Revised comments on the NomCom Recommendations from the Board Working Group
All We discussed the draft Council reply comment on the Nominating Committee Recommendations that John Berard had submitted during the last Council call, agreeing that further comments could be submitted until 31st December and that wed vote electronically early January. The only comments received were from Avri and Ive attempted to capture the points made by amending the draft. Both a marked-up version and clean copy are attached. I would like to propose this draft is put forward for voting fairly quickly in line with the agreed process, unless strong arguments are made against the revised text. Best Wishes to all for a happy and successful 2015. Regards Tony
Hi Tony & Councilors: Thanks for taking point on this. I second the motion for a vote. Thanks- J. From: Tony Holmes <tonyarholmes@btinternet.com<mailto:tonyarholmes@btinternet.com>> Date: Wednesday, December 31, 2014 at 7:54 To: GNSO Council List <council@gnso.icann.org<mailto:council@gnso.icann.org>>, Avri Doria <avri@acm.org<mailto:avri@acm.org>> Cc: Glen de Saint Géry <Glen@icann.org<mailto:Glen@icann.org>>, John Berard <john@crediblecontext.com<mailto:john@crediblecontext.com>> Subject: [council] Revised comments on the NomCom Recommendations from the Board Working Group All We discussed the draft Council reply comment on the Nominating Committee Recommendations that John Berard had submitted during the last Council call, agreeing that further comments could be submitted until 31st December and that we'd vote electronically early January. The only comments received were from Avri and I've attempted to capture the points made by amending the draft. Both a marked-up version and clean copy are attached. I would like to propose this draft is put forward for voting fairly quickly in line with the agreed process, unless strong arguments are made against the revised text. Best Wishes to all for a happy and successful 2015. Regards Tony
Hi everybody, I would like to thank Tony and others involved in crafting such a thoughtful document that largely, although not completely, represents my thoughts and, I believe, those of a great number of those in the noncommercial community whom I represent on Council. I regret, though, that due to changes made to the document since our last Council meeting I will be voting no rather than supporting submission of this public comment. Deletion of the term “civil society” from the final version makes it impossible for me to support submission. Reducing GNSO input to the NomCom, while increasing the role of the GAC, is something I very much oppose for many of the reasons stated in the original letter. I could support submission of that document. Reducing commercial representation, the subject of the revised text, is not something that particularly bothers me. With NPOC being denied an appointment to the NomCom, commercial interests within the GNSO are currently overrepresented there. That said, I was prepared to support the letter because greatly expanding representation of ALAC, the GAC, the ASO and ccNSO at the expense of the GNSO is simply bad policy and does nothing to solve the problem of the underrepresentation of noncommercial interests on the NomCom. A word about timing. Notification of the changed wording was sent to Council members on December 31st. Ballots were sent just after midnight on January 3rd. I would submit that notifying Council members of changes to a document on New Years Eve and expecting them to object within 2 days is a bad idea. In many parts of the world, including the jurisdiction I’m currently in, not a single working day has passed since we were notified of the change in wording. There simply was not sufficient time to object to the changes, at least for those of us partaking in New Years Eve celebrations and recovery thereof. We could have done better and should have. I recognize that the changed wording was made in response to objections by one of my fellow NCSG Council members, one I admire and respect very much. Despite my admiration and respect, we may occasionally disagree on issues and that’s something that should be acknowledged throughout the Council. The NCSG is a very diverse community. We recognize that by giving our Councilors the freedom to vote as they feel best. No one NCSG Councilor speaks for another. That said, I was not the only other Councilor from the NCSG who was considering supporting the original letter. I’m sorry that I, at least, will not be able to do so at this time. Kind Regards, Ed
Hi Ed Its disappointing that you’re unable to support the revised document as it was only updated to align with the input received by 31st December, as agreed during the last Council call. I did indicate before the holiday that I’d only received input from Avri up to that time and would update the document to reflect that if no other input was received by the 31st. The amended document therefore only reflects that request. If you had a problem with changing the document in that manner, that was the time to flag that, particularly as it was also agreed voting would follow very quickly once the comment period was closed (31st December).
