[council] RE: URS follow-up

["Jonathan Robinson" <jonathan.robinson@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

All,

 

I recently forwarded you Olof Nordling's mail below.  This follows on from
the session where Olof presented to the Council as part of our wrap-up
session.  As you may recall, I was caught slightly unaware by the
requirement to chair the wrap-up session.  The discussion on the potential
for formation of a drafting team or at least being in a good position to do
so has continued on the GNSO Council list to the extent that we now have
good indications of interest in the decision and in contributing to the
prospective DT.  Great.

 

However, I wanted to take this opportunity draw to your attention the fact
that the provision of URS services is an area where I have some systems,
process and related expertise.  Accordingly, I have recently had informal
discussions with companies and individuals who may respond to the ICANN RFI
on the URS.  Since no formal arrangements have been made and indeed, nothing
may materialise, I do not believe that there is a current basis to update my
SOI.  Nevertheless, in the circumstances, I have reservations about chairing
Council discussions on the  subject.

 

In order to avoid any appearance of a conflict of interest, I propose to ask
VC Mason Cole to lead any GNSO Council discussions on this topic, at least
until it is clear that I am not involved with or have no future involvement
in a response to ICANN's RFI.

 

Best wishes,

 

 


Jonathan

 

From: Olof Nordling [mailto:olof.nordling@xxxxxxxxx] 
Sent: 21 October 2012 15:33
To: jonathan.robinson@xxxxxxxxxx
Cc: Kurt Pritz
Subject: URS follow-up

 

Dear Jonathan,

Congratulations to your recent election as GNSO Council Chair and many
thanks to you and to all Council members for the constructive discussions we
had on URS matters on 18 October! The willingness to consider a drafting
team to address URS implementation questions and issues is much appreciated.

 

The subsequent URS session the same day in Toronto proved most interesting.
In addition to presentations from NAF and WIPO as  potential URS providers,
we had the advantage of a very late addition to the agenda - a presentation
from a "new entrant", Intersponsive, intending to respond to the RFI with a
proposal within the target fee, although with some adjustments of the URS
provisions. Also NAF clarified that they would be able to stay within the
target fee, provided reasonable limitations could be established to the
current translation requirements and to the number of domain names covered
by a single complaint. 

 

I realize that you and other Council members couldn't attend this session,
as it partially overlapped with the GNSO Council session, but the recording
is available at
<http://audio.icann.org/meetings/toronto2012/urs-18oct12-en.mp3>
http://audio.icann.org/meetings/toronto2012/urs-18oct12-en.mp3. Furthermore,
there are a number of relevant documents posted on our recently established
URS web page at  <http://newgtlds.icann.org/en/applicants/urs>
http://newgtlds.icann.org/en/applicants/urs, notably contributions from NAF,
WIPO and CAC, with considerations, proposals, some costing aspects and, most
importantly, questions needing to be resolved (the NAF contribution is of
particular interest in that regard).

 

I believe these recent developments further clarifies the need for a
drafting team to establish realistic implementation measures based on the
URS text. I look forward to further contacts with you and the Council on
this matter in the near future.

 

Very best regards

Olof