Thanks for the continuing discussion on this. As Mathieu noted, lobbying in and of itself is not a ³forbidden² activity for ICANN. However, there are significant limits on the percentages of ICANN¹s revenue that can be used on lobbying activity. If ICANN exceeds that percentage, ICANN can lose it¹s 501c3 status. Under the 501c3 rules, it does not matter if ICANN is directly supporting those lobbying activities; any funds that come from ICANN that are used for lobbying activities are calculated as part of ICANN¹s percentage, whether or not ICANN controlled those lobbying activities. The question here isn¹t whether any lobbying activities could be deemed to be within ICANN¹s mission. Nor is the bar on usage of the auction funds for lobbying activities any sort of judgment on the value or need for lobbying activities in this space. It is a recognition that the use of the auction proceed funds to support lobbying activities places ICANN at risk of losing its 501c3 status, even if that lobbying activity is within ICANN¹s mission and aligned with ICANN¹s core values. ‹ Samantha Eisner Deputy General Counsel, ICANN 12025 Waterfront Drive, Suite 300 Los Angeles, California 90094 USA Direct Dial: +1 310 578 8631 On 3/27/17, 8:22 AM, "ccwg-auctionproceeds-bounces@icann.org on behalf of James Gannon" <ccwg-auctionproceeds-bounces@icann.org on behalf of james@cyberinvasion.net> wrote:
Important to remember that lobbying is a strictly defined and controlled activity and not subject to our interpretation but to that of the IRS and the reason that ICANN is restricted is not out of an arbitrary choice but a strict rule under the IRS of what a 501c3 non profit can and cannot do.
=James
-----Original Message-----
From: ccwg-auctionproceeds-bounces@icann.org [mailto:ccwg-auctionproceeds-bounces@icann.org] On Behalf Of Daniel Dardailler
Sent: Monday, March 27, 2017 3:29 PM
To: Mathieu Weill <mathieu.weill@afnic.fr>
Cc: ccwg-auctionproceeds@icann.org
Subject: Re: [Ccwg-auctionproceeds] Wrt (not) lobbying
Hello Mathieu, all
Thanks for the pointers, especially the ICANN Lobbying Disclosures & Contribution Reports. If my understanding is right, they show that some lobbying areas are already OK, and that the set of areas can evolve over time.
Looking at the various documents, it's clear that the qualifier "attempt to modify legislation" can be subject to interpretation.
Our charter even says "Lobbying does not include public education about issues", which to me, clearly includes public policy makers as a potential audience (it includes everybody when it's online public/free and transparent education and outreach). This would also cover grass-root lobbying, aka indirect lobbying, i.e. when you don't talk to policy makers directly but you hope that your public audience will learn from you and influence the policy work in the end.
The important bit is all that IMO is not so much if you talk directly to policy makers or not, but if when doing so, you represent a political party, or a corporate interest, vs. you represent a public interest position, especially one that involves Internet technicalities.
Maybe we should look at some recent listing of core Internet values (e.g. done at IGF) to identify which "lobbying" areas are potentially aligned with the ICANN core value of "preserving and enhancing the operational stability, reliability, security, and global interoperability of the Internet.".
On 2017-03-24 11:42, Mathieu Weill wrote:
Daniel, All,
Reviewing the slides provided by ICANN Legal
(https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__community.icann.org _display_CWGONGAP_Legal-2Band-2BFiduciary-2BCons&d=DwIGaQ&c=FmY1u3PJp6wrc rwll3mSVzgfkbPSS6sJms7xcl4I5cM&r=w1jlqVWntmqtI5dedIDLQ6uBxH_Jh-uBee_4imoh zko&m=roPF-tYhNVs20qAd27K78QEVuC0f1JsEoozRbYYLdYA&s=LUJyWFAKGTOkiROjLaCJI rc-nDAyRx8JRC2TE0Xx79w&e=
trai
nts+Related+Materials?preview=/64073737/64073741/DT%20for%20Auction%20
nts+Related+Proc
eeds%20-%20CCWG%20Legal%20Presentation.pdf ) on slide 13, it seems
that the statement that "lobbying is a forbidden activity for ICANN"
is not entirely accurate.
