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ccTLD ICANN Meetings in Rio de Janeiro

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ccTLD ICANN Meetings in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, 23-25 March 2003

  1. Agenda: 20030323.Rio-agenda.html
  2. Documents: 20030323.Rio-documents.html
  3. Communiqué: 20030325.ccTLDrio-communique.html
  4. Resolution ccNSO: 20030325.ccTLDrio-ccNSO-resolution.html

ccTLD Rio Meeting Day 1

9:00 - 10:30 am ccNSO Assistance Group Report

0. Opening Remarks - Patricio Poblete (PP), Meeting Chair

PP welcomed everyone who made it to the meeting despite the happenings around the world. He said he understood the feelings of those who decided not to travel, including the secretariat and added however that Abhisak was willing to work remotely and will keep posting the material on the web site as and when he receives it. He also mentioned that he hoped the meeting would understand that there was a need to find other ways of working around the things that were normally done, e.g., donations that were usually collected in front of the door. He said the donations would be collected during break. The normal practice he said was for the AdCom representative to chairs the meeting, and so he was the chair. Oscar Robles, the second LACTLD representative, could not attend the meeting so Christina Paiva, from Paraguay, will be co-chairing instead. He added that the minutes would be taken by the volunteers (Shariya Haniz Zulkifli, Ramesh Nadarjah, Young-Eum Lee). He indicated that the main agenda for the day was discussion on ccNSO AG work and proposals. He also said he was reminded that, they were meeting not as a part of ICANN but as a group of ccTLD managers who had a common interest and were discussing various issues. He suggested that even though the meeting was not a formal ICANN meeting and therefore members did not need the ICANN badges, ccTLD members should continue wearing the badges with the nametags, which represent security measures as well. He introduced PDT as leader for the first session.

Plenary Session 1 - Session Leader: Peter Dengate Thrush 1. ccNSO AG Report

1.1 PDT said the most important part of ICANN would occur after coffee break, when the meeting will talk to the people who were involved in the discussions in ICANN regarding this process. He went on to describe the background of ccNSO. He said discussions began in 1999. Robert, an ICANN staff, suggested that ccTLDs formed a group. In Yokohama, June 2000, ccTLDs decided that we needed to determine an appropriate place within ICANN. In Marina del Ray, November 2000, we decided to go ahead with our plans. In Stockholm, March 2001, we formally discussed a process of "leaving" ICANN to form our own organization. In Montevideo, ccTLDs took an important step by agreeing that they needed to form a Supporting Organization (SO). CcTLDs agreed that each registry was not an island and that there was a needed to consider interoperability issues. In Feb. 2002, CEO of ICANN published a report on the likely future of ICANN. Notable was the failure of ICANN to establish a working relationship with the constituencies, especially with regard to ccTLDs. This failure was considered by ccTLDs to be a critical failure of ICANN. In Bucharest, June 2002, ccTLDs looked at the Blueprint. The most significant item was the suggestion of a formation of an SO by the ICANN board. The political battle was largely won by June of 2002. The nature of the organization still needs to be discussed, today. When ccTLDs met in Shanghai, in September 2002, ccTLDs heard a first report from a group that was put together by ICANN to discuss the details. CcTLDs will hear from members of that group today. PDT then showed parts of presentations of ICANN we had before the process (structure of ICANN presented as PowerPoint). In the New arrangement (adopted by the ICANN board in Shanghai) - the General Assembly, within GNSO, has disappeared. The PSO has also disappeared, and had been placed by various supporting organizations. ccNSO, 8 At Large, 6 non-voting liaisons on the board(ALAC, GAC, TAC, etc), Nominating Committee. In ERC's proposal, the Country Names Council- 1/3 was to be appointed by the Nominating Committee. In ccTLDs proposal, the International Council would have 15 seats, 3 per region, chair, secretariat, reflecting existing regional associations, open international assembly. ccTLDs responded to the Blueprint presented. ccTLDs wanted to continue talking to the ICANN board; ccTLDs position was for SO to make policy, not the board. ICANN board was supposed to just make sure of a proper process and should not be able to reject policy. There was supposed to be no cross subsidy. If in ccTLDs proposal, ccNSO would approve ICANN budget, etc. then ccTLD seat on the Nominating Committee was too small. PDT moved on to the ccNSO Policy Development process. He said documents issued by ICANN after Bucharest meeting (list presented). On 18 September, after Bucharest, ERC announced the formation of cc Assistance Group. The process of the formation of the group was subject to comment, and ccTLDs subsequently decided to focus on the outcome, not the process of the formation of the group. In Shanghai, ccTLDs expressed support of the work. Since then, renewed ICANN contract with the US government also pointed to the fact that contracts with ccTLDs were necessary for the success of ICANN. At ccTLD Meeting in Shanghai, ccTLDs withdrew from ICANN DNSO, endorsed the Bucharest Response welcomed the work of the Assistance Group. The scope of the power of an SO, the Boswinkel's paper, and Policy Development Process were published. Clarification of PDP was made, and a Paper on the Council published. Structure consisted of a transition team of 10 ccTLD managers. Final recommendation has also been made. PDT said in the AG recommendation on scope, no conclusion on circumstances requiring or processes or achieving change of manager. PDP membership implied acceptance of policy unless against local law. International Council - 3 "angels" appointed by Nomination Committee (with voting rights), observers from GAC, ALAC. International Council - meets in conjunction with ICANN. Council appoints 2 directors to the ICANN board, 1 member to the Nominating Committee. In the transition - there would be a "Launch Group" of 15 ccTLD managers. Once the election was completed, Launch Group's term would be over. PDT also said the AG proposal was similar to the ccTLD proposal in that the International Council would be a bit larger than originally proposed (18, 15 + 3 by Nom Com, up to 7 observers), 2 board seats (3 proposed). He said there were still questions to be answered about Issues Manager and Secretariat. PDT said what the meeting needed to do after coffee break was to bring out the members of the AG to talk about the details of the proposals. He then opened the floor for questions.

1.2 Paul Kane(PK) thanked PDT for the presentation and asked whether any thought had been give to defining the scope of the ccTLD group. PDT replied that the AG has come up with a matrix for thinking about scope. He said ccTLDs needed to talk about how to limit the matrix in the bylaws. Nigel Roberts (NR) asked whether the ccTLD Nominating Committee member had been to a ccTLD meeting? PDT replied in the negative and said the issue of the Nom Com member be left for later discussion. He wanted the meeting to first go through the SO process and talk about what ccTLDs want, and see if the AG has met the those needs. Willie Black (WB) wanted to know what the cost benefit analysis of joining this group (SO) would be and what risk was involved in not joining? He wanted the meeting to an approximately idea of what the contribution was going to be and how much was involved? Bart Boswinkle (BB) suggested that a SWOT (strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats) analysis was rather what was needed. In contribution to WB's point raised NR said he thought one thing that people were fearful of was that if they did not take part in this global organization, there would be a change of manager. PDT said direct election from the SOs was going to come from people running the grass roots organizations. WB said the only group that could vote for the policy of .uk was the local Internet community. In that respect, he said the only things that ICANN could make policy about were running IANA and running a forum, and not about anything else related with local policy. PDT announced that a vote might be taken at the closing of day 3 on whether to entirely accept, entirely reject, etc. after some discuss of the subject among ccTLDs, with the board, etc. WB asked whether the meeting try to get agreements on communique points as the meeting is being progressed, rather than trying to come up with all the communique points at the end. NR supported WB's suggestions completely. PP said he was wondering whether the meeting wanted to make a final decision until it could see what the outcome of the next 2-3 days. NR said the job, as a team would be to identify propositions. WB added that the meeting should try to get things out early, so that there would be time to talk thing over. PP said whatever the meeting decide would be presented during ICANN, and hope that everyone could stay up to that session. PK proposed that a drafting committee was formed for communiqué. NR said he did not want people standing up in the public forum to disagree with the ccTLD communiqué. PP asked for volunteers for the communiqué (at least one from each region) The following participants volunteered: Bernard Turcotte (.ca), Nigel Roberts (.gg), Bart Boswinkle (.nl), Shariya Haniz Zulkifli (.my), Kim Davies (CENTR), Michael Silber (co.za), and Stephan Welzel (.de)