From the ISPCP perspective and I would suspect other Constituencies as well, we would also prefer the original text, but the agreement was the final version should reflect all requested changes received prior to the 31st. If your view, or members of your Constituency strongly differed from Avri’s request then it needed to be stated before the closure of that comment period. Unfortunately that didn’t happen.
To be fair the only person who gave any indication that different opinions may exist within the NCSG was Avri! Regards Tony From: owner-council@gnso.icann.org [mailto:owner-council@gnso.icann.org] On Behalf Of Edward Morris Sent: 04 January 2015 19:45 To: Tony Holmes; council@gnso.icann.org Cc: Glen de Saint Géry; John Berard Subject: Re: [council] Revised comments on the NomCom Recommendations from the Board Working Group Hi everybody, I would like to thank Tony and others involved in crafting such a thoughtful document that largely, although not completely, represents my thoughts and, I believe, those of a great number of those in the noncommercial community whom I represent on Council. I regret, though, that due to changes made to the document since our last Council meeting I will be voting no rather than supporting submission of this public comment. Deletion of the term “civil society” from the final version makes it impossible for me to support submission. Reducing GNSO input to the NomCom, while increasing the role of the GAC, is something I very much oppose for many of the reasons stated in the original letter. I could support submission of that document. Reducing commercial representation, the subject of the revised text, is not something that particularly bothers me. With NPOC being denied an appointment to the NomCom, commercial interests within the GNSO are currently overrepresented there. That said, I was prepared to support the letter because greatly expanding representation of ALAC, the GAC, the ASO and ccNSO at the expense of the GNSO is simply bad policy and does nothing to solve the problem of the underrepresentation of noncommercial interests on the NomCom. A word about timing. Notification of the changed wording was sent to Council members on December 31st. Ballots were sent just after midnight on January 3rd. I would submit that notifying Council members of changes to a document on New Years Eve and expecting them to object within 2 days is a bad idea. In many parts of the world, including the jurisdiction I’m currently in, not a single working day has passed since we were notified of the change in wording. There simply was not sufficient time to object to the changes, at least for those of us partaking in New Years Eve celebrations and recovery thereof. We could have done better and should have. I recognize that the changed wording was made in response to objections by one of my fellow NCSG Council members, one I admire and respect very much. Despite my admiration and respect, we may occasionally disagree on issues and that’s something that should be acknowledged throughout the Council. The NCSG is a very diverse community. We recognize that by giving our Councilors the freedom to vote as they feel best. No one NCSG Councilor speaks for another. That said, I was not the only other Councilor from the NCSG who was considering supporting the original letter. I’m sorry that I, at least, will not be able to do so at this time. Kind Regards, Ed
From the ISPCP perspective and I would suspect other Constituencies as well, we would also prefer the original text, but the agreement was the final version should reflect all requested changes received prior to the 31st. If your view, or members of your Constituency strongly differed from Avri’s request then it needed to be stated before the closure of that comment
Hi Tony, Thanks again for the hard work you've put in on this. The only input I'm aware of from Avri is her December 16th post where she requested "unanimous" be changed to something less encompassing. Specifically: Hi, I still request that unanimous in the text be replaced with something like 'most' or even 'a super majority' (not sure we can use the consensus words without a GNSO process). I will still not vote for it, and will write up a comment explaining why, but at least the letter would be correctly describing the situation in the council. I do not know how the vote will go, but I am pretty sure it will not be unanimous. Thanks avri I had absolutely no problem with her request. Obviously the vote was not going to be unanimous. I have no knowledge of any request from Avri, or anyone else, that the term "civil society" be deleted from the letter. period. Unfortunately that didn’t happen. Again, I've checked the archives and I see no submission from Avri or anyone else asking that you delete the term "civil society". If there had been I would have objected. I'm not clairvoyant: I can't object to changes that aren't in view. There was no indication onlist, prior to the 31st as you state, that the term 'civil society' was going to be dropped from the letter. Your reasoning seems to be that if Avri is going to oppose something it should be assumed that the rest of the NCSG councillors will be joining her in