January 2006 - council - lists.icann.org

RE: [council] Notice of motion regarding statements of interest
by Bruce Tonkin Jan. 29, 2006

Jan. 29, 2006

Hello Tom, > > just for clarities sake. No disclosure under either of the > two paragraphs will lead to a situation in which a council > member will "have to" refrain from casting a vote, right. We > are still talking about transparency not neutrality. > Agreed. The focus is on transparency. Issues regarding when to vote or not vote, will be dealt with separately. I hope to be able to have the General Counsel (John Jeffrey) give some general advice on voting during the next Council call. Regards, Bruce

1 0

RE: GNSO Council teleconf. 6 February dial-in details
by Marilyn Cade Jan. 29, 2006

Jan. 29, 2006

Thanks, Glen, for the notice of the upcoming Council call with the agenda. However, I have a question that I would invite Olof to respond to. And, perhaps Bruce... As I recall, regarding the work plan for new gTLD policy, there was a motion approved by Council, which agreed that there would be a work plan developed by staff -- for agreement by council -- of a modified time frame for the gTLD policy development process. Our discussion included, as I recall, recognition that the review of Council acknowledged that the present PDP time process is often not realistic and that council should develop and gain agreement of the modification for the work plan, rather than simply ignore the timeframes. We have to take into account in our work plan that we have to address interactions with the GAC Subcommittee on the GNSO, and I believe that the Council invited the liaison of that committee to work with us toward a conference call discussion between now and Wellington, and toward a face to face interaction in our two day policy development session, if I recall the Council's last conf. call session and the specific discussion on this topic. However, I don't think that Olof has yet had a chance to deliver that modified work plan to council for discussion, and it should be on our agenda as an item. Item 3 seems to ignore that previous discussion and assignment by Council, and that is probably an omission. I propose that the agenda just be expanded to add the discussion of the need to develop and agree a revised work plan. Best regards, Marilyn Cade Draft Agenda for Council meeting Monday 6 February 2006 http://gnso.icann.org/meetings/agenda-6feb06.shtml Item 1: Approval of minutes - GNSO Council teleconference minutes 17 January 2006 Item 2: Issues Report on policy issues raised in the proposed .com agreement - consider the issues report (due 1 Feb 2006) - decide whether to initiate the PDP (see "Initiation of PDP" in section 3, Annex A, of the ICANN bylaws) "3. Initiation of PDP The Council shall initiate the PDP as follows: a. Issue Raised by the Board. If the Board directs the Council to initiate the PDP, then the Council shall meet and do so within fifteen (15) calendar days after receipt of the Issue Report, with no intermediate vote of the Council. b. Issue Raised by Other than by the Board. If a policy issue is presented to the Council for consideration via an Issue Report, then the Council shall meet within fifteen (15) calendar days after receipt of such Report to vote on whether to initiate the PDP. Such meeting may be convened in any manner deemed appropriate by the Council, including in person, via conference call or via electronic mail. c. Vote of the Council. A vote of more than 33% of the Council members present in favor of initiating the PDP will suffice to initiate the PDP; unless the Staff Recommendation stated that the issue is not properly within the scope of the ICANN policy process or the GNSO, in which case a Supermajority Vote of the Council members present in favor of initiating the PDP will be required to initiate the PDP." Item 3: Initial Report on new gTLDs - consider cosnsitutency statements and public comments (due 31 Jan 2006) - discuss content of Initial Report (due on 15 Feb 2006) (see section 8 (c), Annex A, of the ICANN bylaws) "c. The Staff Manager will take all Constituency Statements, Public Comment Statements, and other information and compile (and post on the Comment Site) an Initial Report within fifty (50) calendar days after initiation of the PDP. Thereafter, the PDP shall follow the provisions of Item 9 below in creating a Final Report." Item 4: Next meeting - 21 Feb 2006 - Consider holding a two day physical meeting around 21 Feb 2006 in Washington, DC to advance the work on policy issues in items 2 and 3 above - note the Final Report on new gTLDs is due on 15 March 2006 (see section 9 (c), Annex A, of the ICANN bylaws) "9. Public Comments to the Task c. The Staff Manager shall prepare the Final Report and submit it to the Council chair within ten (10) calendar days after the end of the public comment period." Item 5: Statements of Interest Item 6: Any other business