Coffee Break

ccTLD Rio Meeting Day 1

11:00 - 12:30pm Panel Discussion by the members of ccNSO Assistance Group (Internal)

1.3 PDT announced that the discussion in the session was an internal one, meaning only ccTLD members were going to make comments. Chris Disspain (CD), Bernard Turcotte (BT), and Bart Boswinke (BB) would be participating as the ccSO AG. CD introduced the AG's compiled Recommendations on ccNSO by going through presentation with the follow sub-headings: 1) Background; preliminary recommendations, input from community, compilation of preliminary recommendation. 2) What is the ccNSO supposed to do? 1. Develop policy recommendations to the ICANN board 2. Nurture consensus, 3. Coordinate with other constituencies. 3) Focus of Recommendation: Develop policy recommendations to the ICANN board, which are within ICANN's missions. 4) Structure (I) - members: ccTLD managers, ccNSO Council: 18 members 5) Mechanism - PDP, Issue report, Issue Manager, timeline, council must vote in issue report 6) Binding powers of ccNSO: After final vote has gone through, it cannot be changed. 7) Next steps? - input from community to the ERC, Public Forum, ERC incorporates input from community, Recommendations of ERC to ICANN board. PK asked about the "less" in "ccTLD more or less appoints the issue manager". CD said it was just the language but the council appoints the issue manager. Jeff Neumann (JN)(.us) said it would be of help to him if CD could tell him whether all the ccTLD managers on the AG supported the recommendations. CD said everyone supported the recommendations and Hotta Hiro (HH) confirmed the same. Hilde Thunen(HT) said he participated in a personal capacity. BB introduced the scope of the recommendations. As to the question on what the functions of the ccTLD registry were, he said the two core functions were entering data to generating a database, and resolving the nameserver. He said whois, for example, were secondary functions. If members agreed with the two core functions, then if one started at the bottom level, one could have 3, 4, 5 levels. The second level was what the registry maintained. He said in his case, they were the registry for Philips.nl At the top level of this hierarchy was where one could say that data had to be entered into the IANA database and would be put into root servers. BB explained the issues of entering data into the database and the naming policy (terms and conditions under which one entered data into the database). At a higher level, in order to make changes to the IANA database, one needed certain policies. He said it was currently based on RFC1591. In the case of the ccTLD, it was the policy of the ccTLD manager. If one filled in the matrix as it was of now, the matrix was there to show possible functions. He added that ccNSO had the right to set policy regarding delegations and redelegations. He added, however, that there was a limited role of the ccNSO to set conditions on the quality of the nameservers.

PK asked whether BB was suggesting a more active role in delegations and redelegation since IANA generally takes no actions unless there is an agreement by all members, a passive role. BB answered by saying the policy itself was RFC1591. If one were satisfied with the current state, then no changes would be made. If one were dissatisfied, however, then one would need to do something about it. CD added that if members decide that they wanted to create a PDP, then they could do it since members decide the policy.

PK said he was concerned that most of the ccTLDs were satisfied the 1591. He expressed his concerned about whether with the ccNSO the small number of participants would be able to define the ccNSO even when not many members of the ccTLD community participate. BT said it was a chicken and egg situation. PK again said the prudent move to the ccNSO should be that there is no change to the 1591 unless 75% of the ccTLDs agree.

NR said irrespective of the current status, it was clearly stated by the ccTLD president. CD said if one wanted to change this, then he was suggesting go through the PDP, which was a thing of the past. PDT said that was why the SO was the political forum to ensure that the board would listen.

PK asked whether the meeting could have the scope of the board to which PDT answered in the affirmative. BB said in the scope document, ICP-1 was referred to and that most ccTLDs lived by 1591.

Stephan Welzel (SW) (.de) said there was a possibility of change or replacement of RFC1591. He said according to the recommendation, the policies are applicable to the members. He asked whether it meant that any change in 1591 would be binding only to the members or whether it meant that the policies of the ccNSO could change policies that would be binding to all the members of the ccTLD community? BB said he thought it did not have implications to IANA functions, which would have direct implications for those who are not members. E.g., if there were a change to a nameserver policy, it would have a direct effect.

NR said it seems to be an appropriate point to bring local officials, not GAC representatives. CcTLDs were being asked to sign a contract with a private company. He asked members to look at it from the point of an international treaty organization like the ITU where occasionally, countries would say they could not live with policies that they have not agreed on and enter reservations. He asked why ICANN should have more power than an intergovernmental organization? BT referred back to SW's question and said if one did not want to be in the "club", then one fell into default. What the AG had tried to create here, he said, was that if one was not satisfied, things were going to have to affect everyone "in the club." The realities of having some of these policies fall on the ccTLD community as a whole were very few. If it goes against local law, this is perfectly okay. What will be reflected was that one could abstain from council decisions. BT said scope was narrow and there were a number of ways for ccTLDs to deal with it. NR the devil was in the details, and would like to see them. PDT said he would like to mention Stephan's question. He said it would be foolish to think that only because one did not participate in the discussions one would not be affected. A reservation that a company expresses does not have to be excused by the council. CD asked that members remember to post the comments to the documents. PDT asked whether it was not the thought of members whehter other groups of ICANN(like the GAC) would have opinions?

Sabine Dolderer of .de (SD) mentioned that there were still problems with the terminology of finding policy. We should try to distinguish between standards, recommendations, etc. She was wondering whether we still had the possibility to propose standard (binding) policies and recommendations.

BT responded that AG members were asked to design things that could implement policies. And in fact they have. As AG members designed this process; they tried to make this as logical to ccTLDs as possible. BT did not see many things that were global and most of them were local. It was his personal belief that the work would result in something like a "best practices" and recommendations rather than binding policies. SD added that there was a possibility of deciding policies without much discussion, once the organization and system was implemented. BT agreed and added that that was why members were trying to do this, to create a contact point. He said he saw that as a tool for answering the problems that ccTLD had as an organization. If ICANN continuously disregarded what ccTLDs do, there was no point in doing that. PDT asked what the alternatives were, e.g., change of IANA management? PK responded that by asking that, if one stood back, saying that the ccTLD manager represents the LIC, what was the chance that this was going to have any impact? PDT stated that the board was having a meeting of ERC on that day.

PK asked what the scope was of that meeting was going to be because he heard that the scope was narrow:one of two items: IANA - operate in a certain way. PK said he does not want the scenario where the ones who are wealthy, better at English, get to make policy. He said he wanted it to be best policy. If it was common sense, it would become policy. He suggested that ccTLD managers initiate the process.

BT implies that if one was in, it gave one a chance to look at the stuff to make sure that it was at a right level. If it was a local or regional thing, that was fundamentally designed to ensure that before it becomes binding to the ccTLDs, everyone could get a chance to vote. As far as money was concerned, he said AG members had not set a fee structure. But they had certainly taken into account that there were a lot of registries in the world that could reasonably join. BT stressed that those global issues that got past the ccTLDs would be very few, and the ccNSO, for the most part, would devise "best policies."

HT (.no) commented that ICANN had a bad track record when it was a top-down policy, compare to a bottom-up policy. HTwas worried about joining something that was not certain. HT thought that there was a need to state beforehand that the ccNSO would be involved in binding policies only with regard to IANA but other areas should fall under "best practices." HT also said that she was accountable to her LIC and her government. She would like to be able to answer to them, not just give that up by joining the ccNSO.

