As a private member of the intellectual property community, let me publicly express my personal agreement with Ross and his assessment of the situation. I believe that it is non-productive to be arguing about Formulation 1 at this juncture. The voting has already taken place and the result is what it is! Let's move on to the next task at hand. It is no wonder that we have made so little progress on this issue. Regards, Lucy

-----Original Message----- From: owner-council@gnso.icann.org [mailto:owner-council@gnso.icann.org] On Behalf Of ext Ross Rader Sent: Wednesday, June 21, 2006 1:53 PM To: Ute Decker Cc: Council GNSO Subject: Re: [council] Regarding Letter from American Intellectual Property Law Association

"AIPLA therefore maintains its request that the GNSO adopt a definition meeting the needs of all Internet users"

In this discussion, it would extremely helpful if stakeholders limited themselves to speaking for themselves. I have noticed a trend amongst various stakeholder groups to speak on behalf of other stakeholder groups. This makes it very difficult to have a frank and compelling discussion concerning the requirements of the various groups, and how they might be actualized through policy.

This statement, for instance, implies that the GNSO Council vote of support for Formulation 1 does not meet the needs of all users, and I suppose this is true. It is probably equally true that it is impossible to actually meet the needs of all Internet users - at least not in a way that everyone would be happy with.

In its current formulation, we have proposed and adopted a definition that seems to meet the needs of individual and non-commercial users, registries and registrars. The definition also seems to meet the needs of web host and ISP operators, at least those outside of the telecommunications sector, educational interests, human rights groups, and a significant number of governmental and law enforcement interests.

It is also quite apparent that this definition does not meet the needs of those that are seeking to preserve unfettered public access to these sensitive databases, such as the AIPLA and the rest of the intellectual property community (and other related parties such as those that place a higher relative value on intellectual property considerations than they do on privacy, convenience and cost considerations such as the GNSO's BCUC and ISPC.)

In all honesty, I don't think that we'll ever be at a point where what we do is 100% acceptable to everyone that uses the internet, but I think we can strive to be as fair as possible to as many as possible. In this instance, I suspect that we're very close to that ideal, and were it not for the inordinately loud voice of the intellectual property community and its capability to influence the United States Government and other similarly powerful stakeholders, we would probably have moved beyond this discussion many moons ago.

Thank you for passing this along Ute.

-ross

Ute Decker wrote:

...

Forwarding the second letter sent by AIPLA today for further clarification: == From: Michael K. Kirk [mailto:mkirk@aipla.org] Sent: Wednesday, June 21, 2006 12:20 PM To: 'Bruce.Tonkin@melbourneit.com.au' Cc: 'vint@google.com'; 'sharil@cmc.gov.my' Subject: FW: [gnso-dow123] Regarding Letter from American Intellectual Property Law Association

Dear Mr. Tonkin,

Thank you for your observations regarding the comments of the American Intellectual Property Law Association on the GNSO Council vote on the Formulation 1 definition of the purpose of the WHOIS service. Please find attached our reply to your observations.

Regards,

Mike Kirk

-----Original Message----- From: Bruce Tonkin [mailto:Bruce.Tonkin@melbourneit.com.au] Sent: 21 June 2006 03:33 To: Council GNSO Subject: [council] Regarding Letter from American Intellectual Property Law Association

Hello All,

I have read the letter from the American Intellectual Property Law Association. I don't understand how the letter relates to the formulations 1 or 2. It seems that members of the community have made pre-mature judgements on the eventual outcomes of the WHOIS work. The letter raises issues about the importance of the data, and the need for access to that data by law enforcement and other legitimate parties. This seems entirely consistent with the current terms of reference of the WHOIS task force. I have sent the following reply to clarify that there are no changes in collected data, nor in the requirement for that data to be accurate. The more important work has yet to be done, which is developing better access controls.

Regards, Bruce Tonkin

Dear Mr Kirk,

I will pass on your letter to the GNSO Council and the WHOIS task force.