2 1

Re: [council] Re: Regarding issues report on IDNs
by Sophia B Jan. 28, 2006

Jan. 28, 2006

Greetings John, You have just revealed the extent of the complexity below, and perhaps set the stage for the discussions, I believe. Thank you for your time. I like your ...analogy that IDNs will not solve... or cure cancer. That was humerus. In any case, I read your analysis with interest and believe ICANN/GNSO would benefit and draw a lesson from many of the points you made; I certainly did, specifically from these main comments below: I am continuing my dialog with you as appropriate ... - I also believe that effort should have f*ocused on the establishment of "best practices" models, not mandates and requirements*, from the very beginning (and independent of where and how those models are approved and published) and that ICANN's PDP process is inappropriate for trying to draw that work together. ( I see that...) - The ICANN PDP approach, with its model of one SO developing a proposal and then throwing it over the wall for review by others is, in my opinion, very poorly suited for developing good policies, or even good recommendations, in an environment that is this complex. We also *run the risk that poor policies or poor guidelines could effectively make IDNs almost useless* --or too dangerous to use-- in actual practice. (this is where we have to evaluate the best approach, and it seems that we are perhaps applying a single standard for all... we have to think more in dept..uhmm) - We know from the original IDN testbed activities that it is easier to say "testbed" than it is to say *" wait until we figure this out".*Whether that is the right answer or not typically depends on what a testbed is intended to accomplish. If the idea is to give some registrants, registrars, or registries an advantage or if the testbed is designed in a way that has that effect even if it was not intended, then testbeds are generally a poor idea (as I think we learned from the original IDN testbed some years ago). They are, ultimately, nothing more than an attempt to turn such principles as *"make sure it is really a test, not a head-start or commitment to a particular strategy" and "be sure that you understand what you are trying to learn and how you intended to learn it "* into an outline of a testing procedure. ( my point, exactly John, I could not agree with you more on this. This was why I raised my question during the meeting, although I could not articulate it as well as you. The testbeds seem like bet and keep strategy..in light of this and in restating what I asked, ..please see below) ........ - I believe that, if we are going to do tests, we need to use them to examine each of the alternatives and its implications so that we can advise relevant parties as to what to do or not do and can advise ICANN on priorities and actions (is there a big challenge to another 'go-ahead' strategy other than testbeds?,otherwise, I agree with your point.) If we play devil's advocate, and say there is no real technical issue with the 'testbeds'that prevents us from going directly to the policy issue, then, some questions that I think I want to ask, which seem to be *brought to my attention as a concern * would be the following: 1. Why should we do the testbed? What are the EXACT technical objectives of the testbed? What do you expect to achieve from the technical aspect? Do we have a detailed proposal and framework to work from, like in any other experiment? 2. What do we think is going to work? Where do we expect is it going to fail (from a technical point of view – like overload, resolution, etc." – If we don't think anything is going to fail then its really and implementation and not a testbed issue? 3. Moreover –from the DNAME perspective, there seem to be an issue with going for the DNAME solution, which is not recommended (not a real Internationalized domain name, but kind of another name to an English name. You can't do email on a DNAME). In the IDN workshop at Vancouver Vint Serf said explicitly that DNAME is a bad solution. so "Why do they want to go that way? 4. Finally, *if there is a decision to really go for a testbed before resolving the policy issues,* are we considering the following few principals? - The testbed must be done for a virtual TLD –- like ".xyz" - a TLD with no meaning in the language it is done – so it should be something equivalent to ".xyz" in Chinese. This will prevent from this testbed to become an implementation. - ICANN