Thanks Elisa. This is very helpful. I agree that the term RVC should not be modified since that is the term that Sub Pro used, the Council forwarded to the Board, and the Board adopted. In the case of GAC requirements, the context was that the applicant "volunteers" to add a Commitment in order to resolve a barrier to the application moving forward. This function of RVCs was further explained in the Clarifying Statement issued by the GNSO Council to the Board in connection with its work on "Sub Pro Pending Recommendations". The reason for calling these RVCs instead of PICs is that some on the working group were not ready to concede that every requirement beyond the established Safeguard PICs actually qualified as a Public Interest Commitment. This is why I think we must distinguish between Safeguard PICs and other RVCs which may be negotiated between GAC members or the GAC generally and an applicant. The term "Voluntary" was also adopted to contrast these Commitments against the "Mandatory PICs" in Spec 11.) Having said that, the term "Remedial RVC" goes too far in the other direction since the applicant should not be characterized as "remediating" some situation with the application when the applicant is put into the circumstance of not being able to move forward unless it agrees to the GAC request for an RVC. Accordingly, rather than "Remedial RVC", I would favor a more accurate label recognizing these processes, i.e. "Safeguard PIC" as one subset, and "Negotiated RVC" as another subset of the commitment category. ( As explained above, the third established category is Mandatory Pics as per Specification 11.) The term "Negotiated RVC" would at least recognize that the applicant has the ability to negotiate with the GAC members to reach agreement on an appropriate RVC (Subject to Board approval) or to withdraw the application if agreement cannot be reached. With respect to the String Confusion Objection, please note that during deliberations on the Singulars/Plurals issue by the GNSO Council small team which worked with Board Sub Pro Caucus members Becky and Alan, this issue of whether or not ICANN was exceeding Mission in that Objection was raised and most on those calls (even the NCSG reps) argued that allowing an independent panel to determine the risk of confusion by looking at the meaning of the strings falls within ICANN's security and stability responsibilities under the ByLaws. To my mind, there is absolutely no way this aspect of the Sub Pro Final Report Recommendations as approved by Council and the Board could be reversed without further policy work and a resulting delay in the launch of the next round of new gTLDs. Let us not make a farce of the MSM by initiating a sudden reversal of this policy while at the same time having adopted a policy against any singulars and plurals whatsoever based on the concern that there is too great a risk of confusion. Certainly in light of the GNSO Council letter to the Board regarding the reversal of Recommendation 20.6, I think the Council is at its limit in relation to sudden reversals by the Board of previously Board-adopted Sub Pro Recommendations and Affirmations. I also think that if we pretend that Board approval of an RVC does not in any way involve a "content" determination at any level, we are participating in pure fiction. The Board guidelines for evaluation of RVCs are presumably acceptable. There is also "content" involved in Safeguard PICs and in promoting the Global Public Interest by addressing the risk of confusion via the prevention of singular and plural TLDs and by having a String Confusion Objection process. Without these policies, the TLD environment becomes a "Wild Kingdom". Again, many thanks for trying to solidify further clarifying language before putting these sections out for public comment. We all appreciate the time pressure. Anne We certainly appreciate Anne Aikman-Scalese GNSO Councilor NomCom Non-Voting 2022-2026 anneicanngnso@gmail.com On Thu, Dec 12, 2024 at 11:56 PM Elisa Busetto via SubPro-IRT < subpro-irt@icann.org> wrote:

Dear all,

Thank you very much for the productive discussions we had yesterday <https://community.icann.org/x/H4CpG> regarding Community Input and Dispute Resolution.

Based on your initial feedback, we understand that there are concerns around the complexity and potential lack of clarity of the section, but not on the implementation of policy. We believe that gathering community input as soon as possible is crucial, so we can have sufficient time to make updates before the final Public Comment for the draft AGB in May 2025. As noted in our call yesterday, we planned to place this particular section for initial Public Comment on 17 December 2024. However, to give you the chance to provide any additional comments, we will postpone the launch of the Public Comment to Thursday, 19 December. All feedback should be received by EOB *Sunday, 15 December 2024*. We recognize that this is a quick turnaround, but we will continue discussions on this topic in the new year as part of the RVC discussions, and following the Public Comment.

