Follow up on GNSO Council related meetings at ICANN78
Dear Councilors, I’m following up on the email below regarding the working document<https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1a3plNvimEJjpSUhahQPtpJU6BUXBkUKiQruv...> which includes the agendas for the various Council related meetings, such as the GNSO working sessions and joint meetings. I’d like to highlight a couple portions below (but please comment on any section of the document). First I would like to confirm the single topic suggested by the Council for the joint meeting between the ICANN Board and GNSO Council. The topic is: Preliminary discussion of Board Statement not-adopting certain SubPro recommendations. The Council’s topic(s) must be communicated to the Board by 11 October. Note, this engagement is expected to serve as at least the first meeting to discuss the Board Statement as required by Annex A, Section 9 (c) of the ICANN Bylaws, referenced in Tripti’s letter<https://gnso.icann.org/sites/default/files/policy/2023/correspondence/sinha-...> to the Council. Holding this meeting would not preclude additional discussion at a later time, as deemed necessary. In order to support this topic, the Council’s SubPro Pending Recommendations small team is concentrating on a working document<https://docs.google.com/document/d/1bumhCtJ1C3PatdsSHsl435Kk11mxGJXQ/edit> that first and foremost, identifies clarifying questions to discuss with the Board. In addition, the working document identifies which of the non-adopted recommendations that the small would like to try and modify in order to address the Board’s concerns, as well as a high-level understanding of what that modification could look like. The second reason for follow-up is to draw attention to the second GNSO Working Session where the GNSO will meet with staff from the Global Domains and Strategy (GDS) team. While the GDS team will come prepared to provide an update, it will be helpful if Councilors identify questions/comments in advance, in order to better support an active dialogue. Thanks, Greg From: council <council-bounces@gnso.icann.org> On Behalf Of Steve Chan via council Sent: Wednesday, October 4, 2023 4:51 PM To: council@gnso.icann.org Subject: [EXTERNAL] [council] GNSO Council related meetings at ICANN78 CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the organization. Do not click links or open attachments unless you can confirm the sender and know the content is safe. Dear Councilors, For your planning purposes, please find this working document<https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1a3plNvimEJjpSUhahQPtpJU6BUXBkUKiQruv...> which includes the agendas for the various Council related meetings, such as the GNSO working sessions and joint meetings. In particular, I’d like to draw your attention to the tab for the GNSO Council/Board session which currently has one potential topic for the Council to suggest, and one Board proposed topic. The deadline to communicate topics for that Board/Council session is 11 October. The other quick comment is that the latest and greatest Council/GAC proposed agenda is included. Jeff, apologies for potentially stealing your thunder! If you have any questions or comments on any of the agendas, please share them on this list. And for the Council/Board session, please also consider whether additional topics are needed for the 60 minute session. Best, Steve Steven Chan VP, Policy Development Support & GNSO Relations Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) 12025 Waterfront Drive, Suite 300 Los Angeles, CA 90094-2536 Email: steve.chan@icann.org<mailto:steve.chan@icann.org> Skype: steve.chan55 Mobile: +1.310.339.4410 Find out more about the GNSO by visiting: https://learn.icann.org/<https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__learn.icann.org_&d=DwMGaQ&c=FmY1u3PJp6wrcrwll3mSVzgfkbPSS6sJms7xcl4I5cM&r=DRa2dXAvSFpCIgmkXhFzL7ar9Qfqa0AIgn-H4xR2EBk&m=jLNFXvpu9gNdUeHi-G6sjWNCF9w4_AwhzzUDFZy2elE&s=o7Auz997kA-HPv9PHJCjFVZw7Pgo8krw4MxfqCwBrIU&e=> Follow @GNSO on Twitter: https://twitter.com/ICANN_GNSO<https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__twitter.com_ICANN-5FGNSO&d=DwMGaQ&c=FmY1u3PJp6wrcrwll3mSVzgfkbPSS6sJms7xcl4I5cM&r=DRa2dXAvSFpCIgmkXhFzL7ar9Qfqa0AIgn-H4xR2EBk&m=jLNFXvpu9gNdUeHi-G6sjWNCF9w4_AwhzzUDFZy2elE&s=kWw4fQPNjw2lVKy1UjTxS2F0BmjEAzaDFWNmsYywbmE&e=> Transcripts and recordings of GNSO Working Group and Council events are located on the GNSO Master Calendar <https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__gnso.icann.org_en_group...>
Thanks Greg. Regarding the discussion with the Board re the non-adoption of certain Sub Pro Final Report Recommendations, I am pasting below the relevant section of Annex A Section 9 of the ByLaws for easy reference by Council members. Please note that this step appears to invoke the Supplemental Recommendation process under 9 d. below. As we understand it within the small team, this does not foreclose a recommendation from the small team to the Council to pursue the Section 16 process as to any particular non-adopted Recommendation. For example, within the small team, no particular conclusion has been drawn as to which of these processes (Supplemental Recommendation or Section 16 process) should be applied to the rejection by the Board of Recommendation 17.2 regarding Applicant Support. Clearly the Board has requested the consultation that is planned for the meeting in Hamburg. Given that Tripti's letter to Council is dated October 5, I think Council has not yet reviewed and discussed the Board's letter as set forth in 9.c. below. Nevertheless, it seems appropriate to take advantage of the in-person meeting with the Board. In this regard, I hope we will add to the GNSO Council working sessions a discussion of the Board's non-adoption statement so that we are closely following 9 c. below. As I understand it, the small team will be trying to develop a recommendation, in its meeting this coming Monday, as to how to address invitations to the wider community for input into the non-adopted Recommendations. In this regard, it strikes me that the Supplemental Recommendation process may be appropriate for most of the non-adopted Recommendations, but again, as far as I know, there has been no consensus as yet within the small team regarding the process to be recommended to Council in each case. Hopefully this will be resolved in the Small Team meeting on Monday and brought to a Council working session in Hamburg on the non-adopted Recommendations. Thank you, Anne Section 9. *Board Approval Processes* The Board will meet to discuss the GNSO Council recommendation as soon as feasible, but preferably not later than the second meeting after receipt of the Board Report from the Staff Manager. Board deliberation on the PDP Recommendations contained within the Recommendations Report shall proceed as follows: 1. Any PDP Recommendations approved by a GNSO Supermajority Vote shall be adopted by the Board unless, by a vote of more than two-thirds (2/3) of the Board, the Board determines that such policy is not in the best interests of the ICANN community or ICANN. If the GNSO Council recommendation was approved by less than a GNSO Supermajority Vote, a majority vote of the Board will be sufficient to determine that such policy is not in the best interests of the ICANN community or ICANN. 2. In the event that the Board determines, in accordance with paragraph a above, that the policy recommended by a GNSO Supermajority Vote or less than a GNSO Supermajority vote is not in the best interests of the ICANN community or ICANN (the Corporation), the Board shall (i) articulate the reasons for its determination in a report to the Council (the "*Board Statement*"); and (ii) submit the Board Statement to the Council. 3. The Council shall review the Board Statement for discussion with the Board as soon as feasible after the Council's receipt of the Board Statement. The Board shall determine the method (e.g., by teleconference, e-mail, or otherwise) by which the Council and Board will discuss the Board Statement. 4. At the conclusion of the Council and Board discussions, the Council shall meet to affirm or modify its recommendation, and communicate that conclusion (the "*Supplemental Recommendation*") to the Board, including an explanation for the then-current recommendation. In the event that the Council is able to reach a GNSO Supermajority Vote on the Supplemental Recommendation, the Board shall adopt the recommendation unless more than two-thirds (2/3) of the Board determines that such policy is not in the interests of the ICANN community or ICANN. For any Supplemental Recommendation approved by less than a GNSO Supermajority Vote, a majority vote of the Board shall be sufficient to determine that the policy in the Supplemental Recommendation is not in the best interest of the ICANN community or ICANN. Anne Aikman-Scalese GNSO Councilor NomCom Non-Voting 2022-2024 anneicanngnso@gmail.com On Tue, Oct 10, 2023 at 10:23 AM DiBiase, Gregory via council < council@gnso.icann.org> wrote:
Dear Councilors,
I’m following up on the email below regarding the working document <https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1a3plNvimEJjpSUhahQPtpJU6BUXBkUKiQruv...> which includes the agendas for the various Council related meetings, such as the GNSO working sessions and joint meetings. I’d like to highlight a couple portions below (but please comment on any section of the document).