should decide on a technical group, with different representatives (like the PAC) to run the tesbed, and do in the facilities of an objective party – like a university, etc. in any case it must not be done by an existing gTLD registry. - BEFORE deciding and running a testbed – ICANN must have an open discussion about conducting it (like in the next ICANN meeting). I hope I am going towards the right direction in my understanding of matters. Your guidance is always appreciated. Kind regards, Sophie On 27/01/06, John C Klensin <klensin(a)jck.com> wrote: > Sophia, > > Thanks for the clarification and the kind words. A few comments > below... > > --On Thursday, 26 January, 2006 17:08 -0800 Sophia B > <sophiabekele(a)gmail.com> wrote: > > >... > > was specific to the 'test beds' as you can see,and comes > > directly from the question I asked you during our Jan 17 > > meeting, on the 'test beds' while discussing the IETF Draft > > doc on the IDN issues. > > > > Your response to me* interalia,* you did *not recommend > > personally the test beds, was not personally involved in the > > development of the guidelines except peripherally etc...* I > > suppose that threw me off and I was trying to confirm your > > involvement from this specific subject and not necessarily > > your involvement within the 'internationalization' issues, > > to which again, we are grateful for your input. > > > > I hope that shades some light of where I was coming from, and > > provide clarification to my question. > > Yes, thank you. > > Your question actually opens up the entirety of my complex > relationship with IDNs. That is hard to summarize in a note of > reasonable length, but let me try to do so. References that > expand on some of these issues are cited in the IAB draft (more > in version 02 than in version 01; I now hope to have version 02 > posted on Monday). I have always believed that IDNs are > important and useful. At the same time, simply going from the > use of around 63 characters to several tens of thousands > increases complexity on many dimensions. Those dimensions are > not just technical ones. Indeed, for IDNs, implementation of > the protocols to make them work is the easiest of the various > issues. If one is going to have IDNs, one must accept, > understand, and deal with those complexities or there is danger > of reducing the use of the DNS as an effective tool. Unless one > likes keeping track of and typing IP addresses --very long IP > addresses and many of them as we move to IPv6-- we have no > alternative to the job the DNS must do, so I don't consider > reducing DNS effectiveness to be an option. > > More important, there are a series of problems that IDNs cannot > solve. It is important to know the difference between those and > the ones for which IDNs are really useful and to make business, > policy, and technical decisions accordingly. IDNs will not > solve Internet deployment problems, connect countries that are > not now connected, or cure cancer. They may contribute to the > motivation to do those things, but our expectations should > remain closely tied to reality, not wild claims and desires. > The most common example of an unsolved problem is the "users > should be able to work entirely in their own script" statement > of the IDN requirement. The difficulty is that, in general, > users don't use domain names. Instead, they use URIs, email > addresses, and other types of references. That is important > because, in something like > > > http://www.example.com/search?q=abc+def&ie=utf-8&rls=def.ghi:en-US:official > > going to IDNs and substituting an internationalized version of > the URL (an "IRI"), we can get the domain name (but not the "." > characters) into a local script and we can change the "abc" abd > "def", into local scripts too. By changing the server, we might > be able to convert the keywords ("search", "q", "ie" and perhaps > "utf-8" or "en-US" into the local script. But we are stuck with > "http://", "/", and "?" and "&" although possibly not with "=", > "+", and ":". Getting rid of those things --getting them into > the local script or otherwise fixing it so the end user doesn't > see them-- requires an entirely different approach than IDNs and > IRIs. And, interestingly, as soon as on adopts one of those > approaches, IDNs, for those contexts, may recede in importance. > > That situation takes us back to the guideline and testbed > questions. I don't intend to cast blame here --it would > accomplish little