opposition, unless we speak up. You can't make that assumption. Our members give us the freedom to use our judgement to vote the way we feel best. We will, at times, have differing views reflecting, I hope, the diverse views of our membership. I supported the original letter, I supported Avri's requested changes (given her opposition) but, regrettably, I can't support the final version of the letter, which incorporates changes that I don't see requested anywhere on list. Thanks again for all of your hard work, Ed Hi everybody, I would like to thank Tony and others involved in crafting such a thoughtful document that largely, although not completely, represents my thoughts and, I believe, those of a great number of those in the noncommercial community whom I represent on Council. I regret, though, that due to changes made to the document since our last Council meeting I will be voting no rather than supporting submission of this public comment. Deletion of the term “civil society” from the final version makes it impossible for me to support submission. Reducing GNSO input to the NomCom, while increasing the role of the GAC, is something I very much oppose for many of the reasons stated in the original letter. I could support submission of that document. Reducing commercial representation, the subject of the revised text, is not something that particularly bothers me. With NPOC being denied an appointment to the NomCom, commercial interests within the GNSO are currently overrepresented there. That said, I was prepared to support the letter because greatly expanding representation of ALAC, the GAC, the ASO and ccNSO at the expense of the GNSO is simply bad policy and does nothing to solve the problem of the underrepresentation of noncommercial interests on the NomCom. A word about timing. Notification of the changed wording was sent to Council members on December 31st. Ballots were sent just after midnight on January 3rd. I would submit that notifying Council members of changes to a document on New Years Eve and expecting them to object within 2 days is a bad idea. In many parts of the world, including the jurisdiction I’m currently in, not a single working day has passed since we were notified of the change in wording. There simply was not sufficient time to object to the changes, at least for those of us partaking in New Years Eve celebrations and recovery thereof. We could have done better and should have. I recognize that the changed wording was made in response to objections by one of my fellow NCSG Council members, one I admire and respect very much. Despite my admiration and respect, we may occasionally disagree on issues and that’s something that should be acknowledged throughout the Council. The NCSG is a very diverse community. We recognize that by giving our Councilors the freedom to vote as they feel best. No one NCSG Councilor speaks for another. That said, I was not the only other Councilor from the NCSG who was considering supporting the original letter. I’m sorry that I, at least, will not be able to do so at this time. Kind Regards, Ed
Hi Tony, Thanks for the work you and John put into this letter, and I apologise for getting back to you so late, but was largely offline during the holidays. I also voted “NO”, although my reasons are probably different from Ed’s. During the last council meeting, we were granted time to take the draft letter back to our stakeholder groups, and there was a discussion on the NCSG list that took place. In voting against the submission of this input to the public comment period, I understand that I am still not being very representative of what I believe to be the majority opinion within the NCSG. Like I said before, I actually like the BWG-NomCom’s report. I believe that there should be more equal representation across the different SOs/ACs. I also don’t see much of a problem with the suggested delegate voting system being proposed either. If I understand the proposal on this correctly, it’ll be left up to the GNSO to work out how this system will be used by us. IMHO, ideally, having overbearing GNSO influence on the NomCom’s decision making in order to (for example) get more GNSO representatives appointed to the ICANN board shouldn’t be necessary. I would have alternatively liked to see an additional change being proposed; of more equal representation on the NomCom accompanied by fewer NomCom-appointed board members, and more board member being elected directly by the GNSO. Thanks. Amr On Jan 4, 2015, at 9:30 PM, Tony Holmes <tonyarholmes@btinternet.com> wrote:
Hi Ed Its disappointing that you’re unable to support the revised document as it was only updated to align with the input received by 31st December, as agreed during the last Council call.
I did indicate before the holiday that I’d only received input from Avri up to that time and would update the document to reflect that if no other input was received by the 31st. The amended document therefore only reflects that request. If you had a problem with changing the document in that manner, that was the time to flag that, particularly as it was also agreed voting would follow very quickly once the comment period was closed (31st December).