First I would like to confirm the single topic suggested by the Council for the joint meeting between the ICANN Board and GNSO Council. The topic is: Preliminary discussion of Board Statement not-adopting certain SubPro recommendations. The Council’s topic(s) must be communicated to the Board by 11 October.
Note, this engagement is expected to serve as at least the first meeting to discuss the Board Statement as required by Annex A, Section 9 (c) of the ICANN Bylaws, referenced in Tripti’s letter <https://gnso.icann.org/sites/default/files/policy/2023/correspondence/sinha-...> to the Council. Holding this meeting would not preclude additional discussion at a later time, as deemed necessary. In order to support this topic, the Council’s SubPro Pending Recommendations small team is concentrating on a working document <https://docs.google.com/document/d/1bumhCtJ1C3PatdsSHsl435Kk11mxGJXQ/edit> that first and foremost, identifies clarifying questions to discuss with the Board. In addition, the working document identifies which of the non-adopted recommendations that the small would like to try and modify in order to address the Board’s concerns, as well as a high-level understanding of what that modification could look like.
The second reason for follow-up is to draw attention to the second GNSO Working Session where the GNSO will meet with staff from the Global Domains and Strategy (GDS) team. While the GDS team will come prepared to provide an update, it will be helpful if Councilors identify questions/comments in advance, in order to better support an active dialogue.
Thanks,
Greg
*From:* council <council-bounces@gnso.icann.org> *On Behalf Of *Steve Chan via council *Sent:* Wednesday, October 4, 2023 4:51 PM *To:* council@gnso.icann.org *Subject:* [EXTERNAL] [council] GNSO Council related meetings at ICANN78
*CAUTION*: This email originated from outside of the organization. Do not click links or open attachments unless you can confirm the sender and know the content is safe.
Dear Councilors,
For your planning purposes, please find this working document <https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1a3plNvimEJjpSUhahQPtpJU6BUXBkUKiQruv...> which includes the agendas for the various Council related meetings, such as the GNSO working sessions and joint meetings. In particular, I’d like to draw your attention to the tab for the GNSO Council/Board session which currently has one potential topic for the Council to suggest, and one Board proposed topic. The deadline to communicate topics for that Board/Council session is 11 October.
The other quick comment is that the latest and greatest Council/GAC proposed agenda is included. Jeff, apologies for potentially stealing your thunder!
If you have any questions or comments on any of the agendas, please share them on this list. And for the Council/Board session, please also consider whether additional topics are needed for the 60 minute session.
Best,
Steve
*Steven Chan*
VP, Policy Development Support & GNSO Relations
Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN)
12025 Waterfront Drive, Suite 300
Los Angeles, CA 90094-2536
Email: steve.chan@icann.org
Skype: steve.chan55
Mobile: +1.310.339.4410
Find out more about the GNSO by visiting: https://learn.icann.org/ <https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__learn.icann.org_&d=DwMG...>
Follow @GNSO on Twitter: https://twitter.com/ICANN_GNSO <https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__twitter.com_ICANN-5FGNS...>
Transcripts and recordings of GNSO Working Group and Council events are located on the GNSO Master Calendar <https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__gnso.icann.org_en_group...> _______________________________________________ council mailing list council@gnso.icann.org https://mm.icann.org/mailman/listinfo/council
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Hi Anne, I think our Council discussion on SubPro on the last call where we got our instructions to keep working counts as reviewing the non-adoption statement. The next step vis-à-vis Council and Board is discussing that with the Board in Hamburg. So, while I have no problem taking time, if we have it, to refresh the Council on where we are with the non-adopted Recommendations, I don’t think we’ve skipped any steps. Hope this helps. Best, Paul From: council <council-bounces@gnso.icann.org> On Behalf Of Anne ICANN via council Sent: Wednesday, October 11, 2023 6:38 PM To: DiBiase, Gregory <dibiase@amazon.com> Cc: gnso-secs@icann.org; COUNCIL@GNSO.ICANN.ORG Subject: Re: [council] Follow up on GNSO Council related meetings at ICANN78 Thanks Greg. Regarding the discussion with the Board re the non-adoption of certain Sub Pro Final Report Recommendations, I am pasting below the relevant section of Annex A Section 9 of the ByLaws for easy reference by Council members. Please note that this step appears to invoke the Supplemental Recommendation process under 9 d. below. As we understand it within the small team, this does not foreclose a recommendation from the small team to the Council to pursue the Section 16 process as to any particular non-adopted Recommendation. For example, within the small team, no particular conclusion has been drawn as to which of these processes (Supplemental Recommendation or Section 16 process) should be applied to the rejection by the Board of Recommendation 17.2 regarding Applicant Support. Clearly the Board has requested the consultation that is planned for the meeting in Hamburg. Given that Tripti's letter to Council is dated October 5, I think Council has not yet reviewed and discussed the Board's letter as set forth in 9.c. below. Nevertheless, it seems appropriate to take advantage of the in-person meeting with the Board. In this regard, I hope we will add to the GNSO Council working sessions a discussion of the Board's non-adoption statement so that we are closely following 9 c. below. As I understand it, the small team will be trying to develop a recommendation, in its meeting this coming Monday, as to how to address invitations to the wider community for input into the non-adopted Recommendations. In this regard, it strikes me that the Supplemental Recommendation process may be appropriate for most of the non-adopted Recommendations, but again, as far as I know, there has been no consensus as yet within the small team regarding the process to be recommended to Council in each case. Hopefully this will be resolved in the Small Team meeting on Monday and brought to a Council working session in Hamburg on the non-adopted Recommendations. Thank you, Anne Section 9. Board Approval Processes The Board will meet to discuss the GNSO Council recommendation as soon as feasible, but preferably not later than the second meeting after receipt of the Board Report from the Staff Manager. Board deliberation on the PDP Recommendations contained within the Recommendations Report shall proceed as follows: a. Any PDP Recommendations approved by a GNSO Supermajority Vote shall be adopted by the Board unless, by a vote of more than two-thirds (2/3) of the Board, the Board determines that such policy is not in the best interests of the ICANN community or ICANN. If the GNSO Council recommendation was approved by less than a GNSO Supermajority Vote, a majority vote of the Board will be sufficient to determine that such policy is not in the best interests of the ICANN community or ICANN. b. In the event that the Board determines, in accordance with paragraph a above, that the policy recommended by a GNSO Supermajority Vote or less than a GNSO Supermajority vote is not in the best interests of the ICANN community or ICANN (the Corporation), the Board shall (i) articulate the reasons for its determination in a report to the Council (the "Board Statement"); and (ii) submit the Board Statement to the Council. c. The Council shall review the Board Statement for discussion with the Board as soon as feasible after the Council's receipt of the Board Statement. The Board shall determine the method (e.g., by teleconference, e-mail, or otherwise) by which the Council and Board will discuss the Board Statement. d. At the conclusion of the Council and Board discussions, the Council shall meet to affirm or modify its recommendation, and communicate that conclusion (the "Supplemental Recommendation") to the Board, including an explanation for the then-current recommendation. In the event that the Council is able to reach a GNSO Supermajority Vote on the Supplemental Recommendation, the Board shall adopt the recommendation unless more than two-thirds (2/3) of the Board determines that such policy is not in the interests of the ICANN community or ICANN. For any Supplemental Recommendation approved by less than a GNSO Supermajority Vote, a majority vote of the Board shall be sufficient to determine that the policy in the Supplemental Recommendation is not in the best interest of the ICANN community or ICANN. Anne Aikman-Scalese GNSO Councilor NomCom Non-Voting 2022-2024 anneicanngnso@gmail.com<mailto:anneicanngnso@gmail.com> On Tue, Oct 10, 2023 at 10:23 AM DiBiase, Gregory via council <council@gnso.icann.org<mailto:council@gnso.icann.org>> wrote: Dear Councilors, I’m following up on the email below regarding the working document<https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1a3plNvimEJjpSUhahQPtpJU6BUXBkUKiQruv...> which includes the agendas for the various Council related meetings, such as the GNSO working sessions and joint meetings. I’d like to highlight a couple portions below (but please comment on any section of the document). First I would like to confirm the single topic suggested by the Council for the joint meeting between the ICANN Board and GNSO Council. The topic is: Preliminary discussion of Board Statement not-adopting certain SubPro recommendations. The Council’s topic(s) must be communicated to the Board by 11 October. Note, this engagement is expected to serve as at least the first meeting to discuss the Board Statement as required by Annex A, Section 9 (c) of the ICANN Bylaws, referenced in Tripti’s letter<https://gnso.icann.org/sites/default/files/policy/2023/correspondence/sinha-...