Phil, I wanted to get your proposal onto the correct list, with a relevant title, and adding my support. The BC should make a statement on this, for the reasons you mention. I think your draft is a good first draft for further comment of members, as I've revised it below. If no members object, then it could be submitted by the comment deadline as a BC comment. Or it can be revised and submitted based upon any friendly amendments offered to it in the meanwhile. Thanks, Mike Mike Rodenbaugh RODENBAUGH LAW tel/fax: +1 (415) 738-8087 <http://rodenbaugh.com/> http://rodenbaugh.com From: Phil Corwin [mailto:pcorwin@butera-andrews.com] Sent: Thursday, October 14, 2010 7:55 AM To: Marilyn Cade; bcprivate Subject: RE: Informational: update from Oct. 12: Transcripts and MP3 recording update - 12 October /reminder that BC election for Councilor and V.Chair, Operations and Finance will open soon/ There is a pending request for comment regarding the application of the Arab Center for Domain Name Dispute Resolution (ACDR) to become a certified UDRP arbitration provider. ACDR is located in Amman, Jordan; The comment period closes on October 28th. The BC opposes approval of this application at this time on the grounds that no new UDRP providers should be accredited until ICANN implements a standard contract with all accredited providers or finds some other mechanism for establishing uniform rules and procedures and flexible means of delineating and enforcing arbitration provider responsibilities. It makes no sense to require that domains be registered or renewed via ICANN-accredited registrars who are under a standard contract (the RAA) but then provide that registrants can have domains transferred away through a process administered by an organization that has been granted this power by ICANN -- yet is under no contract that defines its practices and procedures, is not subject to any regular or standardized review by ICANN, and for which ICANN's only disciplinary tool is accreditation revocation (so extreme a sanction that it is unlikely to ever be used). The Business Constituency suggests that ICANN implement a contractual relationship that defines and constrains this grant of power, and provides flexible and effective enforcement mechanisms, because that delegated power can extinguish substantial monetary investment and goodwill in a domain. Granting this kind of power absent any restraints is not an accountable practice. We appear to be transitioning from a DNS that featured an effective duopoly of UDRP providers (WIPO and NAF) and in which all significant gTLDs were based in the developed world -- to one in which the majority of gTLDs and UDRP providers may well be headquartered in nontraditional jurisdictions. Business interests may well be investing substantial amounts in these new gTLDs, for both defensive and new branding purposes. In this type of environment it is even more important that a proliferating cast of UDRP providers be subject to uniform and enforceable responsibilities, as that is the only means of furthering the goal that UDRP decisions are consistent within and among UDRP providers, and that the UDRP remains an expedited and lower cost means of addressing cybersquatting. In closing, we note that this issue of whether UDRP providers should be under standard contract with ICANN is almost entirely separable from the question of whether the UDRP evaluation standards for determining the existence of cybersquatting should be reformed. There is no need to debate the substantive elements of the UDRP in order to address the fundamental issue of whether UDRP providers should be under standardized contract. Regards to all, Philip Philip S. Corwin Partner Butera & Andrews 1301 Pennsylvania Ave., NW Suite 500 Washington, DC 20004 202-347-6875 (office) 202-347-6876 (fax) 202-255-6172 (cell) "Luck is the residue of design." -- Branch Rickey _____ From: Marilyn Cade [marilynscade@hotmail.com] Sent: Wednesday, October 13, 2010 9:07 AM To: bcprivate Subject: Informational: update from Oct. 12: Transcripts and MP3 recording update - 12 October /reminder that BC election for Councilor and V.Chair, Operations and Finance will open soon/ Thanks again to all BC members for your participation in the full series of sessions and events October 12. Yesterday's meetings were a combination of CSG working session; informational roundtables with special guests, including ICANN, and a BC members policy forum/meeting. The purpose of this email is to provide a brief and very high level update from yesterday's meeting on a few of those items. A more detailed "next steps" summary is under development by the officers and others who took work item assignments and should be sent out by Monday. You should also expect to receive the PPs from the speakers as they are gathered. It will be a busy time between now and Cartegena. We will try to manage the email notices to you by having clear subject headings, so that you know whether an email requires action, or is for information/action, or is informational only. This email is informational. To recap: CSG Charter drafting will continue and draft will be circulated. A vote by members on a final draft will be scheduled for November, to meet a Board deadline. Sarah Deutsch is the lead as our CSG rep. A small drafting group supports her from BC: Marilyn Cade, Ron Andruff and Philip Sheppard. Other members are from the other two CSG constituencies. During the call, members did discuss other ways to improve communications [discussion of a more formalized 'newsletter style approach] and move to a more frequent members calls. Steve Delbianco, our V.Chair, Policy Coordination, will be advising on a priorty topical approach for the policy topics for monthly members calls. We also discussed launching a few 'working group' approaches on key issues, where the BC can provide strategic leadership. Stay tuned for more news on that front. We discussed a newsletter approach, and other changes in communications support tools; heard an update on finances, and membership; discussed other administrative functions updates, including announcing the Finance Committee members: Jon Nevett and Anders Halverson, and heard a report on options to manage the banking account and administrative support. Outcomes will be summarized in thee follow up report. Other actions that need your involvement will be announced shortly, including opening our elections for Councilor - 2 year term and V.Chair, Operations and Finance -- completion of term for this year. We will have separate working sessions on Charter development. The present small group of volunteers for working further on the BC Charter are Marilyn Cade, Chris Chaplow, Steve DelBianco, Sarah Deutsch, Philip Sheppard, Ron Andruff, and Mikey O'Connor. As we have worked with the Charter, we have identified some gaps that need addressing, along with changes coming from GNSO Improvements recommendations. A staff developed topical outline was presented on our call and we will continue to utilize staff support and consultation to advance further drafting/discussions re both the CSG charter and BC Charter. If anyone else wants to join this small working group, please so advise off list to Sarah Deutsch and myself by email. A couple of working calls will be scheduled over the next weeks to get a draft document with the proposed edits/clarifications. In the meantime, I will continue to provide the MP3 and transcripts from Oct. 12 as they arrive. there are three MP3s from yesterday's call. CSG charter discussion Roundtables/Dialogue with Kurt Pritz, ICANN BC Members Forum/Meeting Summary of distribution of MP3 and Transcripts: MP3 sent on Oct. 12. . This email includes the CSG Transcript. The Roundtables MP3 has not yet been received, however, I do have the BC call/MP3. Transcripts for both these sessions will be available much later today, or tomorrow and will be posted then. http://audio.icann.org/gnso/gnso-bc-20101012-en.mp3 Apologies for any gaps due to acoustical challenges in capturing particular speakers, but they are still a very good resource to all. The PowerPoints from the second Roundtable, Kurt Pritz discussion, and the BC officers and ICANN staff Charter overview will be posted separately. Special thanks to ICANN for supporting the remote participation and providing ICANN staff and the Chair of the SSAC [and ICANN Board member] Steve Crocker have been extended.