CD emphasized that binding policies cannot be imposed on ccNSO. HD wanted to have it stated clearly that binding policy only applied to IANA functions. Michael Silber (MS) disagreed vehemently with Paul Kane in saying that everything was local. He pointed out that one could not have local changing the international, and the international changing the local. PDT said that was exactly what the APTLD suggested in Montevideo, and was rejected. The proposal to incorporate was rejected. But MS stressed that ccTLDs needed to agree among ourselves. BT pointed out that Peter worked hard, but it did not work.

Shariya Zulkifli (SZ) ( .my)asked if after the ccNSO was formed, what would happen to a member who breached. She said ccTLDs should know what was going to happen when a ccTLD did not join. BT answered that the ultimate "stick" was that it was affecting the stability of the Internet as a whole and thus that ccTLD should be taken off the internet. But PDT felt that it was hard to talk about penalties, the exact penalty that currently stood. If the breach was severe, the local Internet manager would be removed. This could be a powerful motive to join the ccNSO. The whole idea was to bring this into a forum where ccTLDs had an influence. BB pointed out that the penalty was in the matrix. The matrix described who one was responsible to. He said that was completely empty since IANA was only accountable to the DoC and morally responsible toccTLDs. BB thought there were no answers to these questions yet since the accountability matrix was incomplete.

Dotty DeBlanc (DD)( .vi) suggested ccTLDs look at the reason why they were getting together. She said it would be good to devise a list of the "reasons for getting together," as had been proposed by Kilnam Chon. ccTLDs also need to revisit PDT's work since ccTLDs need a legal entity in order for that entity to have any power at all. In terms of WB's cost-benefit ratios, she said there would be no "economic" benefit but rather there would be an effective self governing mechanism. She said it would be in the best best interest of ccTLDs to get together and stressed the need for a purpose which she said no one was talking about. CD pointed out that the ERC drew a difference between a trade organization and a supporting organization. ccTLDs were talking about a supporting organization, not a trade organization. PDT said he thought nobody seemed to want a trade organization but WB agreed with PDT on creating a trade organization. WB said he could talk about US control of IANA and etc., but would like to point out one thing: why it was being said that there were "very few things" and why it was being supposed that there was anything at all? Clearly state beforehand, RFC1591 was a contractual relationship. WB said he wanted a contractual relationship with IANA. CD agreed but pointed out that ICANN IANA had policy on what was needed to sign a contractual relationship. That was a policy that globally affected the ccTLDs. PDT said that ccTLDs agreed on that previously.

JN voiced his opinion by saying that when ccTLDs were talking about accountability, ccTLDs were talking about our accountability to ICANN. He said why could ccTLDs not think about ICANN's accountability to ccTLDs.He said he hoped that through the new SO, ccTLDs could come up with ways in which ccTLDs could hold ICANN accountable. SD suggested that if there was discussion about ccNSO, distinction should be made between things that does not fall under ccNSO but falls under ICANN behavior and may ultimately affect ccTLDs. BT added that if it was going to affect the ccTLDs, then it should go through the PDP. SD commented that it only talked about what fell under the ccNSO. It did not defined what happens to things fell outside the ccNSO scope. BB suggested that it be discussed during PDP discussions.He said one step was scope the second step was PDP.

JN was wondering if this had been put in actual wording. PDT pointed out that it was already there that any policy that affected ccNSOs should go through the PDP.

PK asked if anyone checked with the board to make sure that the board was ready to assume liability for failed policies; whether they were looking to "ratify" or "approve" policy. He said their liability would be an issue.

Lunch Break

ccTLD Rio Meeting Day 1

14:00 - 15:30 Panel Discussion by the members of ccNSO Assistance Group (Includes non-ccTLDs)

PDT makes opening remarks by introducing Bart Boswinkel (BB) of .nl. PDT reminds us that clarity about the scope is essential and references to "just the IANA function" is needed. BB pointed us to CENTR document: "The future management of the IANA function." (http://www.centr.org/docs/statements/future-IANA.html). Most of the issues were dealt with what we meant when we talk of the IANA function.

Chris Disspain (CD) of .au explained that any changes can only occur from bottom-up and changes cannot come from top-down. The board cannot make changes. The only way that an Issue Report can be started is through PDP process which stating that there is an issue. There are steps to create the Issue Report. Basically, an Issue manager is to be appointed. What is the issue? How is it to be handled? The recommendation as to whether it should proceed is determined by the ICANN General Council (GC). APTLD proposed that certain recommendations do not need GC's opinion. Council decides whether to proceed with the PDP, after review of the Issue Report. Votes must have a certain number of Council members, not a percentage of Council members. Then there is the commencement of the PDP. Task Force (TF) may be formed, or may go to regional associations. TF has no authority to make decisions, just gathering input and to obtain relevant information to produce a report for GC. TF must have a charter to operate. The regional organizations may comment on TF Report. Supermajority (66%) of the vote is needed for the Report. If not, all positions must be stated including analysis of Regional Organizations' comments. The Council deliberates whether to make recommendation or not. It may ask for external input. A recommendation by Council must be supported by 12 or more members. This creates a supermajority, but not using percentage in case there are vacancies. The Council will then issue a report to the members. Then the members have a final vote on whether or not the recommendation becomes a ccNSO recommendation. If the vote is yes, then it goes to ICANN Board. If the Board agrees, then policy implemented. If the Board says no, then it goes back to Council for Council to make supplemental recommendation. If the Board decides not to accept supplemental recommendation, then status quo remains. For example, if ccNSO makes recommendations to 1591 and the Board does not agree, then 1591 remains as is. If there is no existing policy, then this remains so if the Board does not agree.

PDT asked why starting with 10 as sufficient to initiate PDP. CD answered that AG members felt that it was appropriate for two regions to be able to initiate policies, including the 3 members from Nom Com. PDT continued to ask of which is the most critical checkpoint in these series of votes. CD said there were two. The first is enough agreement to start initiation, the second is member vote. HT of .nl asked whether AG put any thoughts on weighting regions referring to a limit of 66% to initiate PDP. CD answered that it is not percentage. It requires a certain number of Council as well as a principle that as a member of Council you are representing a ccTLD, not a region. For example, people in the region have voted for you. But when there were times that ccTLDs in a region disagree and a region position may not exist. Three Council members from one region will have more power. PDT added that previous definition of a supermajority was 2/3 from each region. Why was this not considered? CD answered that regions have different sizes and regions with few members could block bigger regions. PK suggested that we should not make any comments as consent to AG recommendations since not many ccTLDs were here unfortunately. CD said we would not do anything in Rio but asking people to make comment. After Rio, the ERC will look at compiled recommendations and prepare draft Bylaws which will then be posted for public comments.

Sabine Dolderer (SD) of .de thought that the supermajority of 2/3 from each region was a ccTLD consensus. She doesn't think that CD should ignore this. CD clarified that AG members thought that it would be inappropriate for one region, say North America (NA), to block the PDP process. If its members vote yes, why one region should be able to block what other regions disagree. SD thinks that if one region does not agree, it should not go through. We are talking about small island ccTLDs and ccTLDs that represent huge economic areas. If you need a supermajority in each region, then interests are balanced out. Then there will be some form of consent. BB pointed out that in the ccTLD world, the two largest members are in Europe. What makes the European area so special compared to other regions? SD mentioned that if you look at the regions economy, they are similar. Europeans are similar to each other, Asia-Pacific regions are similar to each other. If you want to come forward with worldwide global policies, we must accept these different cultures and we have to find ways to facilitate all the regions. BT thinks that the way this is designed does not prevent any Region from associating in blocks. If the Europeans and the AP want to create a block, then you can just name one person to vote. The other thing is that we discussed this as ccTLDs, and if you have alternative points, it should be raised separately. SD then concluded that if this is the case, it means we pushed aside other ccTLDs different opinion on the matter.