and the reasons why things happened or didn't > happen are complex -- but I believe that a serious effort to > revise the guidelines should have been initiated very shortly > after problems with version 1.0 were noticed, i.e., right after > the Montreal meeting. I also believe that effort should have > focused on the establishment of "best practices" models, not > mandates and requirements, from the very beginning (and > independent of where and how those models are approved and > published) and that ICANN's PDP process is inappropriate for > trying to draw that work together. Each part of that is > important: because of the complexities of the general IDN > situation, solutions, rules, or guidelines that are devised by > and for the gTLDs without active consideration of the needs of > the ccTLDs are ultimately going to fail, probably by causing > problems for the end user. Similarly, even if the ccTLDs and > gTLDs were to work together, we would run significant risk of > problems with implementations or subtle technical interactions > for end users or with any number of international cultural or > linguistic authorities. The ICANN PDP approach, with its model > of one SO developing a proposal and then throwing it over the > wall for review by others is, in my opinion, very poorly suited > for developing good policies, or even good recommendations, in > an environment that is this complex. We also run the risk that > poor policies or poor guidelines could effectively make IDNs > almost useless --or too dangerous to use-- in actual practice. > > So I have been unhappy with the 2.0 Guideline process. The > people involved in developing those Guidelines did, I believe, > an outstanding job given a too-short time schedule (from when > they actually got started in what turned out to be a hasty job > after years of procrastination) and the wrong objective > (patching the 1.0 Guidelines rather than starting with a clean > slate and an analysis of the problems to be solved). But they > could not, in my opinion, overcome either obstacle. > > When Patrik and I came on the call, we really were not expecting > to discuss the IDN TLD issue at all (and the IAB report does > not address it in any significant way) so our comments were > personal on-the-spot reflections rather than carefully > considered positions. For me, my issues with the testbed ideas > have been similar to those with the Guidelines. We know from > the original IDN testbed activities that it is easier to say > "testbed" than it is to say "wait until we figure this out". > Whether that is the right answer or not typically depends on > what a testbed is intended to accomplish. If the idea is to > give some registrants, registrars, or registries an advantage or > if the testbed is designed in a way that has that effect even if > it was not intended, then testbeds are generally a poor idea (as > I think we learned from the original IDN testbed some years > ago). I started writing the notes Cary circulated while > listening to the audiocast of the IDN, public forum, and Board > sessions in Vancouver. They are, ultimately, nothing more than > an attempt to turn such principles as "make sure it is really a > test, not a head-start or commitment to a particular strategy" > and "be sure that you understand what you are trying to learn > and how you intended to learn it" into an outline of a testing > procedure. > > Finally, as I and others have said before, we have three > possible ways to implement what the user will see as IDNs at the > top level: > > (i) Name aliases in applications software > > (ii) DNAME-type aliases in the root, with no separate > domain zone files. > > (iii) Actual new TLDs with IDN-style names. > > No one of these is "best" in any absolute way. Instead, each > one has its own advantages, disadvantages, and risks. Those are > not just technical, although the technical issues are different > with each one, but are different in terms of approvals, > allocation models and their implications, IPR and cultural > appropriateness in naming, questions of who stands to profit, > and so on. I believe that, if we are going to do tests, we > need to use them to examine each of the alternatives and its > implications so that we can advise relevant parties as to what > to do or not do and can advise ICANN on priorities and actions. > > regards, > john > > > -- Sophia Bekele Voice/Fax: 925-935-1598 Mob:925-818-0948 sophiabekele(a)gmail.com SKYPE: skypesoph www.cbsintl.com

