RE: [council] FW: Action item on me from our teleconf yesterday regarding the recent Board Resolutions from Trondheim, reflecting on reports from various WG's including JAS and Rec6 CWG...

[Alan Greenberg <alan.greenberg@xxxxxxxxx>]

I believe that the sentence that Tim is referring to is

"It is our belief that particularly where we were jointly operating 
as Chartering Organisations or in Cross Community mode this would be 
quite advantageous and if GNSO and/or GAC do wish to do so the ALAC 
and I look forward to the opportunity to continue to build better and 
more robust models for multi-stakeholderism and bottom up consensus 
built policy processes in ICANN."
I do not claim to speak for Cheryl (but I have copied here on this 
note), but I will give my views. We tend to use the same words but 
with many different meanings in ICANN. There is no doubt that the 
Bylaws give the GNSO Council full and sole control of the gTLD Policy 
Development Process. The PDP is a very specific process and its 
outcomes are subject to very special Board treatment. With the 
current working group model that still gives others (both affiliated 
with AC/SOa or not) the ability to participate.
But in my mind, the GNSO is not the only part of ICANN which has an 
interest in the more general gTLD issues and the two recent working 
group are examples. As indicated in the CCT report recently approved 
by the GNSO Council, cooperation with other ACs and SOs is desirable. 
I note that Cheryl did not capitalize Policy or Processes and I think 
clearly meant the terms in their most general sense.
Despite the general Board rejection of the products of the two recent 
cross-constituency WGs, I would like to think that we need to 
continue to use such models when and where it seems to be 
advantageous. The alternative to the direction indicated by the 
sentence is that the GNSO or the GNSO Council refuse to participate 
in activities with the other groups, or that the other groups not be 
allowed to undertake any gTLD-related discussions on their own unless 
"led" by the GNSO. I don't think that either would be a desirable way forward.
I do not see any of this diluting the role of the GNSO and GNSO 
Council. It may make things more complex at times, but if that is the 
price to pay for good outcomes, I think it may be a worthwhile trade-off.
Alan


At 06/10/2010 11:18 AM, Tim Ruiz wrote:
> Well Bill, if that was all it was about that might be true. But the
> second sentence of the first paragraph of the excerpt clearly indicates
> a bigger picture goal. So perhaps how we proceed all depends on how we
> do it and what it involves. Getting more info on the Board's decisions
> is one thing, extending it beyond that is another.
>
> Tim