At 05:27 AM 12/16/2015, Bruce Tonkin wrote:

We had recommended splitting the text into a simple mission statement followed by a scope of responsibility.

The Mission Statement should be a short and simple statement that conveys what ICANN's purpose is and relates to the specific sector of activities in which ICANN operates.

Short and simple is always a good goal. But the problem is that the Mission Statement has to serve as an ENFORCEABLE limitation on ICANN's powers. It is the primary backstop that will ensure that ICANN does not stray into areas that it should not be in. If it is too "short and simple" it cannot serve that function at all, and we will be left with an entity that can do whatever it wants to do. To illustrate the point, why not make this the Mission Statement: "ICANN shall help coordinate Domain Name System operations"?? Short, simple, and accurate. But that Mission that will not be effective as an enforceable limitation on ICANN's powers, because just about anything it chooses to do it can be seen as "reasonably appropriate" for THIS mission. Not to repeat myself, but the CCWG Mission Statement embodied two principles which the Board would apparently like to see eliminated: the "picket fence" and the requirement for consensus policy-making. I may have missed it, but I don't recall seeing (a) any good reason they should both be eliminated, or (b) any substitute language the Board is proposing that would similarly incorporate these two principles into the corporation's structure.

BT: "Scope of Responsibilities: The Board suggests that the purpose of this section is to define ICANN's current scope of responsibilities within its Mission and in service to its Mission. It should describe what ICANN does, not how it does it, and must not change ICANN's existing role because that would have consequences for ICANN's operations, commitments, and responsibility to the Community."

What is the point of doing this ? What good does it do - as a means of constraining ICANN's exercise of its powers in the future -- to say, as the Board proposal says, that "ICANN coordinates the allocation and assignment of names in the root zone of the DNS ..., and coordinates the operation and evolution of the DNS root name server system, ... and coordinates the allocation and assignment at the top--most level of IP and AS numbers ..., and collaborates with other bodies as appropriate to publish core registries ..."? What's the point of that? I would note that under the Board's proposal, ICANN would not even be bound to comply with that Statement of Responsibilities; the promise is just to act "in accordance with and only as reasonably appropriate for the Mission," which does not include the Statement of Responsibilities. Not that that would do much good, in any event - the responsibilities are so generally phrased ("coordinate" and "collaborate") that they can't really serve as useful limitations on anything the corporation decides to do. Nor does the Board intend for this to be an exclusive list of ICANN's responsibities - that is, there's nothing (unless I'm just missing it) that says that ICANN can't take on other "responsibilities" in the future. I still fail to see how the Board's comments and the CCWG proposal can be reconciled - or more importantly why they should be reconciled. David ******************************* David G Post - Senior Fellow, Open Technology Institute/New America Foundation blog (Volokh Conspiracy) http://www.washingtonpost.com/people/david-post book (Jefferson's Moose) http://tinyurl.com/c327w2n music http://tinyurl.com/davidpostmusic publications etc. http://www.davidpost.com *******************************