Elisabeth Porteneuve (EP) of .fr commented on the vote that we cannot simply accept 66% supermajority. We should have at least a minimum number of votes being cast (e.g., 20% of member). PDT asked EP what minimum quorum she would suggest. EP thinks that the minimum of such a percentage of membership shall be reached before a vote is valid. For DNSO, we had 20% of all members or 50 whichever came first.

Willie Black (WB) of .uk disagrees with the general principles but concerned that we are too concerned about being acceptable to ICANN, not to the ccTLD community. CD responded that, first, it obviously needs to be accepted by ccTLDs. And second, recommendations need to be in a format that needs to be accepted by ICANN. We can't say there is unanimous decision, and ask for quorum. PDT pointed out that we're not talking about a one-vote meeting. This is a position that came out of many previous ccTLD positions. He would join Willie's position. But CD replied that it's a different context under which we're dealing with. We are dealing with an ICANN process. Given the new set of building blocks that we're working with, we thought that the new principles were better.

Becky Burr, who is on the Assistance Group, thinks that it's important to look at the recommendations as a whole and worried that a majority of regions would be able to influence. However, there are checks (board, member votes, etc.) We should ask if this is enough protection.

PK comments that the issue is there are a number of barriers the mechanism is putting in place which makes ccTLDs think twice about joining the ccNSO. For example, lets be very specific about scope, ensure diversity in language. The Board should "ratify", not "approve". We need to ensure that ccTLDs who join ccNSO are free to join without fear or hindrance. He also supports Sabine's position.

CD responded by pointing out that if people believe that one region can block other regions, then comments should be made to ERC. AG could meet again if ERC feels that changes should be made. If big number of ccTLDs do not agree, then it's possible for ERC to ask AG to regroup. PK said it's not one-ccTLD lock-in but it is supposed to be representative to the ccTLDs as a whole. We have an opportunity to get it right.

Michael Silber (MS) is wondering if AG job is not satisfactory, ICANN may form a new AG? BT feels that is the choice of the ERC. AG can not decide on that.

PDT asked the question about the appointment of the issue manager whether it will be the same person for every issue or different one for different issue? CD said it's not specified. Council should decide. It's a question of function and form.

PK added it is a degree of function and form and it needs to be highlighted. The development process is something that should be as embracing as possible.

PDT brought out the issue of funding. If the issue manager is selected by ICANN, then it should be funded by ICANN. If selected by ccTLD, the ccTLDs pays. This immediately separates ICANN and ccTLDs. How do we get out of the "them" and "us" thinking process? BT pointed out that AG tried to leave it open. Let the Committee decide. All through these documents, there are things which were left purposefully open because AG doesn't want to pre-judge these things, just doing the minimum. Once official group is in place, they can decide. The change function is built in.

PDT said his question was not answered about "them" and "us" funding. CD explained that the idea is based on feedback that we received. We changed it. At the end of the day, it solves one problem but creates another. The reason for that was to protect ccTLDs based on feedback received. PDT asked if item 4 is still in. Why do we need to ask Counsel about lasting value? PDT agrees about asking the lawyers for other questions but not this one. Value is a political judgment, not a legal question.

Becky Burr added that the point was to have someone think about whether this was going to be around a long time. Motivation was to prevent the creation of a policy on a regular basis. PK wants to know more about funding and the issue manager. Are the ccTLDs funding this? Where is it coming from? How integrated is it? CD said it depended on who appoints the issue manager and this seems to be fair.

Discussion stops abruptly when Stuart comes in.

Patricio welcomes Stuart.

Patricio's speech: We've had lots of opportunities to agree and disagree. We really care what we are doing. We have common goals even though we disagree on how to get there. But we got to know you as a person at Chile meeting in Sept. 10, 2001. We were able to know Stuart when things were hard and lots were happening. Stuart gave a speech at the opening. And we are grateful to him. As his term is ending, I really feel that we did out best to get to our goals. He recognized at the time that ICANN needed a big change. One of the important things that was recognized, was that there was a need to have an organization that focused on ccTLDs. That was something we have been saying and we are glad that this has been recognized. We wish him all the best for the future.

Stuart's speech: Thank you very much Patricio. I remembered 11Sept 2001 well. The bad news was that I had to spend more time in Santiago, which in turn became good news. Thank you very much for your kind words. It's been a great pleasure to work with ccTLDs. There was nothing personal. It was a wonderful opportunity to work with some terrific people. We don't get to enjoy the places but we do get to know each other as individuals. I hope this does not mean that we cannot meet each other in different context and places. We made some progress, there are some way to go. I am confident that with ccTLDs working together, you will find the right ways to put this together that will make sense for the global Internet community.

(Stuart leaves meeting and discussion resumes.)

PDT continues by bring us back to PDP issue. BT said part of the discussion actually centered on the fact that there is no point creating a structure where nothing gets done. If you are going to do it, build something that has checks and balances.

PP realized how hard it is to get people to come to meetings. Document was posted for comments for many months without people commenting on it. He worried that timetable might put us in a situation where we don't have an opportunity to propose all these good ideas because timeline has passed. Can we have revised recommendations?

BT answered by saying that we went through a formal process of getting comments. But AG will try to propose amendments.

PDT started next topic: Membership.

CD asked if there were any problems with the membership scenario. Stephan Welzel (SW) said there is no problem with membership, but need clarification on the distinction between ccTLD registry and the ccTLD manager. Bart Boswinkel said that the solution that we came up with was from the CENTR By-laws. WB pointed out that Registry is a thing but Manager is a person. SW responded that it seems to be saying that the database is the member. CD agrees with SW that the database is the member. PDT refers to previous ccTLD documents that said members are the managers but Registry is just a qualifying condition. What makes this difficult is whose list of management authority we should look to. SW is right. There is no way a registry can be a member. CD said the word "manager" is missing. WB asked who actually the managers are. That's the whole point. The membership is the list. But the members decide who gets to be on the list.

PDT: My personal view is that I'm reluctant to use the IANA database because it is inaccurate. I think there has to be a rule about membership whereby it says that when there is a dispute about membership we allow both to be members.

CD: We should follow 1591 until it's sorted.

Becky Burr: We took out the notion of "sponsoring organization" because there were too many positions and the idea was whoever is operating the registries will get it first.

BT: If there is consensus, if there is a policy, then it will be changed.

WB: Funding point. We want to be clear on the memebership fee. Is it separate from IANA fees and the ICANN fees?

CD: Yes. ICANN fees are subject to PDP.

WB: If the cost of being part of this 1 million(hoping it will not be), or 1000? Need an idea of what the cost will be.

CD: People who joined and are on the council will be deciding this.

PDT: The obvious cost is something that needs to run the ccTLD secretariat.

EP: I have numbers from Abhisak. 150,000 per annum. But you should give an order of magnitude. That is open ended.

BT: The reason it is open ended is because it is up to the members to decide. If it is going to be one issue manager, severl issue managers, etc… it is up to you. You set it.

EP: Then ccNSO is part of ICANN.

CD: This has nothing to do with ICANN.

PP: We didn't want to discuss fees because we wanted the members to decide. We just outlined that we need the cost of running the secretariat.

PDT: What about these other obligations on the members? Acceptance of policies that have been determined by the board? The ability to make reservations on the council decisions.

CD: We will take reservations into account.

Bart Boswinkel: To make the language clearer, parties can apply for reservations. It's not drafted yet.

Becky Burr: If there are possibilities of individual members making reservations, then the whole issue about super majority etc. can be resolved. It gives an individual ccTLD an opportunity to opt out.

BT: That is not quite the case.

SD: Question about membership. If I decide not to follow the "binding" policy, what will happen?

Bart Boswinkel: This come to the accountability issue. If you "breach" this binding policy, who are you going to be accountable to?

