Dear All: As you may recall, an Ad-Hoc Working Group on GNSO Improvements, with representatives of each RALO, has been working on a response to the public consultation on the Board Governance Committee¹s proposals for improvements to the GNSO. As a part of that work, the working group was also engaged in negotiations with various communities within the GNSO Community, including the Commercial and Business Users, Intellectual Property, Internet Service and Connectino Providers, and Non-Commercial Users Constituencies. The Joint Statement that resulted from those discussions was posted to the public comment forum today, and is accessible at: http://forum.icann.org/lists/gnso-improvements-report-2008/msg00012.html. The Working Group also produced a draft statement for transmission to the Board of Directors by the ALAC in its role as an Advisory Committee. That document was subject to a community comment period, and the working group incorporated those comments received however, the working group took the decision that it would be better to wait to finalise the text until after the Joint Statement was finished, so that the At-Large community could take one final look at the two statements, make any comments, and if necessary those comments could then be dealt with in the ALAC¹s individual statement. The ALAC also discussed the progress on this issue at its meeting earlier this month. The Staff have been asked to post a version of the ALAC statement, as well as the Joint Statement, so that comments can be taken. It is envisaged that we will be able to take comments for a few days as the statement can be transmitted to the board following the end of the public comment period on the GNSO Improvements draft, which finishes on the 24th of April. You may access both the draft ALAC Statement, and the Joint Statement, from this URL. Please do use the comment button to provide any comments you care to make. https://st.icann.org/alac-docs/index.cgi?al_alac_gnim_wg_01_01_alac_statemen t_on_gnso_improvements -- Regards, Nick Ashton-Hart, Matthias Langenegger, Frederic Teboul ICANN At-Large Staff email: staff@atlarge.icann.org