To: ICANN Secretary From: GNSO Chair Dear John, The ICANN bylaws set forth a process and timeline for policy development. Article X, Section 3(4) States: "The GNSO Council is responsible for managing the policy development process of the GNSO. It shall adopt such procedures as it sees fit to carry out that responsibility, provided that such procedures are approved by the Board, and further provided that, until any modifications are recommended by the GNSO Council and approved by the Board, the applicable procedures shall be as set forth in Section 6 of this Article." The WHOIS policy development is scheduled to take longer than the PDP process allows, as the process is currently incorporating a data gathering phase (http://gnso.icann.org/issues/whois-privacy/ ). At its meeting on 19 Feb, the GNSO Council approved the following timeline for completing the WHOIS policy development. March 19, 2004 - Receive Constituency Statements April 9, 2004 - Preliminary Task Force Report April 29, 2004 - Public Comment Period Closes May 20, 2004 - Final Report Due The GNSO Council seeks the Board's approval for the new timeline. Regards, Bruce Tonkin