RE: [ga] RE: is ICANN or is ICANN not?

["Roberto Gaetano" <roberto@xxxxxxxxx>]

JFC,

Don't worry, go ahead and report to whomever you want.
I will only ask you a personal favour: please quote verbatim, don?t attempt
to interpret what I am saying, because your interpretation does not seem, to
my personal judgement, a fair reproduction of the original.

The beauty of discussing in a public forum, where contributions are
archived, is that there is always the possibility to read the source. In
this case it is at
http://www.gnso.icann.org/mailing-lists/archives/ga/msg05812.html.

Most people I know are able to make the difference between the statement of
fact "IANA operates under contract with USG" and the allegation "ICANN
believes that the fact that USG controls the root is the best solution and
could not be changed", and finding the former in my statement and the latter
in your statement will draw their conclusions.

My deepest apologies to the GA for intervening again on this subject, but I
thought I could not avoid responding without giving the false impression
that I was fearing some consequences. Now I will keep my mouth shut, but
will be glad to listen to other opinions, because I am interested in the
subject.

Best regards,
Roberto



> -----Original Message-----
> From: JFC Morfin [mailto:jefsey@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx] 
> Sent: 01 February 2007 05:09
> To: Roberto Gaetano
> Cc: ga
> Subject: RE: [ga] RE: is ICANN or is ICANN not?
> 
> Dear Roberto,
> I report this thread to a certain numbers of outsiders. I 
> suggest you reread what you wrote before I confirm it. This 
> is very important. 
> This is your position. You are the ICANN Vice-Chair and, 
> since the Chair is going to retire, it will be considered 
> with the greatest care, to know if this is a position from 
> the Vice Chair of an IGF International body, serving the 
> world digital ecosystem, or of an US Agency directing its 
> Internet to best suit  the market influence of the US Industry
> 
> I am sure you will realise the impact of this mail of yours. 
> This deliberately opposes the Tunis agenda I quoted yesterday 
> and is therefore a violation of the Tunis agreement by an US 
> Agency. This de facto removes ICANN from the IGF processus.
> 
> I am fully neutral about it. I must only be prepared to 
> document the new DNS top zone, as I do every day for years 
> for many people using it for their operations. A ne top zone, 
> because this would authorise every other party (them being 
> civil society, economic interests, governments, international 
> entities, SSDOs and R&D) to protect themselves against the 
> impact of such a IANA declaration of independance, under the 
> sole control of ICANN/NTIA/US Industry, and opposing RFC 
> 1591, ICP-1 and the Tunis agenda. This would legitimates 
> every non concerted local linguistic, regional, or local TLD 
> by local authorities or communities.
> 
> You will understand that if you maintain such a position, 
> ICANN has no more legitimacy to manage the root file which is 
> the embodiement of national sovereign rights collected and 
> supported by ICANN, and not an US authority over the rest of 
> the world delegated to ICANN. It means that everyone is 
> legitimate in adding/removing its own TLDs, and correcting 
> the ICANN choice, in order to respect ISO 3166 in their own 
> DNS (as per RFC 920 and 1591, and ICP-1 and ICP-3). This 
> probably represents 20,000 TLDs being in use. Starting wth 
> Karl's own TLD.
> 
> jfc
> 
> At 23:05 31/01/2007, Elisabeth Porteneuve wrote
> >Roberto Gaetano wrote:
> > > >
> > > > I do hope that ICANN learned the lesson as well.
> > > >
> > > It did, I can assure you.
> > > That's also why it is now looking for community input on 
> TLD sunset, 
> > > before taking action on .su.
> >
> >Roberto, who gave ICANN a mandate for allocating or retiring 
> ccTLD names?
> >Or to take action on .SU?
> >Or just any other ccTLD for that matter?
> >Who autorised ICANN to make policy regarding ccTLDs?
> >Is that within IANA contract?
> >
> >Best regards,
> >Elisabeth Porteneuve
> 
> At 23:54 31/01/2007, Roberto Gaetano wrote:
> >Elisabeth,
> >
> >I am puzzled by your questions, because I believe that we would give 
> >the same answers, but this whole discussion might make the 
> rest of the 
> >audience believe that we are on diametrally opposite positions.
> >
> >Anyway, let's try (it's my last post on the subject, except for 
> >possible apologies if I said something inaccurate).
> >
> > > Roberto, who gave ICANN a mandate for allocating or 
> retiring ccTLD 
> > > names?
> >Please refer to 
> http://www.icann.org/general/iana-contract-14aug06.pdf. 
> >Look at clause C.2.2.1.2.
