The Meeting started at 15:04 UTC:
List of attendees: NCA – Non Voting – Carlos Raúl Gutierrez – absent apologies
Contracted Parties House
Registrar Stakeholder Group: Volker Greimann, James Bladel, Yoav Keren
gTLD Registries Stakeholder Group: Jonathan Robinson, Donna Austin, Bret Fausett
Nominating Committee Appointee (NCA): Thomas Rickert
Non-Contracted Parties House
Commercial Stakeholder Group (CSG):Phil Corwin, Susan Kawaguchi, Osvaldo Novoa,Tony Holmes- absent apologies, proxy to Osvaldo Novoa, Heather Forrest, Brian Winterfeldt
Non-Commercial Stakeholder Group (NCSG): Amr Elsadr, Marilia Maciel absent apologies temporary alternate Rafik Dammak, Edward Morris, Stephanie Perrin, Avri Doria – joined late - if absent apologies proxy to Amr Elsadr, David Cake – if absent apologies proxy to Edward Morris
Nominating Committee Appointee (NCA): Daniel Reed
GNSO Council Liaisons/Observers:
Olivier Crépin - Leblond – ALAC Liaison
Patrick Myles - ccNSO Observer
Mason Cole – GNSO liaison to the GAC
ICANN Staff
David Olive - VP Policy Development
Marika Konings - Senior Policy Director
Rob Hoggarth - Senior Policy Director
Mary Wong – Senior Policy Director
Julie Hedlund – Senior Policy Director
Steve Chan – Policy Director
Lars Hoffmann – Policy Analyst
Berry Cobb- Consultant
Glen de Saint Géry - GNSO Secretariat
Cory Schruth – Systems Engineer
Guests:
Jen Wolfe – GNSO Review Working Party - Chair
Jeff Neuman - New gTLDs Subsequent Rounds DG – co-chair
Petter Rindforth - IGO-INGO Access to Curative Rights Mechanisms PDP WG – co-chair
MP3 Recording
Adobe Chat Transcript
Transcript
Item 1: Administrative matters
1.1 - Roll Call
1.2 - Statement of interest updates
1.3 - Review/amend agenda
1.4 - Note the status of minutes for the previous Council meeting per the GNSO Operating Procedures:
The Minutes of the GNSO Council meeting of 11 February, 19 March and 16 April 2015 will be posted as approved on xxxx 2015.
Item 2: Opening Remarks / Review of Projects & Action List
2.1 - Review Action List
ICANN meetings in Buenos Aires.
The purpose of the Tuesday evening meeting at the end of the Constituency/Stakeholder group day 18:00-19:00 is to enable the Council, relevant members of the stakeholder groups, and the constituencies or stakeholder group chairs or delegates to meet and discuss any concerns or issues regarding motions on the Council agenda.
GAC Communiqué
The template for the GAC Communiqué needs to be populated and could be topic for discussion with the GAC in Buenos Aires.
Potential drafting team on Auction proceeds
Action Item:
- Provide written update to clarify the status of the drafting team – Jonathan Robinson.
- Auction Proceeds will be a potential topic for community discussion at the 'High Interest session' on Monday, 22 June 2015 and a 'Workshop' on Wednesday 24 June 2015 in Buenos Aires.
- Provide questions and comments for these sessions. ALL
Item 3: Consent agenda
There were no items on the consent agenda
Item 4: DISCUSSION – Cross Community Working Group to develop a transition proposal for IANA stewardship on naming related functions
Jonathan Robinson reminded Council that the GNSO is a co-chartering organization of the Stewardship and Accountability CCWG's and the updates are rolling agenda items, given the substance, importance and high speed at which these are operating, to ensure that councilors and their groups are informed and thus prepared to vote on the outcomes and content of the work.
The public comment period, 30 days rather than the usual 40 has ended. The comments are being reviewed, and will be synthesized with the additional work that is going on, to generate a final proposal ahead of the ICANN53 Buenos Aires meeting such that, that proposal can in principle be brought to the chartering organizations at their meetings in Buenos Aires in June 2015.
The Business Constituency (BC) provided comments and noted that the proposal out for comment was not complete and was dependent on the work of the CCWG-Accountability. The BC requested that the CCWG- Stewardship consider doing another 40-day comment period on a more complete proposal after Buenos Aires.
Commenting on the imminent departure of the CEO, Fadi Chehadé, Jonathan reported that this had been remarked by another group and the responses were that Fadi is with ICANN until March 2016 when, in an ideal world and in a fair wind, the transition will be completed by the time he steps down and that the institution is bigger than the person and should in any event be able to cope.
