GNSO Council Teleconference Minutes

3 August 2006

Proposed agenda and meeting documents

List of attendees:
Philip Sheppard - Commercial & Business Users C.
Marilyn Cade - Commercial & Business Users C.
Alistair Dixon - Commercial & Business Users C
Greg Ruth - ISCPC - absent - apologies
Antonio Harris - ISCPC - absent - apologies
Tony Holmes - ISCPC - absent - apologies
Thomas Keller- Registrars
Ross Rader - Registrars - absent - apologies
Bruce Tonkin - Registrars
Ken Stubbs - gTLD registries
June Seo - gTLD registries
Cary Karp - gTLD registries
Lucy Nichols - Intellectual Property Interests C
Ute Decker - Intellectual Property Interests C - absent - apologies
Kiyoshi Tsuru - Intellectual Property Interests C - absent
Robin Gross - NCUC. - absent - apologies
Norbert Klein - NCUC. - absent - apologies
Mawaki Chango - NCUC
Sophia Bekele - Nominating Committee appointee - absent - apologies
Maureen Cubberley - Nominating Committee appointee
Avri Doria - Nominating Committee appointee - absent - apologies

11 Council Members
(16 Votes quorum)

ICANN Staff
Denise Michel - Vice President, Policy Development
Olof Nordling - Manager, Policy Development Coordination
Liz Williams - Senior Policy Counselor
Glen de Saint G�ry - GNSO Secretariat

GNSO Council Liaisons
Suzanne Sene - GAC Liaison - absent - apologies
Bret Fausett - ALAC Liaison

Quorum present at 12:10 UTC.

MP3 Recording

Bruce Tonkin chaired this meeting

Approval of the agenda

Item 1: Update any statements of interest
No updates recorded

Item 2: Approval of the GNSO Council minutes of 28 June 2006.
(http://www.gnso.icann.org/mailing-lists/archives/council/msg02685.html)

Philip Sheppard seconded by Lucy Nichols, moved the adoption the minutes.

Motion approved.

Decision 1: The GNSO Council minutes of 28 June 2006 were adopted.

Item 3: Vote to initiate IDN-gTLD PDP [PDP-Jul06]
- updated terms of reference

Philip Sheppard - I'm broadly happy with the issues report as written. My only suggestion would be that the text, that was useful under Term of Reference 1 On page 11 of the report, the Term of Reference 1 is a description of matters as opposed to foreseeing an action, ending on the phrase 'we should address the following additional terms of reference ' and goes on to describe it. To be clear, what the expectations of the terms of reference are, my suggestion would be a re-numbering to make as an introductory paragraph, paragraph 2 which is currently 1 a and b of the proposed Terms of Reference, and number the Terms of Reference accordingly from what is currently 2.

Bruce Tonkin - I had noted that as well. That is a formatting change rather than substance but it makes sense.

Cary Karp - with specific reference to the document distributed this morning, the Revised Issues Report, what strikes me as a mismatch between a basic tenet of the revised Terms of Reference and the summary at the start of the Issues Report and that is how the policy development process, interfaces and/or is meshed with the equivalent ccNSO action. The summary says "It is recommended that the GNSO launch a focused policy development process, in close consultation with the ccNSO and the broader ICANN community. However by the time we get to John Jeffrey's thoughts on the matter and the Terms of Reference, we are speaking exclusively on 'g' issues. Am I only one perceiving this? I need further clarification.

Bruce Tonkin - the issue is, our mandate under the bylaws is only for gtld by definition, that is what the GNSO is allowed to do, so that's why the Terms of Reference are drafted in that way. If it is called gTLD, it's current title, it probably needs to make that a little clearer early on in the Issues Report that it focuses on gTLD issues because it was requested by the GNSO.

Olof Nordling - we can easily accommodate that. in the summary, what it says is: "It is recommended that the GNSO launch a focused policy development process," That can be further specified, and also in the introduction it is highlighted. It is true there's been some movement in that respect since the Issues Report was first conceived.

