December 2008 - ALAC-Announce

Second Vote on the RAA Package now open
by At-Large Staff Dec. 24, 2008

Dec. 24, 2008

Dear ALAC members, A briefing was recently held on the RAA Package by Tim Cole and Kurt Pritz from ICANN staff. You can find the audio recording and summary minutes of this briefing under: https://st.icann.org/alac/index.cgi?discussion_on_the_raa Following this briefing, it was decided to start a second online vote on the ALAC recommendation to the GNSO on the RAA Package. The new vote will be open until 08 January 2009 at 1200 UTC, which will allow the ALAC GNSO Liaison to announce the result at the GSNO Council meeting scheduled later that day. You will be asked to choose among the following options: 1. Recommend the GNSO to accept the current RAA package, with the possibility of further policy development in the future. 2. Recommend that the GNSO do not approve the current RAA package. 3. Abstain You will receive a separate email with you voting credentials shortly. Regards, Nick Ashton-Hart, Matthias Langenegger, Marie-Hélène Bouchoms, Heidi Ullrich ICANN At-Large Staff email: staff(a)atlarge.icann.org

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Results of the first vote on the RAA Package
by At-Large Staff Dec. 24, 2008

Dec. 24, 2008

Dear all, With 10 out of 15 ALAC Members having voted in the recent vote on the ALAC recommendation to the GNSO on the vote on the RAA Package, we can confirm that the vote is quorate: Number of voters: 10 · Group size: 15 · Percentage voted: 66.67 ³ICANN staff has told the GNSO that the only way that the current RAA package of amendments can be approved is if they pass a super-majority (66%) vote accepting the package. If it is not approved, any future policy development must be done over using current PDP processes. Some of the issues covered by the package, such as enforcement and accreditation are not likely to be considered in scope for a PDP. Please choose one of the following options:² 70.00% 1 ) Recommend that the GNSO defer the decision until such time that the ALAC can be properly briefed on the current position by ICANN staff. ( J Ovidio Salgueiro, P Vande Walle, S Bachollet, R Guerra, F Seye Sylla, TH Nguyen, C Langdon-Orr) 20.00% 2 ) Recommend the GNSO to accept the current RAA package, with the possibility of further policy development in the future. (A Greenberg, A Peake) 10.00% 3) Recommend that the GNSO do not approve the current RAA package. (B Brendler) 0.00% 4) Abstain 0 0.00 You may verify the results independently under: https://www.bigpulse.com/pollresults?code=w6iazAxzpvfT4cqTQkbc Regards, Nick Ashton-Hart, Matthias Langenegger, Marie-Hélène Bouchoms, Heidi Ullrich ICANN At-Large Staff email: staff(a)atlarge.icann.org

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ICANN Holiday Closure
by Denise Michel Dec. 23, 2008

Dec. 23, 2008

Greetings. ICANN offices will be closed between Christmas and New Years. Specifically, Policy Staff will be on vacation from noon on 24 December through 2 January 2009. Best wishes. Denise Denise Michel ICANN VP, Policy

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MP3 of Second Consultation on Registry/Registrar Report 19 December 2008
by At-Large Staff Dec. 22, 2008