> >
> > > Or to take action on .SU?
> >It is part of the ÏANA Root Management Requests", referenced above.
> >There is no hurry to take .su out of the root, except for 
> the fact that 
> >at one point in time SU could be reallocated by ISO-3166/MA (under 
> >current rules, not earlier than some 40+ years, but it would be bad 
> >policy to depend on rules established by others). If this 
> happens, IANA 
> >might be asked to process the delegation of .su, and it might be 
> >utterly inconvenient to have .su. So it might be healthy to revocate 
> >the one deprecated by ISO-3166/MA
> >
> > > Or just any other ccTLD for that matter?
> >Same story.
> >
> > > Who autorised ICANN to make policy regarding ccTLDs?
> >Nobody. But since the ICANN Board has to approve the IANA 
> >recommendations to put them into action, to obey the letter of the 
> >contract above, it seems to be a fair thing to have a 
> general policy, 
> >discussed with the community, rather than take decisions on 
> a case-by-case basis.
> >
> > > Is that within IANA contract?
> >"That" being the delegation/redelegation/revocation, yes.
> >"That" being the formulation of policy, no.
> >
> > >
> > > Best regards,
> > > Elisabeth Porteneuve
> >
> >If anybody has different facts, please feel free to correct me.
> >
> >Cheers,
> >Roberto
> 
> At 00:30 01/02/2007, Gomes, Chuck wrote:
> >Elisabeth,
> >
> >If ICANN is providing a useful service with appropriate community 
> >input, does it really matter who gave ICANN the mandate or authority?
> >
> >Chuck Gomes
> >
> >P.S. - Always good to see you active again.
> >
> >-----Original Message-----
> >From: owner-ga@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:owner-ga@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx] On 
> >Behalf Of Elisabeth Porteneuve
> >Sent: Wednesday, January 31, 2007 5:06 PM
> >To: roberto@xxxxxxxxx
> >Cc: ga@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> >Subject: RE: [ga] RE: is ICANN or is ICANN not?
> >
> >
> >
> >Roberto Gaetano wrote:
> > > >
> > > > I do hope that ICANN learned the lesson as well.
> > > >
> > > It did, I can assure you.
> > > That's also why it is now looking for community input on 
> TLD sunset, 
> > > before taking action on .su.
> >
> >Roberto, who gave ICANN a mandate for allocating or retiring ccTLD 
> >names?
> >Or to take action on .SU?
> >Or just any other ccTLD for that matter?
> >Who autorised ICANN to make policy regarding ccTLDs?
> >Is that within IANA contract?
> >
> >Best regards,
> >Elisabeth Porteneuve
> 
> At 00:47 01/02/2007, Andy Gardner wrote:
> 
> >On Jan 31, 2007, at 5:30 PM, Gomes, Chuck wrote:
> >
> >>Elisabeth,
> >>
> >>If ICANN is providing a useful service with appropriate community 
> >>input,
> >
> >I'm sorry?
> >
> >Did I miss sometthing?
> >
> >
> 
> At 01:50 01/02/2007, Karl Auerbach wrote:
> >Gomes, Chuck wrote:
> >>Elisabeth,
> >>If ICANN is providing a useful service with appropriate community 
> >>input, does it really matter who gave ICANN the mandate or 
> authority?
> >
> >It does.
> >
> >ICANN *is* a forum.  An synonym is that ICANN is a "combination".
> >
> >And ICANN is a combination that establishes rules for a 
> marketplace and 
> >makes final choices regarding who may, and who may not be a 
> vendor in 
> >that marketplace, establishes many aspects of what are and 
> what are not 
> >acceptable products in that marketplace, establishes price 
> components, 
> >takes an override fee on all sales, and defines several of 
> the terms of 
> >sales.  This could be called, more succinctly, "restraint of trade."
> >
> >In other words ICANN is "a combination in restraint of trade."
> >
> >Now, some combinations in restraint of trade are frowned upon by the 
> >laws of various countries.  And often that frowning applies 
> not only to 
> >the forum itself but also to those vendors who participate 
> in those fora.
> >
> >One way in which such a combination might escape the effects 
> of those 
> >frowns is if it is operated under the authority of a governmental 
> >authority with appropriate authority.  NTIA/Dept of Commerce is 
> >certainly a governmental authority.  But it is not clear whether 
> >NTIA/DoC have endowed ICANN with governmental immunity; nor 
> is it clear 
> >whether NTIA/DoC have the legal authority to do so.
> >
> >So yes, it is a *very* important question.  And any company 
> or person 
> >who participates in ICANN should ask their legal counsel 
> whether such 
> >participation might engender consequences should some 
> country decide to 
> >move from frowing to enforcement, or if some private actor 
> should ask 
> >that question in a legal proceeding in some country.
> >
> >                 --karl--