Sorry, you need to enable JavaScript to visit this website.
Skip to main content

GNSO Council Teleconference Minutes

Last Updated:
Date

22 September 2005

Proposed agenda and related documents

List of attendees:
Philip Sheppard - Commercial & Business Users C. - absent - apologies - proxy to Marilyn Cade
Marilyn Cade - Commercial & Business Users C.
Grant Forsyth - Commercial & Business Users C - absent - apologies - proxy to Marilyn Cade
Greg Ruth - ISCPC
Antonio Harris - ISCPC - absent - apologies - proxy to Tony Holmes/Greg Guth
Tony Holmes - ISCPC
Thomas Keller- Registrars - absent - apologies proxy to Ross Rader/Bruce Tonkin
Ross Rader - Registrars
Bruce Tonkin - Registrars
Ken Stubbs - gTLD registries - proxy if needed to Philip Colebrook/Cary Karp
Philip Colebrook - gTLD registries
Cary Karp - gTLD registries
Lucy Nichols - Intellectual Property Interests C - absent - apologies - proxy to Niklas Lagergren/Kiyoshi Tsuru
Niklas Lagergren - Intellectual Property Interests C
Kiyoshi Tsuru - Intellectual Property Interests C.
Robin Gross - Non Commercial Users C. - absent - apologies - proxy to Norbert Klein/Ross Rader
Norbert Klein - Non Commercial Users C.
Alick Wilson - Nominating Committee appointee - absent - apologies - proxy to Bruce Tonkin
Maureen Cubberley - Nominating Committee appointee
Avri Doria - Nominating Committee appointee

12 Council Members

ICANN Staff
Kurt Pritz - Vice President, Business Operations
Olof Nordling - Manager, Policy Development Coordination - absent - apologies
Maria Farrell - ICANN GNSO Policy Support Officer
Liz Williams - Senior Policy Counselor
Tina Dam - Chief gTLD Registry Liaison
Glen de Saint G�ry - GNSO Secretariat

GNSO Council Liaisons
Suzanne Sene - GAC Liaison
Bret Fausett - acting ALAC Liaison

Michael Palage - ICANN Board member

MP3 Recording

Quorum present at 14: 15 CET.

Bruce Tonkin chaired this teleconference.

Approval of Agenda

The Secretariat reported on the Vancouver program meeting:
GNSO Councillors should plan to arrive in time to start work on Monday morning.
The current essential information is:

- Tuesday November 29 morning - the GAC /GNSO WHOIS workshop

- Wednesday November 30 - (tentative) DNSSEC deployment workshop,
GAC, ALAC, ccNSO meetings.

- Thursday December 1 - GNSO Constituency day, Opening ceremony

- Friday December 2 morning - (TENTATIVE) IDN workshop which is a joint
effort with the GAC
- Friday December 2 afternoon - Public Forum

- Saturday December 3 morning - Public Forum

- Sunday December 4 morning - Board meeting

Bruce Tonkin recognized that there would not be a full compliment of councillors on Monday morning and Tuesday afternoon was suggested for the GNSO /ICANN board meeting.

Marilyn Cade noted a word of caution about other workshops that were put forward and not identified by the community and that there was a commitment about the WSIS and the strategic/operational plan.

Bruce Tonkin proposed working with Tina Dam about the outcomes for the IDN workshop to identify policy and technical issues.

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
- GNSO Council teleconference - 18 August 2005

Ken Stubbs moved the adoption of the minutes of 18 August 2005.
Motion approved. Two abstentions from Niklas Lagergren and Maureen Cubberley.

Decision 1: The GNSO Council minutes of 18 August 2005 were adopted.

Item 3: Evaluation of new gtlds (.biz, .info etc as well as .travel, .jobs. .mobi etc)
- determine next steps, for example:
- clearly define remaining questions
- a 30 day comment period - require constituency statements, registry operator statements
- staff to produce evaluation report
- identify time required from staff

Bruce Tonkin, wanting to estimate the length of the process, proposed the following timelines:

30-day process for staff preparation to produce clear questions - end of October
30 days for comments, which could include constituency statements, individual's input, registries involved in the recent TLD rounds, identified organizations, the Government Advisory Committee (GAC) and input from the GNSO public forum in Vancouver
30 days for staff to produce final report and Public Comment on Final Report

Total of 90 days lapsed time.

Marilyn Cade supported the timeframe and the input during the Vancouver meetings.
Ken Stubbs commented that the timeframe should rather overestimate than underestimate the required time.

Bruce Tonkin suggested reflecting, in a draft paper, questions on:
- whether to introduce further gTLDs,
- the criteria for approving applications for new TLDs
- the allocation method, assuming that there was a limit to how many gTLDs could be introduced at once.
- the key contractual conditions for those TLDs
in a way that related to the policy development process so that the evaluation would be mapped to the questions.

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.

Item 4: Policy Development Process for new gtlds
- initiate vote for an issues report (as per annex A, Section 1 (b) of the bylaws)

- issues report to contain background material on:
* whether to continue to introduce new gTLDs
- collect previous submissions from constituencies on new gTLDs
* the criteria for approving applications for new gTLDs
- collect previous material used for .org and .net tenders
* the allocation method, assuming that there was a limit to how many gTLDs could be introduced at once
- collect previous input (e.g OECD etc)
* the key contractual conditions for those gTLDs which might include conditions such as : escrow policies, obligation to use an ICANN accredited registrar etc.
- collect current significant conditions from new gTLD agreements

Bruce Tonkin stated that the first step was to formally vote on creating a new issues report that identified the 4 areas:
whether to continue to introduce new gTLDs
the criteria for approving applications for new gTLDs
the allocation method, assuming that there was a limit to how many gTLDs could be introduced at once
the key contractual conditions for those gTLDs
The proposed timeline would be producing the Issues Report by end of October 2005 for the GNSO council meeting on the 16 November 2005.

