My thoughts embedded. Alan At 19/09/2008 03:37 AM, Denise Michel wrote:
Dear Community Members,
As previously noted, discussions continue on outstanding issues related to GNSO Council restructuring. I wanted to keep you apprised of issues and ideas under consideration that I am aware of, and give you (individually or as constituencies/advisory committees if time permits) an opportunity to provide input. Thank you to those who responded to my previous email (included below). Additional input received before 26 September on the issues noted below will be summarized for the Board prior to their 30 September meeting at which these issues will be discussed.
1) Registrants and/or Individual User Participation -- If the Non-commercial Stakeholder Group includes individual Internet user groups, should any distinctions be made with the membership of the ALAC and supporting At-Large structures (which represents individual Internet users' viewpoint across all of ICANN's structures and activities)? The GNSO Working Group (WG-GCR) recommended the inclusion of "all interested parties that use or provide services for the Internet..." in the non-contracted party house and stated that it "should not be restricted to domain registrants." The BGC GNSO Improvements Report adopted by the Board in June stated that a new Non-commercial Stakeholders Group "must go far beyond the membership of the current NCUC" (which is chartered to represent non-commercial entities). "We must consider educational, research, and philanthropic organizations, foundations, think tanks, members of academia, individual registrant groups and other noncommercial organizations, as well as individual registrants, as part of a non-commercial registrants Stakeholders Group."
I have some trouble figuring out exactly what is being asked in the first sentence. Membership of ALAC is a bunch of people and I don't see what this small group has to do with GNSO constituencies. The same goes for the RALO management (or whatever the right term is for those who carry out the chair/secretariat/etc roles). The issue of ALSs I have addressed in several venues when commenting on Recommendation 12 of the ALAC Review. I will reproduce my answer in my formally posted comments here. But in summary, I don't see the confusion. The distinction is one of the interests of the ALS or other organization, and they should be free to participate where they want, in line with other ICANN participation rules. With regard to the other types of groups listed in the BGC report (educational, research, and philanthropic organizations, foundations, think tanks, members of academia, individual registrant groups and other noncommercial organizations), the more the merrier as far as I am concerned. My comment to Rec 12: Recommendation 12: That the ALAC should explore ways to differentiate between organizations that genuinely represent individual Internet users, and are therefore ALS candidates, as opposed to those which may be a better fit with the NCUC. I believe that this question was not quite appropriate at the time it was asked, and even less so with the restructuring of the GNSO Council. Without going into the letter of the formal rules, an ALS must credibly represent user interests. And at least one RALO allows individuals to join the RALO directly in lieu of joining an ALS. Pretty much any not-for profit can join the NCUC, and they are now planning to let individuals join as well. There is clearly overlap and that is not likely to change. The differentiator is not necessarily the characteristic of the organization, but rather their interests. Ignoring for the moment the new GNSO structure: o NCUC is a part of the GNSO which has a mandate to develop ALL gTLD policies in ICANN. No more, no less. o ALAC and its At-Large organization have a mandate to advise the Board on ANY ICANN issue of relevance to users. But because of the wider scope, it will always need to pick and choose what it selects to address. It is not formally mandated to develop policy. Depending on where their interest and priorities lie, they may pick who they want to associate with. Or both. There is (as far as I know) nothing that prevents an organization (or individual for the areas where they are allowed) from playing in both sandboxes. The ICANN Bylaws EXPLICITLY state that an individual or entity can participate in more than one GNSO constituency. I can see no reason that the same cannot be true for GNSO Constituencies and At-Large ALSs. I note that most ALSs existed before they joined At-Large - they have lives and interests of their own which may or may not coincide with multiple ICANN outreach directions. Once can easily imagine a community-owned wireless network becoming an ALS and a member of the ISP or Registrar Constituencies. If the question being asked is should the ALAC help develop guidelines that would explain to outsiders why they might want to join ALAC, the answer is "Definitely". Just as presumably the NCUC will do for their prospective members. And in the presence of both documents, perhaps a "participation flowchart" could be developed.
2) Voting Thresholds for New Working Group Model -- An additional issue raised is whether voting thresholds were needed for electing the chair of a PDP WG and approving the charter for a PDP WG. If so, what should the thresholds be? (see previous email below for other thresholds recommended by the WG-GCR).
I have no problem with these votes falling under the "all other" category requiring 50% of both houses, but could probably be happy with some other threshold if there were a compelling reason.
3) Electing Council Leadership -- There seems to be agreement with the WG-GCR proposal to elect the chair by 60% vote of both houses, and the discussion is focused on whether a back-up provision is needed. If you have not provided comments, input would be appreciated on whether an alternate provision is needed in case no candidate achieves such supermajority and, if so, what that provision should be. Ideas discussed include: the full Council voting with a simple majority with weighted voting in the contracted party house to make the total house votes equal, and the NCAs would each have a single vote; and elect a chair by more than 50% of the vote of both houses.
I would prefer to have a simple mechanism which does not have the potential for deadlock, and in the previous set of answers supported the weighted voting mechanism. I can live with is as the fall-back method as well.
4) Implementation Plan -- The Board has directed that an implementation plan be submitted for Board approval that creates a transition to the new Council structure. Further input would be appreciated on this point, including on transition timing and whether additional guidance or requirements are needed on the implementation plan. Also, views would be appreciated on what provision should be made to fill seats on the new Council if a Stakeholder Plan is not approved by the Board.
Regarding timing, the recently announced revised timing of April 2009 or later makes a lot more sense than the previous deadline of Jan. 1, 2009. Regarding the allocation of Council seats, I have no easy solution in the cases where the N constituencies must divide 3 or 6 seats. Even in a "simple" case of 2 constituencies and 6 seats, it is not intuitively obvious that the division should be 3 and 3. The size and import of the two constituencies should play a factor, and both of those measures are going to be VERY subjective. This is an implicit problem with the Constituency:Stakeholder Group model proposed by the BGC. Although not a full solution to the problem, allowing fractional votes per council member may be required (that is, a given member may vote .6 of a vote Yes, and .4 No. VERY ugly, but unclear what better way we will have of representing constituencies if we are successful and have MANY in an SQ.
Thank you for your continued involvement and input.
Regards, Denise
-- Denise Michel ICANN VP, Policy <mailto:policy-staff@icann.org>policy-staff@icann.org