Dec. 22, 2008

Message forwarded from the GNSO Secretariat ************************************ Dear All, Please find the MP3 recording of the Second Consultation on Registry/Registrar CRA International report titled, "Revisiting Vertical Separation of Registries and Registrars" held on Friday, 19 December 2008. http://audio.icann.org/crai-teleconference-20081219.mp3 http://www.icann.org/en/announcements/announcement-2-15dec08-en.htm Second Consultation on Registry/Registrar Report this Friday 15 December 2008 Responding to community requests for additional dialogue about the requirements for the separation of gTLD registries and registrars, ICANN posted a 9 December announcement about two open consultations on the CRA International report titled, "Revisiting Vertical Separation of Registries and Registrars" [PDF, 493K]. The first consultation occurred in Washington, DC on 11 December 2008, and the MP3 recording of that can be found here. http://audio.icann.org/crai-teleconference-20081211.mp3 The second consultation is scheduled for Friday, 19 December in Marina del Rey, CA from 10am-noon (PST) / 18:00-20:00 (UTC). The consultation will be hosted near ICANN's office and remote participation will again be available. If you plan to attend in person or call in for this meeting, please RSVP to crai-report-consultation(a)icann.org by 18 December and the hotel address and dial-in information will be emailed to you. This session also will be recorded and an MP3 recording will be publicly posted. In addition, a summary of the comments and proposed models for registry agreement terms that describe registry-registrar separation requirements will be published. http://audio.icann.org/crai-teleconference-20081219.mp3 While the short notice period has made it difficult for some to participate, remote participation facilities have been made available and support received for the Washington, DC and Marina del Rey, CA meetings has been excellent. To ensure broad opportunity for comment, there will be additional consultations that will be arranged by ICANN staff. Comments on the CRAI report are welcome via email to crai-report(a)icann.org. Because the comment period on this document is scheduled to conclude today and it is anticipated that the session on Friday will result in additional comment, the comment period will be extended until 0:00 UTC, 23 December 2008. Comments are reported at http://forum.icann.org/lists/crai-report/. Thank you. Happy listening and happy holidays! Glen de Saint Géry GNSO Secretariat gnso.secretariat(a)gnso.icann.org http://gnso.icann.org ------ End of Forwarded Message

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INVITATION: RAA Briefing on Monday, 22 December 2000 UTC
by At-Large Staff Dec. 22, 2008

Dec. 22, 2008

Dear all Tim Cole, Chief Registrar Liaison, agreed to participate in a discussion on the RAA and answer your questions regarding the issues surrounding the modification of the RAA. The teleconference is scheduled on Monday, 22 December from 2000 UTC to 2100 UTC. Please find participation instructions under: https://st.icann.org/alac-docs/index.cgi?how_can_i_participate_in_this_meeti ng If there is interest for French or Spanish interpretation for this meeting, please contact us as soon as possible. Please note, however, that we can not guarantee interpretation for this meeting due to time constraints. Further Information on the recent RAA developments: https://st.icann.org/alac/index.cgi?raa_the_way_forward (prepared by Alan Greenberg, ALAC GNSO Liaison) Regards, Nick Ashton-Hart, Matthias Langenegger, Marie-Hélène Bouchoms, Heidi Ullrich ICANN At-Large Staff email: staff(a)atlarge.icann.org

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Vote on the updated ALAC Response now open
by At-Large Staff Dec. 22, 2008

Dec. 22, 2008

Dear ALAC members, The ALAC Response to the BGC WG midpoint consultation report on ALAC Review has recently been updated. The ALAC Chair decided to stop the previous vote on the ALAC response and to restart an online vote on the updated document, which you can find attached to this email. The question to be put is: ³Would you like to endorse the updated ALAC Response to the BGC WG midpoint consultation report on the ALAC Review as an official ALAC Statement?² With possible answers: Yes No Abstain You will shortly receive a separate email with your voting credentials. Due to the Holidays and the many seasonal commitments of some of the ALAC members, the Chair extended the vote until the January 5th, 2009 at 2350 UTC. Regards, Nick Ashton-Hart, Matthias Langenegger, Marie-Hélène Bouchoms, Heidi Ullrich ICANN At-Large Staff email: staff(a)atlarge.icann.org

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ALAC vote on the ALAC response to the ALAC Review report now open
by At-Large Staff Dec. 18, 2008

Dec. 18, 2008

Dear all, The ALAC vote on the the ALAC response on the Board Governance Committee Working Group mid-point consultation report on ALAC review is now open. Due to the holidays, the ALAC Vice Chair decided to extend the voting period until December 31st at 2559 UTC. The ALAC members will receive a separate email with their voting credentials shortly. The question to be put will be: ³Would you like to endorse the 'ALAC Response to the BGC WG mid-point consultation report on ALAC Review' as an official ALAC Statement?² With possible answers: Yes No Abstain The ALAC Response to the mid point consultation was drafted by the ALAC ExCom. It incorporates the views expressed by community members in Cairo and the reactions received from the RALOs. You can download a PDF version of the ALAC Response under: http://forum.icann.org/lists/alac-mid-consult/pdfqEF1JejEF4.pdf Regards, Nick Ashton-Hart, Matthias Langenegger, Marie-Hélène Bouchoms, Heidi Ullrich ICANN At-Large Staff email: staff(a)atlarge.icann.org