Item 5: DISCUSSION - Cross Community Working Group on Enhancing ICANN Accountability – CCWG Accountability
Thomas Rickert provided Council with an update on the Cross Community Working Group on Enhancing ICANN Accountability (CCWG Accountability) noting that the public comment period is open until 3 June 2015, and the full Draft Report including Annexes of the Cross Community Working Group on Enhancing ICANN Accountability is available. However the report does not yet represent consensus positions.
The CCWG-Accountability charter requires that the group work on accountability mechanisms to replace the historical relationship that ICANN had with the US Government and some of the areas of focus are:
- establishing requirements for accountability
- defined escalation paths for the community to exercise certain powers.
- revised mission for core values and commitment for the ICANN bylaws.
The concept of fundamental bylaws for those areas of the bylaws that need to be made robust against changes by the ICANN Board so that the community would have the opportunity to veto changes to normal bylaws but would need to be asked for explicit approval when it concerns fundamental bylaws.
- voting thresholds for exercising community powers are established.
- the independent review process has been improved and work is ongoing on the reconsideration process
- implementation oversight is built into the thinking on the proposals.
The work is being undertaken in conjunction with an external law firm to assure that the proposals are in compliance with Californian law. The reference model, currently under consideration, is to make ICANN a membership organization with a Community Council where the community has voting powers. These unincorporated associations would be the members. They can either be natural persons or legal persons. As the proposal currently stands, all SOs and ACs, except for RSAC and SSAC, would have five votes, and RSAC and SSAC would have two votes.
The community is encouraged to provide guidance especially in the areas where the CCWG-Accountability has provided alternatives.
In order to make the long report as accessible as possible to a broad public and inform the community there is an executive summary published in six languages, two webinars have been held, a question-and-answer document has been created, there is a series of graphics and videos, all of which, it is anticipated, will to lead in to extensive and informed discussions with the community at the ICANN53 meeting in Buenos Aires.
Action Item:
Councillors and members of the respective groups are encouraged to provide comments and questions during the public comment period on Cross Community Working Group on Enhancing ICANN Accountability (CCWG-Accountability)
Item 6: UPDATE FOR COUNCIL DECISION – Cross Community Working Group on Internet Governance
Rafik Dammak noted that in order to complete the transition of the Cross-Community Working Group Internet Governance (CCWG IG) to a fully chartered cross community working group (CCWG), the group requests the Council's 'non objection' on the interpretation of 'observer' in the CCWG IG charter to mean: "In addition, the CCWG-IG will be open to any interested person as a participant. Participants may be from a chartering organization, from a stakeholder group not represented in the CCWG-IG, or may be self-appointed. Participants will be able to actively participate in and attend all CCWG-IG meetings, work groups and sub-work groups. However, should there be a need for a consensus call or decision, such consensus call or decision will be limited to CCWG-IG members appointed by the chartering organizations."
This is an important point in order to align the cross community working group with other CCWG'S.
Olivier Crépin-Leblond noted that the same question was asked of the ALAC and the ccNSO and there were no objections.
No objections were recorded to the interpretation of the section on observers in the CCWG IG charter to mean
Action Item:
- Convey to the Cross-Community Working Group Internet Governance that no objections were recorded to the interpretation of the section on observers in the CCWG IG charter (Staff)
- Communicate on the mailing list that Carlos Raúl Gutierrez is the appointed Council liaison to the Cross-Community Working Group Internet Governance (Staff)
Item 7: UPDATE FOR COUNCIL GUIDANCE – Cross-Community Working Group on Use of Country & Territory Names as TLDs
Heather Forrest provided Council with a Status summary.
Several issues were raised namely with regard to clarification and dealing with definitions, significant overlap of work with a working group within the GAC on geographic names and the low GNSO participation where there is a risk that the outcome is not one that fully expresses the full range of GNSO perspectives on this issue.
Action Item:
- The gTLD Registries Stakeholder Group to talk directly to the Cross-Community Working Group on Use of Country & Territory Names as TLDs (RySG Councillors)
- Council to discuss the issue with the GAC – Council leaders commit to commence the communication with the GAC leadership (Chair /Staff)
- Heather Forrest to request guidance from the Council by posting the substantive issues to the Council list
- Heather Forrest to track the outcomes of the discussion and ensure that the Council is responding to the requests and points
- Call for additional GNSO participation to the Cross-Community Working Group on Use of Country & Territory Names as TLDs (Staff)
Item 8: UPDATE FOR COUNCIL GUIDANCE – IGO-INGO Access to Curative Rights Mechanisms PDP Working Group
Phil Corwin provided Council with a status summary of the IGO-INGO Access to Curative Rights Mechanisms PDP Working Group noting that the working group, after making substantial and rapid progress, has foundered on the issue of determining the precise scope of sovereign immunity for IGO's.