Cary Karp - my concerns are two. If we are talking about issues that apply to the entire TLD space, even if there are specific aspects of that discussion that apply to the cc's and others specifically come to the 'g's'. These two policy development processes have to be in reasonable harmony with each other in terms of extent and there is a very clear concern about there being possible contradictions between the two of them. Some coordination is necessary. I would be quite interested to know what the ccNSO is planning before making a commitment to a detailed policy development process from the 'g' side. Not suggesting that there be a single process but these things need to be clearly balanced.

Marilyn Cade - my discussion is related to this topic and I would like to make my comments before you give a response to Cary. I share .. segregation of some of the work and want to be sure we plan, make it clear in our terms of reference and implement the needed interaction with other advisory committees and SOs. I would slightly disagree with the interpretation of the bylaws. I believe we are encouraged to work with other SOs and Advisory Committees. In the elaboration and introduction of IDNs into the TLD space, there has to be discussion of where harmonization is needed and what the implications are of the decisions made in what today are called cctlds

Bruce Tonkin - if I can summarise, for Marilyn Cade, in the terms of references the explicit mention of the need to interact with the other Advisory Committees and SOs.

Marilyn Cade - that is a start of getting us there.

Bruce Tonkin - let me respond to Cary's question. Coming out of Wellington I had assumed the ccNSO would create a policy development process around this. In Marrakech I found out they seemed reluctant to do that. There is still the sense that ccTLD managers deal with things in their own country and the ccTLD managersfelt they would be proposing to ICANN, this is the TLD that we want and ICANN has some process for dealing with that. There has been a suggestion, not yet written up, of potentially creating an alternative table of IDN based ccTLDs. I had assumed that this suggestion would be written up for comment. That hasn't happened. We are still a bit in the dark about what the ccNSO intends to do, they haven't progressed at all. The ccNSO as an SO has not progressed the suggestion and in terms of how ICANN would deal with requests from individual ccTLD managers, that hasn't been progressed either.

Philip Sheppard - in the report on section E before the recommendations, that we launch a policy development process on the 'g' issues in cooperation with the ccNSO and the GAC. The General Counsel opinion says it is within scope on the gtld issues. The terms of reference describes those issues. That clear laying out would seem to me to capture the points we are all referencing here that the work cannot go on in isolation from the ccTLDs and the GAC.

Cary Karp - a point of information. The ccNSO will realize that policies to do with languages have to do with several nation states. It is inconceivable that this will work at all if languages are considered as governmental rights and are being considered separately by the 'g's. The issues must be treated in the exact same manner by all the bodies dealing with it, if it's a single or parallel effort.

Bruce Tonkin - I understood they were parallel but coupled processes. We are taking the lead here by saying these are the issues we are starting to work on. I would like a liaison from the ccNSO with the committee we form. Once they set up a structure on their side, that would be reciprocal. At regular points the two groups would get together as a whole to synchronize. So maybe it's a case of writing that up as an intent as part of the terms of reference if that gives people more comfort that there is an intention to harmonise.

Cary Karp - why not have this as a terms of reference? We will be meeting face to face not far from now, maybe we should take inventory of the remaining issues that require articulation and defer voting until we are all together.

Bruce Tonkin - we have so far a suggested change from Philip Sheppard to move 6.1 into the introduction. The suggestion on interaction with the ccNSO, is that also part of the introduction or are we making one of the terms of references, we are tasking the committee to do that interaction?

Marilyn Cade - I would prefer we task the task force to do that interaction.

Philip Sheppard - we just need staff to turn paragraph 1 under recommendations:
"It is recommended that the GNSO launch a policy development process on the gTLD issues outlined in the 2 December 2005 resolution, as expanded upon during discussions in Wellington and Marrakech, in cooperation with the ccNSO (on the ccTLD aspects) and the Government Advisory Committee (on the public policy aspects), as well as in close consultation with the broader ICANN community. It is further recommended to support this process by a dedicated communication plan to be developed by ICANN staff."
into the new terms of reference 1.

