GNSO Council Teleconference Minutes
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22 September 2005 Proposed agenda and related documents List of attendees: 12 Council Members Quorum present at 14: 15 CET. - Tuesday November 29 morning - the GAC /GNSO WHOIS workshop - Wednesday November 30 - (tentative) DNSSEC deployment workshop, - Thursday December 1 - GNSO Constituency day, Opening ceremony - Saturday December 3 morning - Public Forum - Sunday December 4 morning - Board meeting Bruce Tonkin drew attention to constituency elections that were required for councillors whose terms expired at the end of ICANN's Annual General Meeting on December 4, 2005 in Vancouver. ACTION: The Secretariat will poll the constituencies on their election processes. Item 1: Approval of minutes Total of 90 days lapsed time. Bruce Tonkin suggested reflecting, in a draft paper, questions on: Kurt Pritz stated that Miriam Sapiro's report on the Evaluation of new gTLDs: Policy and Legal Issues should be taken into consideration so as not to repeat accomplished work. Kurt Pritz suggested taking up the topic with Maria Farrell off line. - issues report to contain background material on: Bruce Tonkin stated that the first step was to formally vote on creating a new issues report that identified the 4 areas: Bruce Tonkin commented that single letter domain names (SLDN) were a current condition on registry operators, and recommended that the topic be treated under the issues report in agenda item 4. Marilyn Cade agreed with the recommendation and commented that other questions for new gTLDs should be considered in the issues report, such as, to examine the topic that policies were being written into contracts and decide whether to ratify the process or whether it needed more work. An example was the criteria staff used for place names in the .info contract which had not been approved as policy. Maureen Cubberley supported working from the broad to the specific in a whole process. Kurt Pritz did not support folding single letter second level issues into the gTLD policy development process as the topics shared no common issues and recommended that it should be undertaken as a separate policy development process. There are infinite numbers of tlds and finite numbers of second level names, there are technical issues associated with the second level at one time for the single letters that do not apply to the TLDs, and the allocation methods would probably be different Bruce Tonkin clarified that the issue was not about single letter names in the root but rather that currently there was a condition on the operators of TLDs that restricted them from offering single letter names, and that "restriction" was the contracts and these were being examined. Bruce added that when introducing a new TLD like .travel, one of the current conditions in the TLD was that they were not allowed to introduce single letters. Marilyn Cade concurred with points in the Status Paper that the technical issues were resolved but there may be questions about symbols and ampersands that have not been explored. A persuasive point in making single letter domain names part of the overall policy development process was that policy governing the unreserving of names would affect new gtlds as well as old tlds. The term "new gtlds" is used but in fact a policy is being devised for the gTLD space. The process is evaluating lessons learned and figuring out what policy is going forward. Thus questions like unreserving names and deciding how to treat place names would be questions in a forward going policy while looking back might apply to policies such as escrow Bret Fausett supported a more general approach to prioritise work where new gTLDs could be launched with the current restrictions which could be lifted later rather than holding up the whole process. Tina Dam requested that it be clearly stated if the single letter domain name issue were merged into the implementation of new TLDs and the policy development process on new TLDs that the single letter domain names belonged under the policy issues whereas the symbols in domain names belong under the International Domain Names (IDN). Ross Rader commented that it would appear that those involved within the ICANN community’s prioritization should take a backseat to the priorities of those outside. Marilyn Cade proposed moving forward with the issues report with the understanding that it may be appropriate to split into two policy development processes or establish separate priorities on the broader issues of a Policy Development Process for new gTLDs including a discussion whether to initiate an "issues report" on single letter domain names. Maureen Cubberley agreed to move ahead and to take on single letter domain names as a separate entity externally driven did not seem consistent with the policy development process. Kurt Pritz responded that the single letter domain name was strictly within the purview of the policy development process. The policy issues were, should a scarce resource be allocated as in single letter domains, as opposed to the gTLDs where the question was whether an infinite resource should be allocated. The technical allocation methods involved in taking up an infinite resource could be different from those involved in a scarce resource. Being responsive to a new set of community members who looked to ICANN for a solution to a problem was important. Bruce Tonkin commenting on the "problem" stated that from a Registrars viewpoint it was considered a prioritization issue according to the numbers, as those companies making the request would realize. The issues currently being examined impacted millions of Internet users, such as improving the WHOIS system and introducing new tlds opposed to a few companies that wanted unique domain names and which currently already had domain names and websites. Bruce Tonkin summarised saying that a decision should be made that Council was requesting an Issues Report on new tlds. 2. Creation of the Issue Report Within fifteen (15) calendar days after receiving either (i) an a. The proposed issue raised for consideration; b. The identity of the party submitting the issue; c. How that party is affected by the issue; d. Support for the issue to initiate the PDP; e. A recommendation from the Staff Manager as to whether the Council 1. is within the scope of ICANN's mission statement; 2. is broadly applicable to multiple situations or organizations; 3. is likely to have lasting value or applicability, albeit with the 4. will establish a guide or framework for future decision-making; or 5. implicates or affects an existing ICANN policy. f. On or before the fifteen (15) day deadline, the Staff Manager shall Marilyn Cade proposed a motion to:: Ross Rader did not support singling out any modification or restriction to policy, such as single letter domain names, for special treatment as prioritisation was the issue being addressed. However, Ross supported examining the issue, but not the combination as in the above proposed motion. Bruce Tonkin, seconded by Cary Karp, proposed a motion to: Decision 2: Bruce Tonkin proposed requesting the ICANN staff to produce a background document with the aim to assist in developing a workshop agenda for the Vancouver meeting. Bruce Tonkin declared the GNSO meeting closed and thanked everybody for participating.
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