> to the Council. Holding this meeting would not preclude additional discussion at a later time, as deemed necessary. In order to support this topic, the Council’s SubPro Pending Recommendations small team is concentrating on a working document<https://docs.google.com/document/d/1bumhCtJ1C3PatdsSHsl435Kk11mxGJXQ/edit> that first and foremost, identifies clarifying questions to discuss with the Board. In addition, the working document identifies which of the non-adopted recommendations that the small would like to try and modify in order to address the Board’s concerns, as well as a high-level understanding of what that modification could look like. The second reason for follow-up is to draw attention to the second GNSO Working Session where the GNSO will meet with staff from the Global Domains and Strategy (GDS) team. While the GDS team will come prepared to provide an update, it will be helpful if Councilors identify questions/comments in advance, in order to better support an active dialogue. Thanks, Greg From: council <council-bounces@gnso.icann.org<mailto:council-bounces@gnso.icann.org>> On Behalf Of Steve Chan via council Sent: Wednesday, October 4, 2023 4:51 PM To: council@gnso.icann.org<mailto:council@gnso.icann.org> Subject: [EXTERNAL] [council] GNSO Council related meetings at ICANN78 CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the organization. Do not click links or open attachments unless you can confirm the sender and know the content is safe. Dear Councilors, For your planning purposes, please find this working document<https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1a3plNvimEJjpSUhahQPtpJU6BUXBkUKiQruv...> which includes the agendas for the various Council related meetings, such as the GNSO working sessions and joint meetings. In particular, I’d like to draw your attention to the tab for the GNSO Council/Board session which currently has one potential topic for the Council to suggest, and one Board proposed topic. The deadline to communicate topics for that Board/Council session is 11 October. The other quick comment is that the latest and greatest Council/GAC proposed agenda is included. Jeff, apologies for potentially stealing your thunder! If you have any questions or comments on any of the agendas, please share them on this list. And for the Council/Board session, please also consider whether additional topics are needed for the 60 minute session. Best, Steve Steven Chan VP, Policy Development Support & GNSO Relations Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) 12025 Waterfront Drive, Suite 300 Los Angeles, CA 90094-2536 Email: steve.chan@icann.org<mailto:steve.chan@icann.org> Skype: steve.chan55 Mobile: +1.310.339.4410 Find out more about the GNSO by visiting: https://learn.icann.org/<https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__learn.icann.org_&d=DwMGaQ&c=FmY1u3PJp6wrcrwll3mSVzgfkbPSS6sJms7xcl4I5cM&r=DRa2dXAvSFpCIgmkXhFzL7ar9Qfqa0AIgn-H4xR2EBk&m=jLNFXvpu9gNdUeHi-G6sjWNCF9w4_AwhzzUDFZy2elE&s=o7Auz997kA-HPv9PHJCjFVZw7Pgo8krw4MxfqCwBrIU&e=> Follow @GNSO on Twitter: https://twitter.com/ICANN_GNSO<https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__twitter.com_ICANN-5FGNSO&d=DwMGaQ&c=FmY1u3PJp6wrcrwll3mSVzgfkbPSS6sJms7xcl4I5cM&r=DRa2dXAvSFpCIgmkXhFzL7ar9Qfqa0AIgn-H4xR2EBk&m=jLNFXvpu9gNdUeHi-G6sjWNCF9w4_AwhzzUDFZy2elE&s=kWw4fQPNjw2lVKy1UjTxS2F0BmjEAzaDFWNmsYywbmE&e=> Transcripts and recordings of GNSO Working Group and Council events are located on the GNSO Master Calendar <https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__gnso.icann.org_en_group...> _______________________________________________ council mailing list council@gnso.icann.org<mailto:council@gnso.icann.org> https://mm.icann.org/mailman/listinfo/council _______________________________________________ By submitting your personal data, you consent to the processing of your personal data for purposes of subscribing to this mailing list accordance with the ICANN Privacy Policy (https://www.icann.org/privacy/policy) and the website Terms of Service (https://www.icann.org/privacy/tos). You can visit the Mailman link above to change your membership status or configuration, including unsubscribing, setting digest-style delivery or disabling delivery altogether (e.g., for a vacation), and so on. This email originated from outside the firm. Please use caution.
Dear Council Colleagues, I wanted to suggest an additional topic during our meeting with the Board: The Next Round Date. I have raised concerns immediately after the publication of the Tripti Sinha’s 1 August blog on behalf of the Board regarding the aspirational April 2026 target. In my view, as I shared it privately with Becky Burr and Matthew Shears as our Board appointed members within a day or two of the publication, this does not constitute a firm date and is very likely to end up being a goal post that will slip. Firm dates not only mark clear goals but trigger reactions such as additional efforts and funds when deemed to be at risk of missing; aspirational targets don’t, they get missed and rescheduled. I note here the private nature of this exchange, I was at the time still hopeful that this was not the Announcement of a Date I was told we would have prior to Hamburg, and I wanted to make sure I was leaving all the room needed not to botch the announcement. As time goes, the likelihood of a more precise date is evaporating. The same point was made last month in our Leadership call with Sally Costerton and in fact took our entire conversation. There were admittedly concerns raised, but our point was confirmed to be clearly undertood. I won’t dwell too much on the fact that to me April is too late as it will run the 12-15 weeks Application Phase into the summer. The point has been made before, including to Sally, Becky and Matthew in our exchanges. I will note – and admittedly I still need to go through this week’s transcripts for accuracy – that on a number of occasions I have heard in Staff presentations hints that April 2026 is already slipping into June 2026. “Q2 2026” is still the expression used, but we are talking in 2-3 cases of activities to happen in late 2025 or early 2026 quoting them as “6 months before the launch”. I would like for Council to be able to express both its understanding of the complexity of the task ahead and the difficulty to commit this far ahead to a date, and the imperative necessity to do so early to allow the rest of the world to plan for a Next Round with the confidence that is will now happen in the next 3 years. Kindly, Sebastien Ducos GoDaddy Registry | Senior Client Services Manager [signature_2437175996] +33612284445 France & Australia sebastien@registry.godaddy<mailto:sebastien@registry.godaddy> From: council <council-bounces@gnso.icann.org> on behalf of DiBiase, Gregory via council <COUNCIL@gnso.icann.org> Date: Tuesday, 10 October 2023 at 7:25 pm To: COUNCIL@GNSO.ICANN.ORG <COUNCIL@gnso.icann.org> Cc: gnso-secs@icann.org <gnso-secs@icann.org> Subject: [council] Follow up on GNSO Council related meetings at ICANN78 Caution: This email is from an external sender. Please do not click links or open attachments unless you recognize the sender and know the content is safe. Forward suspicious emails to isitbad@. Dear Councilors, I’m following up on the email below regarding the working document<https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1a3plNvimEJjpSUhahQPtpJU6BUXBkUKiQruv...> which includes the agendas for the various Council related meetings, such as the GNSO working sessions and joint meetings. I’d like to highlight a couple portions below (but please comment on any section of the document). First I would like to confirm the single topic suggested by the Council for the joint meeting between the ICANN Board and GNSO Council. The topic is: Preliminary discussion of Board Statement not-adopting certain SubPro recommendations. The Council’s topic(s) must be communicated to the Board by 11 October. Note, this engagement is expected to serve as at least the first meeting to discuss the Board Statement as required by Annex A, Section 9 (c) of the ICANN Bylaws, referenced in Tripti’s letter<https://gnso.icann.org/sites/default/files/policy/2023/correspondence/sinha-...> to the Council. Holding this meeting would not preclude additional discussion at a later time, as deemed necessary. In order to support this topic, the Council’s SubPro Pending Recommendations small team is concentrating on a working document<https://docs.google.com/document/d/1bumhCtJ1C3PatdsSHsl435Kk11mxGJXQ/edit> that first and foremost, identifies clarifying questions to discuss with the Board. In addition, the working document identifies which of the non-adopted recommendations that the small would like to try and modify in order to address the Board’s concerns, as well as a high-level understanding of what that modification could look like. The second reason for follow-up is to draw attention to the second GNSO Working Session where the GNSO will meet with staff from the Global Domains and Strategy (GDS) team. While the GDS team will come prepared to provide an update, it will be helpful if Councilors identify questions/comments in advance, in order to better support an active dialogue. Thanks, Greg From: council <council-bounces@gnso.icann.org> On Behalf Of Steve Chan via council Sent: Wednesday, October 4, 2023 4:51 PM To: council@gnso.icann.org Subject: [EXTERNAL] [council] GNSO Council related meetings at ICANN78 CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the organization. Do not click links or open attachments unless you can confirm the sender and know the content is safe. Dear Councilors, For your planning purposes, please find this working document<https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1a3plNvimEJjpSUhahQPtpJU6BUXBkUKiQruv...> which includes the agendas for the various Council related meetings, such as the GNSO working sessions and joint meetings. In particular, I’d like to draw your attention to the tab for the GNSO Council/Board session which currently has one potential topic for the Council to suggest, and one Board proposed topic. The deadline to communicate topics for that Board/Council session is 11 October. The other quick comment is that the latest and greatest Council/GAC proposed agenda is included. Jeff, apologies for potentially stealing your thunder! If you have any questions or comments on any of the agendas, please share them on this list. And for the Council/Board session, please also consider whether additional topics are needed for the 60 minute session. Best, Steve Steven Chan VP, Policy Development Support & GNSO Relations Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) 12025 Waterfront Drive, Suite 300 Los Angeles, CA 90094-2536 Email: steve.chan@icann.org<mailto:steve.chan@icann.org> Skype: steve.chan55 Mobile: +1.310.339.4410 Find out more about the GNSO by visiting: https://learn.icann.org/<https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__learn.icann.org_&d=DwMGaQ&c=FmY1u3PJp6wrcrwll3mSVzgfkbPSS6sJms7xcl4I5cM&r=DRa2dXAvSFpCIgmkXhFzL7ar9Qfqa0AIgn-H4xR2EBk&m=jLNFXvpu9gNdUeHi-G6sjWNCF9w4_AwhzzUDFZy2elE&s=o7Auz997kA-HPv9PHJCjFVZw7Pgo8krw4MxfqCwBrIU&e=> Follow @GNSO on Twitter: https://twitter.com/ICANN_GNSO<https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__twitter.com_ICANN-5FGNSO&d=DwMGaQ&c=FmY1u3PJp6wrcrwll3mSVzgfkbPSS6sJms7xcl4I5cM&r=DRa2dXAvSFpCIgmkXhFzL7ar9Qfqa0AIgn-H4xR2EBk&m=jLNFXvpu9gNdUeHi-G6sjWNCF9w4_AwhzzUDFZy2elE&s=kWw4fQPNjw2lVKy1UjTxS2F0BmjEAzaDFWNmsYywbmE&e=> Transcripts and recordings of GNSO Working Group and Council events are located on the GNSO Master Calendar <https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__gnso.icann.org_en_group...>