Maureen Cubberley - on cooperation with other groups, particularly the cc's, my colleagues have said much of what I want to but there is one piece, on page 11 of the new version, at the end of the recommendation section, counsel notes:
"The General Counsel notes that care will need to be taken to ensure that any PDP on IDNs stays narrowly focused on discrete gTLD policy questions in line with the limited intended ambit of the policy development process as set forth in the ICANN Bylaws ,and does not become over-broad and begin to encompass more questions than can be successfully answered in one policy development process.
So where we have in one place it appears there is latitude to work with other groups, the ccNSO particularly, this statement, by the General Counsel, tends to narrow the focus. I would agree we need to look at each one of the terms of reference individually. I would think the most logical exercise is what Bruce proposed. When we get to terms of reference :
"4. Policy to Guide Contractual Conditions for Top-Level Domains with IDN
Labels

a. Taking into account the background, considerations and
findings regarding contractual conditions in the New gTLD PDP
[PDP-Dec05], develop policies to guide the specific contractual criteria
needed for gTLDs with IDN labels, to be made publicly available prior to
any application rounds."

that is where we separate into 'cc' and 'g' issues. Up until that point it seems to me there's much value in sharing the work.

Marilyn Cade - Maureen, you're supporting, my interpretation of the General Counsel's comments. I did not read the General Counsel to be restricting the research and preparatory work and analysis the task force should undertake, but that specific policy we are charged to put forward for the TLD space has to be focused on what would be classified on generic names, whatever generic is determined to mean. Would that be consistent with what you think?

Maureen Cubberley - I can't imagine generic being country codes.

Marilyn Cade - This has been discussed before, but I don't know if all councillors have been in all sessions. The present definition of a country code is restricted to the ISO 3166. There are countries that might want to open that up and use a 3 letter code, There are countries that might want to use a full name or some version of their name. EG, The United States of America which could be called .US, United States, the United States of America and America. Under the present definition of country codes, only .US falls into the definition.

Maureen Cubberley - so the way it's written it doesn't leave a latitude.

Marilyn Cade - I don't agree. If the General Counsel is telling me as a GNSO councilor that we already know what the limitations are that might fall into a new designation of name, we have not thought as a community, what the issues are, in relation to that last example, I gave (US, America, united states). Some countries have restrictive laws that effect the use of their name, and would want to be restrictive and determine what versions of their names may be used. Other countries do not have those laws, there may be practices under the UN system to be followed, but there are broader questions, that is:
Does a country want to have 3 versions of a name that are limited to national sovereignty?
And do they want to be the only entity to decide that these names have national boundaries and certain characteristics?
Most of my experience and in discussions on the topic at the ITU and with others, most governments will think their view should be paramount on that last topic. But, as Cary said, there will be implications for such issues in the IDN space.

Maureen Cubberley - I understand. So my question is if, on this call, was there a decision on whether we'll adopt these terms of reference now, subject to discussion, or will we discuss further by email in another meeting?
What I have heard makes me want to go back and look at these terms of reference.

Bruce Tonkin - That is the intent Maureen, we only have 14 or 16 votes. We don't have enough Council members to be comfortable with initiating a policy development process on this call. We will use the input of this call for the terms of reference. On our last call we did not discuss in any detail.

Maureen Cubberley - ok, thank you, it makes me feel more comfortable.

Bruce Tonkin - To pick up on what Marilyn said, is exactly right. I tidied up the language to refer only to gTLDs, because that is what the GNSO does, but actually, as it is defined, a gTLD is anything other than what is on that ISO 3166 list. It is very broad and this group might define that further and decisions might be taken further down the track, but right now, there are none of those decisions, so it is still basically in scope, anything other than what is on the ISO list is in scope.

Maureen Cubberley - Thank you for the clarification, Marilyn and Bruce.

Marilyn Cade - one comment for the record. I'm not suggesting that a decision we make would not have significant political implications and that those would need to be discussed with the SO and in settings that involve the broader cc community. The cc community is not yet fully represented within the SO and that is a challenge for them to address in terms of how they get broader input. There will also have to be discussion with the governments in a structured way.