The group determined to eliminate consideration of INGO's non-governmental organizations because they have no problem accessing the current curative rights protection mechanisms and no sovereign immunity issue.
The group determined that IGO's which have exercised their rights to protection under Article Six Tier of the Paris Convention do have standing to use the UDRP and the URS and in fact there were examples of IGO's using the UDRP in the past.
The group determined that the consideration of whether the URS should be a consensus policy was outside the scope of the working group.
The group experienced difficulty in determining the precise scope of sovereign immunity for IGO's and the input from one legal expert was not satisfactory.
Additional input is being sought in the rare circumstances that an IGO would bring a UDRP case and at the same time would prevail as complainant in the UDRP and then the registrant would exercise its right, which is in the current UDRP, of appealing to a court of national jurisdiction.
Mason Cole is arranging a meeting with GAC members and some IGO representatives in Buenos Aires to discuss sovereign immunity issues because of the broader international political implications.
The working group is still awaiting certain clarifications and responses to a questionnaire before being able to reach its first conclusions and proposals.
Action Item:
- Determine the scope of GNSO GAC related issues which could be worked through by the Council leaders and Staff as agenda topics for the joint GAC GNSO meetings in Buenos Aires (Chair / Vice Chairs / Staff)
- Topic for future Council discussion:
Introduction of changes to Registry agreements through private negotiations relative to the Policy Development Process and whether this is appropriate (Philip Corwin).
Item 9: UPDATE FOR SUBSEQUENT COUNCIL ACTION – New gTLDs Subsequent Rounds Discussion Group
Update provided to Council mailing list.
Bret Fausett noted that the discussion group started in June, 2014 at the ICANN50 London meeting with the aim to wind up the group at the ICANN53 in Buenos Aires and then return the work to the Council.
It is important to study the draft documents, consult with the different groups and be prepared for the motion at the Council meeting in ICANN53 Buenos Aires.
The purpose of the group was to capture the experience of various members in the community around new gTLD's. reflect on issues that might be appropriate for future policy work, and reflect on where course corrections in the new gTLD program could be made in subsequent rounds.
The group was open and had broad participation from every GNSO constituency/stakeholder group. Over one hundred issues were captured and phrased in a neutral manner for subsequent work. The list has been refined and organized against the Council's previous policy work that gave rise to the last round of new gTLD's.
The question of what would happen if the next round turned out significantly different from the last is an issue for the policy development process to consider. One of the key considerations to be included in the discussions is the competitive impact of any new policies, any new operational burdens or requirements that are put on these second rounds, because it is the Registrar who has to manage the customer confusion when there is any unusual or a non-standard implementation.
Action Item:
Review documentation before Buenos Aires for discussion at the working group meeting
Item 10: UPDATE & DISCUSSION – GNSO Drafting Team on New ICANN Meeting Strategy
Marika Konings provided Council with an overview of the New meeting Strategy Drafting Team's initial proposal
Action Item:
Urgent request to provide drafting team with feedback on the initial proposal especially with regard to Meeting B before the proposals go the other Supporting Organisations and Advisory Committees for comments and input. (ALL)
Item 11: UPDATE – Progress on GNSO Review
Jennifer Wolfe provided an update on the Initial Report and proposed timelines for completing the Review to the Council.
Action Item:
- Councillors are encouraged to review the GNSO Review report
- Inform staff if Stakeholder Groups/Constituencies wish to meet with the Westlake team and the GNSO Review Working Party during Constituency Day in Buenos Aires so that time slots can be arranged. (ALL)
Item 12: Any Other Business
12.1 - Buenos Aires meeting planning (update: David Cake / Jonathan Robinson)
Jonathan Robinson reminded Council of the informal Council meeting with the Chairs of the Stakeholder Groups and Constituencies to prepare for and discuss the Council agenda on Tuesday, 23 June 2015 from 18:00-19:00.
12.2 - James Bladel cautioned all councilors and liaisons to resist linking any one particular issue or the resolution of any particular issue to the IANA Stewardship Transition and overall Accountability and the suitability of IANA to becoming IANA functions operator.
12.3 - Concern was raised, especially in the BC with ICANN's reaction to the IPC letter regarding dotSUCKS.
This was suggested as a discussion topic in Buenos Aires.
Susan Kawaguchi to formulate the topic
Jonathan Robinson, GNSO chair, adjourned the GNSO Council meeting and thanked everyone for their participation.
The meeting was adjourned at 17:04 UTC.
The next GNSO Public Council meeting will take place in Buenos Aires on Wednesday, 24 June 2015 at 13:00 ART (16:00 UTC)
For other places see: