March 2018 - comments-fy19-budget-19jan18@icann.org

[Comments-fy19-budget-19jan18] ccNSO-SOPC updated comments to ICANN FY19 Operating Plan and Budget
by Giovanni Seppia March 7, 2018

March 7, 2018

Dear ICANN, Please find attached the ccNSO-SOPC updated comments to the ICANN FY19 Operating Plan and Budget. The text includes a very small change relating to the ccTLD affiliation of a Committee member. Best, Giovanni Giovanni Seppia External Relations Manager EURid Woluwelaan 150 1831 Diegem - Belgium TEL: +32 (0) 2 401 2750 MOB:+39 335 8141733 giovanni.seppia(a)eurid.eu<mailto:giovanni.seppia@eurid.eu> http://www.eurid.eu<http://www.eurid.eu/> Please consider the environment before printing this email. Disclaimer: This email and any attachment hereto is intended solely for the person to which it is addressed and may contain confidential and/or privileged information. If you are not the intended recipient or if you have received this email in error, please delete it and immediately contact the sender by telephone or email, and destroy any copies of this information. You should not use or copy it, nor disclose its content to any other person or rely upon this information. Please note that any views presented in the email and any attachment hereto are solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of EURid. While all care has been taken to avoid any known viruses, the recipient is advised to check this email and any attachment for presence of viruses. http://www.eurid.eu/en/legal-disclaimer

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[Comments-fy19-budget-19jan18] ICANN 61: PLEASE RESTORE THE ICANN FELLOWSHIP BUDGET CUT
by Wisdom Donkor March 7, 2018

March 7, 2018

*My name is Wisdom Donkor. I am submitting bellow comment with regard to the ICANN fellowship budget cut.* High-quality ICANN Fellowship Program is a prerequisite for societal change and progress. Societies without strong capacity faces difficulties in producing and utilizing reliable evidence for development planning and action, generating new ideas to drive economic growth and social wellbeing, deciding on trade-offs in the choice of interventions, and gauging the impact and performance of policies, programs and investments. Robust ICANN Fellowship program will advances the production and utilization of sound evidence for internet development across board, most especially in the developing world that is yet to see total development. In one of the most recent and trenchant affirmations of the importance of building capacities within the internet governance space to help build sustainable human resource capacities to supporting the implementation of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) across nations. The ICANN fellowship program largely has strengthen ICANN and the IG communities in this regard. The UN and it stakeholders, DIPLO Foundation, IGF etc, keeps referencing to the ICANN fellowship program as one key program that is helping bridge the digital gaps most especially in the low income countries. The module of the ICANN Fellowship program has been emulated in several ICT and other IG related programs. There is still huge deficit both in human capacities and awareness creation within the low income countries and Efforts must be doubled in capacity development and extending the program to the unreached. The sustainable developments goals (SDG’s) particularly recognizes the need for internet governance capacity building as key to: 1. the generation of new and locally relevant knowledge 2. the full and safe operationalization and transfer of existing technologies 3. the promotion and acceleration of human, institutional and infrastructural development 4. and the alignment of social and healthy systems to deliver efficient, accessible, and affordable services. With this in mind, I dont think the ICANN Fellowship program has ever let ICANN down on its mandate to building capacities and reaching out to the unreached specially from within the ldeveloping countries that seems to be lagging behind or marking-time on development. Huge amount of work has been done and more work needs to be done to realizing the dreams we all want to see. The evidence is there for all to see. When you look at Ghana, Kenya, Nigeria, South Africa, Malawi, Uganda, Zambia, Gambia, DR Congo, Egypt, Rwanda, Togo, Senegal, Cameron, Armenia, Pakistan, India etc. and even Madagascar that seems to be blank on the map is now seeing the light through the ICANN fellowship empowerment. ICANN is almost present in every Conner of the world through the fellowship program. Fellows are really working using their little resources to reach out to others in their local communities just to make sure ICANN message gets to everyone. I am very happy that ICANN over the years through the fellowship program have produce great leaders, many of which are taken position within ICANN and IG communities. eg. At-Large, NCUC, NCSG, GNSO, GAC, ccNSO, NomCom, SSAC, RSSAC, IGF MAG, Diplo and even the ICANN board working and promoting ICANN values across nations. There have been a call from the public to restore the ICANN Fellowship budget CUT, 279 petitioners across the ICANN Communities signed the petition asking for ICANN to restore the fellowship budget CUT in full. The simple question ????? i will ask ICANN Board is, what else can ICANN do apart from improving the fellowship program instead of CUTTING its Budget. In view of all this, I do not think CUTTING the fellowship budget by half (50%) is the way to go. ICANN should be seen as growing and strengthening it support base (The fellowship program) and not the other way round (slowing down the Fellowship program by pulling down its success over the years) with the intention of frustrating the program. There is public call to restoring the fellowship budget in full and My humble plead to ICANN CEO, the Board and all that is concern with the budget CUT to please reconsider their decision to restore the fellowship budget in full and if possible increase it. *WISDOM DONKOR (S/N Eng.)* *Africa Open Data and Internet Research Foundation* E-government, Internet Governance & Open Government Data and platforms Specialist ICANN Fellow / UN IGF MAG Member, ISOC Member, Freedom Online Coalition (FOC) Member, Diplo Foundation Member, OGP Open Data WG Member, GODAN Member. National SDG's data Roadmaps Advisory Board Member, Ghana Ghana Energy Data Task-force Member Ghana OGP Advisory Committee Member Email: wisdom.dk(a)gmail.com Skype: wisdom_dk facebook: Kwasi Wisdom Linkdin: Kwasi Wisdom

