| 27 March 2008 Proposed agenda and documents List of attendees: 17 Council Members ICANN Staff Denise Michel - Vice President, Policy Development GNSO Council Liaisons Rita Rodin - ICANN Board member Avri Doria chaired the meeting. Item 1: Update any Statements of Interest Item 2: Review/amend the agenda Item 3: Approve GNSO Council minutes of 31 January 2008 . Chuck Gomes seconded by Adrian Kinderis moved the adoption of the GNSO Council minutes of 31 January 2008 The Motion passed unanimously. Decision 1: The Council approved the GNSO Council minutes of 31 January 2008 Item 4: Confirm Election Results for ICANN Board seat 14 Results of Election for ICANN Board seat # 14 : The details of the vote: The total number of votes that Council could cast was 27 and a majority is 14 or more. Avri Doria seconded by Tom Keller proposed that: The motion passed unanimously by voice vote. Decision 1: The GNSO Council resolved to confirm the election results of Rita Rodin Item 5 -- (Item 12 on agenda) Inter-Registrar Transfer Policy Olof Nordling reported that the Initial report had been posted without the Internet Service and Connectivity Providers (ISP) statement and the revised statement of the Non Commercial Users constituency (NCUC). If the missing statements are forthcoming soon they will be included in the Final Report. Tony Holmes commented that Mark McFadden had been tasked with sending the report which he thought had been received. 5.2 Inter-Registrar Transfer Policy - grouping of other issues - Overview of report Chuck Gomes thanked the small group that worked on prioritising the issues for future policy development processes (PDPs) and gave an overview of the report that recommends the 19 transfer policy issues be divided into five PDPs for all but four and half of the issues, the half, was one issue separated into two and only one part was recommended for a PDP. One issue was singled out for a single PDP and the others were grouped by categories as follows: new transfer policy issues, undoing transfers, operational rule enhancements, dispute policy enhancements, and individual PDP for penalties. Before deciding on the order of the PDPs, the Council should investigate the available volunteer resources and given the issues, the expertise of registrar volunteers will be critical to the process. Five PDPs were prioritised which could be undertaken serially or partially serially. An Issues Report would be required for each PDP. Avri Doria proposed that Council craft a motion on the procedure for the next Council meeting scheduled on 17 April 2008. Item 6: Update from Denise Michel on Board activities Denise Michel reported that the Board's Executive Committee had met on 19 March 2008 and the full ICANN Board was due to meet on the same day as the GNSO Council, 27 March 2008. The Executive committee extended the public comment period on the GNSO Improvements Report for 30 days to April 25, 2008 in response to Phillip Sheppard's request on behalf of the Commercial and Business Users (CBUC), the Intellectual Property (IPC) and the Internet Service and Connectivity Providers (ISP) constituencies. 1) Approval of Regular Board Meeting Minutes from New Delhi Meeting 2) Discussion of Mid-term Review of the Joint Project Agreement between NTIA and ICANN 3) Discussion of NeuStar and Afilias AGP Modification Proposals 4) Update Discussion on New gTLDs 5) Update Discussion on GNSO Improvements 6) Update Discussions on various Bylaws-Mandated Reviews 7) Update Discussion on Meetings and Budget Issues 8) Update Discussion on Paris ICANN Meeting 9) President’s Report 10) Discussion of Riga Board Workshop Agenda scheduled for April 17 and 18, 2008. 11) Briefing on Budget and Management Process Reporting 6.1 Discuss feedback from Board on new gTLD process The Board passed a resolution in New Delhi, (http://www.icann.org/minutes/resolutions-15feb08.htm#_Toc64545922) Kurt Pritz and Karla Valente, at the Council meeting on 6 March 2008 gave an overview of the implementation work and in line with the resolution, suggested that staff could set up a series of conference call briefings and discussions. Council suggested that a face to face meeting would be more effective and staff chose Los Angeles as the venue on 10/11 April 2008. The outcome of the meeting would be provided to the Board for discussion at its scheduled retreat on 17 April 2008. Avri Doria emphasised, the need expressed by several councillors, for receiving prior documentation so that constituencies would have the opportunity to discuss and brief the representatives on the issues in preparation for the meeting. ICANN will financially support travel and necessary hotel costs for one representative from each constituency, the liaisons and nominating committee appointees to the Council to attend the meeting which will be open to all interested parties. The starting time on Thursday will be determined by the plurality of responses either for half a day on Thursday and Friday, or a late start with a standing working cocktail session on Thursday 10 April and a full working day on Friday 11 April 2008. Adrian Kinderis, on behalf of the Council, thanked ICANN for arranging and supporting the meetings. Item 7: IDNC update - Edmon Chung Avri Doria who attended the IDNC calls, in the absence of Edmon Chung the principal GNSO participant in the group, gave an update of the IDNC work. All the issues were discussed, but particular attention was given to checking the capabilities of a new registry and there was general agreement that IANA would undertake this role. A new registry operator would need to run some tests, which might not be necessary for an experienced registry operator, however no conclusion was reached. There was further discussion on how delegations would be done and the tendency was for official languages only in the fast track. Other languages and scripts, as well as names in ASCII or extended ASCII, pertained to the Policy Development Process (PDP) in the long-term. The fast track will be reserved solely for names in non-ASCII scripts, that is non-Latin scripts. There were few changes made to the document. Bart Boswinkel and Chris Disspain