BT: If you are not satisfied, you can always leave. If you look at the way it's structured, 1) global and binding policies were very narrow and very few. 2) supermajority vote is needed in various processes 3) If it's against your law, you are exempted. 4) If you request it, you're exempted. 5) If everything fails you, maybe you should step out.

SD: I think a lot of ccTLDs do not participate. For most of them, it might be an opportunity to give someone the mandate to work in their interests. Majority model will see ccTLDs trying to sell their votes.

BT: I understand. You've made your argument well. We tried to come up with a democratic process. As of now, please convince people.

SD: The recommendation has to convince me.

BT: This is the time where we are to have discussions. As someone trying to nurture consensus, I think this is a period where people should comment.

WB: You are never quite sure whether majority agrees. There is no mechanism for us to know what other people are thinking. On the mailing list, people tend not to respond to points made.

CD: On the ICANN side, there is an ability to make comments.

WB: People don't voice agreements.

CD: If you believe that the ccNSO should vote on 2/3 majority per region, ask the people in the list to comment. And then make the comment on the ICANN list, identifying the supporters.

PDT: Comments from this meeting should be presented to the ERC.

EP: ICANN will only accept or not accept. They won't modify.

BT: I think of this as giving ICANN the last chance. Our thinking, because of the composition of the committee, was that this should be accepted. The reason I did this is because I thought this is the way it should be. I took this as a take it or leave it scenario. If ICANN does not follow, then we will leave.

Bart Boswinkel: For argument's sake, a lot of ccTLDs will join. The board decision is way out. If a board of ICANN makes a decision like that, I think you will see a lot of ccTLDs leave.

Becky Burr: It should be in the By-Laws. The other part of legitimacy is that it will depend on ccTLDs joining in.

BT: The legitimacy of this will depend on how many people will be joining.

CD: If you have a problem, you can go to the council, and can ask for exemption. If you want more than that, I suggest you make a statement regarding this.

Stephan: If it is anything less than what Nigel had in mind (asking for exemption and getting it), people will think of ways of getting around it.

BT: This is an implementation detail.

Bart Boswinkel: You need many staff to check national laws.

PDT: Can we move on to the composition of the council?

 

ccTLD Rio Meeting Day 1

16:50 - Meeting with ICANN ERC

The session leader introduced Hans Krijenbrink(HK)and Alejandro Pisanty (AP) of ERC.

Stephan (SW) asked why there was suggestion of Nomination Commitee (nom com) nominated members in the council by the ERC. AP said he recognize that AG had been active and committed. He said not many of them were trying to take advantage of the process. The rationale behind having nom com nominated members in the council, he said, goes far back in the process of reform. First of all, the idea was that in all bodies, there should be a member nominated by the nominating committee. Frequent problems in ICANN was that communities were perceived as taking too much time, limiting their effectiveness. He said ERC had used the concept of the ccNSO not as a group of ccTLD managers, but as a more open body. According to AP options for analysis should not be confined to the ccNSO community. The ccNSO members should not only be constituted by ccTLD managers but also other groups having interest in the community. This proposal was not accepted by the ccTLD managers. The result was the presence of external members. He said non-ccTLD members of the AG had provided views and options, ways of thinking about things that were diverse. SW said the basic idea behind that was understandable but asked whether it was necessary to have members that were observers and voting members that were not ccTLDs. AP answered by saying the voting members cannot make a majority by themselves.

PDT said there was a misunderstanding about what the SO was going to do. He said in the view of ccTLDs, there was going to be very few global policies that were binding to the ccTLDs. He added that ccTLD's view was that they would be involved in forming best practices. He said he did not see any reason for having external members in forming "best practices," recommendations that were subject to voluntary acceptance. Nonvoting liaisons may make sense but having members in the standing council voting on day to day development of local practices was not understandable. AP said there was misunderstanding. He said he knew that this had been found acceptable by some ccTLD communities. The misunderstanding was that the ccNSO was not designed to make day-to-day local policies. The ccNSOs would be concerned with global binding policies, e.g., interoperability. They would be very rare, but important. He added that there had been discussions in cases where although most ccTLDs agreed that certain policies were important, but were seen to counter national laws in certain communities, this should be available for legal analysis. But they were being told by the ccTLD managers that they were a responsible group of people. They will not invite unwise interventions. HK also said there were certain things that were important for the interoperability of the internetand that he recognize in the ccNSO the ccTLD managers would be able to find a platform to discuss ccTLD matters. He wondered why anyone would oppose outside members being involved in non-binding policies. SD responded by saying that as long as these outsiders took the same liability, it would be better. If, however, they did not take the responsibility, then there would be an imbalance. He said there were suspicions about who could be nom com because the proposal was still vague. He was wondering the process would end up with people from broad backgrounds. In reply to SD's thoughts HK said the nom com was still forming and incomplete. He said when the ccNSO was in place, the ccNSO would be able to appoint members of the board. Before the ccNSO was formed, it would be the board to place members of the nom com delegate. He said they sent out messages and there was one person nominated. SD said adding the more broad experience would be desirable. However, he said there was the possibility of external interest groups putting forth specific interests from their groups. AP replied by saying one could have all those conspiracy theories, see the clouds in the horizon but that should be seen as as a no-win situation. There was not a widespread trust in the concept of the nominating committee. He said they had even heard that the ccTLD community was waiting until the nom com was in place. He said they decided to place any organization willing to participate. ERC made a call for participation and decided to go with a person that fitted the profile. The whole idea of the nominating committee was to get people a little beyond the immediate push and pull. A transparent player, one who had no known conflicts of interest. Jeff Neuman(JN) ERC to explain what the next steps were. In reply to the question, HK said there were no bylaw changes posted. Recommendations for the AG were posted for comments in Rio. From the input they would get here in the ERC, we will try to suggest to the Implementation AG. JN said ccTLDs were talking about, in areas of policy, the situation where if there was national law, the ccTLD manager would not be bound to the policies and wanted to know if the concept had been brought up to the ERC. HK: Have just mentioned the inputs, the Nigel Roberts. Not only in conflict with local law, but may have difficulty implementing given local conditions. The exemption was already seen when we mentioned that you never can be asked to break national law. If it conflicted with your local political situation, we may be able to talk about with. NR welcomed the statement HK made but pointed out that the issue was not local political situation, rather national policy. AP said they believed the council of the ccNSO would not want to have so many clauses.

HTasked how the input was to be made to the ERC. AP in his answer said they would use several mechanisms including availability for meetings listening and if possible personal contact and said even if the minutes of the current meeting were made available, we would like to read them carefully. He added that in view of the fact that they wanted bylaws by June, they had to work fast to have something about 4 weeks to the time..

PDT asked about policy development, a clarification on whether the board's power regarding the policy was either to ratify it or to remit it for further processes. HK said he believe that the policy development process was a process ending in a final board decision. On the basics that the ccNSO had been put forward by the matrix, having only the top layer being subject to policy development, the recommendations of the ccNSO council would have to be so serious that the board would be able to accept it or to reject it, based on a 2/3 vote of the board. He said the position of the gTLD registries was different from that of the ccNSO since they had to take many more things into account. The ccNSO community , he added, had to answer to their LICs. AP said in other words, they were experiencing slight resistance with this proposal. HK also added that some people are uncomfortable that the ccNSO policy proposal would be binding to the board. PDT asked whether it was clear to them and the rest of the board that the ccTLDs in relation to any matters that becomes binding to the ccTLDs goes through the ccNSO, that no policy binding to the ccTLDs would go through any other process. HKreplied by saying that they had some difficulty in announcing this. He said basically, there could not be policy developments outside the ccNSO with regard to ccTLD managers although other things to which ccNSO may have no power to make policy over may affect the ccNSO. AP added that all processes that affects ccNSO would go through the ccNSO. E.g., WIPOII

JN refered back to the previous question about nominating committee. He wanted to know if a policy being developed by the ccNSO got input by GAC would just be approved or whether there was a possibility of being modified. HK replied by saying he thought redelegation would be the most controversial issue. He said in that aspect, he would hope that the council would have enough responsibility to sit down with GAC members to get their input. AP added that an analysis of this possibility would encourage GAC to provide input. JN acknowledged that GAC had opened up more recently.

