Today, Wednesday November 28 2018, at 4:30pm ET (21:30 UTC) TeleCommunities Canada and NARALO presentICANN 63 READOUT – OTTAWA at 25oneCommunity, Ottawa. The event will include ICANN senior staff and community members providing insights into the multistakeholder system of internet governance as well as overviews of discussions at the recent ICANN meeting in Barcelona (Oct. 20-25, 2018). Topics presented will be explored through the following lenses: What is this about?How does it affect the end user? Speakers include Joe Catapano & Chris Mondini, ICANN; Stephanie Perrin (NCSG); Marita Moll (ALAC); Charles Taillefer, Michael De Santis, Luisa Paez, and Taylor Bentley (ISED). The event will be webcast live on the Internet Society Livestream Channel.
ISOC-NY is At-Large Structure in the North America Regional At-Large Organization (NARALO) of ICANN The At-Large community is holding a post-WCIT (World Conference on International Telecommunications) webinar today Thursday, January 17 between 14:00-15:00 UTC, that’s 9am-10am EST, This webinar will present various perspectives of the WCIT, challenges and opportunities and possible next steps for the At-Large community and ICANN. Speakers include ISOC-NY Board member Avri Doria. All ISOC-NY members are welcome to attend. No registration is required.
)Following the US Senate Commerce Committee hearing on new TLD expansion on December 8 2011, Dr. Olivier MJ Crépin-Leblond, Chair of the At-Large Advisory Council (ALAC), which represents the views of Internet users within the ICANN multistakeholder process, and Beau Brendler, Chair of the North American Regional At-Large Organization (NARALO) have written to Committee Chair Sen. John Rockefeller to depict the testimony of former ICANN Chair Esther Dyson as “out of date”.
we found Ms. Esther Dyson’s description of the ALAC circa 2003 extremely out-ofdate. Her testimony depicted the ALAC prior to the establishment of the five Regional At-Large Organizations (RALOs) which are designed to provide a structured input first to the ALAC and then to ICANN from Internet end-users around the world.
and
Today, the ALAC is able to comment on any aspect of the new gTLD program, which it has on several occasions, as well as any other program or process at ICANN.
It’s not all criticism, though..
However, we fully support her overall message for the public to pay attention to the workings of ICANN, and that ICANN’s door is open.
The letter goes on to emphasize that public interest should be the touchstone of Internet policy, and appeals to the Senator for assistance in strengthening that priority by encouraging membership in At-Large by interested parties. (One way would be to join ISOC-NY since we are an At-Large Structure! However NARALO, uniquely amongst the regions, does accept individual members.)
The current .NET Registry Agreement between ICANN and Verisign is due to expire on 30 June 2011. On April 11 2011 ICANN posted a proposed draft renewal agreement for public comment. Under the terms of the existing agreement, which contracted a 6 year term starting July 1 2005, renewal is automatic unless Verisign commits some egregious breach of terms. Although ICANN has made some tweaks this clause (4.2) is unchanged in the new draft.
However Verisign still held an ace – it operated the root zone and, as they say, possession is nine/tenths of the law. Starting in 2004 Verisign also launched a barrage of lawsuits against ICANN, essentially challenging its authority and crippling it financially.
In early 2005, the ‘competitive process’ to assign .net took place. Verisign – in what was described as a deeply flawed process – won. Then, in October 2005, came the ‘monster deal‘ – Verisign dropped it’s lawsuits, gave up control of the root, and agreed to regulation of “non-registry services” in return for renewed 6 year contracts on .com and .net. What evidently wasn’t apparent at the time – as nobody appears to have commented on it, was that the wording in these contracts actually gave them control in perpetuity.
Thus, when the draft renewal agreement was announced in April 2011 it received little attention. However in just the last few days – the deadline for public comment was May 10 – suddenly a flurry of comment appeared. Correspondence, especially out of the North American Regional At-Large Organization (NARALO), of which ISOC-NY is an At-Large Structure, noted that under the 2009 Affirmation of Commitments that gave ICANN its independence, it undertook to make decisions solely in the public interest through a multi-stakeholder bottom-up policy development model. It was also noted that ICANN’s partner in the AoC, the United States National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) has itself recently demanded that ICANN perform economic studies before any further delegation of top level domains (TLDs) and also that ICANN provide “a thorough and reasoned explanation of decisions taken“.
At the monthly NARALO monthly meeting on May 9 the issue was raised of questioning the automatic renewal or, at least the renewal of the automatic renewal clause in the new contract, and also asking ICANN to clarify the process by which it came to be in the first place. There was enough concern expressed at the meeting that Olivier Crepin-Leblond, chair of the At-Large Advisory Committee (ALAC) moved rapidly to contact the ICANN board support staff and gain a window – an extension until May 18 – for the ALAC to gather input from the At-Large community for a statement to present to the board in advance of its retreat May 20 -21 2011.
The draft of the statement is at https://community.icann.org/x/noHg – if you have further comments they can be added there (or below). The deadline is tomorrow May 17 2011.
Vint Cerf will give the keynote at the North American At-Large Showcase at ICANN 40 in San Francisco on Mar 14. ISOC-NY is an At-Large Structure within NARALO and cordially invites you to attend. The event will be held in the Westin Hotel’s Alexandra Room with great views of the city. Vint’s theme – very much in keeping with the purpose of At-Large – will be “Amplifying the Voices of Civil Society”. Admission is free but space is limited so please RSVP at the earliest opportunity.
Beau Brendler finishes a three-year term as an elected member of the At-Large Advisory Committee (ALAC) to ICANN in December 2010, after which he becomes chairman of the North American Regional Organization of the At-Large (NARALO) of which ISOC-NY is a member structure.
Beau, long a champion of Internet consumer concerns, informs us that he just been engaged as blogger at thinkerNet , and you can read his first effort below.
I attended the 12/14 NARALO meeting on behalf of ISOC-NY.
1. The Special Trademark Issues (STI) Review Team has issued it’s recommendations. This is a follow up to the earlier IRT proposals that were discussed at sessions like the one in NYC earlier in the year. The lack of consensus there led to the STI process which indeed has succeeded in ironing out many differences. The At-Large nevertheless has quibbles detailed here.
2. Outreach at conferences was discussed. A small number of conferences, including the Nonprofit Technology Network, has been targeted. Funds will be applied for. A brochure is needed. A brochure working group was formed. Examples are the current EURALO and At-Large brochures.
3.Theresa Swineheart gave a presentation on the newly forged ICANN Draft Strategic Plan 2010 – 2013. There is a 45 day comment period closing Jan 21 2010. There is also a survey. Feel free to also reply to this post with any comments. The reccomendations will be voted on by the GNSO Council on Thurs Dec 17.
Today, Wednesday November 28 2018, at 4:30pm ET (21:30 UTC) TeleCommunities Canada and NARALO present ICANN 63 READOUT – OTTAWA at 25oneCommunity, Ottawa. The event will include ICANN senior staff and community members providing insights into the multistakeholder system of internet governance as well as overviews of discussions at the recent ICANN meeting in Barcelona (Oct. 20-25, 2018). Topics presented will be explored through the following lenses: What is this about?How does it affect the end user? Speakers include Joe Catapano & Chris Mondini, ICANN; Stephanie Perrin (NCSG); Marita Moll (ALAC); Charles Taillefer, Michael De Santis, Luisa Paez, and Taylor Bentley (ISED). The event will be webcast live on the Internet Society Livestream Channel.
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