were revising the document which would soon be published. The meeting was recorded: Item 8: GNSO - ccNSO relations Avri Doria reported that there had been an invitation from the ccNSO to meet with the GNSO in Paris and the suggested day was Thursday 26 June 2008. The question arose whether it should be a Council to Council or Supporting Organisation (SO) to Supporting Organisation meeting and the general agreement was for SO to SO. It was suggested that the usual Thursday afternoon Council debriefing would be done by teleconference the week after the Paris meetings. Item 9: GNSO Improvements - Discuss planning group Avri Doria reported that an initial planning group had been formed, consisting of the GNSO chair, vice chair, a Board Governance Committee member, Susan Crawford, to liaise with the Board and staff, and the 5 Policy staff members to start work on the recommendations of the GNSO Improvements Report. Council was invited to add participants to this group bearing in mind that ideally it should be kept small and possible options were: Chuck Gomes commented that two standing committees, a) process issues, b) operational issues, each with a charter, would be formed so there would be opportunities for broad constituency and community participation which would represent commercial, non-commercial registrar and registry interests. It was foreseen that these two committees would be prototypes of the Board's standing committees, while the planning committee would end when its work was accomplished. Philip Sheppard commented that while the difference between the planning committee and the standing committees was understood, there was uncertainty as to where planning stops and the substantive standing committees go forward and more minds would be helpful thinking about the planning process because that was the critical starting point. Kristina Rosette supported a representative from each constituency and said it made no sense to limit the number of Council representatives when there were so many staff members on the planning team. Robin Gross suggested a tag team given the regularity and importance of conference calls, and the need for constituency representation. Adrian Kinderis would enquire about a Registrar participant. There was general agreement that each constituency should be represented on the GNSO Improvements 'planning group'. Interested participants to be added to the planning group included Philip Sheppard (CBUC), Ken Stubbs (Registry constituency), Wolf-Ulrich Knoben (ISPCPC), Ute Decker (IPC) Milton Mueller and Robin Gross (NCUC) and Olga Cavalli (Nominating Committee appointee). Chuck Gomes suggested that Ken Stubbs may withdraw his participation in favour of keeping the group small. Denise Michel commented that staff would provide the necessary level of support as well as a Wiki environment for the work with clear parameters by the Council and also stated that the number of staff participants on the committee could be scaled back to a smaller number if it was a concern. Item 10: Discuss Whois report - Start discussions on what to ask for a bid on. Chuck Gomes introduced the motion before Council saying that more detailed work was needed on WHOIS studies and cost estimates and suggested that it could be more productively done by a small group which would come back to the Council with its findings . Philip Sheppard commented that the report did not mention, who suggested the studies, what support there was and from whom, and also noted that in a political world, it was important to know the level of support behind ideas and who was proposing them, in order to facilitate prioritisation decisions. Liz Gasster responded that due to a logistical problem, names were not mentioned, but a list could be produced correlating the submissions to the submitters; however, the records did not indicate support. Chuck Gomes, accepted Tim Ruiz's friendly amendment:: Whereas: On 31 October 2007 the Council passed a motion to “. . . initiate the following sequential actions: 1) Council shall provide additional definition regarding the potential data gathering and study requirements 2) staff shall provide the Council with rough cost estimates for various components of data gathering and studies no later than February 15th, 2008; 3) the Council will decide what data gathering and studies would be pursued; and 4) staff will perform the resulting data gathering and studies and report the results back to the Council” (resolution 20071031-3) On 6 December 2007 the Council initiated the formation of a group of volunteers to develop a proposed “format to solicit what studies should be undertaken” On 20 December 2007 the Council reviewed and discussed the WHOIS template developed by the group and approved it with one additional column under potential sources of data, asking proposers to comment on the challenges of sourcing that data From 8 January through 15 February 2008 a public comment period was held soliciting suggestions from the community for specific topics of study on WHOIS that community stakeholders recommend be conducted A report titled ‘Report on Public Suggestions on Further Studies of WHOIS’ and dated 25 February 2008 summarized the study suggestions and comments received during the public comment period Resolve to form a group of volunteers to: 1. Review and discuss the ‘Report on Public Suggestions on Further Studies of WHOIS’ 2.Develop a proposed list, if any, of recommended studies for which ICANN staff will be asked to provide cost estimates to the Council 3. Deliver the list of recommendations with supporting rationale not later than 24 April 2008. Avri Doria called for a voice vote on the motion. The motion passed unanimously. Decision 2 On 6 December 2007 the Council initiated the formation of a group of volunteers to develop a proposed “format to solicit what studies should be undertaken” On 20 December 2007 the Council reviewed and discussed the WHOIS template developed by the group and approved it with one additional column under potential sources of data, asking proposers to comment on the challenges of sourcing that data From 8 January through 15 February 2008 a