SD said he wanted clarification on the "but." by asking whether there were some possible policies that would fall under "but" besides the whois policies and whether they (ERC) saw any room in ICANN to develop policies with regard to those issues.HKin answer said his interpretation was that one of the first tasks for the ccNSO would be to develop a work plan for the ccNSO, filling in the matrix. He said he would agree that DRPs are local issues. The plan for the cc Managers was to eschange DRPs, and have a catalogue of the different ways that they handled that. He added that he did not see how the ccNSO council could develop policies for the local communities that were binding.

SD also wanted to know about IDN policies AP replied by saying IDNs was one of the reason why they want to get the reform wrapped up because if there was an IDN policy for ccTLDs, it should come from a ccNSO. In responsd to PDTs question as to whether they could identify anything that could be worked on together, HK said IDN is too complicated but however there were elements where the cc managers neede to be involved with interoperability issues.

NR raised a point about policies outside the ccNSO. He sited root server issues and Security issues as examples and asked whether ccTLDs could just solve that by saying that if the board thought that a policy may affect the ccNSO would send it to the ccNSO. HK in reply said notifications about what the board was doing were publicly accessible. Every request for advice from an SO would be copied to other SOs and therefore could take it up if one feel that one was affected. AP there was need to start the ccNSO real fast.

PK: Within ccTLDs, we have policy advisory boards. The liability of the board lies with the registry. I want every ccTLD to join up as a ccNSO. One problem I see with this proposal is whether the board is satisfied with the liability. Are they willing to take up the liability?

JN asked whether there were ways for the qualifications for the members to be set. HK in reply said nominating committee selects members and should be there as a pool of knowledge. That notion would be communicated to the nominating committee. They would not be there to make sure that certain "interests" were represented. He pointed out that the nominating committee was not made up of representatives of SOs

AP said the point of not having ICANN build trade associations, there is not opposition to self organizations made up of ccTLD managers. We have instances of ill-advised relationships with ccTLD managers. The AG has abandoned the idea of a broad community outside of the ccTLD community shaping that community. We feel that they will be prudent enough to sense trouble.

 

ccTLD Rio Meeting Day 1

18:30 -20:30 ccTLD public outreach meeting in Rio

Session Leader: Peter Dengate Thrush Sidse Aegidins (SA) in his speech said during WSIS in Geneva, it was suggested that domain names should be dealt with by intergovernmental organizations. He suggested that governments were urged to talk to each other, to make sure they are speaking in one voice. The ITU accepted a resolution in Marrakesh, resolution 102, and said that the ITU should be involved in certain ICANN areas. This he said was his prime message to ccTLDs. PDT (.nz) asked what the implications would be for the people in the room if governments carried out the proposal that was discussed in the world summit? SA replied by saying the implication would depend on the wording and that governments might form an international organization outside ICANN PK (.ac) said he hoped the ccTLD managers recognize the significance of this at statement. One of the things ccTLDs had difficulty with was identifying parties with whom to speak with. He asked whether there was a list? He said CENTR, for instance had received invitations to attend such meetings. However, identifying the key player was the challenge. SA in reply to PK said there were no formal lists of participating governments. He said, however, that it was important for ccTLDs to talk to the regular point of contact in govt to raise the awareness. The lack of lists, he said, gave the right to compete amongst the governments. He said it was mainly the Geneva governments that were involved. Marilyn Cade (MC) (Business Constituency) in her speech said she was involved in the new code but still believed that if ICANN could not bring together cc's, RIRs, business constituencies, etc., then this was going to be the alternative (ie significant govt involvement). If one tried to do something in the plenipotentiary, one could not be a part of it, which she thought was not a comfortable process. Governments, she said, were very actively getting engaged in trying to "encroach" into the process. This she thought was very troubling language. She said if it was expected that all would work together for a private sector led approach, then she did not think that a significant government involvement, lack of transparency, etc., was desirable and hence the reason for importance to have a ccNSO had to be re- thought. Tony Holmes (TH)(ISP constituency) said it has been discussed they continue to do so within the ISP constituency the formation of a support organization. The ISP constituency, he said recognized there were some issues ccTLDs needed to deal with in a certain way and said ISPs would like to be involved with ccTLD and others as well. He said only two of them were working on that and that trying to find someone to represent the appropriate views of ISPs was difficult. He expressed the desire of ISP constituency to continue talking with ccTLDs. PK said he would like to thank SA for work done with the European ccTLDs. Wolfgang Kleinbechter (WK) ( ) said there were WSIS documents on the site, available for comments, from governments as well as non-governments. She said in late September, there would be a 3rd preparatory conference. She said she perceived there would be alot of resistance, especially from Europe and US government, but there were others that agree and that comments were need. MC said she would like to follow up on that point. She said governments had legitimate concerns and questions. The problem was that their questions might lead to answers that even they were not satisfied with. If there was no way to establish an appropriate representative, then it might be a reason to create an intergovernmental organization. TH said one of the things that had proved difficult, esp. from the ITU side, was the argument that ICANN was not working as expected because of reforms. He said it was important to show that ERC work was being implemented quickly and that something concrete was coming out. He added that the ISP was going through difficult times that they might have to spread themselves out thinly to take a/c of different groupings going on. PDT said the .nz position had been a white paper based on ICANN bringing together the essential players in the process, an industry-led, bottom-up process. He said he did not think that things that happened eliminated that need. He said one of the things that could happen was the elimination of the cc community. He added that in that event, regional organizations like CENTR would have their voice severely minimized.

ccTLD Rio Meeting Day 2

9:00 - 9:30 Panel Discussion with ccNSO Assistance Group (cont.) Session Leader: Peter Dengate Thrush (PDT) Panel: Chris Disspain (CD), Bernard Turcotte (BT), Bart Boswinkle (BB) The meeting chair, PP, announced a of change of plans, and recapped the previous day's discussion before the start of the session.

PDT introduced CD and asked about preferred method of participation in ICANN

CD said on structure, the ccNSO Assistance Group recommended that there be a Launching Group. The Launching Group would be drawn from the ccNSO AG and the ccTLD Community, and would comprise fifteen (15) ccTLD registry managers. The Launching Group would have no power other than formalization of the start-up of the ccNSO pursuant to the ICANN bylaws and to organize and run the election of the Council. PDT wanted to know why that recommendation was made and how one could cope with the idea of the group setting up the election and standing. CD said it seemed to be the easiest way of organizing and that the launching group did not necessarily had to be actually running the election. An independent panel would run the election. It seemed to them that it would be restrictive for people to be in launching group and not be able to stand for elections

NR welcomed the regional proposal that there be three representatives from each of the five regions but asked why the AG was proposing a 1, 2, and 3 year terms.

CD said it was only meant to be an initial measure. Given that it was the 1st election and membership would grow, it was sensible to hold positions for 3 yrs. NR asked whether this idea come from Assist Group. He disagreed the 3year term but agreed about rotation. He suggested that all elections were done annually, than have longer terms. He said he was on the Names Council for the 1st election for ICANN board of directors and that there was a technical issue that involved PDT not getting his seat on board. If the elections were run like ICANN board, you do not get proper representation of the proportion of the voted.

