NARALO Teleconference 7 January 2008
Summary Minutes
Present: Darlene Thompson, Gareth Shearman, Alan Greenberg, Evan Liebovitch, Sylvia Caras, Wendy Seltzer, Beau Brendler, Danny Younger
Minutes taken in the first instance by D Thompson
1) Do we want to produce comments for the NTIA transition review?
http://www.ntia.doc.gov/ntiahome/frnotices/2007/ICANN_JPA_110207.html
If so, do we want it as an ALAC statement/project or is this internal to NARALO?
Wendy: Basically, ICANN has been operating under its 9 years of existence under the US Government and we are nearing the mid-term of that contract. The US Gov has asked for a mid-term review of the project. There are 10 milestones that ICANN must report on and the US Gov has called for public comment on ICANN’s performance on same. This is one of the places that we can actually have impact on ICANN as they are sensitive as to their position with the US Gov as it has a lot of power in this arrangement. The US Gov can then give ICANN a lot of power or move the contract over to another agency. This gives the constituency a major voice right now in how ICANN has been doing up until now. The US Gov could change its service contract for IANA services and such which would remove ICANN’s reason for being. This is within the US Gov’s power to give or withdraw. It is constricting ICANN to the whims of the US Gov but so far this control has only come at the edges rather than in the core of ICANN’s day-to-day workings. Intellectual property law is a big one that the US Gov is highly into.
Has ALAC taken a stand on this yet, to date? No, not yet. It would have to be driven by the local communities. Should this go to ALAC, ICANN, or a UN organization? There are a lot of assumptions out there that need to be ironed out.
Alan: As unhappy as many are over ICANN’s performance, would we prefer to see this body moving to the ATU or some other UN organization?
Wendy: Or, do we want to see it stay the same but keep its accountability to the US Gov so that we can keep it accountable to the masses?
Evan: Do we prod ALAC to do something on this issue or does the NARALO wish to do something on its own and submit it to ALAC? Do we want to take an initiative on this issue?
Gareth: This IS an important issue but the dangers that others have identified is that we are giving other governments the ability to meddle with things like domain names and root servers. Although, as Wendy said, there have been problems, perhaps leaving things as they might be for the best so as to keep up accountability. Maybe we need to raise this to ALAC as an organization and see who might respond from the other ALSs.
If we are going to do something, we need to do it quickly as there is a Feb. 15 deadline on this. Sylvia: If we are going to fight this, we need a good alternative. So far, any other alternatives are quite draconian. She thinks that we should stay out of it or just provide background information.
Wendy: We don’t want to send ICANN’s mandate into the arms of some other organization. We just need to encourage ICANN to clean up its act as per its dealings with the grassroots community so that it isn’t just toadying to those with the bucks (Darlene’s paraphrase). We don’t want to knock them out of the race, just get them to clean up their dealings.
Who would like to lead this? Wendy will be drafting something and will be sharing it with the group. Alan: The only ones we will hear from on this is from those who dissent. Beau, Alan and Wendy can bring this forward to ALAC on their call tomorrow. Alan: If ALAC doesn’t even discuss this issue then it is negligent. NARALO will devote some of its time in Delhi to discuss this further. Hopefully the draft that Wendy comes up with will be something that will be palatable to other regions and deal with the end results rather than how its done (US Gov). Danny will assist with this.
2) Does NARALO have anything to say to follow up on the issue of Venue Accessibility for ICANN meetings? Or has the issue been discussed sufficiently in the At-Large mailing list?
Alan: If its phrased such that it makes sense for those that are not subsidized can get to a venue location easily – that will be accepted. Sometimes, however, this is not possible (like with Kenya this year). That still doesn’t preclude that the planning needs to be done far more in advance. We should let this issue lie for now and bring it up in the future if need be.
3) One nasty aftermath of the ALAC statement on domain tasting was the assertion by Alan that it is current ALAC policy that, in its decision-making process, "silence means consent". I personally find this policy quite disturbing for a number of reasons, and I believe that ALAC needs to abandon this stance as a matter of its own credibility. I would like to NARALO's backing to press ALAC to change that policy – if it does not get enough feedback to a request given suitable time, lack of response should never be seen as acceptance.
Alan: We have had significant problems over the last year to get people to speak up or to vote. We accept ALSs if there wasn’t a “no” vote. It is in their policy that silence means agreement, mainly because there was frustration over the fact that if they didn’t go with this policy, nothing would happen at all.
Wendy: It seems that you wouldn’t hear from an ALS until their was travel in the offing. At least the “silence means consent” made things be able to move forward and those that were paying attention could dissent and bring things to the table, rather than having the “no-sayers” hanging the procedures.
Alan: Unfortunately, is seems that if the vast majority of those that don’t vote/say are usually in agreement with the issue but a couple of vociferous nay-sayers can derail the issue.
Beau: There are stats kept on ALAC members as to who shows up and who does not. Perhaps those that consistently miss meetings should be encouraged to leave ALAC. The Rapporteur position is supposed to be in charge of keeping track of this sort of thing.
Perhaps we need to request a resource from ICANN to be in telephone contact with the ALSs, like Jacob used to do. A staff person needs to oversee the RALOs and keep track of who is doing what.
4) Reports from Wendy, Beau and Robert – even brief ones – about recent Board and ALAC activities would be appreciated.
Danny: The domain tasting comment period just opened up.
5) According to http://icann.org/public_comment/#nomcom-review the comment period for the Nominating Committee review has not closed. Does NARALO have anything to offer? Are there any other issues at http://icann.org/public_comment that warrant our direct participation?
This is open until Feb. 15. Do we want to make any kind of statement on it? Beau will work with, maybe, Danny on this.
6) It's been a while since we heard the status of any North American ALSs in the process of being reviewed. Are there many new ones coming on board soon? Is the loss of Jacob damaging ICANN's work to recruit new ALSs? What more could/should be done?
There has been no outreach so no new ALSs.
7) How to introduce issues local to any of the RALOs at the proposed summit or generally with ALAC
There are issues that may be peripheral to the ICANN mandate. Are there any ways that an ALS can raise such an issue for support from our group(s) (such as Telecommunications Policy)?
Perhaps this is something that should be raised on the list and get some feedback on it. It might be easier to flesh out the idea if it comes out on an e-mail.
8) Next meeting
Monday, February 4, 2008
