I've reviewed the updated Council work plan, provided by Maria today [thanks,Maria!], and our agenda for the Council call, and the transcript from the ICANN Vancouver meeting and subsequent postings re the com/litigation settlement PROPOSED agreement, and offer the following comment. The resolution of the Council regarding the .com bid/litigation settlement PROPOSED agreements, forwarded to the Board, made it clear to the Board that the Council sees policy issues inherent/embedded in the PROPOSED agreements, and intends to offer guidance. That must mean in a timely manner. Obviously, we have a full plate. However, we can’t just say: oops. Well, don’t have time to do our job on the policy guidance we told the Board and Community was our responsibility. So, we have to develop a methodology to consider these issues quickly, efficiently, and thoroughly, and meet the PDP requirements for public comment. I'll be prepared to offer some concrete suggestions during our call on how to allocate and identify resources to address the issues in 6. We should assume a priority of making decisions on this topic. One addition to the list in #6, however: I have reviewed the comments from the various constituencies and the ALAC, and the workshop jointly organized and hosted by the ALAC and several constituencies, and note that we need to include "traffic data" in the topics to be addressed as policy, in order to capture the widely supported concerns identified by the broad community. Prioritization: I've stated this before, but it bears stating again. The Council will need to make this particular policy process a priority and develop additional resources to ensure that this priority concern is adequately resourced. With that in mind, I remind Council that Council has the authority to identify external resources as needed. In this instance, it appears appropriate to retain an independent resource to undertake preparation of the Issues Report, and provide additional expert advice to the Council. I fully appreciate that while we can augment or even replace some of the demands on ICANN policy staff with this methodology, we will have the burden still on Councilors. However, I note that given the seriousness of the community's concern; Council's obvious responsibilities, and the timeline the ICANN Board and staff seem to be pursing on the negotiations of the PROPOSED agreement re .com/litigation settlement, we must meet an accelerated time line. I think we would have failed in our responsibilities if we didn't understand this and reprioritize, as needed, to meet this need. It's a simple matter of triage. When a patient is bleeding to death, that patient moves to the top of the list of those who get attention and care. Other patients may be in pain, but not in a life threatening situation and can wait a bit – even if they, and their “families” do complain bitterly. Given the time factors, Council will need to make decisions on Tuesday’s call on approaches and resources. Have a good week end, everyone! Best regards, Marilyn Cade -----Original Message----- From: owner-council@gnso.icann.org [mailto:owner-council@gnso.icann.org] On Behalf Of Bruce Tonkin Sent: Tuesday, January 10, 2006 4:49 PM To: GNSO Council Subject: RE: [council] Draft Agenda for Council meeting Tuesday 17 Jan 2006 Also add under item 7 - update on GNSO review (Dr Liz Williams) Regards, Bruce

-----Original Message-----

From: owner-council@gnso.icann.org

[mailto:owner-council@gnso.icann.org] On Behalf Of Bruce Tonkin

Sent: Tuesday, 10 January 2006 11:40 AM

To: GNSO Council

Subject: [council] Draft Agenda for Council meeting Tuesday

17 Jan 2006

Draft Agenda for Council meeting Tuesday 17 January 2006

Coordinated Universal Time UTC 19:00

(11am Los Angeles, 2pm Washington DC, 7pm London, 6am (next

day) Melbourne )

Item 1: Approval of minutes of 2 Dec 2005 and 21 Dec 2005

Item 2: Update on new gTLD policy development process

- advise constituency representatives

Item 3: Update on WHOIS poloicy development

- preliminary report on purpose of WHOIS

- current work

Item 4: IETF draft on IDN issues

- discuss document authored by John Klensin and Patrik Fältström

- see

http://www.iab.org/documents/drafts/draft-iab-idn-nextsteps-00.txt

Abstract:

This note describe issues raised by the deployment and use of

Internationalized Domain Names. It describes problems both

at the time of registration and those for use of those names

for use in the DNS. It recommends that IETF should update

the IDN related RFCs and a framework to be followed in doing

so, as well as summarizing and identifying some work that is

required outside the IETF. In particular, it proposes that

some changes be investigated for the IDNA standard and its

supporting tables, based on experience gained since those

standards were completed.

Document status:

This document reviews the IDN landscape from an IETF

perspective and presents the recommendations and conclusions

of an IAB-convened ad hoc committee charged with reviewing

IDN issues and the path forward (See Section 6). Its

recommendations are recommendations to the IETF, or in a few

cases to other bodies, for topics to be examined and actions

to be taken if those bodies, after their examinations,

consider those actions appropriate.

Neither the IAB nor the members of the ad hoc committee have

yet reached consensus that this document is ready for final

publication.

However, the IAB concluded that it was appropriate to expose

it, as a working draft, for community comment and feedback.

Such comments should be sent to iab@iab.org (relevant

material will be forwarded to the IAB IDN Ad Hoc committee).

Item 5: Update on status of proposed .com agreement

Item 6: Next steps on policy issues related to proposed .com

agreement E.g

- policy for renewal of gtld agreements

- funding model policy (possible new policy)

- policy for capping fees that a registry can charge

- exclusions in agreements from future consensus polices or

changes in consensus polices

Item 7: Any other business

Regards,

Bruce Tonkin