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Advisory: Add Grace Period Limits Policy ICANN announces implementation plan for new consensus policy
by At-Large Staff Dec. 18, 2008

Dec. 18, 2008

Message forwarded from the GNSO Secretariat ******************************************* http://www.icann.org/en/announcements/announcement-17dec08-en.htm Advisory: Add Grace Period Limits Policy ICANN announces implementation plan for new consensus policy 17 December 2008 ICANN is today announcing the implementation plan for the new Add Grace Period (AGP) Limits Policy adopted by the ICANN Board on 26 June 2008. A grace period is a specified number of calendar days following a gTLD registry operation in which the operation may be reversed and a credit may be issued to a Registrar. AGP is typically the five-day period following the initial registration of a domain name. Currently, when a domain name is registered through a registrar, that registrar may delete the domain name at any time during the first five calendar days of the registration (the AGP) and receive a full credit for the registration fee from the registry operator. AGP appears as a contractual term in some, but not all gTLD registry agreements. Posted here is the AGP Limits Policy and the implementation plan. The plan specifies that gTLD Operators (hereinafter referred to as "Operators") must inform each of their accredited Registrars of the new Policy within the next 21 days and subsequently implement the Policy as soon as possible thereafter but no later than 31 March 2009. The new AGP Limits Policy is based on a detailed recommendation made by the GNSO Council to the Board earlier this year and provides that Operators who offer an AGP to their customers will now be prohibited from making refunds to registrars for AGP deletes that exceed the threshold limits set by the Policy. The limits defined by the Policy are (i) 10% of that registrar's net new registrations (calculated as the total number of net adds of one-year through ten-year registrations as defined in the monthly reporting requirement of Operator Agreements) in that month, or (ii) fifty (50) domain names, whichever is greater, unless an exemption is requested by a Registrar and subsequently granted by an Operator. While Operators will initially have significant flexibility on how to treat such requests, ICANN Staff will monitor the process closely and modifications will be recommended if any additional patterns of abusive behavior are detected. The implementation plan is the result of extensive public deliberations which were part of the GNSO Policy Development Process (PDP) on domain tasting, outreach to Operators and ICANN-accredited Registrars, and public comment on a draft implementation plan. The plan includes significant changes to the reporting obligations of Operators. Operators will now be required to submit as part of their monthly reporting requirement information for each Registrar including, but not limited to, the number of exemption requests, number of exemptions granted, numbers of names affected by granted exemption requests and number of AGP deletes if this information is not currently defined in the Operator's monthly reporting requirement. Additionally, the monitoring requirements in the plan require ICANN to publish status reports on the implementation effort which will include a review of all exemption requests and their disposition, names of registrars that have recurring requests for exemptions and the reasons for these exemptions as well as other information defined in the plan. The recent announcement to the ICANN Community on 13 November 2008 reported that AGP deletes decreased by 84% from June to July 2008 as a result of the related AGP budget provision adopted by the Board for fiscal year 2009. The budget provision has the same thresholds as the AGP Limits Policy. The AGP Limits Policy will carry a much higher financial penalty (i.e., the domain name registration fee paid by Registrars to Operators) than the budget provision (i.e., the current registrar-level transaction fee of US$0.20) for excessive AGP deletes. It is expected that following implementation of the Policy, AGP deletes will continue to decline until few or none are subject to excess delete fees. Glen de Saint Géry GNSO Secretariat gnso.secretariat(a)gnso.icann.org http://gnso.icann.org

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Welcome Dr. Heidi Ullrich to the ICANN At-Large Staff!
by Nick Ashton-Hart Dec. 11, 2008