I will note however that the GNSO Council does believe that its decision is consistent with your requirements below. The decision makes no change to the requirement to collect the data or the requirement that the data must be accurate. Thus the data will still be available to prove any IP infringement. In fact one of the objectives of improving controls on access to data is that it will lead to higher data accuracy as registrants will be more comfortable in providing their true contact information.

1. A pattern of behavior that can lead to an inference of bad faith which, under the UDRP, can result in the transfer of a domain name from a bad faith registrant is frequently only provable through WHOIS;

2. Unchecked IP infringement undermines business viability and technical stability and could result in Internet fragmentation;

3. Accurate and available information is essential for law enforcement in crimes including spamming, denial of service attacks, identity theft and account fraud, hate literature, terrorism and child pornography;

4. The requirement to provide accurate contact and identity information acts as a deterrent to trademark infringement, copyright infringement, cybersquatting, phishing, typosquatting and other IP cyber infringements and facilitates enforcement of IP rights.

The objective to make up-to-date and accurate WHOIS information available to all who have a legitimate need to obtain such information is consistent with the aims of the GNSO. The current work is focussed on considering methods for access control that ensure that only those with a legitimate need have access. This work has not yet reached any recommendations.

Your letter does not seem to explain why the American Intellectual Property Law Association thinks formulation 1 is inconsistent with those aims.

Regards, Bruce Tonkin

Regards,

--

-rr

"Don't be too timid and squeamish about your actions. All life is an experiment. The more experiments you make the better." - Ralph Waldo Emerson

Contact Info:

Ross Rader Director, Research & Innovation Tucows Inc. t. 416.538.5492 c. 416.828.8783

Get Started: http://start.tucows.com My Blogware: http://www.byte.org

Ross, I think you have a valid point when you say: "it would extremely helpful if stakeholders limited themselves to speaking for themselves." And thus am rather surprised at your conclusion that: "The definition also seems to meet the needs of web host and ISP operators," If it does, I have yet to meet one... As to your remark: "(and other related parties such as those that place a higher relative value on intellectual property considerations than they do on privacy, convenience and cost considerations such as the GNSO's BCUC and ISPC.)" This is your opinion. Not necessarily a fact. Nonetheless, I beleive it an opportune occasion to point out that you have neglected to declare a pretty obvious fact, and that is that the whole content of this very prolongued (and in your personal case, very agressive) discussion, seeks to eliminate WHOIS entirely and rid you of the cost and trouble of providing it. The task force is a vehicle to do this piece by piece, since you have the weighted voting advantage when it comes to that. This is something I can understand, and I am sure there must be a suitable solution for it, that can be discussed in a civil, cooperative atmosphere, without insulting our intelligence in the process. Tony Harris ----- Original Message ----- From: "Ross Rader" <ross@tucows.com> To: "Ute Decker" <Ute.Decker@ifpi.org> Cc: "Council GNSO" <council@gnso.icann.org> Sent: Wednesday, June 21, 2006 3:52 PM Subject: Re: [council] Regarding Letter from American Intellectual Property Law Association

"AIPLA therefore maintains its request that the GNSO adopt a definition meeting the needs of all Internet users"

In this discussion, it would extremely helpful if stakeholders limited themselves to speaking for themselves. I have noticed a trend amongst various stakeholder groups to speak on behalf of other stakeholder groups. This makes it very difficult to have a frank and compelling discussion concerning the requirements of the various groups, and how they might be actualized through policy.

This statement, for instance, implies that the GNSO Council vote of support for Formulation 1 does not meet the needs of all users, and I suppose this is true. It is probably equally true that it is impossible to actually meet the needs of all Internet users - at least not in a way that everyone would be happy with.

In its current formulation, we have proposed and adopted a definition that seems to meet the needs of individual and non-commercial users, registries and registrars. The definition also seems to meet the needs of web host and ISP operators, at least those outside of the telecommunications sector, educational interests, human rights groups, and a significant number of governmental and law enforcement interests.

It is also quite apparent that this definition does not meet the needs of those that are seeking to preserve unfettered public access to these sensitive databases, such as the AIPLA and the rest of the intellectual property community (and other related parties such as those that place a higher relative value on intellectual property considerations than they do on privacy, convenience and cost considerations such as the GNSO's BCUC and ISPC.)