From the ISPCP perspective and I would suspect other Constituencies as well, we would also prefer the original text, but the agreement was the final version should reflect all requested changes received prior to the 31st. If your view, or members of your Constituency strongly differed from Avri’s request then it needed to be stated before the closure of that comment period. Unfortunately that didn’t happen.
To be fair the only person who gave any indication that different opinions may exist within the NCSG was Avri!
Regards Tony
From: owner-council@gnso.icann.org [mailto:owner-council@gnso.icann.org] On Behalf Of Edward Morris Sent: 04 January 2015 19:45 To: Tony Holmes; council@gnso.icann.org Cc: Glen de Saint Géry; John Berard Subject: Re: [council] Revised comments on the NomCom Recommendations from the Board Working Group
Hi everybody,
I would like to thank Tony and others involved in crafting such a thoughtful document that largely, although not completely, represents my thoughts and, I believe, those of a great number of those in the noncommercial community whom I represent on Council. I regret, though, that due to changes made to the document since our last Council meeting I will be voting no rather than supporting submission of this public comment.
Deletion of the term “civil society” from the final version makes it impossible for me to support submission. Reducing GNSO input to the NomCom, while increasing the role of the GAC, is something I very much oppose for many of the reasons stated in the original letter. I could support submission of that document.
Reducing commercial representation, the subject of the revised text, is not something that particularly bothers me. With NPOC being denied an appointment to the NomCom, commercial interests within the GNSO are currently overrepresented there. That said, I was prepared to support the letter because greatly expanding representation of ALAC, the GAC, the ASO and ccNSO at the expense of the GNSO is simply bad policy and does nothing to solve the problem of the underrepresentation of noncommercial interests on the NomCom.
A word about timing. Notification of the changed wording was sent to Council members on December 31st. Ballots were sent just after midnight on January 3rd. I would submit that notifying Council members of changes to a document on New Years Eve and expecting them to object within 2 days is a bad idea. In many parts of the world, including the jurisdiction I’m currently in, not a single working day has passed since we were notified of the change in wording. There simply was not sufficient time to object to the changes, at least for those of us partaking in New Years Eve celebrations and recovery thereof. We could have done better and should have.
I recognize that the changed wording was made in response to objections by one of my fellow NCSG Council members, one I admire and respect very much. Despite my admiration and respect, we may occasionally disagree on issues and that’s something that should be acknowledged throughout the Council. The NCSG is a very diverse community. We recognize that by giving our Councilors the freedom to vote as they feel best. No one NCSG Councilor speaks for another. That said, I was not the only other Councilor from the NCSG who was considering supporting the original letter. I’m sorry that I, at least, will not be able to do so at this time.
Kind Regards,
Ed
"I would have alternatively liked to see an additional change being proposed; of more equal representation on the NomCom accompanied by fewer NomCom-appointed board members, and more board member being elected directly by the GNSO." +1 to this, altho I think this would be a more substantial (bylaws?) change.... J.
I suspect that you’re right, James. Additionally, it is a different section of the by-laws, and would probably warrant a separate project and its own public comment period. Still…, the two issues (at least from a GNSO perspective) seem to me to be very interrelated. I haven’t seen any metrics on how much board-related work is dedicated to gTLDs, but would be interested to learn more about this. Not sure if any metrics on this actually exist, or not. Also not sure about how much NomCom work is dedicated to the GNSO relative to other SOs/ACs, but appointing board members certainly affects the GNSO, as well as other aspects of the NomCom such as appointing GNSO councillors. Thanks. Amr On Jan 5, 2015, at 5:31 PM, James M. Bladel <jbladel@godaddy.com> wrote:
"I would have alternatively liked to see an additional change being proposed; of more equal representation on the NomCom accompanied by fewer NomCom-appointed board members, and more board member being elected directly by the GNSO.”
+1 to this, altho I think this would be a more substantial (bylaws?) change….
J.
participants (4)
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Amr Elsadr -
Edward Morris -
James M. Bladel -
Tony Holmes