Thanks for circulating, Greg. All I note that we are meeting with the ALAC on Saturday, and that they wish to discuss diacritic characters/Quebec, including what the Council’s view is and “How does the Council plan to address the issue(s)” https://community.icann.org/display/atlarge/At-Large+Meetings+-+Saturday%2C+... The timing of this meeting on Saturday seems a little unfortunate, since I don’t believe Council yet has a clearly formulated and agreed view, nor have we agreed on next steps – this is not on our agenda for discussion until Wednesday. Hopefully, the meeting with the ALAC can be an opportunity to understand their position on this, and discuss possible options, since we aren’t in a position to make any commitments on what happens next – if anything. On the substantive issue, having reviewed the agenda item for Wednesday and had more opportunity to reflect on this, I am not altogether convinced that there is a problem to be solved here. * The role of the IDN EPDP is to set the rules for equivalent IDN variants, including considering same applicant provisions at both the top and second level. What is considered a variant had been determined by the relevant LGR. Although some accented characters in ASCII script have been determined to be variants by the LGR, the accented characters in issue here have not been determined not to be variants. The special IDN rules that are being developed therefore do not apply. * This therefore becomes a string similarity issue: are the strings with and without diacritic characters confusingly similar or not? The same issue arises across languages, whether one is talking about a word that is spelled similarly, e.g., the addition of an “s” in the French compared to the English, or whether one language uses an accented character and another does not. If the strings are held to be similar, following String Similarity Evaluation, then, if applied for in the same round, both go into a contention set, or, if applied for in different rounds, the later is blocked by the prior application. Just because a string is unavailable for delegation does not make it an “issue to be solved”, it is the string similarity rules working as they were designed to, in order to safeguard the public. Why do we propose now creating a separate set of rules to end-round a potential determination that it is unsafe to delegate confusingly similar strings, just because there is an accent involved? * If the strings are considered by the SSE panel NOT to be similar, then they can both go forward. In the case of the specific dot Québec example, to whom this string is delegated is then subject to further rules since Quebec is a geographic name as determined by Work Track 5, requiring governmental consent/non-objection. No-one can have that string delegated to them without the necessary support. It is also worth noting that we discussed diacritical characters in WT5 and did not make recommendations, so this is not an issue which was simply overlooked. * The same string similarity issue also arises more generally for ALL applicants: the first mover gets an advantage and blocks identical or confusingly similar strings that come later. A next round applicant might want .cat for their cat-lovers community, for example. They cannot have it because .cat has already been delegated to the Catalan community. All potential applicants understand that they cannot necessarily have their first-choice string just because they want it, but that an alternative may be an available option for them. * Overall, since this is a string similarity issue, should we not, at least, wait on the development of the planned String Similarity Guidelines before we start talking about committing Org and community resources to even considering creating (probably complex) exceptions to a set of policy rules which have only just been developed through an open-model PDP and are still being implemented? There is a session on the development of the String Similarity Guidelines on Thursday, in fact. Susan Payne Head of Legal Policy Com Laude T +44 (0) 20 7421 8250 Ext 255 [cid:image001.png@01DA02D1.27514970]<https://comlaude.com/> Follow us on Linkedin<https://t-uk.xink.io/Tracking/Index/pRkAAGVfAADw_RQA0> and YouTube<https://t-uk.xink.io/Tracking/Index/bhkAAGVfAADw_RQA0> From: council <council-bounces@gnso.icann.org> On Behalf Of DiBiase, Gregory via council Sent: Tuesday, October 10, 2023 6:23 PM To: COUNCIL@GNSO.ICANN.ORG Cc: gnso-secs@icann.org Subject: [council] Follow up on GNSO Council related meetings at ICANN78 Dear Councilors, I’m following up on the email below regarding the working document<https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1a3plNvimEJjpSUhahQPtpJU6BUXBkUKiQruv...> which includes the agendas for the various Council related meetings, such as the GNSO working sessions and joint meetings. I’d like to highlight a couple portions below (but please comment on any section of the document). First I would like to confirm the single topic suggested by the Council for the joint meeting between the ICANN Board and GNSO Council. The topic is: Preliminary discussion of Board Statement not-adopting certain SubPro recommendations. The Council’s topic(s) must be communicated to the Board by 11 October. Note, this engagement is expected to serve as at least the first meeting to discuss the Board Statement as required by Annex A, Section 9 (c) of the ICANN Bylaws, referenced in Tripti’s letter<https://gnso.icann.org/sites/default/files/policy/2023/correspondence/sinha-...> to the Council. Holding this meeting would not preclude additional discussion at a later time, as deemed necessary. In order to support this topic, the Council’s SubPro Pending Recommendations small team is concentrating on a working document<https://docs.google.com/document/d/1bumhCtJ1C3PatdsSHsl435Kk11mxGJXQ/edit> that first and foremost, identifies clarifying questions to discuss with the Board. In addition, the working document identifies which of the non-adopted recommendations that the small would like to try and modify in order to address the Board’s concerns, as well as a high-level understanding of what that modification could look like. The second reason for follow-up is to draw attention to the second GNSO Working Session where the GNSO will meet with staff from the Global Domains and Strategy (GDS) team. While the GDS team will come prepared to provide an update, it will be helpful if Councilors identify questions/comments in advance, in order to better support an active dialogue. Thanks, Greg From: council <council-bounces@gnso.icann.org<mailto:council-bounces@gnso.icann.org>> On Behalf Of Steve Chan via council Sent: Wednesday, October 4, 2023 4:51 PM To: council@gnso.icann.org<mailto:council@gnso.icann.org> Subject: [EXTERNAL] [council] GNSO Council related meetings at ICANN78 CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the organization. Do not click links or open attachments unless you can confirm the sender and know the content is safe. Dear Councilors, For your planning purposes, please find this working document<https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1a3plNvimEJjpSUhahQPtpJU6BUXBkUKiQruv...> which includes the agendas for the various Council related meetings, such as the GNSO working sessions and joint meetings. In particular, I’d like to draw your attention to the tab for the GNSO Council/Board session which currently has one potential topic for the Council to suggest, and one Board proposed topic. The deadline to communicate topics for that Board/Council session is 11 October. The other quick comment is that the latest and greatest Council/GAC proposed agenda is included. Jeff, apologies for potentially stealing your thunder! If you have any questions or comments on any of the agendas, please share them on this list. And for the Council/Board session, please also consider whether additional topics are needed for the 60 minute session. Best, Steve Steven Chan VP, Policy Development Support & GNSO Relations Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) 12025 Waterfront Drive, Suite 300 Los Angeles, CA 90094-2536 Email: steve.chan@icann.org<mailto:steve.chan@icann.org> Skype: steve.chan55 Mobile: +1.310.339.4410 Find out more about the GNSO by visiting: https://learn.icann.org/<https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__learn.icann.org_&d=DwMGaQ&c=FmY1u3PJp6wrcrwll3mSVzgfkbPSS6sJms7xcl4I5cM&r=DRa2dXAvSFpCIgmkXhFzL7ar9Qfqa0AIgn-H4xR2EBk&m=jLNFXvpu9gNdUeHi-G6sjWNCF9w4_AwhzzUDFZy2elE&s=o7Auz997kA-HPv9PHJCjFVZw7Pgo8krw4MxfqCwBrIU&e=> Follow @GNSO on Twitter: https://twitter.com/ICANN_GNSO<https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__twitter.com_ICANN-5FGNSO&d=DwMGaQ&c=FmY1u3PJp6wrcrwll3mSVzgfkbPSS6sJms7xcl4I5cM&r=DRa2dXAvSFpCIgmkXhFzL7ar9Qfqa0AIgn-H4xR2EBk&m=jLNFXvpu9gNdUeHi-G6sjWNCF9w4_AwhzzUDFZy2elE&s=kWw4fQPNjw2lVKy1UjTxS2F0BmjEAzaDFWNmsYywbmE&e=> Transcripts and recordings of GNSO Working Group and Council events are located on the GNSO Master Calendar <https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__gnso.icann.org_en_group...