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[Comments-fy19-budget-19jan18] ccNSO-SOPC comments to the ICANN FY19 Operating Plan and Budget
by Giovanni Seppia March 5, 2018

March 5, 2018

Dear ICANN Staff, Please see attached the ccNSO-SOPC comments to the ICANN FY19 Operating Plan and Budget. The SOP Committee remains available to provide you with any further clarification and/or information you may need. Kind regards, Giovanni Seppia Giovanni Seppia External Relations Manager EURid Woluwelaan 150 1831 Diegem - Belgium TEL: +32 (0) 2 401 2750 MOB:+39 335 8141733 giovanni.seppia(a)eurid.eu<mailto:giovanni.seppia@eurid.eu> http://www.eurid.eu<http://www.eurid.eu/> Please consider the environment before printing this email. Disclaimer: This email and any attachment hereto is intended solely for the person to which it is addressed and may contain confidential and/or privileged information. If you are not the intended recipient or if you have received this email in error, please delete it and immediately contact the sender by telephone or email, and destroy any copies of this information. You should not use or copy it, nor disclose its content to any other person or rely upon this information. Please note that any views presented in the email and any attachment hereto are solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of EURid. While all care has been taken to avoid any known viruses, the recipient is advised to check this email and any attachment for presence of viruses. http://www.eurid.eu/en/legal-disclaimer

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[Comments-fy19-budget-19jan18] NCSG Comment on FY19 Budget
by Rafik Dammak March 5, 2018

March 5, 2018

Hi, please find attached NCSG comment on FY19 budget and operating plan. Best Regards, Rafik Dammak

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[Comments-fy19-budget-19jan18] Comment on the Reductions to Fellowship and NextGen seats in the proposed FY19 Total Budget | January 2018
by Isaac Maposa March 3, 2018

March 3, 2018

I would like to comment on the reductions to Fellowship and NextGen seats in the proposed FY19 Budget | January 2018. The Fellows and NextGen ambassadors are ICANN's touch points to the community and they do help demystify ICANN and reach out to the underrepresented communities. Unless we still want to keep ICANN to the few who already know about ICANN and having ICANN labeled as some American organization controlling how the domain name system is run, we should maintain the fellowship and NextGen program at the current number of 60 and 20 respectively as a means of reaching out and carrying out different ICANN capacity building programs in home countries and regions by the Fellows and the ambassadors. ICANN's policy development work is carried out by Volunteers and there is always an issue of volunteer burnout within ICANN's work, a greater pool of fellows will help bring in volunteers as evident currently where we do have a reasonable number of fellows who are actively engaged in ICANN work and some have assumed leadership positions and joined ICANN staff. I am sure most fellows would agree to mantain the number of fellowships at 60 as evidenced on the petition signed by 279 fellows on the following petition (Stop the ICANN Budget Cuts and Save the Fellowship Program! <https://www.change.org/p/icann-stop-the-icann-budget-cuts-and-save-the-fell…>), I being one of them. This overwhelming response is evidence of how crucial the fellowhip program is and it's impact. In conclusion, I do suggest that the fellowship and NextGen programs must be maintained at the current number of seats, but review and improve the the programs so as to have increased fellowship and NextGen engagement and effectiveness of the programs. Warm Regards, Isaac Maposa

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[Comments-fy19-budget-19jan18] ICANNwiki, Fellowship Program, and Reserve Fund
by Kurt Pritz March 3, 2018

