George, These are the questions that I sent through today: Twomey (two years ago): “What has happened to registrants with RegisterFly.com has made it clear there must be comprehensive review of the registrar accreditation process”. Where’s the review? The IANA’s .int registry serves the IGO population without fees. Will the Board direct the IANA to provide registry services without fees to other small populations? How does the Board intend to resolve the current impasse over the proposed amendments to the RAA? Will fees for new IDN ccTLDs also be predicated on a cost-recovery basis? Will the final set of PSC accountability recommendations be in place and adopted prior to the expiration of the JPA? When can we expect to see representatives from the at-large community seated on the ICANN Board as directors? The ICANN Compliance Department together with the National Opinion Research Center organized a Whois Accuracy Study. When can we expect to see the results of this study? Recent Breach Notices illustrate that registrar violations can span more than a year before a Breach Notice is finally sent. Will the Board recommend a more timely approach? The bylaws require constituent bodies to operate to the maximum extent feasible in a transparent manner. Will the Board refuse to re-certify constituencies that don’t publicly archive member discussions? A $60million budget is currently insufficient to fully fund GNSO Council travel expenses. How high does the budget need to be before full travel funding becomes available? --- On Wed, 2/11/09, George Kirikos <gkirikos@yahoo.com> wrote: From: George Kirikos <gkirikos@yahoo.com> Subject: [ga] ICANN opens up Question Box for Mexico City meeting To: ga@gnso.icann.org Date: Wednesday, February 11, 2009, 8:25 PM Hi folks, ICANN has opened up a Question Box for the Mexico City meeting, see: http://www.icann.org/en/announcements/announcement-2-11feb09-en.htm It'll be interesting to see whether they respond with more than just canned non-answers given that they have the time to prepare. Since we're allowed to submit more than one question, here's a few I submitted (with perhaps more to come once the next new gTLD Draft Guidebook is published). If others submit questions feel free to post them to the GA list, and we can see whether ICANN does in fact answer them in Mexico. Questions were limited to 30 words. 1. Why did ICANN use its emergency reserve fund to speculate in financial markets, losing a reported $4.6 million? Emergency reserves are supposed to be kept in risk free liquid securities. 2. In ICANN's Form 990, Paul Twomey's compensation was adjusted upwards to reflect the declining US dollar. Now that the US dollar has soared, will his compensation be adjusted downward accordingly? 3. Why is the Board Finance Committee planning an expensive hedging program, when it is possible to conduct most of its business in US dollars, shifting currency risks to suppliers? 4. One million/year is spent on telephone costs. What's being done to minimize that cost, in particular competitive tenders by suppliers, etc? What's the cost per minute of conference calls currently? 5. Why was ICANN staff researching George Kirikos' political views on President Barack Obama? (as was verified by Apache webserver referrer logs) Does ICANN keep a dossier on every community participant? 6. Why does ICANN use For-Profit companies as "comparables" in its compensation, when it purports to be a Non-Profit? Given staff's job security compared to the private-sector, isn't this unwise overspending? 7. A federal court in California awarded Verizon $33.15 million against OnlineNIC for cybersquatting. What's ICANN doing to protect registrants in the event of registrar failure? Are other registrars vulnerable? Sincerely, George Kirikos http://www.leap.com/