Bruce Tonkin - a lot of that discussion still needs to happen. There were very early suggestions heard in Marrakech in one of the Public Forums on IDNs and they have not gone any further with respect to, may be carve out a bit of work. That suggestion was made that there should be a separate list created and it would contain only country names, potentially 2 characters in length, those characters may be of different scripts but that's very early stuff. Nothing has been written down or widely discussed amongst the cc's or the ccNSO. Still early days for them. We, as the GNSO need to start thinking about these policy issues. And then start writing them down and we'll start to get more engagement from the ccTLD's, and as Marilyn says, I'm talking about the ccTLD managers and not the ccNSO, and that will push the ccNSO to look at it as well.

Alistair Dixon - a question. The General Counsel's view is the policy development process should be narrowly focused on discrete gTLD policy issues. Issues like languages don't strike me as a discrete gTLD issue. It is an issue that is equally relevant in the cc situation. Are you suggesting that by consulting with the cc's we will be able to address this non-discrete policy issues?

Bruce Tonkin - languages issues are not constrained to IDNs. Language exists within the work we are currently doing within PDPDec05, because different languages can be represented by the Latin script in use today. It has been talked about very much and I hope to talk about it in Amsterdam. Some of these issues we already need to think about and IDNs will bring those into focus a bit more, because when you start looking at some of the scenarios, "This is more complex than I thought", and we start to do some of the thinking, then we need to coordinate that thinking, with other groups, so I don't think that it means that we don't do any work on language, I think that we do have to consider that but, what Cary is saying, is that if we do some work on that, and another group does some work on that , what we do not want is to have two different answers. So the work needs to be coordinated.

Cary Karp - I can exemplify on the general point I raised before. Let us assume that a half a dozen Arabic speaking countries, are interested in participating in this and each wants to have some form of the name of its country represented using Arabic script. Since Arabic has significant variations, so it is quite rightly that there will be some detail of the way the Arabic script is used, that these countries may regard as a debate, it may not be outright controversial. That is not really important to the gTLDs how we use any given script as long as we have a clear warrant for doing it and doing it in a responsible manner, but we would have our heads handed to us if we pretended that we were the ones who decided how Arabic script ought to appear in the TLD space. This will have to be resolved by the speech community itself. But the delusion that such issues can be easily resolved, is something that we have to be on our guard against. With regard to Latin script there are also similar issues. For example, the way accents are applied in certain contexts in the French use of
the French language, differ from the way accents are applied in the French Canadian use of the French language and because avoiding user confusion is the prime reason why we are discussing IDNs, such seemingly small issues are important to resolve up front. There's no way for the 'g's to take the lead in this nor is there any way that 'c' are going to be able to treat this as a governmental issue. They have to address this in a broad forum as well. To say nothing about the additional issue that arises that not all national governments are happy with how their cc's are being operated.

Bruce Tonkin - are we happy, I am trying to get a forum handling with GNSO where we start talking about policy issues understanding them some more, then once we have more understanding in the GNSO, we interact with other groups. Are we comfortable with putting in the first terms of reference a specific task to interact with other groups where there are overlapping issues?

Marilyn Cade - that is a minimum of what we should do but it's also high level enough to allow us to develop appropriate activities under it. So I would say yes. Then if we take it as one of our first tasks, beginning to figure out what the interactions might be.

Maureen Cubberley - an observation. Given the level of expertise in our group in the person of Cary who knows more about the specifics of this issue than most of us. It would be worthwhile to develop a catalogue of these specific examples that will have an impact in more than one realm so we don't lose it. It's extremely valuable as these examples of potential conflicts in the way the policy or operation of an IDN system working are
identified and we keep a list and that at the time they are being discussed in that level of detail we contribute. We get in to detail from time to time and say 'that is too detailed'.

Bruce Tonkin - that makes sense. The issues should be documented as they are raised. Like the new gTLD policy, you have a test case and test whether your policy works.