public comment period was held soliciting suggestions from the community for specific topics of study on WHOIS that community stakeholders recommend be conducted A report titled ‘Report on Public Suggestions on Further Studies of WHOIS’ and dated 25 February 2008 summarized the study suggestions and comments received during the public comment period 1. Review and discuss the ‘Report on Public Suggestions on Further Studies of WHOIS’ 2.Develop a proposed list, if any, of recommended studies for which ICANN staff will be asked to provide cost estimates to the Council 3. Deliver the list of recommendations with supporting rationale not later than 24 April 2008. Avri Doria proposed that Liz Gasster and the Secretariat coordinate and create a mailing list. Ute Decker left the call Item 11: Report on Single-Character Domain Names at the second -level Patrick Jones gave an overview of the Report on Single-Character Domain Names at the second-level prepared at the direction of Council and the GNSO Reserved Names working group after a public comment period from 16 October to 15 December, 2007 during which thirty-six comments were received from the broad community in nine different countries and among others, suggestions were made on possible allocation methods for single-character domain names. Mike Rodenbaugh, referred to an email exchange on the Council list http://gnso.icann.org/mailing-lists/archives/council/msg04824.html concerning questions posed by members of the Registry constituency that expressed the view that the reservation requirement was a 'service' implemented by the Registry Operator, and such 'services' cannot be amended by Consensus Policy. Mike Rodenbaugh commented that he interpreted Sec. 3.1(b)(iv) and 3.1(b)(iv)(C) as specifically allowing Consensus Policy for issues including "reservation of names in the TLD that may not be registered initially.." and therefore this issue was within purview of potential Consensus Policy and he wanted to know whether it had become a gating issue. Dan Halloran referred to an email exchange that he had with the Registry constituency member http://gnso.icann.org/mailing-lists/archives/council/msg04845.html and offered to follow up by email if there were more questions about what he said. Philip Sheppard viewed the question in two parts: Kurt Pritz responded that public comments on the issue pointed to the need for an efficient means of allocation to be developed and the staff position was that the Council could recommend that staff develop one allocation method. Avri Doria proposed: - tabling the discussion until the next Council meeting on 17 April 2008 - resolving what the actual question was on the Council mailing list - propose next steps on the mailing list. Item 12: Vote on Electronic Voting Philip Sheppard noted that the motion requested the Board to adopt a change to the bylaws to enable electronic voting in certain circumstances so that absent Councillors were not disenfranchised. Philip went on to note that the wording was legally robust, and the succinct document with subsequent action set an example for future Council work. Philip Sheppard, seconded by Cyril Chua and Bilal Beiram, proposed: Whereas Add to: ICANN Bylaws ARTICLE X: Section 3. 8 c. Absentee voting. Members that are absent from a meeting at the time of a vote on whether to initiate a PDP, forward a policy recommendation to the Board, or fill a position open for election may vote by absentee ballot. The GNSO Secretariat will provide reasonable means for transmitting and authenticating absentee ballots, which could include voting by telephone, e-mail, or web-based interface. Absentee ballots must be submitted within 72 hours after the start of the meeting in which a vote is initiated, except that in exceptional circumstances announced at the time of the vote the Chair may reduce this time to 24 hours or extend the time to 7 days. Avri Doria called for a roll call vote. The motion passed unanimously. 20 Votes in favour Carlos Souza and Ute Decker had already left the call. Absent: Cyril Chua, Tony Harris, Olga Cavalli (one vote each), Edmon Chung (two votes) Avri Doria noted that she would forward the motion to the ICANN Board. Decision 3 : Add to: ICANN Bylaws ARTICLE X: Section 3. 8 c. Absentee voting. Members that are absent from a meeting at the time of a vote on whether to initiate a PDP, forward a policy recommendation to the Board, or fill a position open for election may vote by absentee ballot. The GNSO Secretariat will provide reasonable means for transmitting and authenticating absentee ballots, which could include voting by telephone, e-mail, or web-based interface. Absentee ballots must be submitted within 72 hours after the start of the meeting in which a vote is initiated, except that in exceptional circumstances announced at the time of the vote the Chair may reduce this time to 24 hours or extend the time to 7 days. Item 13: AOB 13.1 WDPRS Kristina Rosette requested Staff to provide Council with a brief report on the status of Whois Data Problem Report System (WDPRS). There had been several messages recently regarding reported problems with the WDPRS. Given the importance of the WDPRS to Internet users, more information was required. Kurt Pritz responded that the database table was overfilled by a reporter who had written a script that furnished about 5,000 reports per day. The database was subsequently emptied, the problem was being monitored and the rate limits would continue to be in effect. Patrick Jones sent the following email from Kieren McCarthy to the Council list in this regard: Item 14: Action Item Review Mike Rodenbaugh requested that the ICANN IANA names be placed back on the action item list. Domain Name Tasting New gTLDs Councillors were requested to respond promptly on the choice of times for starting the face to face meeting in Los Angeles on 10 April 2008, and that the plurality of responses would be considered as the preferred starting time. Avri Doria adjourned the GNSO Council meeting and thanked everyone for their participation. The meeting ended at 17:00 UTC. Next GNSO Council teleconference will on 17 April 2008 at 12:00 UTC. |