alan Greenberg: I think that’s quite appropriate.
Andrew Mack: I think so, too.
Avri Doria: Okay, so I will send off two letters. Heidi, I’ve got two action items here, to send off two emails – one to Olivier and one to Chris, asking about outreach. And it has been suggested that if I can find the direct quote on the tweets between Rod and myself I’ll include them in it. And as I say, I’m at the IGF this week so I’ll be seeing lots of these people, and one of my objectives while I’m here is to pester people about this program. Certainly not my only objective, I have my IGF objectives, too, but this is one of the reasons why I’m here.
Yes, Heidi?
Heidi Ullrich: Yes, just to confirm the action item, I put them into one but you said the Chair of the Board and then I heard you say “Chris.”
Avri Doria: No, not the Chair of the Board. I’m going to go to the Chair of the Board’s ASP Program, in other words basically Chris Disspain.
Heidi Ullrich: Oh, okay, thank you.
Avri Doria: I forget what the working group was called but it was the working group in charge of JAS stuff.
Heidi Ullrich: Okay, thank you.
Avri Doria: Thank you. Okay, anything else on the ASP that people would want to bring up and discuss now? There’s a lot of us concerned about it so I will work on it and I will know that I’m working on it with the group’s blessing. Yes, Tijani?
Tijani Ben Jemaa: As you know there is a discussion on the list about the composition of the SARP, so I don’t know if I have any problem with that but if people feel that there is a problem, having the SARP composed only of volunteers it should be addressed, I think.
Avri Doria: Oh, you mean the problem that I posted, that I forwarded to the New gTLD list? Yeah, well I believe though, I don’t know how much that’s a discussion for this group; or as I said in one of my responses, the JAS Group made a recommendation and essentially the Board accepted it. Now, I understand that there are some who feel that they were asleep at the switch and therefore are going to make an issue with the Board.
Andrew Mack: Now wait a second.
Avri Doria: I wasn’t talking about you, Andrew.
Andrew Mack: Who feels who was asleep at the switch, Avri? I think [there are] people who disagree about this. I think we even brought it up on some of the calls. I mean what- This is an evolving thing.
Avri Doria: Andrew, please, please Andrew – as opposed to trying to shout over me if you had stuck your hand up I would have called on you. What I was saying is in her mail I am almost quoting… Oh God, her name is slipping my head at the moment.
Andrew Mack: Marilyn. Okay, I understand.
Avri Doria: Marilyn, right. I said “No one commented on this during the comment period”; her response was “Perhaps a few of us were…” I think she actually used the phrase “asleep at the switch.”
Andrew Mack: Okay, no problem. I understand.
Avri Doria: And so I wasn’t referring to the fact that you mentioned it in the group, but the JAS Group did come to a decision on it and you know, the Board did make its recommendation based upon, I mean made a decision based upon the recommendation of JAS. So I’m not sure about changing it.
There are all kinds of issues coming up about the composition of the SARP; for example, some people have argued that no one that was in the JAS should be a member of the SARP. I know that’s a personal position I’m taking for myself but I’m not arguing it for other people. So yes, there are definitely issues.
I see two hands up – Tijani and Alan.
Tijani Ben Jemaa: Yes, Avri. The JAS Group (interference).
Andrew Mack: I can’t hear.
Avri Doria: Yeah, I don’t know where that noise is coming from. Okay, go ahead please, try again.
Tijani Ben Jemaa: Can you hear me now? Okay, yes good. I said that the recommendation of the JAS is to have a SARP composed of both community people and external experts.
Avri Doria: Yeah, and that does seem to be what they’re doing.
Tijani Ben Jemaa: No, that’s not what they chose – they chose only community people.
Avri Doria: Well, they also talked about hiring other experts as needed.
Tijani Ben Jemaa: “As needed,” I see. So I have seen on the mailing list that there is a [trend] of a hybrid SARP, so it seems that it [was the real proposal] of the JAS.
Avri Doria: You’re right.
Tijani Ben Jemaa: But you remember I asked Chris about it and I said “Why do we not have here the external experts?” and he said we can have experts from the community; and in case we need experts, we will have experts inside the JAS. So it is not closed but it is not inside the process, if you want.
Avri Doria: Okay.
Tijani Ben Jemaa: And I do think that a hybrid solution is the best.
Avri Doria: Okay, so is there a suggestion that this group needs to talk about it some more and figure out if this group wants to get involved in making some further suggestions to the Board on this issue? It’s certainly not an issue we’re going to resolve in the next ten minutes and perhaps we should discuss it further on the list. I see, Alan, you have your hand up.
Alan Greenberg: Yeah, a couple of things. My recollection, and I might be wrong, was although there were a number of people – I was among them – who said volunteers are going to be problematic, I thought what we ended up with was a volunteer committee and paid experts but who would be non-voting – they would just be advisors. I think that’s where we ended up.
Avri Doria: That’s my recollection as well.
Alan Greenberg: …would not actually be members of the Committee but advisors to the Committee.
Avri Doria: Thank you, and that was my recollection.
Alan Greenberg: In that context, what they put the solicitation out for was correct because the composition of the Committee itself would not include paid experts.
To recap the sequence, Marilyn said something to the effect that she and other people were asleep at the switch and not noticing it when it was out for comment. She also made the comment that it’s the duty of staff to make sure that there aren’t any big gaps left in these kinds of things when they see the light of day; and the sequence was, if I remember Kurt’s words, that the JAS Group recommended all volunteers plus advisors perhaps, and staff and the Board couldn’t find anything wrong with that so they went with it. And Marilyn is saying “There is something wrong with it, you should have noticed it.” So that’s the context of her reaction at this point.