Cary Karp - one way to fold this back in is a clear policy concern for the GNSO to be adequately informed about language requirements by the governments on differing language requirements, that may have varying opinions on those requirements, and that this would be straightened out in a forum elsewhere where we don't necessarily participate. It is a 'g' specific concern to know what the c's are going to do with language.

Bruce Tonkin - yes, a couple of sentences, there Cary?

Cary Karp- let me listen to the mp3 first of this meeting.

Bruce Tonkin- Glen - can you get this transcribed?

Glen - yes

Bruce Tonkin - if Olof could pick up on these discussions, based on a transcription.

Marilyn Cade - time frame for the policy development process (pdp). I would like us to officially and formally acknowledge the policy development process time frame is not appropriate to this task force and not to ignore the inappropriateness of the time frame but to be clear in launching the policy development process that we would develop an appropriate and achievable time line to undertake this work. So that in launching the pdp, staff are not constrained to push us into deadlines. Instead, given the complexity and importance, we should develop an appropriate timeline.

Bruce Tonkin - how would you see the timeline being developed? Is the group itself ? From the way I have managed project, get the group to come back to me to with what they think the time line is.

Marilyn Cade - I am not suggesting that staff would not put together timelines, I am suggesting that we give them guidance and give ourselves guidance in the terms of reference that note that the present time limitations are not suitable to the work of this task force.

Bruce Tonkin - what that means is that you might put into the introduction:' it's expected the timeline is not appropriate' and then the first task of the group that does this work, is to actually come back to the Council with a time frame.

Cary Karp - one of the things that we could comfortably peg that time line to, is the pace at which the technical testing and such things are going to be proceeding. I will be coming to the August meeting with Tina knowing what the IETF has in mind in terms of advancing the protocol basis. And one of the things that Tina and I will have to do during that meeting, is see to it that they realise that we have a time line too and we will be happy to peg our timeline to theirs if they can give us useful numbers to do that. I would also like to point out that the present discussion, although perhaps not quantifiable on how long it ought to take, is certainly an essential aspect of a policy development process.

Bruce Tonkin - OK - Should try to capture that. One of the first steps when the policy development process is initiated is to ask the constituencies to prepare positions, the time is three weeks. I think that we ought to explicitly extend that time line so that there is enough time for people to think about and understand the issue before they put pen to paper into a constituency statement.

Tom Keller - I am looking for clarification for:
term of reference
5.c. "Be particularly mindful of detail which, although initially considered in the IDN context, may otherwise be relevant to the New gTLD PDP. The association of two separate labels with the same TLD is an example of this, given that the linguistic justification for such action can as easily be derived from two languages that can be adequately represented using ASCII characters as it can from a situation where one or both labels requires IDN representation."

Cary Karp - Bruce has already pointed out that there will be situations where two separate language representations of a single label may be requested, but both of those labels can be represented in ASCII, there are language issues that are not IDN issues.


Bruce Tonkin - I think Tom, this is one of those points, a bit like what Philip said about 1a and 1b, it is more or less a statement of fact, it is not really a terms of reference, so much. What it is basically saying is that when you start thinking about the IDN issue, you realise that a lot of these issues apply to ASCII TLDs as well in the context of language specifically.

Tom Keller - I would like to have some examples.

Cary Karp - the situation of the library community, which is a perfect analogy to the museum community is considering the potential value of having a TLD dedicated to itself, but they can't get past the selection of the label because In English the word 'library' means 'library' but in French the word 'librairie' means 'bookstore' the absolute opposite of this research like academic facility. So they would need to have some label resembling 'library' and some label representing 'bibliothèque'. For example .lib and .bib which are both ASCII labels, but they are two entirely different groups of languages representing the exact same TLD.

Philip Sheppard - Of course it is only the arrogance of the English speaking races who assume .com does not derive from French word "commerce" and .info does not derive from the Italian word "informatzione"

Cary Karp - advocates from those communities fail to make this point that the discussion matures the Anglophone arrogance is justified (joke)

Alistair Dixon - What I was going to say has already been discussed.