> ________________________________ The contents of this email and any attachments are confidential to the intended recipient. They may not be disclosed, used by or copied in any way by anyone other than the intended recipient. If you have received this message in error, please return it to the sender (deleting the body of the email and attachments in your reply) and immediately and permanently delete it. Please note that Com Laude Group Limited (the “Com Laude Group”) does not accept any responsibility for viruses and it is your responsibility to scan or otherwise check this email and any attachments. The Com Laude Group does not accept liability for statements which are clearly the sender's own and not made on behalf of the group or one of its member entities. The Com Laude Group is a limited company registered in England and Wales with company number 10689074 and registered office at 28-30 Little Russell Street, London, WC1A 2HN England. The Com Laude Group includes Nom-IQ Limited t/a Com Laude, a company registered in England and Wales with company number 5047655 and registered office at 28-30 Little Russell Street, London, WC1A 2HN England; Valideus Limited, a company registered in England and Wales with company number 6181291 and registered office at 28-30 Little Russell Street, London, WC1A 2HN England; Demys Limited, a company registered in Scotland with company number SC197176 and registered office at 15 William Street, South West Lane, Edinburgh, EH3 7LL Scotland; Consonum, Inc. dba Com Laude USA and Valideus USA, a corporation incorporated in the State of Washington and principal office address at Suite 332, Securities Building, 1904 Third Ave, Seattle, WA 98101; Com Laude (Japan) Corporation, a company registered in Japan with company number 0100-01-190853 and registered office at 1-3-21 Shinkawa, Chuo-ku, Tokyo, 104-0033, Japan; Com Laude Domain ESP S.L.U., a company registered in Spain and registered office address at Calle Barcas 2, 2, Valencia, 46002, Spain. For further information see www.comlaude.com<https://comlaude.com/>
Susan, I went back to the list of geoTLDs from the last round, and ".quebec" is in a unique situation, to be honest. Other strings that might have fallen into the same pattern ended up making choices that steered them away from the ssue, case in point being ".koeln", which is a corruption of "köln". We know from Universal Acceptance that the German people are used to the replacements for their accents and Eszett, so it makes sense the applicants would proceed in this way. We can also assume that deliberate choices were made by applicants in the transliteration of Sino-Tibetan and Japonic languages into Latin. As far as the limits of my knowledge go, this leaves ".quebec" alone in having made it all the way to delegation while there still being a very clear variant contained within the string and being unadressed, which is pretty vexing. In that sense, this seems to be more of a leftover case that we need to tackle than necessarily an entirely different process. Best, --- Mark W. Datysgeld Director at Governance Primer ICANN GNSO Councilor ________________________________ From: Susan Payne via council <council@gnso.icann.org> Sent: Thursday, October 19, 2023 23:01 To: COUNCIL@GNSO.ICANN.ORG Cc: gnso-secs@icann.org Subject: [council] Meeting with ALAC and Diacritic Characters
Thanks for circulating, Greg. All I note that we are meeting with the ALAC on Saturday, and that they wish to discuss diacritic characters/Quebec, including what the Council’s view is and “How does the Council plan to address the issue(s)” https://community.icann.org/display/atlarge/At-Large+Meetings+-+Saturday%2C+... The timing of this meeting on Saturday seems a little unfortunate, since I don’t believe Council yet has a clearly formulated and agreed view, nor have we agreed on next steps – this is not on our agenda for discussion until Wednesday. Hopefully, the meeting with the ALAC can be an opportunity to understand their position on this, and discuss possible options, since we aren’t in a position to make any commitments on what happens next – if anything. On the substantive issue, having reviewed the agenda item for Wednesday and had more opportunity to reflect on this, I am not altogether convinced that there is a problem to be solved here. The role of the IDN EPDP is to set the rules for equivalent IDN variants, including considering same applicant provisions at both the top and second level. What is considered a variant had been determined by the relevant LGR. Although some accented characters in ASCII script have been determined to be variants by the LGR, the accented characters in issue here have not been determined not to be variants. The special IDN rules that are being developed therefore do not apply. This therefore becomes a string similarity issue: are the strings with and without diacritic characters confusingly similar or not? The same issue arises across languages, whether one is talking about a word that is spelled similarly, e.g., the addition of an “s” in the French compared to the English, or whether one language uses an accented character and another does not. If the strings are held to be similar, following String Similarity Evaluation, then, if applied for in the same round, both go into a contention set, or, if applied for in different rounds, the later is blocked by the prior application. Just because a string is unavailable for delegation does not make it an “issue to be solved”, it is the string similarity rules working as they were designed to, in order to safeguard the public. Why do we propose now creating a separate set of rules to end-round a potential determination that it is unsafe to delegate confusingly similar strings, just because there is an accent involved? If the strings are considered by the SSE panel NOT to be similar, then they can both go forward. In the case of the specific dot Québec example, to whom this string is delegated is then subject to further rules since Quebec is a geographic name as determined by Work Track 5, requiring governmental consent/non-objection. No-one can have that string delegated to them without the necessary support. It is also worth noting that we discussed diacritical characters in WT5 and did not make recommendations, so this is not an issue which was simply overlooked. The same string similarity issue also arises more generally for ALL applicants: the first mover gets an advantage and blocks identical or confusingly similar strings that come later. A next round applicant might want .cat for their cat-lovers community, for example. They cannot have it because .cat has already been delegated to the Catalan community. All potential applicants understand that they cannot necessarily have their first-choice string just because they want it, but that an alternative may be an available option for them. Overall, since this is a string similarity issue, should we not, at least, wait on the development of the planned String Similarity Guidelines before we start talking about committing Org and community resources to even considering creating (probably complex) exceptions to a set of policy rules which have only just been developed through an open-model PDP and are still being implemented? There is a session on the development of the String Similarity Guidelines on Thursday, in fact. Susan Payne Head of Legal Policy Com Laude T +44 (0) 20 7421 8250 Ext 255
Follow us on Linkedin and YouTube From: council <council-bounces@gnso.icann.org> On Behalf Of DiBiase, Gregory via council Sent: Tuesday, October 10, 2023 6:23 PM To: COUNCIL@GNSO.ICANN.ORG Cc: gnso-secs@icann.org Subject: [council] Follow up on GNSO Council related meetings at ICANN78 Dear Councilors, I’m following up on the email below regarding the working document which includes the agendas for the various Council related meetings, such as the GNSO working sessions and joint meetings. I’d like to highlight a couple portions below (but please comment on any section of the document). First I would like to confirm the single topic suggested by the Council for the joint meeting between the ICANN Board and GNSO Council. The topic is: Preliminary discussion of Board Statement not-adopting certain SubPro recommendations. The Council’s topic(s) must be communicated to the Board by 11 October. Note, this engagement is expected to serve as at least the first meeting to discuss the Board Statement as required by Annex A, Section 9 (c) of the ICANN Bylaws, referenced in Tripti’s letter to the Council. Holding this meeting would not preclude additional discussion at a later time, as deemed necessary. In order to support this topic, the Council’s SubPro Pending Recommendations small team is concentrating on a working document that first and foremost, identifies clarifying questions to discuss with the Board. In addition, the working document identifies which of the non-adopted recommendations that the small would like to try and modify in order to address the Board’s concerns, as well as a high-level understanding of what that modification could look like. The second reason for follow-up is to draw attention to the second GNSO Working Session where the GNSO will meet with staff from the Global Domains and Strategy (GDS) team. While the GDS team will come prepared to provide an update, it will be helpful if Councilors identify questions/comments in advance, in order to better support an active dialogue. Thanks, Greg From: council <council-bounces@gnso.icann.org> On Behalf Of Steve Chan via council Sent: Wednesday, October 4, 2023 4:51 PM To: council@gnso.icann.org Subject: [EXTERNAL] [council] GNSO Council related meetings at ICANN78
CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the organization. Do not click links or open attachments unless you can confirm the sender and know the content is safe.
