[registrars] Further summary of the GNSO Council Meeting 17 Jan 2008

[Tim Ruiz <tim@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

As Tom forwarded, Avri was confirmed for another term as Chair of the
GNSO.

A group of Councilors will be formulating the next steps for the Tasting
PDP, due by the Meeting in New Delhi for Council consideration.

A group of Councilors and possibly one or two others will be considering
the reports of the Transfers WG and recommending a way forward on the
issues raised and prioritized in those reports.

Registrar Councilors will be involved in both groups.

Another issue that I believe should be of concern to the RC and watched
closely is the Fast Track process for .IDNs being developed by IDNC WG
of the ccNSO:
http://ccnso.icann.org/workinggroups/idncwg.htm

This process will be used to assign one .IDN to ccTLD managers before
completion of the ccPDP on IDN ccTLDs. The .IDN will be a localized
version of their ccTLD.

I am concerned because this further broadens the ccTLD universe beyond
the current two character codes specified in ISO 3166, and may set a
precedent used by the ccNSO PDP. A major question is what kind of
agreement with ICANN will these fall under? If they fall under the
existing loose ccTLD framework agreements then these new IDN name
spacess:

1. Will not required to comply with consensus policies as Accredited
Registrars and gTLD Registries are.
2. Will not be required to use *only* Accredited Registrars, or to even
use them at all.
3. Will have no ownership requirement limitations so they can own
registrars, registrars can own them, can sell direct, etc.
4. Will have no requirement to fund ICANN through transactional fees or
any other method.

This expansion of the ccTLD namespace is being done completely within
the ccNSO WG and PDP with only comment opportunities by the rest of the
stakeholders actually affected by the outcome, and in particular the
Registrars and Registries who should be concerned about the unbalancing
of the competitive environment this expansion could create if these new
namespaces are not under the same rules and restrictions as gTLDs are
and new gTLDs and IDN gTLDs will be.

The ccNSO WG Fast Track initial report will be posted for comment in the
next few weeks. I encourage anyone concerned as I am to be sure and look
at this issue closely and comment. It may also be worthwhile for the RC
as a whole to also comment.

The Issue Report for ccNSO PDP itself on this topic can be commented on
until 25 Jan 2008:
http://www.icann.org/announcements/announcement-19dec07.htm


Tim