RE: [council] RAA Amendments discussion

["Gomes, Chuck" <cgomes@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Mike,
 
It is the responsibility of the GNSO to develop policy, not negotiate
contracts.  A community wide negotiations process would be a very
strange model and one that would be fraught with problems and likely
totally unfeasible.  Comment opportunities were provided as you indicate
and that is as it should be, but the negotiations process needs to be
between the contracting parties.
 
At the same time, if there are issues in the RAA that seem worthy of
policy development, we have procedures for that.  If consensus policy is
developed within the picket fence and approved by the Board, then
registries and registrars are required to implement them.  Therefore it
seems to me that the proper approach would be for the GNSO to focus on
specific policy issues rather than contract terms except for contract
terms that involve already established consensus policy and for which
compliance is in question.
 
Chuck


________________________________

        From: owner-council@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx
[mailto:owner-council@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Mike Rodenbaugh
        Sent: Wednesday, September 03, 2008 4:01 PM
        To: 'Council GNSO'
        Subject: [council] RAA Amendments discussion
        
        

        Hi all,

         

        I see 15 mins on tomorrow's agenda for this topic, and only a
link to this letter from the US Government to the Chair of the ICANN
Board.  http://forum.icann.org/lists/raa-consultation/pdfXG2oUDNceq.pdf.
I have no idea what our discussion was going to be about, and so I try
to kick off a talk on the list.  I appreciate the letter and hope we as
a Council can respond by moving WHOIS studies forward at long last, and
meanwhile (at minimum) formally object to the newly proposed RAA
amendments wrt WHOIS proxy services.  

         

        The entire RAA amendment "process" has not involved the GNSO.
Instead there have been two very long rounds of bi-lateral negotiations
between ICANN Staff and the Registrars Constituency.  There was one
round of public comment in between (though it is difficult to understand
how public comments played any significant role in the second draft),
and one just closed wrt the second draft.  

         

        The RAA amendments involve many changes to existing gTLD policy
as embodied in the existing, many-year old RAA.  Public comments from
several constituencies indicate substantial disagreement with many of
the suggested amendments.  The Council really should consider the
proposed amendments formally and with the goal of consensus comments,
and to record constituency and/or minority comments.  Yet this may be
far too late at this point, it is unclear what the "process" is and how
GNSO might impact it, and some of the RAA amendments are unobjectionable
and should be implemented immediately.  

         

        Still, some of the suggested amendments are completely
unacceptable.  So we need to figure out a way to formally register those
concerns and ensure they will be heard, while not unduly stalling the
entire process.  The only other option would be to request Issues
Reports on various of the suggested amendments?  

         

        Thanks,

        Mike