Dear Councilors, For your planning purposes, please find this working document which includes the agendas for the various Council related meetings, such as the GNSO working sessions and joint meetings. In particular, I’d like to draw your attention to the tab for the GNSO Council/Board session which currently has one potential topic for the Council to suggest, and one Board proposed topic. The deadline to communicate topics for that Board/Council session is 11 October. The other quick comment is that the latest and greatest Council/GAC proposed agenda is included. Jeff, apologies for potentially stealing your thunder! If you have any questions or comments on any of the agendas, please share them on this list. And for the Council/Board session, please also consider whether additional topics are needed for the 60 minute session. Best, Steve Steven Chan VP, Policy Development Support & GNSO Relations Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) 12025 Waterfront Drive, Suite 300 Los Angeles, CA 90094-2536 Email: steve.chan@icann.org Skype: steve.chan55 Mobile: +1.310.339.4410 Find out more about the GNSO by visiting: https://learn.icann.org/ Follow @GNSO on Twitter: https://twitter.com/ICANN_GNSO Transcripts and recordings of GNSO Working Group and Council events are located on the GNSO Master Calendar ________________________________ The contents of this email and any attachments are confidential to the intended recipient. They may not be disclosed, used by or copied in any way by anyone other than the intended recipient. If you have received this message in error, please return it to the sender (deleting the body of the email and attachments in your reply) and immediately and permanently delete it. Please note that Com Laude Group Limited (the “Com Laude Group”) does not accept any responsibility for viruses and it is your responsibility to scan or otherwise check this email and any attachments. The Com Laude Group does not accept liability for statements which are clearly the sender's own and not made on behalf of the group or one of its member entities. The Com Laude Group is a limited company registered in England and Wales with company number 10689074 and registered office at 28-30 Little Russell Street, London, WC1A 2HN England. The Com Laude Group includes Nom-IQ Limited t/a Com Laude, a company registered in England and Wales with company number 5047655 and registered office at 28-30 Little Russell Street, London, WC1A 2HN England; Valideus Limited, a company registered in England and Wales with company number 6181291 and registered office at 28-30 Little Russell Street, London, WC1A 2HN England; Demys Limited, a company registered in Scotland with company number SC197176 and registered office at 15 William Street, South West Lane, Edinburgh, EH3 7LL Scotland; Consonum, Inc. dba Com Laude USA and Valideus USA, a corporation incorporated in the State of Washington and principal office address at Suite 332, Securities Building, 1904 Third Ave, Seattle, WA 98101; Com Laude (Japan) Corporation, a company registered in Japan with company number 0100-01-190853 and registered office at 1-3-21 Shinkawa, Chuo-ku, Tokyo, 104-0033, Japan; Com Laude Domain ESP S.L.U., a company registered in Spain and registered office address at Calle Barcas 2, 2, Valencia, 46002, Spain. For further information see www.comlaude.com
(I am not bringing Simplified vs. Traditional Chinese characters into this discussion because that should be the realm of the IDN PDP). --- Mark W. Datysgeld Director at Governance Primer ICANN GNSO Councilor ________________________________ From: "Mark W. Datysgeld via council" <council@gnso.icann.org> Sent: Friday, October 20, 2023 06:14 To: Susan Payne; COUNCIL@GNSO.ICANN.ORG Cc: gnso-secs@icann.org Subject: Re: [council] Meeting with ALAC and Diacritic Characters
Susan, I went back to the list of geoTLDs from the last round, and ".quebec" is in a unique situation, to be honest.
Other strings that might have fallen into the same pattern ended up making choices that steered them away from the ssue, case in point being ".koeln", which is a corruption of "köln". We know from Universal Acceptance that the German people are used to the replacements for their accents and Eszett, so it makes sense the applicants would proceed in this way. We can also assume that deliberate choices were made by applicants in the transliteration of Sino-Tibetan and Japonic languages into Latin.
As far as the limits of my knowledge go, this leaves ".quebec" alone in having made it all the way to delegation while there still being a very clear variant contained within the string and being unadressed, which is pretty vexing.
In that sense, this seems to be more of a leftover case that we need to tackle than necessarily an entirely different process.
Best, --- Mark W. Datysgeld Director at Governance Primer ICANN GNSO Councilor
________________________________ From: Susan Payne via council <council@gnso.icann.org> Sent: Thursday, October 19, 2023 23:01 To: COUNCIL@GNSO.ICANN.ORG Cc: gnso-secs@icann.org Subject: [council] Meeting with ALAC and Diacritic Characters
Thanks for circulating, Greg. All I note that we are meeting with the ALAC on Saturday, and that they wish to discuss diacritic characters/Quebec, including what the Council’s view is and “How does the Council plan to address the issue(s)” https://community.icann.org/display/atlarge/At-Large+Meetings+-+Saturday%2C+... The timing of this meeting on Saturday seems a little unfortunate, since I don’t believe Council yet has a clearly formulated and agreed view, nor have we agreed on next steps – this is not on our agenda for discussion until Wednesday. Hopefully, the meeting with the ALAC can be an opportunity to understand their position on this, and discuss possible options, since we aren’t in a position to make any commitments on what happens next – if anything. On the substantive issue, having reviewed the agenda item for Wednesday and had more opportunity to reflect on this, I am not altogether convinced that there is a problem to be solved here. The role of the IDN EPDP is to set the rules for equivalent IDN variants, including considering same applicant provisions at both the top and second level. What is considered a variant had been determined by the relevant LGR. Although some accented characters in ASCII script have been determined to be variants by the LGR, the accented characters in issue here have not been determined not to be variants. The special IDN rules that are being developed therefore do not apply. This therefore becomes a string similarity issue: are the strings with and without diacritic characters confusingly similar or not? The same issue arises across languages, whether one is talking about a word that is spelled similarly, e.g., the addition of an “s” in the French compared to the English, or whether one language uses an accented character and another does not. If the strings are held to be similar, following String Similarity Evaluation, then, if applied for in the same round, both go into a contention set, or, if applied for in different rounds, the later is blocked by the prior application. Just because a string is unavailable for delegation does not make it an “issue to be solved”, it is the string similarity rules working as they were designed to, in order to safeguard the public. Why do we propose now creating a separate set of rules to end-round a potential determination that it is unsafe to delegate confusingly similar strings, just because there is an accent involved? If the strings are considered by the SSE panel NOT to be similar, then they can both go forward. In the case of the specific dot Québec example, to whom this string is delegated is then subject to further rules since Quebec is a geographic name as determined by Work Track 5, requiring governmental consent/non-objection. No-one can have that string delegated to them without the necessary support. It is also worth noting that we discussed diacritical characters in WT5 and did not make recommendations, so this is not an issue which was simply overlooked. The same string similarity issue also arises more generally for ALL applicants: the first mover gets an advantage and blocks identical or confusingly similar strings that come later. A next round applicant might want .cat for their cat-lovers community, for example. They cannot have it because .cat has already been delegated to the Catalan community. All potential applicants understand that they cannot necessarily have their first-choice string just because they want it, but that an alternative may be an available option for them. Overall, since this is a string similarity issue, should we not, at least, wait on the development of the planned String Similarity Guidelines before we start talking about committing Org and community resources to even considering creating (probably complex) exceptions to a set of policy rules which have only just been developed through an open-model PDP and are still being implemented? There is a session on the development of the String Similarity Guidelines on Thursday, in fact. Susan Payne Head of Legal Policy Com Laude T +44 (0) 20 7421 8250 Ext 255
Follow us on Linkedin and YouTube From: council <council-bounces@gnso.icann.org> On Behalf Of DiBiase, Gregory via council Sent: Tuesday, October 10, 2023 6:23 PM To: COUNCIL@GNSO.ICANN.ORG Cc: gnso-secs@icann.org Subject: [council] Follow up on GNSO Council related meetings at ICANN78 Dear Councilors, I’m following up on the email below regarding the working document which includes the agendas for the various Council related meetings, such as the GNSO working sessions and joint meetings. I’d like to highlight a couple portions below (but please comment on any section of the document). First I would like to confirm the single topic suggested by the Council for the joint meeting between the ICANN Board and GNSO Council. The topic is: Preliminary discussion of Board Statement not-adopting certain SubPro recommendations. The Council’s topic(s) must be communicated to the Board by 11 October. Note, this engagement is expected to serve as at least the first meeting to discuss the Board Statement as required by Annex A, Section 9 (c) of the ICANN Bylaws, referenced in Tripti’s letter to the Council. Holding this meeting would not preclude additional discussion at a later time, as deemed necessary. In order to support this topic, the Council’s SubPro Pending Recommendations small team is concentrating on a working document that first and foremost, identifies clarifying questions to discuss with the Board. In addition, the working document identifies which of the non-adopted recommendations that the small would like to try and modify in order to address the Board’s concerns, as well as a high-level understanding of what that modification could look like. The second reason for follow-up is to draw attention to the second GNSO Working Session where the GNSO will meet with staff from the Global Domains and Strategy (GDS) team. While the GDS team will come prepared to provide an update, it will be helpful if Councilors identify questions/comments in advance, in order to better support an active dialogue. Thanks, Greg From: council <council-bounces@gnso.icann.org> On Behalf Of Steve Chan via council Sent: Wednesday, October 4, 2023 4:51 PM To: council@gnso.icann.org Subject: [EXTERNAL] [council] GNSO Council related meetings at ICANN78
CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the organization. Do not click links or open attachments unless you can confirm the sender and know the content is safe.
