I note that item 5 on the agenda for the 18 December meeting is "Due
consideration of alternative proposal (not to exclude other
proposals)".
I also note that there has been significant discussion about the CWG
Stewardship and the CCWG Accountability, their inter-relationship and
co-dependency.
In light of this, I would like to bring the CWGs attention to a recent
e-mail on the CCWG list (copied below).
Although I believe that the ALAC proposal
(
http://forum.icann.org/lists/comments-cwg-naming-transition-01dec14/msg00011.html
) is the only such alternative presented here, it is not alone. I am not
advocating the exact details of the proposal referenced in the message
(see
http://www.innovationfiles.org/key-principles-for-the-icann-transition/
and
http://thehill.com/blogs/pundits-blog/technology/227375-icann-transition-plan-needs-new-ideas-to-ensure-accountability),
but it does demonstrate that we are not unique in wanting a far simpler
mode for the new IANA coupled with real multistakeholder
accountability in ICANN.
I believe that the CCWG *WILL* deliver and I think that we need to factor
that into our deliberations. Specifically, is there really a need for the
complexity, cost and associated issues of Contract Co. given the same
level of control could be provided by a change such as this?
Alan
===================
From: Steve DelBianco
<sdelbianco@netchoice.org>
To: Accountability Cross Community
<accountability-cross-community@icann.org>
Date: Wed, 17 Dec 2014 16:20:43 +0000
Subject: [CCWG-Accountability] Op-Ed from ITIF regarding permanent
cross-community group as ultimate authority
This pertains to our discussion yesterday about a permanent,
cross-community "˜Membership" group to hold ICANN board and
management accountable to the community. It was described this way
in
draft3 for work area 2:
- Amend ICANN bylaws to recognize a permanent cross-community
representative structure (all ACs, SOs, Constituencies) with authority
to:
- Appoint members of Affirmation review teams
- Review a board decision, or resolve a dispute (option to use
independent panel)
- Approve changes to ICANN bylaws or Articles, with 2/3 approval
- Approve annual proposed ICANN budget
- Recall one or all ICANN Board members
One of the groups
proposing a community of stakeholders as ultimate authority posted a
relevant
Op-Ed in a Washington paper today. Daniel Castro of the
Information Technology & Innovation Foundation (ITIF) wrote:
- California state law applies since ICANN is a registered nonprofit
corporation in the state. As such, California law allows nonprofit
organizations to have statutory members. Gunnarson suggests that one way
to provide an effective check on the ICANN board's power is to create
statutory members of ICANN with extensive authority over the board. This
authority could include removing board members, overturning board
decisions, etc. The statutory members would likely include the chairs of
the various ICANN "supporting organizations" and "advisory
committees," such as the Address Supporting Organization (ASO)
responsible for IP address policy and the Country Code Name Supporting
Organization (ccNSO) responsible for managing the country code top-level
domains. To ensure that the statutory members do not hold too much sway,
their actions could be limited to situations where there is a
supermajority (i.e., consensus).
We welcome further elaboration of legal basis to enable this
modification to ICANN’s bylaws in conformance with California
law.
Steve DelBianco
Executive Director
NetChoice
http://www.NetChoice.org and
http://blog.netchoice.org
+1.202.420.7482