CD agreed with NR. And said ICANN was not telling AG how the election was going to be run. He said he envisaged there would be 4 or 5 candidates and 3 elected. He asked whether it was the principle or the mechanism that was the problem. NR said he would strongly recommend that the election be run the way the Australian parliamentary elections were run. BT said that was what they used for CIRA and that launching group could use their auditors if they like but should ensure rotation. He said the ICANN board election system was not going to be used.

PDT said with timing of the election, ccTLDs had to get some kind of indication as to whether to proceed with SO. He said he was assuming that meeting would want to discuss the formation of the launching group.

CD in reply to PDT said there would be a formal call for volunteers within a reasonable time frame, perhaps a 3 weeks response time. Then an attempt would be made to get regional balance. Once that had happened, there was nothing to stop the launching group from working in tandem with by-laws.

PDT asked whether the launching group was a ccTLD initiative or an ICANN board appointed group

BB replied by saying from a legal point of view, it had to be appointed by the ICANN board, because the ccNSO was not in place yet. The only formal structure to do it was the ICANN itself.

EP said when ICANN was first formed there was no nomination from ICANN for the DNSO. It was self-organized.

CD said the AG and the ERC were looking for as much constructive feedback as possible. They would like to encourage every individual ccTLD to post comments to the ICANN board. The more comments there was, the more it would help. He appealed to all to post comments and take part in the feedback.

PK said it was not known how that was going to pan out yet. The proposals might be rejected and asked whether if that was the case, there was a possibility of the ccTLD community to form an alternative ccSO and propose it to ICANN

BB said he thought it was the wrong forum for stating that discussion. The question should have been presented to the ERC.

End of session

ccTLD Rio Meeting Day 2

9:30- 10:15 ITU Meeting Report By Willie Black Session Leader: Niger Roberts(NR) NR, the session chair introduce WB, the co-chair of the ITU meeting on member states' experiences in Geneva from 3 -4 March 2003 WB presented the report of the meeting. He said 140 participants attended from different sectors including ccTLDs, government people (telecom people) and GAC people. He said the papers were all available on the web site. (http://www.itu.int/ITU-T/worksem/cctld/index.html) and the ITU report is at (http://www.itu.int/itudoc/itu-t/workshop/cctld/cctldrep_ww9.doc) A wide range of topics was discussed and papers presented. These included the following:

WB also said there was some talk about the status of ICANN and wealth of papers about people's views, and lack of knowledge about what was happening presented. According to WB, a few suggestions came out of the meeting. These included the following: Dissemination of best practices, via workshops and/or publications.

The meeting suggested that a follow-up meeting should be organized by ITU within one year. The President of ICANN suggested that this follow-up meeting could be organized in conjunction with an ICANN meeting. WB said at the closing session, the Director of TSB stated that he highly appreciated the impressive quality and quantity of the input contributions, the good diversity of participation, the well-balanced representation from the different regions of the world, the enthusiasm and constructive discussions by the participants, and the excellent work of the co-chairmen. NR asked about the difference between binding policies as described in ICANN and ITU. Robert Shaw (RS), ITU president made presentation. He said many people did not understand ITU. ITU, a highly compartmentalized organization, he said, was founded in 1865, and was the oldest specialized agency of the UN system. ITU Mission was cooperation and harmonization. On what ITU does, he said it principal included spectrum allocation, coordination of national spectrum planning. He said ITU had three main organizations: ITU-R, ITU-T, ITU-D. ITU-T worked in work groups, like the IETF. He said ITU developed consensus based recommendations. A vast majority of work was by private sector members driven. He said the approach was a bottom-up process. ITU does not impose contractual terms on companies and recommendations were non-binding. He said tremendous amount of work was going on. He added that there were two ways to become a private sector member. DENIC had already become an associate member. PK made a point that a number of ccTLD were concerned that they had local policy mechanisms in place. One of the issues of concern was the binding policy. He asked whether in the ITU, plenipotentiary decisions would never impose policies on local ccTLDs. RS in answering said ITU never forces policies because they recognize the national sovereignty. There was no top-down binding policy. PK asked what he would suggest in the case where there was conflict between the local Internet community and the local government in managing the database. RS said the reason why there was no controversy in E161 was because those policies were completely defined by ITU members on a voluntary basis. The ITU could not make any decision that would go against national sovereignty. PK said during the ITU session, many of the governments were saying that they wanted to be handling the Internet. He asked what he (RS) had to say to cases where individuals who had been managing the local Internet community satisfactorily was not "in the right bloodline" (and being under the threat of having that taken away). BT asked whether in the ITU thinking, there were plans to work away from the US government or work with the US government.

WB said people would like ITU to move away from the US government. However, there were no recommendations. PK's question was who to take instructions from.

BT asked whether the ITU would consider the management of the root server issue a matter of national sovereignty based on his understanding of how the ITU works.

RS said there was a need an alternative to the USG. He said in 1996 he wrote a paper (perhaps badly) saying that the NTIA should be looking at it. Then the white papers came. He expected things to settle down by 2000. However, they still had to sign contracts.

PDT asked how it did relate to the fact that ITU was a member of the GAC. He said ccTLDs were very disappointed in the way that ICANN mangled the policy and the administrative process. ICANN tried to force administrative contracts using their powers with IANA.

RS said he was not sure how the GAC was created. He said GAC was a strange creature and it was difficult to participate in the activities of GAC. He added that there was a wide range views among member states about GAC - some positive, some negative. PDT asked whether there was a possibility of the ITU withdrawing from GAC in future. RS said there was a possibility. However, some member states clearly would not agree with that.

End of session

ccTLD Rio Meeting Day 2

11:00- 11:15 Discussion with Dr Paul Twomey

Patricio Poblete (PP) introduces Paul Twomey (PT). In his speech, PT said he was happy about being CEO of ICANN. He also gave a brief introduction of his career background.

He said he had made a couple of observations but he was ready to receive views if anybody wanted to share them with him. He said he was open to sensible feedback as to what was to be done. One of things that needed to be done was IANA. He said there was a need to appoint a responsible manager. There was also the need for clarity of processes and reporting of those processes like manufacturer's approach - measuring and reporting was important. He said his intention was to move into making some software investments to make it transparent and display the facts.

PT also said he had seen in the GAC, that there was a wave of ccs who are flavour of the moment. He said looking from the ICANN context over the last 4-5 years ccTLDs had been doing a good work. There were issues that came out of the US experience, issues like IP, privacy etc issues that became important were driven by e-commerce. His sense, he said, was that somewhere around mid-2001, Internet got focused. Consequently, the e-commerce world had gone from North American world and now is becoming a globalised world. So ccs were now flavour of the moment.

PT said issues were all different for different regions. In the South Pacific region, where Internet was more for education and health care, there had been efforts to get funds and now there was a sense that money was not around much anymore. Therefore I he said he heard a different thing from a broader Internet community. In the Africa region the Internet was important for education and empowerment issues, which was not heard of in Africa 3 years ago.

PT said he thought relationship with ccs was important for ICANN and that the pressures were not going to go away. He said he was keen to get reform process and structure finished. According to him, the ERC process and discussions look like bilateral discussions and when he heard ERC, it sounded much more like a hub process rather than cross dialogue.

Sabine in asking a question said he agreed that there were many issues, and answers had to be found for these questions but said he still had a problem as to what that had to do with ICANN. He thought ICANN had narrowly defined scope (only technical scope) and asked whether PT shared that view or whether he thought ICANN had a role for e-commerce broad role and how ccTLD fitted in.

PT answered by saying it was a reality that technical functions were interacting with other areas. ICANN was to express this interaction and find homes for it. He mentioned cybersquatting and how IP was affected as example and said with IP, WIPO was involved and that was the appropriate model.