Dear Councilors, For your planning purposes, please find this working document which includes the agendas for the various Council related meetings, such as the GNSO working sessions and joint meetings. In particular, I’d like to draw your attention to the tab for the GNSO Council/Board session which currently has one potential topic for the Council to suggest, and one Board proposed topic. The deadline to communicate topics for that Board/Council session is 11 October. The other quick comment is that the latest and greatest Council/GAC proposed agenda is included. Jeff, apologies for potentially stealing your thunder! If you have any questions or comments on any of the agendas, please share them on this list. And for the Council/Board session, please also consider whether additional topics are needed for the 60 minute session. Best, Steve Steven Chan VP, Policy Development Support & GNSO Relations Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) 12025 Waterfront Drive, Suite 300 Los Angeles, CA 90094-2536 Email: steve.chan@icann.org Skype: steve.chan55 Mobile: +1.310.339.4410 Find out more about the GNSO by visiting: https://learn.icann.org/ Follow @GNSO on Twitter: https://twitter.com/ICANN_GNSO Transcripts and recordings of GNSO Working Group and Council events are located on the GNSO Master Calendar ________________________________ The contents of this email and any attachments are confidential to the intended recipient. They may not be disclosed, used by or copied in any way by anyone other than the intended recipient. If you have received this message in error, please return it to the sender (deleting the body of the email and attachments in your reply) and immediately and permanently delete it. Please note that Com Laude Group Limited (the “Com Laude Group”) does not accept any responsibility for viruses and it is your responsibility to scan or otherwise check this email and any attachments. The Com Laude Group does not accept liability for statements which are clearly the sender's own and not made on behalf of the group or one of its member entities. The Com Laude Group is a limited company registered in England and Wales with company number 10689074 and registered office at 28-30 Little Russell Street, London, WC1A 2HN England. The Com Laude Group includes Nom-IQ Limited t/a Com Laude, a company registered in England and Wales with company number 5047655 and registered office at 28-30 Little Russell Street, London, WC1A 2HN England; Valideus Limited, a company registered in England and Wales with company number 6181291 and registered office at 28-30 Little Russell Street, London, WC1A 2HN England; Demys Limited, a company registered in Scotland with company number SC197176 and registered office at 15 William Street, South West Lane, Edinburgh, EH3 7LL Scotland; Consonum, Inc. dba Com Laude USA and Valideus USA, a corporation incorporated in the State of Washington and principal office address at Suite 332, Securities Building, 1904 Third Ave, Seattle, WA 98101; Com Laude (Japan) Corporation, a company registered in Japan with company number 0100-01-190853 and registered office at 1-3-21 Shinkawa, Chuo-ku, Tokyo, 104-0033, Japan; Com Laude Domain ESP S.L.U., a company registered in Spain and registered office address at Calle Barcas 2, 2, Valencia, 46002, Spain. For further information see www.comlaude.com
Hi I like the examples Mark provided as it proves that the GNSO can have a separate discussion on .québec perhaps after Wednesday String Similarity Guidelines. The LGR rules have left us with a challenge by saying there are no variants in Latin alphabets, an oversimplification. Therefore as .Québec is beyond the IDN EPDP problem because it is not a variant. However, the GNSO Council will have to address this and future cases of String Similarity and it is important to recognise that String Similarity does not necessarily have to create a confusion in user's mind. We need to have a policy tool box to cater for those as well. Some examples of those are .ong and .ngo and few other gTLDs in Cyrillic language for example. Also agree with Susan that we should listen to ALAC's views to start with. Desiree -- Desiree -- Sent with [Proton Mail](https://proton.me/) secure email. ------- Original Message ------- On Friday, October 20th, 2023 at 06:14, Mark W. Datysgeld via council <council@gnso.icann.org> wrote:
Susan, I went back to the list of geoTLDs from the last round, and ".quebec" is in a unique situation, to be honest.
Other strings that might have fallen into the same pattern ended up making choices that steered them away from the ssue, case in point being ".koeln", which is a corruption of "köln". We know from Universal Acceptance that the German people are used to the replacements for their accents and Eszett, so it makes sense the applicants would proceed in this way. We can also assume that deliberate choices were made by applicants in the transliteration of Sino-Tibetan and Japonic languages into Latin.
As far as the limits of my knowledge go, this leaves ".quebec" alone in having made it all the way to delegation while there still being a very clear variant contained within the string and being unadressed, which is pretty vexing.
In that sense, this seems to be more of a leftover case that we need to tackle than necessarily an entirely different process.
Best, --- Mark W. Datysgeld Director at Governance Primer ICANN GNSO Councilor
---------------------------------------------------------------
From: Susan Payne via council <council@gnso.icann.org> Sent: Thursday, October 19, 2023 23:01 To: COUNCIL@GNSO.ICANN.ORG Cc: gnso-secs@icann.org Subject: [council] Meeting with ALAC and Diacritic Characters
Thanks for circulating, Greg.
All I note that we are meeting with the ALAC on Saturday, and that they wish to discuss diacritic characters/Quebec, including what the Council’s view is and “How does the Council plan to address the issue(s)” https://community.icann.org/display/atlarge/At-Large+Meetings+-+Saturday%2C+...
The timing of this meeting on Saturday seems a little unfortunate, since I don’t believe Council yet has a clearly formulated and agreed view, nor have we agreed on next steps – this is not on our agenda for discussion until Wednesday. Hopefully, the meeting with the ALAC can be an opportunity to understand their position on this, and discuss possible options, since we aren’t in a position to make any commitments on what happens next – if anything.
On the substantive issue, having reviewed the agenda item for Wednesday and had more opportunity to reflect on this, I am not altogether convinced that there is a problem to be solved here.
- The role of the IDN EPDP is to set the rules for equivalent IDN variants, including considering same applicant provisions at both the top and second level. What is considered a variant had been determined by the relevant LGR. Although some accented characters in ASCII script have been determined to be variants by the LGR, the accented characters in issue here have not been determined not to be variants. The special IDN rules that are being developed therefore do not apply. - This therefore becomes a string similarity issue: are the strings with and without diacritic characters confusingly similar or not? The same issue arises across languages, whether one is talking about a word that is spelled similarly, e.g., the addition of an “s” in the French compared to the English, or whether one language uses an accented character and another does not. If the strings are held to be similar, following String Similarity Evaluation, then, if applied for in the same round, both go into a contention set, or, if applied for in different rounds, the later is blocked by the prior application. Just because a string is unavailable for delegation does not make it an “issue to be solved”, it is the string similarity rules working as they were designed to, in order to safeguard the public. Why do we propose now creating a separate set of rules to end-round a potential determination that it is unsafe to delegate confusingly similar strings, just because there is an accent involved? - If the strings are considered by the SSE panel NOT to be similar, then they can both go forward. In the case of the specific dot Québec example, to whom this string is delegated is then subject to further rules since Quebec is a geographic name as determined by Work Track 5, requiring governmental consent/non-objection. No-one can have that string delegated to them without the necessary support. It is also worth noting that we discussed diacritical characters in WT5 and did not make recommendations, so this is not an issue which was simply overlooked. - The same string similarity issue also arises more generally for ALL applicants: the first mover gets an advantage and blocks identical or confusingly similar strings that come later. A next round applicant might want .cat for their cat-lovers community, for example. They cannot have it because .cat has already been delegated to the Catalan community. All potential applicants understand that they cannot necessarily have their first-choice string just because they want it, but that an alternative may be an available option for them. - Overall, since this is a string similarity issue, should we not, at least, wait on the development of the planned String Similarity Guidelines before we start talking about committing Org and community resources to even considering creating (probably complex) exceptions to a set of policy rules which have only just been developed through an open-model PDP and are still being implemented? There is a session on the development of the String Similarity Guidelines on Thursday, in fact.
Susan Payne Head of Legal Policy Com LaudeT +44 (0) 20 7421 8250 Ext 255
Follow us on [Linkedin](https://t-uk.xink.io/Tracking/Index/pRkAAGVfAADw_RQA0) and [YouTube](https://t-uk.xink.io/Tracking/Index/bhkAAGVfAADw_RQA0) From: council <council-bounces@gnso.icann.org> On Behalf Of DiBiase, Gregory via council Sent: Tuesday, October 10, 2023 6:23 PM To: COUNCIL@GNSO.ICANN.ORG Cc: gnso-secs@icann.org Subject: [council] Follow up on GNSO Council related meetings at ICANN78
Dear Councilors,
I’m following up on the email below regarding the [working document](https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1a3plNvimEJjpSUhahQPtpJU6BUXBkUKiQruv...) which includes the agendas for the various Council related meetings, such as the GNSO working sessions and joint meetings. I’d like to highlight a couple portions below (but please comment on any section of the document).
First I would like to confirm the single topic suggested by the Council for the joint meeting between the ICANN Board and GNSO Council. The topic is: Preliminary discussion of Board Statement not-adopting certain SubPro recommendations. The Council’s topic(s) must be communicated to the Board by 11 October.
Note, this engagement is expected to serve as at least the first meeting to discuss the Board Statement as required by Annex A, Section 9 (c) of the ICANN Bylaws, referenced in Tripti’s [letter](https://gnso.icann.org/sites/default/files/policy/2023/correspondence/sinha-...) to the Council. Holding this meeting would not preclude additional discussion at a later time, as deemed necessary. In order to support this topic, the Council’s SubPro Pending Recommendations small team is concentrating on a [working document](https://docs.google.com/document/d/1bumhCtJ1C3PatdsSHsl435Kk11mxGJXQ/edit) that first and foremost, identifies clarifying questions to discuss with the Board. In addition, the working document identifies which of the non-adopted recommendations that the small would like to try and modify in order to address the Board’s concerns, as well as a high-level understanding of what that modification could look like.
The second reason for follow-up is to draw attention to the second GNSO Working Session where the GNSO will meet with staff from the Global Domains and Strategy (GDS) team. While the GDS team will come prepared to provide an update, it will be helpful if Councilors identify questions/comments in advance, in order to better support an active dialogue.
Thanks, Greg
From: council <council-bounces@gnso.icann.org> On Behalf Of Steve Chan via council Sent: Wednesday, October 4, 2023 4:51 PM To: council@gnso.icann.org Subject: [EXTERNAL] [council] GNSO Council related meetings at ICANN78
CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the organization. Do not click links or open attachments unless you can confirm the sender and know the content is safe.
Dear Councilors,
For your planning purposes, please find this [working document](https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1a3plNvimEJjpSUhahQPtpJU6BUXBkUKiQruv...) which includes the agendas for the various Council related meetings, such as the GNSO working sessions and joint meetings. In particular, I’d like to draw your attention to the tab for the GNSO Council/Board session which currently has one potential topic for the Council to suggest, and one Board proposed topic. The deadline to communicate topics for that Board/Council session is 11 October.
The other quick comment is that the latest and greatest Council/GAC proposed agenda is included. Jeff, apologies for potentially stealing your thunder!
If you have any questions or comments on any of the agendas, please share them on this list. And for the Council/Board session, please also consider whether additional topics are needed for the 60 minute session.
Best, Steve
Steven Chan VP, Policy Development Support & GNSO Relations
Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) 12025 Waterfront Drive, Suite 300 Los Angeles, CA 90094-2536
Email: steve.chan@icann.org Skype: steve.chan55 Mobile: +1.310.339.4410
Find out more about the GNSO by visiting: [https://learn.icann.org/](https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__learn.icann.org_&d=DwMGaQ&c=FmY1u3PJp6wrcrwll3mSVzgfkbPSS6sJms7xcl4I5cM&r=DRa2dXAvSFpCIgmkXhFzL7ar9Qfqa0AIgn-H4xR2EBk&m=jLNFXvpu9gNdUeHi-G6sjWNCF9w4_AwhzzUDFZy2elE&s=o7Auz997kA-HPv9PHJCjFVZw7Pgo8krw4MxfqCwBrIU&e=) Follow @GNSO on Twitter: [https://twitter.com/ICANN_GNSO](https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__twitter.com_ICANN-5FGNSO&d=DwMGaQ&c=FmY1u3PJp6wrcrwll3mSVzgfkbPSS6sJms7xcl4I5cM&r=DRa2dXAvSFpCIgmkXhFzL7ar9Qfqa0AIgn-H4xR2EBk&m=jLNFXvpu9gNdUeHi-G6sjWNCF9w4_AwhzzUDFZy2elE&s=kWw4fQPNjw2lVKy1UjTxS2F0BmjEAzaDFWNmsYywbmE&e=) Transcripts and recordings of GNSO Working Group and Council events are located on the [GNSO Master Calendar](https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__gnso.icann.org_en_group...) --------------------------------------------------------------- The contents of this email and any attachments are confidential to the intended recipient. They may not be disclosed, used by or copied in any way by anyone other than the intended recipient. If you have received this message in error, please return it to the sender (deleting the body of the email and attachments in your reply) and immediately and permanently delete it. Please note that Com Laude Group Limited (the “Com Laude Group”) does not accept any responsibility for viruses and it is your responsibility to scan or otherwise check this email and any attachments. The Com Laude Group does not accept liability for statements which are clearly the sender's own and not made on behalf of the group or one of its member entities. The Com Laude Group is a limited company registered in England and Wales with company number 10689074 and registered office at 28-30 Little Russell Street, London, WC1A 2HN England. The Com Laude Group includes Nom-IQ Limited t/a Com Laude, a company registered in England and Wales with company number 5047655 and registered office at 28-30 Little Russell Street, London, WC1A 2HN England; Valideus Limited, a company registered in England and Wales with company number 6181291 and registered office at 28-30 Little Russell Street, London, WC1A 2HN England; Demys Limited, a company registered in Scotland with company number SC197176 and registered office at 15 William Street, South West Lane, Edinburgh, EH3 7LL Scotland; Consonum, Inc. dba Com Laude USA and Valideus USA, a corporation incorporated in the State of Washington and principal office address at Suite 332, Securities Building, 1904 Third Ave, Seattle, WA 98101; Com Laude (Japan) Corporation, a company registered in Japan with company number 0100-01-190853 and registered office at 1-3-21 Shinkawa, Chuo-ku, Tokyo, 104-0033, Japan; Com Laude Domain ESP S.L.U., a company registered in Spain and registered office address at Calle Barcas 2, 2, Valencia, 46002, Spain. For further information see [www.comlaude.com](https://comlaude.com/)
participants (7)
-
Anne ICANN -
desiree-me -
DiBiase, Gregory -
Mark W. Datysgeld -
Paul McGrady -
Sebastien@registry.godaddy -
Susan Payne