Please try to relate your questions to ALAC/At-Large priorities, including the At-Large Review Implementation, ATLAS III and current policy priorities.
ICANN64 Board Questions as well as their Requests
1. OUR QUESTIONS TO THE BOARD
(Maureen) A Third Team (ATRT3) has been established to conduct another review of ICANN's Accountability and Transparency. I would like to raise two issues that I believe were incorrectly identified as "completed" from the ATRT2 review. The recommendations relate to #6: GAC Operations and Interactions and #8: Multilingualism
My question is what constitutes "the successful completion" of the implementation process from a Review of ICANN? From the perspective of those who were impacted by the two review items I have identified, their lack of resolution from the ATRT2 review compounded the original problem so that it still exists and creates even more of a risk to the work that the affected organisation does within ICANN? And both indirectly and directly the two issues are related to At-Large.
Item 6.6 of the GAC Operations and Interactions section, states as an implementation goal: To Increase support and resource commitments of government to the GAC with specific deliverables that would identify and implement initiatives to remove barriers to participation; and to improve GAC procedures to ensure more efficient, transparent and inclusive decision-making.
The GAC was assigned responsibility to address the issues themselves to remove their barriers to participation. However what was later identified following the review was that in order to be more successful in removing the barriers to successful participation required ICANN input. The barrier was in fact the lack of support from ICANN to produce introductory information about some of the complex issues that the GAC was being asked to comment on, in a format that was more easily digested by non-experts who did not completely understand the complexities of the issues as expressed by ICANN. ICANN had passed their lack of understanding of often expert knowledge, as their problem. The ALAC and the GAC have since jointly raised this issue with the Board and are grateful for the support that the Board has demonstrated for this continuing concern. We would like some assurance that the Board will support our joint efforts to work with the Information Transparency Initiative in order to help to ensure Inclusive, Informed and Meaningful Participation at ICANN for both the ALAC and the GAC by further implementing what were the original recommendations of the ATRT2 but this time incorporating some further support from ICANN in order to more appropriately address a communication issue which is vital to the work of both our organisations and actually successfully complete that particular review item.
Also of concern is Item #8: To support public participation, the Board should review the capacity of the language services department versus the community need for the service using Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) and make relevant adjustments such as improving translation quality and timeliness and interpretation quality. ICANN should implement continuous improvement of translation and interpretation services including benchmarking of procedures used by international organizations such as the United Nations.
While there was major prioritization of this project for the APAC region during ATRT2, there were major gaps on the achievement area of this implementation work which are still yet unresolved. There was also no mention of another RALO which has experienced major email translation issues for years which have created major blocks in communication between the two key partners of this particular region. Until the Board prioritizes the technical and communication issues for LACRALO, all the good work that has gone into the region to resolve other issues will be lost and ICANN will have to start all over again. It is important the ICANN priorities this critical resource to support the work of At-Large within ICANN.
While At-Large does not have any say as to what the Board priorities, we have noted this in our submissions, that it would be helpful if the Board was more open about what its priorities were and how it priorities these. It would help our own planning in At-Large so that we too could incorporate them into our own strategic planning as well. But the issues that were identified in ATRT2 are important issues for At-Large and we believe they are also important for ICANN. Both the issues we have mentioned above, are related to partnerships within ICANN. These partnerships are vitally meaningful to us as an advisory organization within ICANN working with another Advisory Committee, and also attempting to strengthen a Regional At-Large Organization. For At-Large, our ultimate goal is to get better participation from members of At-Large - from the ALAC as well as from our own regional organizations - into our policy development and advice work. In order to be successful in the implementation of our own review, At-Large needs the support of ICANN to support the diversity of voices and languages contributing to our policy discussions.
(Holly) We've all seen an increase in the use of alternatives internet "identities," whether as simple as using Facebook, Flickr, Opentable, ect. as a substitute for a website or building a site with a free service such as wordpress.com and wix.com. Further, evolution of search engine design are allowing for more content based searching, rendering second level domains less and less relevant. What is the Board's view(s) of the implications on the budget, and perhaps on ICANN priorities. What impacts do those challenges have on the role(s) that ALAC can play?
(Jonathan) The subsequent procedures working group is doing yeoman's work to try and address all of the issues raised during the 2012 round but seems to be operating with an unjustified sense of urgency. There's lots to be done prior to any subsequent rounds and if we learned anything from the 2012 round, it was don't drive off a cliff while building your airplane. Is all the pressure from those whose business is domains or are there other considerations such as the budget that are driving this sense of urgency?
(Jonathan) Also on Subsequent Procedures, we were asked recently to comment on a proposal to have a brand round before anything else. On the surface, this seems innocuous and a benefit to the bottom line but given the failure to successfully engage both communities and underserved regions in the 2012 round, a "brand" round could easily become a "land grab" in which loosely held "brands" are used to scoop up all manner of strings without the possibility of contention from communities and the developing world. If "priority" should be given to anyone it seems those would be good candidates. How do we reconcile what seems to be a simple request with the complexity of engaging the broader internet community?
(Jonathan) The At-large has the privilege to try and represent the interest of end users, the majority of whom are not registrants. Ironically, all parties focused on those non-registrant end users (ie GAC and SSAC) are advisory committees and, as such, are faced with peculiar challenges in the contest of GNSO PDPs. In most instances, the lines drawn are not so bright but in the case of the EPDP on GDPR compliance, those non-registrant end users were given very little consideration. We are aware that the NCSG is operating from a principled, more ideological, position and that the contracted parties are potentially facing an extremely complex patchwork of privacy regimes and liability but we remain convinced that 3rd party access to registrant data is imperative to law enforcement, research and consumer protection in its many forms. The At-large are aware of efforts by ICANN.org to take on some of the liability otherwise faced by contracted parties. Can you help us understand the likelihood of that outcome or any other efforts to ensure the many do not suffer for the needs of the few?
2.a Suggestions for the Board - to help them with the implementation of their new plans for 2021-25 Strategic Plan, FY20 Budget, 2year Budget planning, ICANN governance model
(Marita) Could the Board initiate special communications fora to ensure that the community is aware of any developments early on and has the opportunity to offer advice at early stages
2.b Suggestions for ICANN Org - to aid the Board in their tasks above.
(Marita) Hold discussions with the community re: establishing priorities and managing workflow
2.c Suggestions for the ICANN Comunity - to aid the Board and ICANN Org, to achieve their tasks above.
(Marita) consider establishing some workflow studies.
look into software that could be used to improve efficiency in handling community input
3. How can ICANN improve trust and collaboration with its external allies and partners?
ICANN64 ccNSO Questions
- The ccNSO have asked for a general overview of At-Large and our priorities for 2019
- Giovanni Seppia who is the Head of their Strategic Operations WG will explain the ccNSO priorities for 2019
- Some discussion perhaps on progress with their Organisational Review?
ICANN64 GAC Questions
EPDP
Subsequent gTLD procedures/Geo names
Follow-up to the GAC/ALAC statement at ICANN60
Reactions to President Macron's IGF speech
GAC/ALAC cooperation in capacity building.
ICANN64 GNSO Questions
(Holly) What impacts will changes to ICANN processes to comply with the GDPR have on other ICANN policies?
What lessons have been learned for GNSO policy development processes from the whole EPDP process?
(Marita) fostering a spirit of cooperation