In all honesty, I don't think that we'll ever be at a point where what we do is 100% acceptable to everyone that uses the internet, but I think we can strive to be as fair as possible to as many as possible. In this instance, I suspect that we're very close to that ideal, and were it not for the inordinately loud voice of the intellectual property community and its capability to influence the United States Government and other similarly powerful stakeholders, we would probably have moved beyond this discussion many moons ago.

Thank you for passing this along Ute.

-ross

Ute Decker wrote:

...

Forwarding the second letter sent by AIPLA today for further clarification: == From: Michael K. Kirk [mailto:mkirk@aipla.org] Sent: Wednesday, June 21, 2006 12:20 PM To: 'Bruce.Tonkin@melbourneit.com.au' Cc: 'vint@google.com'; 'sharil@cmc.gov.my' Subject: FW: [gnso-dow123] Regarding Letter from American Intellectual Property Law Association

Dear Mr. Tonkin,

Thank you for your observations regarding the comments of the American Intellectual Property Law Association on the GNSO Council vote on the Formulation 1 definition of the purpose of the WHOIS service. Please find attached our reply to your observations.

Regards,

Mike Kirk

-----Original Message----- From: Bruce Tonkin [mailto:Bruce.Tonkin@melbourneit.com.au] Sent: 21 June 2006 03:33 To: Council GNSO Subject: [council] Regarding Letter from American Intellectual Property Law Association

Hello All,

I have read the letter from the American Intellectual Property Law Association. I don't understand how the letter relates to the formulations 1 or 2. It seems that members of the community have made pre-mature judgements on the eventual outcomes of the WHOIS work. The letter raises issues about the importance of the data, and the need for access to that data by law enforcement and other legitimate parties. This seems entirely consistent with the current terms of reference of the WHOIS task force. I have sent the following reply to clarify that there are no changes in collected data, nor in the requirement for that data to be accurate. The more important work has yet to be done, which is developing better access controls.

Regards, Bruce Tonkin

Dear Mr Kirk, I will pass on your letter to the GNSO Council and the WHOIS task force. I will note however that the GNSO Council does believe that its decision is consistent with your requirements below. The decision makes no change to the requirement to collect the data or the requirement that the data must be accurate. Thus the data will still be available to prove any IP infringement. In fact one of the objectives of improving controls on access to data is that it will lead to higher data accuracy as registrants will be more comfortable in providing their true contact information.

1. A pattern of behavior that can lead to an inference of bad faith which, under the UDRP, can result in the transfer of a domain name from a bad faith registrant is frequently only provable through WHOIS;

2. Unchecked IP infringement undermines business viability and technical stability and could result in Internet fragmentation;

3. Accurate and available information is essential for law enforcement in crimes including spamming, denial of service attacks, identity theft and account fraud, hate literature, terrorism and child pornography;

4. The requirement to provide accurate contact and identity information acts as a deterrent to trademark infringement, copyright infringement, cybersquatting, phishing, typosquatting and other IP cyber infringements and facilitates enforcement of IP rights.

The objective to make up-to-date and accurate WHOIS information available to all who have a legitimate need to obtain such information is consistent with the aims of the GNSO. The current work is focussed on considering methods for access control that ensure that only those with a legitimate need have access. This work has not yet reached any recommendations.

Your letter does not seem to explain why the American Intellectual Property Law Association thinks formulation 1 is inconsistent with those aims. Regards, Bruce Tonkin

Regards,

--

-rr

"Don't be too timid and squeamish about your actions. All life is an experiment. The more experiments you make the better." - Ralph Waldo Emerson

Contact Info:

Ross Rader Director, Research & Innovation Tucows Inc. t. 416.538.5492 c. 416.828.8783

Get Started: http://start.tucows.com My Blogware: http://www.byte.org

Ross, On schedule as expected!

I would be very happy to introduce you to any number of operators that are unconcerned about Formulation 1 as it relates to their core business. Unfortunately, there aren't many (if any) of them that participate in ICANN's policy development process, so they are relatively unheard in the process. (On a slightly related not, it seems that the ISPCP website has been taken offline by your provider and that many of the associations counted as members are defunct. Presumably, this makes it extremely difficult for interested parties to get involved with the ISPCP.)

The core business of operators can hardly revolve around what happens to WHOIS, no one ever stated that. WHOIS information is but one useful resource that we see no need to hide or do away with it. It is comforting to see that you are vigilant over our website and it's contents. There is work in progress going on there.

Moreover, I should also clarify that I am not pretending to speak for these operators. Rather, I'm passing on my observation that based on the conversations that I have almost daily with them about this and other related operational issues, that they don't seem to share the views espoused by those in the ISPC and other GNSO constituencies who opposed Formulation 1.

OK they are entitled to have a different viewpoint, and so?

Yes, you are correct - this is my opinion. But please don't forget that my opinions are mostly shaped by your position. If my interpretation of the position of your constituency is incorrect, I welcome the opportunity to learn more and form new opinions based on that. However, I'm not sure that it is incorrect. The ISPC is quite clear that unfettered whois access must be preserved in order to ensure that issues related to content can be resolved by network operators. Of course, IP issues are only a subset of content issues (which also includes phishing, DDOS attacks, etc.) but I'm not sure that this changes my basic understanding or assertion.

This is a complete misrepresentation of fact. The ISPCP never refused to consider alternatives to unfettered access to WHOIS data. The subject of tiered access began to be discussed quite some time ago in the TF (possibly you were not around at that time), and was put aside for later work, we did not oppose tiered access as a concept.

Speaking of opinions, I believe that we both have them ;) To the point, I was once asked what I thought might be the best way to deal with the Whois policy issue and I made the mistake of half-seriously replying that personally, I thought the easiest solution to the policy problem was to turn it off entirely. For very understandable reasons, you - and others - continue to quote this out of context. It has never been the formal policy position of Tucows or the Registrar constituency that Whois should be eliminated - it is of tremendous value to my company, my customers and the registrars I represent. The cost issue that we are seeking to avoid has nothing to do with the status quo solution (which truth be told is a non-material element in terms of our annual operating budget). It is a reaction to Tiered Access "solution" that some continue to advocate for. The technical solutions proposed are not practical, nor affordable. This was the main motivation behind the oPOC proposal that our constituency tabled, going back as far as the Mar del Plata meeting. We believe that by rationalizing the level of data presented in Whois and building in additional accountabilities, that a new focus on contactability can be built into Whois that provides a broad range of users with a "best possible compromise" solution. If this approach is too "aggressive" for you, I sincerely apologize.

I fail to see how highlighting a rather evident fact is equivalent to speaking out of context, it rather helps to see what we are talking about in the midst of all the noise...I did not know you said this, but thanks for the confirmation! Your actions speak for themselves, my opinion is unimportant. The OPOC solution is a pretty lame suggestion, fully in context with the Formulation 1 which you successfully voted through. And thanks for confirming the 'technical solutions proposed are not practical, nor affordable' with regards to tiered access. And by the way it is not that particular approach that is 'too agressive', but your continuous vehemence and intolerance which at least I find unacceptable.

I'm not sure that there is anything cooperative about the current task force or the GNSO's policy development process. Your comments, and most of those made in opposition to Formulation 1, perfectly illustrate the problem. Instead of assessing the needs of the other stakeholders as it relates to the needs of your constituency and identifying where compromise might possibly be had, the representatives of the ISPC, BCUC and IPC have instead focused on advocating a single, immutable position. This advocacy consumes most of the time available to the task force and is the primary reason why little progress has been made on this issue.

You are quite right, there is nothing cooperative about the current TF or the GNSO's policy development process. I would simply reply that you have described, in utter perfection, the attitudes you express in your frequent interventions, and your total unwillingness to accept disagreement with your positions. If little progress has been made, I would not deny you your ample share of the credit.

It is not by accident or because of weighted voting that Formulation 1 received support necessary within the task force and at Council. The sole reason that this proposition was successful was because it represents the best middle ground that many parties with differing goals and needs could find. This middle ground was only found because these parties, the registries, noncommercials, nominating committee reps and registrars, actually talked to one another and worked through their respective differences until a consensus view was found. I believe an effort was made on several occassions to include the rest of the constituencies in this dialog, but the outreach never bore fruit.

It is a falsity that outreach was made to, at least, our constituency. In fact, as you may recall in Luxembourg I attempted this, and was rewarded later with a document containing......the OPOC !

I keep bringing this up in our calls, and I apologize if it has become boring for you, but we need alternatives and suggestions for compromise from your constituency and those of the IPC and BC - not advocacy. Without it, this criminal lack of progress will continue.

It has nothing to do with boredom, and as far as advocacy..... Tony Harris ----- Original Message ----- From: "Ross Rader" <ross@tucows.com> To: "Anthony Harris" <harris@cabase.org.ar> Cc: "Council GNSO" <council@gnso.icann.org>; <gnso-dow123@gnso.icann.org> Sent: Wednesday, June 21, 2006 7:43 PM Subject: Re: [council] Regarding Letter from American Intellectual Property Law Association

Anthony Harris wrote:

...

Ross,

I think you have a valid point when you say: "it would extremely helpful if stakeholders limited themselves to speaking for themselves."

And thus am rather surprised at your conclusion that: "The definition also seems to meet the needs of web host and ISP operators,"

If it does, I have yet to meet one...

I would be very happy to introduce you to any number of operators that are unconcerned about Formulation 1 as it relates to their core business. Unfortunately, there aren't many (if any) of them that participate in ICANN's policy development process, so they are relatively unheard in the process. (On a slightly related not, it seems that the ISPCP website has been taken offline by your provider and that many of the associations counted as members are defunct. Presumably, this makes it extremely difficult for interested parties to get involved with the ISPCP.)

Moreover, I should also clarify that I am not pretending to speak for these operators. Rather, I'm passing on my observation that based on the conversations that I have almost daily with them about this and other related operational issues, that they don't seem to share the views espoused by those in the ISPC and other GNSO constituencies who opposed Formulation 1.

...

As to your remark: "(and other related parties such as those that place a higher relative value on intellectual property considerations than they do on privacy, convenience and cost considerations such as the GNSO's BCUC and ISPC.)"

This is your opinion. Not necessarily a fact.

Yes, you are correct - this is my opinion. But please don't forget that my opinions are mostly shaped by your position. If my interpretation of the position of your constituency is incorrect, I welcome the opportunity to learn more and form new opinions based on that. However, I'm not sure that it is incorrect. The ISPC is quite clear that unfettered whois access must be preserved in order to ensure that issues related to content can be resolved by network operators. Of course, IP issues are only a subset of content issues (which also includes phishing, DDOS attacks, etc.) but I'm not sure that this changes my basic understanding or assertion.

...

Nonetheless, I beleive it an opportune occasion to point out that you have neglected to declare a pretty obvious fact, and that is that the whole content of this very prolongued (and in your personal case, very agressive) discussion, seeks to eliminate WHOIS entirely and rid you of the cost and trouble of providing it.

Speaking of opinions, I believe that we both have them ;) To the point, I was once asked what I thought might be the best way to deal with the Whois policy issue and I made the mistake of half-seriously replying that personally, I thought the easiest solution to the policy problem was to turn it off entirely. For very understandable reasons, you - and others - continue to quote this out of context. It has never been the formal policy position of Tucows or the Registrar constituency that Whois should be eliminated - it is of tremendous value to my company, my customers and the registrars I represent. The cost issue that we are seeking to avoid has nothing to do with the status quo solution (which truth be told is a non-material element in terms of our annual operating budget). It is a reaction to Tiered Access "solution" that some continue to advocate for. The technical solutions proposed are not practical, nor affordable. This was the main motivation behind the oPOC proposal that our constituency tabled, going back as far as the Mar del Plata meeting. We believe that by rationalizing the level of data presented in Whois and building in additional accountabilities, that a new focus on contactability can be built into Whois that provides a broad range of users with a "best possible compromise" solution. If this approach is too "aggressive" for you, I sincerely apologize.