1 0

GNSO Council members Conflict of Interest Statements 27 Jan. 2006
by GNSO.SECRETARIAT＠GNSO.ICANN.ORG Jan. 27, 2006

Jan. 27, 2006

GNSO Council members Conflict of Interest Statements Bruce Tonkin - Registrar Constituency - GNSO Council chair I am employed full-time by Melbourne IT Limited. Melbourne IT has a registrar accreditation agreement with ICANN. Melbourne IT also has a contractual relationship with most gtld registries (for a current list see http://www.icann.org/registrars/accredited-list.html) and many cctld registries as a registrar. Melbourne IT holds ten percent of the shares in Neulevel, the operator of the .biz registry. .................................................................... Ross Rader - - Registrar Constituency In relation to conflict of interest with ICANN or the work it is responsible for, I have no employment, contract, financial interest or other business relationship with ICANN, registries or registrars except as current holder, and fee payer, of several domain names in .com, .net and .org. Statement of Interests I am the Director of Research and Innovation for Tucows Inc., an ICANN accredited registrar and internet services vendor. Tucows is a minority shareholder in Afilias LLC, with roughly an 8% shareholding. Neither Tucows, nor I, is in possession of, nor have access to Registry Sensitive or Registry Proprietary information as defined by any relevant registry operating contracts as a result of this relationship. Tucows provides consulting and application hosting services to other registrars and internet services providers. I am not an officer, director, consultant, or employee of any of these customer organizations nor am I specifically involved in providing services to them. The URL for this statement is: http://www.byte.org/blog/_WebPages/StatementofInterestsforRossRader.html ........................................................................ Thomas Keller - - Registrar Constituency I'm a fulltime employee of Schlund+Partner AG. Schlund+Partner AG is ICANN accredited and is conducting business with almost all major gTLDS and ccTLDs. Schlund holds a minority share in Afilias LLC for investment purposes.Besides domain name registrations Schlund is mainly offering wehosting and email services to end users. I'm a member of the DENIC Technical Advisory Council. ....................................................................... Robin Gross - Non Commercial Users Constituency I have no conflicts of interest. ...................................................................... Philip Sheppard - Commercial and Business Users Constituency I have no conflicts of interest. ...................................................................... Anthony Harris - ISPCP Constituency I am under contract as full time executive director of CABASE, a non-profit Internet industry association, incorporated as such in Argentina since 1999. - consulting work done for ICANN - NONE - consulting work done for a gtld or cctld registry, or current applicant to become a gtld or cctld registry - NONE - consulting work done for a registrar - NONE - employment with a registry or registrar - NONE ....................................................................... Mawaki Chango - Non Commercial Users Constituency I am currently a full-time Ph.D. student and Graduate Assistant, and I represent the Non-Commercial Users Constituency on the GNSO Council. In addition, I am involved in social activism through my participation in ACSIS (African Civil Society for Information Society), as ICT policy advocator, and advisor to the ACSIS’ President. Over the last five years, I have been involved as a consultant with UNESCO, the International Development Research Centre, Open Society Initiative for West Africa (Dakar), the Eduardo Mondlane University (Maputo), and EvalNet (Johannesburg). I have never been involved in any business related to the distribution and operation of Internet resources. .................................................................... Bret Fausett - At Large Advisory Committee representative to the GNSO Council I am an attorney, living and working in Los Angeles, licensed to practice law in California (United States). I serve on the GNSO as a liaison from the At Large Advisory Committee, which is charged with representing the interests of end users in all of ICANN's activities. I do not accept legal or consulting work for companies that have business before the GNSO or ICANN. In my personal capacity, I have less than 20% of my savings invested in companies that are in the registry services and registrar businesses, including Tucows, Verisign, and Neustar. I do not believe that any activities of the Council or ICANN could have a material effect on the value of my investments. ....................................................................... Glen de Saint Géry GNSO Secretariat - ICANN gnso.secretariat[at]gnso.icann.org http://gnso.icann.org

1 0

Statement of Interest, Mawaki Chango
by Mawaki Chango Jan. 27, 2006

Jan. 27, 2006

Hi, Glen! I trust this finds you well, and thanks for your kind attention... I fist thought I would rather post my statement (message below) rather to the list just like every one (as it seemed), then things got a little confused with the different threads of discussion and issues... So in the mean time, I'm sending it to you, hopping it is okay! -------- In agreement with this proposal and Ross' approach, namely to have a mandatory and yet light-weight policy, this is my statement: (start) I am currently a full-time Ph.D. student and Graduate Assistant, and I represent the Non-Commercial Users Constituency on the GNSO Council. In addition, I am involved in social activism through my participation in ACSIS (African Civil Society for Information Society), as ICT policy advocator, and advisor to the ACSIS President. Over the last five years, I have been involved as a consultant with UNESCO, the International Development Research Centre, Open Society Initiative for West Africa (Dakar), the Eduardo Mondlane University (Maputo), and EvalNet (Johannesburg). I have never been involved in any business related to the distribution and operation of Internet resources. (end) Thanks, Mawaki