Following internal discussions, we believe that it is necessary to clarify in the AGB language how commitments can be used to address GAC Advice and objections, and also clarify the restrictions and procedural safeguards that will be placed on this type of registry commitment when they are used to resolve an objection or GAC Advice. For this reason, we provided an explanation in the GAC Advice and RVCs <https://docs.google.com/document/d/1bWQejPrHG4LhuzXz0qJ_wYXM1AwEH7VYqS-31T3c...> and the Objections and RVCs <https://docs.google.com/document/d/1bWQejPrHG4LhuzXz0qJ_wYXM1AwEH7VYqS-31T3c...> sections respectively.

We have made the following changes in the aforementioned sections:

- Replaced “should” with “must” in the following sentence: “Should the Board determine that the GAC’s concern *must* be addressed and that the already existing RVC addresses the advice,...” - We added some language clarifying that an applicant is not forced to address GAC Advice via a “Remedial” RVC before the Board resolves on it.

We will consider renaming the “Remedial RVCs” to something else, and the term is TBD at the moment. While we understand that these commitments are different from other RVCs and are not proposed entirely voluntarily by the applicant, we hesitate to come up with a different concept altogether. Please also note that Recommendation 30.7 and 31.17 refers to these commitments as ‘RVCs’, and using a different name or creating a new commitment category might not be entirely aligned with the wording of the recommendation.

We also understand that there could be ways to further simplify these sections, but have not identified a way to ensure that in these specific scenarios applicants and other parties have a clear understanding of what the necessary steps are and why the commitments applied here are different.

We have also added language <https://docs.google.com/document/d/1bWQejPrHG4LhuzXz0qJ_wYXM1AwEH7VYqS-31T3c...> indicating that GAC Member Early Warnings must be submitted in the 90 days following String Confirmation days, in line with Recommendation 30.5.

In addition, we have added a footnote to the Standing to Object: Community <https://docs.google.com/document/d/1bWQejPrHG4LhuzXz0qJ_wYXM1AwEH7VYqS-31T3c...> section indicating that the Board still has to act on the ALAC Advice regarding Standing for Objections in the Next Round Program <https://atlarge.icann.org/advice_statements/13951>, and updates might be necessary based on the Board action.

Finally, regarding the concern raised by Jeff regarding String Confusion Objections, we will get back to you soon.

Many thanks!

Elisa

*From: *Elisa Busetto <elisa.busetto@icann.org> *Date: *Tuesday, 10 December 2024 at 16:27 *To: *"subpro-irt@icann.org" <subpro-irt@icann.org> *Subject: *Re: [SubPro-IRT] Language for Meeting #97a

P.S. Please note that this language was shared and discussed before; in the meeting we will go through some changes we made based on your feedback as well as internal discussions.

Best,

Elisa

*From: *Elisa Busetto via SubPro-IRT <subpro-irt@icann.org> *Reply to: *Elisa Busetto <elisa.busetto@icann.org> *Date: *Tuesday, 10 December 2024 at 15:58 *To: *"subpro-irt@icann.org" <subpro-irt@icann.org> *Subject: *[SubPro-IRT] Language for Meeting #97a

Dear all,

Please find below links to the language that we will discuss during Meeting #97a <https://community.icann.org/x/H4CpG>.

- Community Input and Dispute Resolution [docs.google.com] <https://urldefense.com/v3/__https:/docs.google.com/document/d/1bWQejPrHG4Lhu...> - Dispute Resolution Procedure [docs.google.com] <https://urldefense.com/v3/__https:/docs.google.com/document/d/1F-JZYYgbVqZYa...> - Objection Appeals Procedure [docs.google.com] <https://urldefense.com/v3/__https:/docs.google.com/document/d/1QpSpvUDdJnrz7...>

Best,

Elisa _______________________________________________ SubPro-IRT mailing list -- subpro-irt@icann.org To unsubscribe send an email to subpro-irt-leave@icann.org

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