BT said he was glad to hear that ccTLDs are current flavour. His biggest disappointment with ICANN process, he said, was lack of transparency. He said ccTLDs we were subjected to unclear reasons, baseless expectations and divide and conquer approach taken for ccTLDs. It had been shown that ERC had listened to the request of ccTLDS. The core had been accepted. He said PT talked about trade-offs, which was good point because ccTLDs were listened too little for a long time. He said he thought ccTLDs were at the cusp of whether they were going to do something with ccTLDs within ICANN. He also said he would encourage the board to accept ERC recommendations with appropriate changes in a give and take manner and hoped under the new transparency rules, the process would be able to move forward significantly.

Marcel Schneider (MS)(.ch) congratulated PT on assumption of office. He said the major concern was the communications structure. Once structure was in place, it should be better. He said his main question was private vs public sector. There was still a promise that IANA would be handed to private sector and he wanted to know what the requirements were and when US government was likely to hand over to private organisation

PT said his observations had been that for a lot of the functions for IANA, US government played a sign-off role had not rejected changes. He said he had not seen it play an intervention role and that was a good signal it planned to hand over to private entity. PT said he did no know about requirements.

End of session

ccTLD Rio Meeting Day 2

Plenary Session 3 - Session Leader: Elisabeth Porteneuve 11:15 - 12:30 Meeting with GAC by appointed representatives from ccTLD members

The GAC Chair of the meeting made opening remarks and welcomed the ccTLD representitives

PP said these meetings had become more and more productive. Looking forward to having a productive meeting now. The ccTLD Adcom had decided to pass to GAC a list of questions to consider.

EP said she understood that all had questions that were provided in advance. It was also possible to look at the questions on ccTLD website.

Martin, The UK representative said he had a comment on the format.

The Chair of the meeting said they only recently received the questions, which was circulated to them a day ago and added that GAC did not have a response to give at that at stage in time. It is something we intend to discuss on. Based on some of these questions, there is still a need to engage in discussions as to how processes work. Perhaps people are looking at it differently.

PP said it was the intention to stimulate discussions and were not expecting answers. He said he hoped that though there was no collective answer, they could still express their individual opinions.

The Chair said any member might speak on this matter but added that GAC operates by consensus. So since it had not been discussed it will be difficult for members to speak on it. He said he will like to provide some perspectives, in the interest to move this forward but in a personal capacity but emphasized that GAC did not have a position on the questions.

The Chair said he though perhaps there was needs to be improved understanding, based on some of the questions. It has to be clear to people that GAC did not live in isolation of the governments of ccTLDs or their legislation. It was part of the entire internetworked regime we live in. He said it was difficult for any given body to have harmonised view because they were at different levels of development. What could work for one might not work for another. For example there were some countries that had not decided within their own framework about Internet. Some have realised the importance of public policy. We have people from science, telecoms, foreign affairs, and information economy, domestic trade governments divisions. This reinforces the point that this is where the country has placed the importance of the Internet. So this multifaceted view is useful, but it makes it difficult to have unified positions. But what we are trying to do, is to act as a conduit.

PP said they (ccTLDs) wanted the meeting to be as effective as poss. They were also here to answer your questions too.

PK introduced himself as CENTR chair and said it was not designed to solicit answers. At a high level, the msg was that they very much supported what ICANN should be about. CcTLDs also supported the role of the GAC and what it does within ICANN, the role of ccNSO. Many ccTLDs have local development policy forums. In many instances, many policies can be handled at local level. He said, however, that there were many issues that could be handled at international level. They were now at the stage of trying to define parameters of international forum and would like to work with GAC for a better understanding of the role as ccTLDs.

PK continued by saying many people were aware that many ccTLDs use registrars. Unlike ICANN arena, where registrars were accredited by ICANN, many cc registries accredit or authorise or have them as members, a bottom-up approach. As part of a local Internet community, people were invited to provide input. He said just as governments go back and report to various depts., ccTLDs also include reporting structure, which includes governments. Robin (US) said he just wanted to observe that the discussions include developing work programs. One item is ccTLD issues. We want to come to a better understanding with ccTLDs and though that was shown by the GAC establishing working groups for ccTLDs. He was hopeful that they had made more progress since Bucharest and now was the time to make some progress on these issues. The GAC principles, he said, respected ccTLDs managers and the LIC. There was a need to develop policies that incorporates ccTLDs, LIC, and government issues.

The Chair said he would like to suggest the cc community help us identify who one had to deal with in one's local constituency, who to talk to in government, if some of that info that would help improve the communication between ccTLDs and GAC and outreach that they would like to do so that government officials had a better understanding of the ICANN, GAC process etc. The other was as Robin (US) mentioned. GAC was in the process of re-arranging themselves by are forming WGs to look at specific issues, one major one being ccTLDs. Exchange of info could happen both ways. He said there were instances where there was no agree on everything.

The France representative said GAC might not be able to reach consensus. He said he could give French perspective on these questions, and there will be GAC members who will not agree.

The UK representative said he thought it was a suitable time for him to raise the point he deferred at the beginning. Within ccs, and in the way ccs deal with member states, there was a variety of ways of how things were dealt with. It ended up with a new series of facets when he read the questions. It was presented very much from a point of view of some if not all of cc community. He said one of the key issues that Paul raised was at what level there was a need to make the decisions. He said he would refer back to the way EU works. That means one tried to identify issues, which need to be addressed in an overall framework. There were always difficulties with this. He thought the most important thing from that list of questions and what was a priority for WG is to identify what were the most important of issues for ability of cc managers for them to work effectively in that system.

The Netherlands representative said basically he had the same mixed feelings. I thought the questions were good but the format was wrong. The 1st question was to refered to GAC principles all these points should be picked up by GAC.

PDT welcomed the announcement on formation of cctld WG. In Bucharest, there was the commitment to work in regions. He said if the GAC WG could further that, it would be good. Secondly the reform process in ICANN as it relates to ccTLDs with respect to ccNSO. He said he was happy to report that work of the AG seems to have resulted in change in ccTLD in ICANN. ccTLDs heard from ERC yesterday on 2 issues - (1) Acceptance that the only policies that will be binding on ICANN would be those that came through ccNSO. The concern was that ccTLDs would be subject to policies developed outside ccNSO. (2) When the board received policy recommendations from SO, the board would either ratify/accept them or send them back to Council. The principle was clear that the board would either ratify or remit. We have made considerable progress.

PK referred to the issue mentioned by GAC reps and said he would like to apologise if language is not diplomatic because ccTLDs were techies at heart. Moving on to facilitating dialogue he said there are various regional associations - LACNIC, CENTR, APTLD, NATLD, AFTLD. In Africa, some ccTLDs were sponsoring workshops between governments and ccTLDs. In Europe, there was a good working relationship with government. He said he would like to support the chair so there could be better communications. He said the meeting should push ahead with the idea of setting workshops. The reform of ICANN will be concluded once ccNSO was complete.

The European Community representative said in recent months, he had opportunity to discuss with ccTLDs in Europe and so could answer the questions in 5 minutes. His view of the main point was the scope of the ccNSO and therefore scope of ICANN in terms of policies on ccTLDs. It was a limited area of issues. In any case, there was no way that policies reached elsewhere could go against national laws. He thought that once one accepts that there was a limited list of policies via ccNSO and ICANN, and the rest was done locally, the other concerns would be much less.

The Chair said it depended on communication between cctld and governments. This was not necessarily an easy answer for every case. Once GAC had WG constituted together with liaison and ccTLDs were organising w/shops within specific meetings, perhaps the info could also be pointed to GAC Secretariat. Don't forget to contact your GAC rep. He emphasized that the two parties could work towards building small steps.

The Canada representative said he wanted to thank ccTLDs for taking a productive step. He said it was understood that there was a need for global policies and said they thought ccNSO was a productive step towards this process.

PP said it was good to hear about having a sub-committee and affirmed ccTLDs would exchange info with GAC WG. He suggested that exchange of info at regional level would be highly appreciated.

End of Session

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