2 1

Washington meeting: NCUC position
by Mawaki Chango Jan. 27, 2006

Jan. 27, 2006

Dear Bruce, all: As most of you, it is my duty to report back and forth between the Council and my constituency. I personnally may have rested my case, but the issue of the Washington, D.C. meeting has caused a turmoil on the NCUC-list which is, unfortunately, still distracting the constituency from the actual work at hand. I have to report back to you the strong opposition of NCUC on the principle, and related agenda item, of calling for an addtional and f2f round of public comments in D.C., summarizing the reasons put forward as follows: 1/ Given this particular and sensitive issue of gTLD, which has been on and on for a good while, we have heard the same arguments for and against gTLDs for years, and what is most needed is not more comment, but decisions (at least on positions and recommendations, as far as the GNSO Council is concerned). The idea that we, the Council and our Constituencies, don't know what our position is, or need to hear more, does not convince none of my constituents. Instead, it is beleived that what we really need to do is to put our heads together and come up with a common and final position. 2/ And to better achieve this, we need not to expose ourselves to further pressure and lobbying from interest groups, which my fellow constituents beleive is going to happen in D.C. In effect, we are concerned that opening this meeting in Washington to public comment turn this into lobbying meeting that will easily be dominated by Washington insiders who are far to reflect the variety of possible and existing positions on this sensitive issue of value to all of us, both as ICANN bodies and globally. Please note that the Non-Commercial Users Constituency does not oppose the principle of the GNSO Council having a meeting to advance our work on that crucial issue, and is prepared to participate at its best in such meeting. My very best regards, in a fair play spirit as ever, Mawaki

1 0

Sorry for the mistake
by Mawaki Chango Jan. 27, 2006

Jan. 27, 2006

As you've obviously noticed, my statement was not intended to the Council list but to the GNSO Secretariat whom I've understood will eventually compile the various statements. My apologies for that confusion and for any inconvenience. Mawaki --- Mawaki Chango <ki_chango(a)yahoo.com> wrote: > Date: Fri, 27 Jan 2006 13:19:09 -0800 (PST) > From: Mawaki Chango <ki_chango(a)yahoo.com> > Subject: Statement of Interest, Mawaki Chango > To: Council GNSO <council(a)gnso.icann.org> > > Hi, Glen! > I trust this finds you well, and thanks for your kind attention... > I > fist thought I would rather post my statement (message below) > rather > to the list just like every one (as it seemed), then things got a > little confused with the different threads of discussion and > issues... So in the mean time, I'm sending it to you, hopping it is > okay! > -------- > > In agreement with this proposal and Ross' approach, namely to have > a > mandatory and yet light-weight policy, this is my statement: > > (start) > I am currently a full-time Ph.D. student and Graduate Assistant, > and > I represent the Non-Commercial Users Constituency on the GNSO > Council. In addition, I am involved in social activism through my > participation in ACSIS (African Civil Society for Information > Society), as ICT policy advocator, and advisor to the ACSIS > President. > Over the last five years, I have been involved as a consultant with > UNESCO, the International Development Research Centre, Open Society > Initiative for West Africa (Dakar), the Eduardo Mondlane University > (Maputo), and EvalNet (Johannesburg). I have never been involved in > any business related to the distribution and operation of Internet > resources. > (end) > > Thanks, > > Mawaki > > > > >

1 0

Comments on new gTLD TOR
by Ross Rader Jan. 27, 2006

Jan. 27, 2006

It appears that there is no link from this page - http://gnso.icann.org/comments-request/ - to the Terms of Reference that we are seeking comments on. I know its late in the process, but could this be fixed? Thanks in advance, -ross