Dec. 11, 2008

I am very pleased to announce that Heidi Ullrich has joined ICANN¹s Policy Department as the Manager for At-Large Regional Affairs. Heidi will be responsible for supporting the activities of the community of individual Internet Users (³At-Large²) participating in ICANN at the regional level. Prior to joining ICANN, she worked with international non-governmental organizations in program management and policy coordination positions strengthening the participation of stakeholder groups in negotiations at the domestic, regional, and international levels. Heidi served as a Program Officer in Trade in Services at the International Centre for Trade and Sustainable Development where she helped to manage multiple international projects on trade in services and sustainable development. At Consumers International, she served as the Global Trade Program Coordinator responsible for the implementation of a multi-million dollar global trade and poverty alleviation program, and also helped support a project surveying the credibility of the Internet from a consumer perspective. Previous to her work with non-governmental organizations, Heidi lectured at the University of Southampton and the London School of Economics, where she also received her PhD. She taught such courses as economic diplomacy and international relations, and has participated in various international research projects, including a study on civil society and accountable global governance. Heidi is based at ICANN¹s headquarters in Marina del Rey, California and reports to the Director for At-Large, Nick Ashton-Hart. Heidi can be reached at <heidi.ullrich(a)icann.org>. As always, please send any administrative or informational request related to At-Large to staff(a)atlarge.icann.org. -- Regards, Nick Ashton-Hart Director for At-Large Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) Main Tel: +33 (450) 40 46 88 USA DD: +1 (310) 578-8637 Fax: +41 (22) 594-85-44 Mobile: +41 (79) 595 54-68 email: nick.ashton-hart(a)icann.org Win IM: ashtonhart(a)hotmail.com / AIM/iSight: nashtonhart(a)mac.com / Skype: nashtonhart Online Bio: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ashtonhart

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Letter from ALAC to the Board of ICANN
by At-Large Staff Dec. 11, 2008