March 3, 2018

I. ICANNwiki. While it is not the most important issue confronting ICANN or the ICANN budget, I find the potential elimination of funding for the ICANNwiki highly discouraging. The ICANNwiki has been an essential part of the ICANN culture for many years. Importantly, it has provided an interesting and in-depth online history of ICANN through the ICANNwiki pages - the most easily searchable historical database available of ICANN personalities and issues. The ICANNwiki meeting interviews and the playing card deck are a vital part of the ICANN culture - often saving ICANN meetings from terminal ennui. ICANNwiki describes the ICANN mission and methodology in a clear, objective way that is helpful to newcomers and not-so-newcomers. As the ICANN budget (and its corresponding activity) has grown over 800% since ICANNwiki was first launched, the small amount of funding ICANNwiki receives is necessary to catalogue that history. If ICANN were to take over this role, it would surely be significantly more expensive. The ICANNwiki is an independent resource to which ICANN can point that provides validation fro its mission and work. We should not put this ICANN institution and valuable resource at risk. [As part of the budgeting process, ICANN could list each funded outside program so that the community can see the relative cost and benefit.] II. Fellowship Program. The Fellowship Program, as conceived by Jacob Malthouse and brought to fruition by Janice Douma Lange has been a significant success. How many ICANN programs do we know that delivered on its objectives in this way? An objection application process was implemented an operated without controversy. ICANN fellows have become Board members, staff members and SO/AC members. What other program has produced that? Admittedly, tweaks are necessary. I would: limit public forum participation to those who learn about and comment on specific policy issues; create certain deliverables such as each fellow reaching 30 or more members in their community regarding ICANN; and installation of new, vibrant and engaged leadership. I am not against trimming the number of participants to make participation more valuable. Nonetheless, I see the Fellowship Program as an ICANN success and the argument over its funding as a turf battle in the name of parochial interests and coveted travel dollars. III. Reserve fund. Recent discussions have suggested these solutions to restore the former reserve fund level. 1) increased contracted party fees 2) use of auction funds 3) use of gTLD application fees Each of these is unacceptable. First, the reserve fund can be replenished over many years; there is no rush. The important metric is not the amount of annual replenishment but the direction. So long as ICANN establishes and manages to a budget with an annual surplus, that is fine. We need not pay it all back in 2, 4 or more years. The reserve fund was created to protect against the cessation of funds, not against unexpected expenses. Unexpected expenses should be managed by the CEO. If funds are drained by an unexpected need, those funds must be replaced by reducing some other internal use of the funds. The organization must be managed to accommodate that. CEOs are faced with these issues every year and deal with them in this way. If ICANN does this also, then a positive cash flow can be maintained. Use of excess applications fees is a clear violation of ICANN policy that states that application fees should cover application costs. I don’t see any allowable use of the funds beyond a refund to applicants or the funding of a program agreed by a consensus of the applicants. Similarly, use of auction funds to fund a reserve requires community approval. I, for one, can not imagine a worse use of funds that to reserve them against the occurrence of ICANN budget dilemma. The exhaustion of reserve funds occurred due to the fiscal mismanagement of the IANA transition and inexplicable over-estimation or registry fees. Both of these lessons should have caused the Board and staff to implement better management controls and judgment. Finally, increasing registry and registrar fees reminds me of my water company. They enforced strict conservation practices and (gasp!) their revenue went down. So they proposed to raise water rates and the community rained down on them — complaining of bloated overhead and staffs. The rate increase was beaten back. When contracted parties first agreed to per domain registration fees, then CEO Paul Twomey promised (paraphrasing), “ICANN’s fate is tied to yours - as your revenue increases, so will ours, if your revenue decreases, ICANN will suffer that with you.” The “shortfall” in revenue is nothing but a management error in judgment when budgeting. That error should not result in a fee increase. It violates the original commitment made when the contracted parties supported ICANN by approving per domain registration fees. Thank you, Kurt Pritz

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[Comments-fy19-budget-19jan18] Comment about ICANNWiki funding
by Roland LaPlante March 2, 2018

March 2, 2018

Dear ICANN, As you know from your previous generous support, ICANNWiki provides a valuable service and has become an integral part of the community. Afilias has also supported ICANNWiki for years for this reason and many others have demonstrated support as well. The complete withdrawal of funding from ICANN so abruptly not only threatens the viability of the project, but rather disrespectfully junks the valuable time and resources that the community has invested over the years. Ultimately the loss of ICANNWiki would be a loss to our overall sense of community. ICANN should continue to support ICANNWiki at a reasonable level in the next fiscal year. At a minimum, please consider giving the team time to find other sources of funding. Sincerely, Roland LaPlante Senior Vice President, Chief Marketing Officer Afilias 300 Welsh Road Building 3, Suite 105 Horsham, PA 19044 Office +1 215.706.5700 (ext. 105) Direct: +1 267.781.0546 Fax: +1 215.706.5701 Mobile: +1 267.968.0546 eFax: +353.1.633.5482 www.afilias.info

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