2 1

Re: [council] Re: Regarding issues report on IDNs
by Sophia B Jan. 26, 2006

Jan. 26, 2006

John, Thank you for your very elaborate explanation. I appreciate it. I am very much aware of your background and involvement in the internationalization issues, John, along with your distinguished career. I thank the Internet for that. It is also a privilege that ICANN is assisted by you, as it would be the same for me, to meet with you some day. I am glad Tina and co. has given us the opportunity to discuss the very complex issues we are dealing with at ICANN regarding policy over IDNs. To clarify my point, John, my reference to asking Tina on the question below: I was also not aware that John was involved in the 'testbed' scenario until I saw the attachment you sent, based on some of his responses in the Council meeting. Would he be *working on that with you. * was specific to the 'test beds' as you can see,and comes directly from the question I asked you during our Jan 17 meeting, on the 'test beds' while discussing the IETF Draft doc on the IDN issues. Your response to me* interalia,* you did *not recommend personally the test beds, was not personally involved in the development of the guidelines except peripherally etc...* I suppose that threw me off and I was trying to confirm your involvement from this specific subject and not necessarily your involvement within the 'internationalization' issues, to which again, we are grateful for your input. I hope that shades some light of where I was coming from, and provide clarification to my question. Thanks again for your response (all) and kind regards, Sophia On 26/01/06, John C Klensin <klensin(a)jck.com> wrote: > > Sophia, > > Let me respond to the part of this that asks about my > involvement... > > --On Thursday, 26 January, 2006 13:46 -0800 Sophia B > <sophiabekele(a)gmail.com> wrote: > > >... > > 2) I was also not aware that John was involved in the > > 'testbed' scenario until I saw the attachment you sent, based > > on some of his responses in the Council meeting. Would he be > > working on that with you. > > I am very involved in internationalization issues although the > main focus of my work is outside of ICANN. I've been heavily > involved in the design of the protocols themselves, procedures > for registering of labels containing Chinese characters, > alternative models for IDN TLDs, and generally in trying to > figure out how to maximize the value of IDNs without in the > process reducing the value or utility of the DNS itself. In > that context, I've been thinking about testbeds and ways to > proceed; the notes you saw represent some of my writing on the > subject. In addition, various of Cary, Patrik, Tina, several > others, and myself seem to end up having frequent conversations > about various internationalization, language, and character set > issues, including but not limited to IDNs. > > In terms of "working on that" and other activities in the ICANN > context, there was a plan for me to assume a support role for > Tina and others in developing and explaining ICANN's plans and > efforts related to IDNs. That presumably would have included > direct or indirect support for GNSO and ccNSO Council efforts. > That plan abruptly ended last summer when ICANN's senior > management informed me that they had concluded that they saw no > need for any assistance from me in IDN-related areas. I have > not asked Tina, and would consider it inappropriate to do so, > but I assume that, if she were consulted on that decision, she > favored keeping me involved. To put the rest of this in > context, I participated in the call because the request was to > discuss a draft IAB report and I feel some obligation to help > with IAB issues. Otherwise, had the request to participate in > the call or otherwise support an ICANN effort come from ICANN > staff or the GNSO, given the way things were left in August, I > would have been obligated to respond to the invitation by asking > for a purchase order. > > regards, > john > > -- Sophia Bekele Voice/Fax: 925-935-1598 Mob:925-818-0948 sophiabekele(a)gmail.com SKYPE: skypesoph www.cbsintl.com

1 0

Re: Regarding issues report on IDNs
by Cary Karp Jan. 26, 2006

Jan. 26, 2006

> as it is a bit late in Cary's time zone I thought I would offer Late but not that late :-) > I was also not aware that John was involved in the 'testbed' > scenario until I saw the attachment you sent, based on some of his responses > in the Council meeting. Would he be working on that with you. The testbed issues were discussed in some detail during the IDN workshop in Vancouver. In particular, you should take a look at http://www.icann.org/announcements/proposal-dname-equivalence-mapping-tld-1… There was quite a bit of further informal discussion about how to proceed elsewhere during the meeting. John drafted his memo to focus all this into a concrete proposal. It is otherwise rather difficult to answer your last question. A number of people are in regular contact about a range of issues relating to IDN and discuss various gestational texts with some intensity. John and I are in frequent touch both in those contexts and directly with each other. The testbed text is typical for the kind of thing we discuss but John is its sole author. /Cary

1 0