The slide recognizes that ICANN engages in some lobbying activities
(more about it is disclosed here :
https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__www.icann.org_resour ces_pages_lobbying-2Ddisclosures-2Dcontributio&d=DwIGaQ&c=FmY1u3PJp6wrcrw ll3mSVzgfkbPSS6sJms7xcl4I5cM&r=w1jlqVWntmqtI5dedIDLQ6uBxH_Jh-uBee_4imohzk o&m=roPF-tYhNVs20qAd27K78QEVuC0f1JsEoozRbYYLdYA&s=lCZfYAFba1Ij1XtzcQpujtT ZMXLpXSeEaHxHJrTnmCc&e=
ns-2
015-11-18-en) and mentions a requirement from our CCWG Charter against
providing funds in support of attemps to influence legislation.
The relevant section of our Charter is quoted below, from the "scope"
section (https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__community.icann.org _display_CWGONGAP_CCWG-2BCharter&d=DwIGaQ&c=FmY1u3PJp6wrcrwll3mSVzgfkbPSS 6sJms7xcl4I5cM&r=w1jlqVWntmqtI5dedIDLQ6uBxH_Jh-uBee_4imohzko&m=roPF-tYhNV s20qAd27K78QEVuC0f1JsEoozRbYYLdYA&s=hHDumrVm8pHSbarIiLT8ImHzKiGxza_X-n5hi E220XI&e= ) :
"To align with requirements imposed to maintain ICANN¹s U.S. tax
exempt status, the CCWG must include a limitation that funds must not
be used to support political activity/intervening in a political
campaing public office[2] or attempts to influence legislation[3]. The
definitions of the limitations that are imposed to meet U.S. tax
requirements must be applied across all applicants, and not only those
from or intending to use the funds within the U.S. These requirements
will apply to comparable activities across any location where
applicants are located or intend to use the funds."
So my interpretation would be that organizations who engage in
lobbying activities (such as the examples given by Daniel) would not
be ruled out as a matter of principle, but should commit and ensure
that any funds they would receive from the ICANN Auction Proceeds
would not be used in lobbying or political funding activities.
Would that be correct ?
Best,
Mathieu
-----Message d'origine-----
De : ccwg-auctionproceeds-bounces@icann.org
[mailto:ccwg-auctionproceeds-bounces@icann.org] De la part de Daniel
Dardailler Envoyé : jeudi 23 mars 2017 18:54 À :
ccwg-auctionproceeds@icann.org Objet : [Ccwg-auctionproceeds] Wrt
(not) lobbying
Hello all
In the legal slides, lobbying is pointed out as a forbidden activity
for ICANN and is loosely defined as "attempts to influence
legislation".
I'd like to understand exactly what that means.
For instance, both IETF and W3C have been active in various European
official fora (parliament, commission, national governments) to change
the old EU legislation wrt public procurement so that procurers be
allowed to reference our standards directly (e.g. IPV6 or HTML).
This is clearly about legislation, and it's more than an attempt,
since we eventually succeeded (look for the EU Multistakeholder
Platform for details).
Is this sort of policy oriented work to make the Internet and the Web
technologies more "official", and therefore better deployed, without
fragmentation, considered lobbying ?
Let's take another example. Suppose that some governments want to pass
a brain-damaged legislation related to IP routing. Shouldn't ICANN be
allowed to inform the public authority about the risks of doing just
that ? If ICANN doesn't do it, who will ?
This is not a rhetorical case, every year or so, I get alerted by some
advocacy groups that "deep linking" is about to become illegal
somewhere on the planet (a deep link is just a link to a page "inside"
another site, bypassing their "home" page) in order to protect some
publisher business.
Such an approach would undermine a fundamental piece of the Web
architecture: freedom to link anywhere, and if we, the technical
community, don't explain that point to policy makers, who will ?
There are dozens of public policy topics that are directly related to
the Internet and the Web. They are all technical in nature of course
and they only exist because of the net, because of us. As it happens,
these topics are not very "hot" in the technical community, mostly
because of their "policy/legal" flavor (not geek enough), so it's
already difficult to find resources to represent our point-of-view.
My point is: at this point in time in Internet history, with lots of
legislators trying to control the net without much of a clue of how
things work, I think it would be a strategic mistake from the Internet
technical community to self-censored itself in these debates.
_______________________________________________
Ccwg-auctionproceeds mailing list
Ccwg-auctionproceeds@icann.org
_______________________________________________
Ccwg-auctionproceeds mailing list
Ccwg-auctionproceeds@icann.org
https://mm.icann.org/mailman/listinfo/ccwg-auctionproceeds
_______________________________________________ Ccwg-auctionproceeds mailing list Ccwg-auctionproceeds@icann.org https://mm.icann.org/mailman/listinfo/ccwg-auctionproceeds