...

The task force is a vehicle to do this piece by piece, since you have the weighted voting advantage when it comes to that. This is something I can understand, and I am sure there must be a suitable solution for it, that can be discussed in a civil, cooperative atmosphere, without insulting our intelligence in the process.

I'm not sure that there is anything cooperative about the current task force or the GNSO's policy development process. Your comments, and most of those made in opposition to Formulation 1, perfectly illustrate the problem. Instead of assessing the needs of the other stakeholders as it relates to the needs of your constituency and identifying where compromise might possibly be had, the representatives of the ISPC, BCUC and IPC have instead focused on advocating a single, immutable position. This advocacy consumes most of the time available to the task force and is the primary reason why little progress has been made on this issue.

It is not by accident or because of weighted voting that Formulation 1 received support necessary within the task force and at Council. The sole reason that this proposition was successful was because it represents the best middle ground that many parties with differing goals and needs could find. This middle ground was only found because these parties, the registries, noncommercials, nominating committee reps and registrars, actually talked to one another and worked through their respective differences until a consensus view was found. I believe an effort was made on several occassions to include the rest of the constituencies in this dialog, but the outreach never bore fruit.

I keep bringing this up in our calls, and I apologize if it has become boring for you, but we need alternatives and suggestions for compromise from your constituency and those of the IPC and BC - not advocacy. Without it, this criminal lack of progress will continue.

If you are seriously interested in making progress, then please reconsider the request I made of you and Marilyn on the last call: how can the existing proposals that have been tabled be changed so that they are suitable for the needs of the stakeholders you represent?

Regards,

--

-rr

"Don't be too timid and squeamish about your actions. All life is an experiment. The more experiments you make the better." - Ralph Waldo Emerson

Contact Info:

Ross Rader Director, Research & Innovation Tucows Inc. t. 416.538.5492 c. 416.828.8783

Get Started: http://start.tucows.com My Blogware: http://www.byte.org

Ross, It seems I must thank you again, this time for confirming my words on attitude and civility! Kind regards Tony Harris ----- Original Message ----- From: "Ross Rader" <ross@tucows.com> To: "Anthony Harris" <harris@cabase.org.ar> Cc: "Council GNSO" <council@gnso.icann.org>; <gnso-dow123@gnso.icann.org> Sent: Thursday, June 22, 2006 12:15 PM Subject: Re: [gnso-dow123] Re: [council] Regarding Letter from American Intellectual Property Law Association

Anthony Harris wrote:

...

The core business of operators can hardly revolve around what happens to WHOIS, no one ever stated that. WHOIS information is but one useful resource that we see no need to hide or do away with it. It is comforting to see that you are vigilant over our website and it's contents. There is work in progress going on there.

The "we" you speak of and the "work in progress" are directly related. I tried to go to your website to confirm whether or not any of the hosting companies and ISPs I work with are listed in your membership. Instead, I found a list of members containing dead people, defunct organizations and an admonishment that the ISPCP website was offline. If this is the "we" that you speak of, I'm not sure that there's much more conversation to be had.

...

OK they are entitled to have a different viewpoint, and so?

...and so, you mentioned that you have yet to meet an operator whose interests are served by formulation 1. I mentioned that I knew many of them and would be happy to make an introduction if you thought it would be helpful. My offer still stands.

...

This is a complete misrepresentation of fact. The ISPCP never refused to consider alternatives to unfettered access to WHOIS data. The subject of tiered access began to be discussed quite some time ago in the TF (possibly you were not around at that time), and was put aside for later work, we did not oppose tiered access as a concept.

Hmmm. Perhaps I'm confused then. The ISPCP constituency (such as it is) formal submission to the Whois Task Force pretty explicitly states that "The ISPCP believes that regardless of the vast growth of the number of domain registrations, some core principles should remain unchanged, and ready access to all Whois data is one such principle."

This is a pretty categorical statement and I'm hard pressed to reconcile the need for "ready access to all Whois data" with the more restrictive data access methods in the various Tiered Access proposals.

...