Avri Doria: Yeah, and I figure that Marilyn and the people who believe that there’s something wrong and others should take their issue to the Board. I mean they’ve never been shy about doing it before and I think if JAS wants to reconsider they should; and I think if this group comes to a consensus that there’s something that we should do about it then perhaps we should, too. But I’d like to take the discussion of that to the list although I really recommend that the discussion happen first on the JAS list since they own the recommendation.
We kind of own commenting on the implementation, and I think there’s a certain amount of time going here that, you know… I mean part of the assumption that Marilyn is making is that there won’t be enough quality volunteers to do the job properly and that’s an assumption that I don’t really accept.
Alan Greenberg: She’s more worried about accountability than quality, I think.
Avri Doria: Well, that’s certainly what she says. Okay. So I suggest that we continue this discussion, it’s a good one; that we continue it on the list, perhaps maybe both lists but certainly the JAS who owns this recommendation and see if they want to make a counter-recommendation, or this group if… And I think we have a little bit of time on it if we want to make some further recommendations. Any other comment on this one?
Well with six minutes left, Cintra, is there something that needs to be mentioned on the New gTLD Process or the whole?
Cintra Sooknanan: This is Cintra. Just to ask everybody to just take a look at the link that I posted in the chat and in the Adobe Connect at the moment. If you can just review the issues there and if there are any updates that you can just comment on that Wiki page, and I’ll compile everything and then put it through there.
Avri Doria: Okay, you said you posted the URL in the chat just now?
Cintra Sooknanan: I did…
Avri Doria: Okay, I don’t see anything in today’s chat. I suggest you send it out to the mailing list with the same request.
Cintra Sooknanan: Okay, sure thing. Okay. I just sent it to you on Skype if you can just send it for me.
Heidi Ullrich: Avri, Dev and I have just put it into the chat site. It’s up in the chat now.
Avri Doria: It’s in the chat now?
Heidi Ullrich: Three times.
Avri Doria: Okay, I see it. I was looking in the wrong chat. Ay! I’m not doing so good today. Okay, thank you. Yeah, I was on the wrong page. Okay. Anything else? I see a smile. Anything else on this for now? No? Okay.
Cintra Sooknanan: So as soon as I get all the comments for this then I can [go ahead].
Avri Doria: Okay, great. And then the last thing is the action items, and basically action items was Dev Anand to revise draft based on changes stated on call – that definitely happened, thank you again. Then Cintra and Avri to send update on ASP and gTLD issues. We didn’t send an update. Cintra and staff created a Wiki page for collecting them and I basically talked about ASP issues, so I guess that sort of took care of those.
And anything else? Any other business, any other comments? Anybody want to go back to a topic? Yes, Dev?
Dev Anand Teelucksingh: Sorry, thank you Avri. This is Dev. I think there’s supposed to be some communication with the GAC representative who’s handling automating the objection procedures or something like that. Is there a conference call or something?
Avri Doria: That’s right – Olivier was going to set something up for you and me and others, that’s never happened. That should probably be an action item that we should probe on because that was supposed to happen like a week ago. You’re right, thank you for bringing that up. We should probably put that on the action item list and keep it there until we’ve had that phone call. Yes, Heidi, I see your hand up.
Heidi Ullrich: That was actually a staff responsibility and apologies for that. I now have all three documents that I was waiting to send to staff – the cover note, the explanatory note and the charts – so we can set that call up today. My understanding was that it was going to be a call with Avri, Dev, Olivier with Michael Salazar who is working for staff on the online tool – not directly with the GAC representative.
Dev Anand Teelucksingh: Okay.
Avri Doria: Okay, that works for me.
Heidi Ullrich: Okay, thank you.
Avri Doria: Okay, is that fine with everybody else? Anyone else dying to be there?? No? Okay. With two minutes left is there anything else that anybody wants to bring up on any of the subjects we’ve covered or anything else that slipped through the cracks?
I see no hands, I hear no voices.
Andrew Mack: Good job on the call, Avri.
Avri Doria: Oh, thank you. Thank you. And thank you all for everything, and thank you all for putting up with my errors, mistakes and other foibles. And next week we do not have a call scheduled. We’re skipping next week and we’ll have a call the week after. We talked about that schedule last time – is this correct?
So no call next week and then we have one more call to tie up all loose ends and stuff before the meeting. I will have put out a schedule for that or whatever, an agenda, and we’ll see where we’re at with everything. It may be a brief call. I see a hand, yes Cintra?
Cintra Sooknanan: Thank you, Avri. Just to clarify, that call will be at 21:00 or at 14:00?
Avri Doria: It’ll be the alternate time for this one so I think it’ll be the earlier flavor.
Cintra Sooknanan: Okay.
Avri Doria: And basically I think until the meeting we’ll continue doing alternate even if the next meeting will be the later one, I mean the earlier one.
Cintra Sooknanan: Okay.
Avri Doria: Is that a problem because I know that there’s some people that really just attend one or the other? Okay. Hearing, right, so yes, that would be the 14:00 which is the earlier since this was the 21:00. Okay, in which case I thank you all and now we have used up all the time. So thank you all, and talk to you in two weeks if not sooner on some other mission. Bye-bye.
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