Bruce Tonkin - any other comments? Update the terms of reference and post it to the mailing list. I am trying to get a sense of when we make a decision. Is the suggestion that we vote in Amsterdam assuming we have quorum? Is that what people are suggesting?

Cary Karp - might it be wise in the light of realising the intricacy of all this, to suggest that we indeed we might call the question while in Amsterdam, but if we discover further levels of complexity that we should perhaps defer the proceeding to an absolute formal action a while longer. Amsterdam is a reasonable date to consider voting on this, but we may learn more between now and then.

Marilyn Cade - Can I ask a clarifying question about the point that Cary has just made?
I feel it important that we find a way to officially launch our work. I also understand the point made about getting the terms of reference right because the terms of reference does act as a framework and in some cases, my experience is actually, it can be too binding, we then find it difficult to revise the terms of reference or find the need to change the terms of reference. How do we achieve launching work in the creation of a forum without, I use the term forum loosely here, how do we launch the work without approving an interim terms of reference. At the same time I respect the point Cary made.

Maureen Cubberley - I was offline. I heard the last part of what Marilyn had to say about we have to devise the terms of reference in order to move forward and then the difficulties in changing them, and I wondering if we could we borrow something form the legal world and separate some of the elements in the introductory remarks that seem to be more that than terms of reference, and present them in the same way that you would see recitals presented before the elements of a specific issue are presented, so that we would co-opt some of general things that are observations to be kept in mind, but are not specific to the terms of reference. I wonder if thinking along those lines might get us to a point where we could refine the way we develop our terms of reference.

Bruce Tonkin - quite a few of these points we could move up into an introduction, the equivalent of the whereas clauses the board uses. So we could certainly do that. My question actually Maureen is partly when we would take a decision to do something next, and I was suggesting to perhaps do it in Amsterdam. Cary suggested that we may get more information and we might want to delay it further, but mainly we just pencil it in to try and do in Amsterdam. If people are not comfortable moving forward, then we will schedule another meeting at that point.

Maureen Cubberley - that sounds logical

Bruce Tonkin - One of the things I will have to check on is whether we will have quorum of actual Council members in Amsterdam because some constituencies are sending members who are not Council members. I am not clear on that yet. We will see how we go. Or we may be able to do a teleconference at a time in Amsterdam where those not participating in person can dial in. So we will have a try with who is there, who can dial in and what time, and see if we can schedule a short formal Council meeting over that 3 day period.

Is there any other business someone wants to raise under this meeting?

Olof Nordling - Could we just recap on what we do the mean time; because I reckon we will have some input for modifying the terms of reference?

Bruce Tonkin - We would like to get the terms of reference updated by early next week based on the transcript of this call.

Olof Nordling - indeed and to the lists for further comments?


Bruce Tonkin - I'll preliminarily schedule a meeting in Amsterdam depending on people's availability, and schedule half an hour for any formal business we need to conduct.

Item 4: Update on planning for Amsterdam meeting (29-31 August 2006)


Bruce Tonkin proposed:

The first day and a half reviewing the recommendations, and taking into account constituency or other comments whether they need to be improved further.

- working through each of the Terms of Reference spending at least 1 - 2 hours on each.
- taking IDN case scenarios, and test if the proposed principles produce the expected outcomes expect them.
- Thursday would be testing

Olof Nordling - proposed recapping, on Thursday, the previous IDN committee findings?

On Wednesday night a group dinner is planned.

Remote participation will be available and details of the conference bridge will be sent out shortly.

Item 5: Any Other Business
5.1 PDP Feb 06

Maureen Cubberley proposed scheduling a date for the PDP Feb 06 task force to have a teleconference.
Further notice of this would be sent to the task force list.

Bruce Tonkin formally closed the meeting and thanked everybody for participating.

The meeting ended: 13:21 UTC

• Next GNSO Council meeting during the Amsterdam meeting in August. Details tba.
  see: Calendar