I fail to see how highlighting a rather evident fact is equivalent to speaking out of context, it rather helps to see what we are talking about in the midst of all the noise...I did not know you said this, but thanks for the confirmation! Your actions speak for themselves, my opinion is unimportant. The OPOC solution is a pretty lame suggestion, fully in context with the Formulation 1 which you successfully voted through. And thanks for confirming the 'technical solutions proposed are not practical, nor affordable' with regards to tiered access. And by the way it is not that particular approach that is 'too agressive', but your continuous vehemence and intolerance which at least I find unacceptable.

Stick your ad hominem in your back pocket where it belongs.

I'm not disappointed to hear you characterize the registrar OPOC proposal as lame, but I am disappointed, again, with your stark refusal to make any sort of substantive submission that might help better the proposal. We have heard time and time again about everything that the ISPCP, BCUC and IPC don't like, but we rarely, if ever hear, about how we can improve the substantive proposals made in a manner that might be more acceptable to all involved. This is the advocacy problem that I speak of. If the OPOC proposal is indeed lame, stop talking about it and instead, devote some of your rhetorical energy towards writing down a counter-proposal that we can consider. In other words, participate in the process or get out of the way.

Regarding my statement concerning the costs of tiered access, they are related to implementation of the new CRISP/IRIS protocol, the new compliance, authorization and credentialling programs that go along with it and the mass migration from the existing, simpler, WHOIS protocol that would need to occur. The OPOC proposal is an attempt to implement tiered access within the current environment (i.e. continue to provide law enforcement and government agency interests with an extremely broad dataset, provide other users with a more limited, but more useful dataset).

...

You are quite right, there is nothing cooperative about the current TF or the GNSO's policy development process. I would simply reply that you have described, in utter perfection, the attitudes you express in your frequent interventions, and your total unwillingness to accept disagreement with your positions. If little progress has been made, I would not deny you your ample share of the credit.

Again with the ad hominem Tony. I would have expected more from an elected representative to the GNSO Council. Perhaps manners and grace aren't part of the eligibility requirements in the ISPCP election process - if there is one.

...

It is a falsity that outreach was made to, at least, our constituency. In fact, as you may recall in Luxembourg I attempted this, and was rewarded later with a document containing......the OPOC !

Fine. I'm happy to live with your more curious version of events - I'm not sure that it matters one whit either. It is a well known fact that the OPOC proposal was first published shortly after Mar del Plata after having been drafted by a group of registrars that during the Argentine meeting. It is a lesser known fact that there was a meeting between the ISPCP and a group of Registrars in Luxembourg as you point out. If I recall, we discussed the issue of contactability and other matters - all principles that the "lame" OPOC proposal espouses. It is also a well-established fact that this same proposal has been modified many, many times based on input from interested stakeholders in the registry, registrar, non-commercial and other communities. I'd be happy to amend it further based on input from yours, which I why I will continue to reiterate the question I have been incessantly asking of you and others that seem to staunchly opposed to progress:

"How can the existing proposals that have been tabled be changed so that they are suitable for the needs of the stakeholders you represent?"

Regards,

--

-rr

"Don't be too timid and squeamish about your actions. All life is an experiment. The more experiments you make the better." - Ralph Waldo Emerson

Contact Info:

Ross Rader Director, Research & Innovation Tucows Inc. t. 416.538.5492 c. 416.828.8783

Get Started: http://start.tucows.com My Blogware: http://www.byte.org

Lucy.Nichols@nokia.com wrote:

Let's get you two some rotten fruit while in Marrakech and allow you to continue to "duke" it out there!

My bad manners, lack of civility, vehemence and overall gracelessly poor attitude won't be in Marrakech, but the registrar constituency has no shortage of malcontents like myself, so I'm sure a fruitfling could still be arranged. Regards, -- -rr "Don't be too timid and squeamish about your actions. All life is an experiment. The more experiments you make the better." - Ralph Waldo Emerson Contact Info: Ross Rader Director, Research & Innovation Tucows Inc. t. 416.538.5492 c. 416.828.8783 Get Started: http://start.tucows.com My Blogware: http://www.byte.org