Marilyn Cade supported the 30 day timeline for the Issues Report.
Marilyn noted that potentially "Item 5: Policy development for IDNs and
Item 7: Discussion whether to initiate an "issues report" on single letter domain names" might have implications for the policy development process for new gtlds.

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.

Kurt Pritz commented that the gTLD policy development process was complex and urgent. All the issues associated with the single letter names were different and would be considered serially, taking up management time serially. Single letter name consideration was not a prerequisite to determining whether and how TLDs would be initiated so should be separate. The gTLD process was possibly complex and long while the single letter process could be straightforward and with no common issues one could slow up the other if conducted at the same time. Dr Vint Cerf recommended that single letter domain names should go through a bottom up policy development process which led to a status paper related to second level domain names.

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).

There was general support in the Council to look at the issues as a whole rather than in separate policy development processes.
Bruce Tonkin proposed first examining high level issues on new TLDs.

Kurt Pritz stated that requests came from several multinational companies for the allocation of identified single letter names and these companies should not be turned away. The ICANN Staff recommended and would support a separate policy development process.

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.
The ICANN bylaws state:

2. Creation of the Issue Report

Within fifteen (15) calendar days after receiving either (i) an
instruction from the Board; (ii) a properly supported motion from a
Council member; or (iii) a properly supported motion from an Advisory
Committee, the Staff Manager will create a report (an "Issue Report").
Each Issue Report shall contain at least the following:

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
should initiate the PDP for this issue (the "Staff Recommendation").
Each Staff Recommendation shall include the opinion of the ICANN General
Counsel regarding whether the issue proposed to initiate the PDP is
properly within the scope of the ICANN policy process and within the
scope of the GNSO. In determining whether the issue is properly within
the scope of the ICANN policy process, the General Counsel shall examine
whether such issue:

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
need for occasional updates;

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
distribute the Issue Report to the full Council for a vote on whether to
initiate the PDP, as discussed below.

Marilyn Cade proposed a motion to::
Request an Issues Report from the ICANN staff providing Item 4:
Policy Development Process for new gtlds - initiate vote for an issues report
and including Item 7: an "issues report" on second level single letter domain names
and establish a reasonable timeframe with the ICANN staff input on what would be a reasonable time frame to request the return of the Issues Report .

Motion withdrawn.

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.
Bret Fausett commented that the Issues Report should be focused on whether there should be new TLDs and against what standards.

Bruce Tonkin, seconded by Cary Karp, proposed a motion to:
Request the staff to produce an Issues Report on the topic of new TLD s that covers the four areas:
- whether to continue to introduce new gTLDs
- the criteria for approving applications for new gTLDs
- the allocation method
- the current restrictions
that will document the status quo in the four areas and in documenting that, it will identify any of the requests that ICANN has received to date.

The motion carried unanimously by voice vote.

Decision 2:
Request the staff to produce an Issues Report on the topic of new TLD s that covers the four areas:
- whether to continue to introduce new gTLDs
- the criteria for approving applications for new gTLDs
- the allocation method
- the current restrictions
that will document the status quo in the four areas and in documenting that, it will identify any of the requests that ICANN has received to date.

Item 5: Policy development for IDNs
- recommend request staff to provide a background document listing all past Board decisions regarding the implementation of IDNs, and the status of the IDN guidelines
- this can be a precursor to motion to request an official issues report
- establish clearly roles of:
-- President's Advisory Committee on IDN
-- IDN registry review group (gtld and cctld reps) to development Guidelines for the Implementation of the IETF IDN standards
-- GAC work on IDNs
-- GNSO/ccNSO policy development initiative

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.
Marilyn Cade requested feedback to the program committee to avoid parallel events of importance to the Council and constituencies.
Cary Karp reminded Council that a draft revised version of the IDN guidelines was published for public comment and suggested that the Council revisit the issues at the end of the public comment period.

Bruce Tonkin suggested:
- Cary Karp forward to the Council list the independent source, technical in orientation, listing all the initiatives currently in progress on the various components of IDNs and its development. http://nameprep.org.
- Tina Dam to collect all the ICANN documents, scheduling and coordinating the IDN workshop in Vancouver with the aim of producing an issues report after the workshop.

Item 6: Draft terms of reference for GNSO Review
- review current version
Marilyn Cade commented on section 3 .4 Review scope that the collaborative effort of the GNSO Council with the ICANN Board was not captured. Liz Williams responded that the difference lay in the way the Luxembourg resolution was written which was different from the way in which the bylaws were written and considered the collaborative approach was addressed by the Council's work on the initial draft then the Board's individual input and working in conjunction with the Council.
Marilyn Cade referred to section 5.4.1, 5.5, 5.6 comparing with other organisations and requested a list of the organisations and further commented that internal relationships would be difficult for an external evaluator to decide.
Maureen Cubberley enquired about the expected outcome.
Liz Williams commented that in the policy development process and internal relations with the GNSO and the ICANN Board and staff, an analysis of the interaction was important to look at transparency, effectiveness and consultation.
Update on next steps:
Submit information paper to ICANN Board
A resolution for the ICANN Board to trigger the work
Request for tender
Developing timelines - work will begin
Aim to complete work in early part of 2006

Item 7: Discussion whether to initiate an "issues report" on single letter domain names (as per annex A, Section 1 (b) of the bylaws)
Deferred to next GNSO Council meeting 20 October 2005

Bruce Tonkin declared the GNSO meeting closed and thanked everybody for participating.
The meeting ended: 16: 10 CET.

  • Next GNSO Council Teleconference Thursday 6 October 2005 at 12:00 UTC.
    Topic:
    see: Calendar