Dec. 11, 2008

Dear Community: Today the following was transmitted to the ALAC Board Liaison, Wendy Seltzer, for communication to the Board of ICANN by the At-Large Advisory Committee. The text is reproduced directly below in order to faciliate machine translation of the text into Spanish. You may review the text online and retrieve a PDF at https://st.icann.org/alac/index.cgi?letter_to_the_board_on_public_participat ion. -- From: Cheryl Langdon-Orr, Chair of the ALAC Thursday, December 11, 2008 To: Chairman of the ICANN Board, Mr. Peter Dengate-Thrush Transmitted via email through the ALAC Liaison to the Board. Dear Peter, I write to you today at the request of the At-Large Advisory Committee to convey the disappointment that they and the wider At-Large community have with the way in which the public forum in Cairo was organised in particular, and to express our concern with other elements of the Cairo meeting in general. Perhaps it is most descriptive to give the Board some sense of the mood and reaction to this part of the Cairo meeting, if I quote one commentator - ³For a public forum to be organised in a way that lurches from unacceptable change to unacceptable change during the meeting itself in a way that allows grandees sufficient time to make speeches, yet disenfranchises the community by providing almost no time whatever for its concerns to be aired speaks to a fundamental lack of understanding of the purpose of ICANN¹s meetings on the part of those responsible.² In more general terms what I have heard is that, the public forum is not a time for canned speeches it is a time for the ICANN community of volunteers to air their concerns to the Board, the Staff, and one another, with sufficient time for those concerns to be heard and to be addressed and discussed.¹ (Paraphrased from several people¹s statements at or after Cairo meeting). The At-Large Community is most concerned that those organising the meetings fail to understand this fundamental principle and we trust that this concerns you and the rest of the Board as much as it does us. The At-Large community joins those others who have written to you in expecting the Board taking decisive action to ensure that the debacle we experienced in Cairo never reoccurs. This is especially important given the fact that the Public Forum in Paris was mismanaged. The idea that a snap survey¹, conducted at the last minute, should govern the organisation of that public forum is ludicrous and the fact that only a handful of people responded (given the short timeframe little else can be expected) should have ensured that the idea of allowing such a small sample of the community to dictate the organisation of something as important as the public forum would be abandoned. Unfortunately it seems that basic common sense eluded the people responsible on that occasion just as it did again in Cairo. ICANN¹s constituents are volunteers a point that seems lost upon those who are in charge of organising its meetings. We don¹t fly across the world at our own expense, for many of those not fortunate enough to receive travel support - to listen to canned speeches, or to watch our few opportunities for genuine public interaction with the Board and other communities vanish almost in front of our eyes based upon the poor judgment of those responsible. Further, the provisions for remote participation in ICANN meetings which is vital for the involvement of our At-Large Community is far from satisfactory and have been so for years, and those responsible seem to be allowed to endlessly continue to get away with not fixing the problem. Our community asks (again paraphrased) Why do the repeated calls for remote participation that works get ignored, and why does the Board continue to allow this obvious failure to remain unaddressed?¹ To be clear, issues such as the following are unacceptable: · Main meeting agendas with mistakes (including meeting records on the public schedule showing the same meetings taking place at the same time, going uncorrected for days; · Very poor quality chat interfaces attached to meetings which are unmonitored by staff so that these chat sessions are not acknowledged or their input aired to the main meeting; · Lack of telephonic participation options for meetings that work reliably. After six meetings of technically hopeless telephonic participation facilities for At-Large¹s meetings, in Cairo we didn¹t even bother to try. http://atlarge-lists.icann.org/pipermail/at-large_atlarge-lists.icann.org/20 08q4/004925.html · Receiving very large documents in English-only on the eve of a meeting¹s start, and then expecting attendees to comment and participate in sessions related to these texts. The New GTLDs documents are just the latest example of this problem. This is a totally unreasonable burden on volunteers and reinforces an imbalance between those who make money from registration who will read things no matter when they are released because their business depends on them and everyone else. If substantive documents cannot be made available at least two weeks before a meeting in multiple language versions don¹t bother arranging sessions to talk about them at the meeting and don¹t start consultations on them until well after the meeting is over. ICANN spends a lot of registrant-derived funds on its meetings and on participation mechanisms. They should be run to a far more professional standard than they currently are. It also should be approaching the entire idea of participation in a far more significant and serious way than has been done in the past. We hope that the board-level discussions on participation provide a venue for that discussion, but we wish to make it clear that a lot of talk is not what¹s required. The community needs and deserves for its participation to be taken seriously and for those responsible in ICANN to be held to account for the (currently completely inadequate and often unprofessional) job they do with respect to meetings and participation enhancement systems. We expect that the board will take action to remind those responsible of their obligations and call them to account for their performance. We would like to suggest the creation of an organization meeting committee with one participant from each SO/AC helping on building a better (more useful) meeting. There is also a point of personal concern I wish to raise as Chair of the ALAC, the matter of the reasons for the compressed time¹ remaining for the public forum in Cairo... It has been reported back to me from the rumour mill¹ to be in some way related to the new activity of the Joint AC and SO parts of the planned and advertised Cairo Agenda... To designate this as ridiculous and erroneous is the very least I can say, and indeed to say it is destructive and malicious is more accurate. I urge the Board to ensure this rumour is countermanded strongly and effectively as soon as is possible. Finally and most importantly on a positive note, the ALAC notes and wishes to recognise the efforts being made by the Board to remedy and improve public participation with its newly established Public Participation Committee of the Board (PPBC). Perhaps this is an ideal opportunity for the Chair and others from this committee to join us in a single topic discussion that we could arrange for one of our regular (at least) monthly briefing calls. This would also allow Kieren to be involved, as is quite proper and indeed is something he offered both in Cairo (in conversation with me) and since via email ³I will be more than happy to go through everything from my side and to talk them through what happened and why, what changes are afoot and so on.² (Dec 9th 2008). To this end the ALAC ExCom would be more than happy to plan such a call (as it will be most timely before our At-Large Summit in Mexico) in the week starting January 12th 2009 and will ask our staff to see what can be arranged, set up a doodle for best times and dates, and of course liaise with Kieren on this matter. If the new PPBC desires to be involved in this activity (or some future alternate) then this would be most welcome, and the PPBC Chair need only let us know their availability or plans. Our community recognizes and appreciates that genuine efforts are being made to improve meetings and remote participation, for future meetings and indeed that new line up in the Meetings Team along with Paul Levins and of course Kieren will with the input of the PPBC make significant changes, but our At-Large Community and specifically those who are not on site at ICANN Meetings but rely in remote participation methods and archived materials to interact have made it clear to our Committee that our concerns need to formally registered. (Signed on behalf of the ALAC) Cheryl Langdon-Orr ALAC Chair 2007-2009 -- Regards, Nick Ashton-Hart, Matthias Langenegger, Heidi Ullrich, Marie-Helene Bouchoms ICANN At-Large Staff email: staff(a)atlarge.icann.org

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