Did ICANN hire a lobbying firm to "vet" the DAG v2. comments/analysis??

[George Kirikos <gkirikos@xxxxxxxxx>]

Hi folks,

ICANN published their "analysis" of public comments today, see:

http://www.icann.org/en/announcements/announcement-2-31may09-en.htm

It's more than 200 pages long. Do note, they REWORD your real comments! (often 
to remove details, and to rearrange your text, delete words, etc.) Given the 
length of the report, if folks wanted to see an *unfiltered* version what the 
public actually said (which wouldn't take much longer than reading the 
summary!), one should go to the real comments at:

http://www.icann.org/en/topics/new-gtlds/comments-2-en.htm#expmem
http://forum.icann.org/lists/2gtld-guide/

which of course the announcement fails to even link to (would make it too easy 
for the public to compare the summary with the actual comments, if the real 
comments were only a click away!).

We disagree with nearly all of the ICANN "Analysis and Proposed Position" 
statements, as they simply don't adequately address the real concerns we 
discussed. ICANN "waves its hands" all the time and points back to the "GNSO 
Council" vote that happened AGES ago, as though it still has any validity. Real 
consensus can only be formed if it was the GNSO itself that would create future 
guidebooks via a PDP process workgroup-style system, one open to all 
stakeholders. It's obvious the staff-created and staff-centric approach isn't 
working -- it's elevating the role of staff compared to the level of the 
public. It's top-down, instead of bottom-up.

The only "interesting" aspect was taking a look at the PDF properties of the 
documents. The comments analysis for DAG v1 showed that the "Author" was Karen 
Lentz. However, that changed for DAG v2 comments. This document's PDF has an 
author of "Ann Morton", and under "Custom" the company is listed as "A.P. 
Morton & Co., LLC"! I've put copies of the originals at:

http://www.loffs.com/images/icanncommentspdf/

in case ICANN republishes their PDFs to remove the author and other custom PDF 
properties information. Who is A.P Morton & Company LLC? There's not much about 
them in Google, except that they appear to own the apmorton.com domain name 
(which is parked at NSI with an under construction PPC page):

http://whois.domaintools.com/apmorton.com

However, I *was* able to find a lobbying disclosure with the US government!

http://lobbyingdisclosure.house.gov/mac/house_id.html?reg_id=37198

"A.P. MORTON & COMPANY LLC
(Registrant ID: 37198)"

and Ann Morton is also at LinkedIn:

http://www.linkedin.com/pub/ann-morton/6/b26/69

"Ann Morton
Member & Counsel at AP Morton & Company LLC"

Is this some kind of new addition to the ICANN workflow, lobbying firms making 
the documents "government friendly" (i.e. NTIA, DOC, DOJ, US politicians), to 
vet them before they get published to the public? 

The government might be better served if they don't rely on ICANN's summaries 
and analyses, but instead go back to the PRIMARY documents, i.e. the comments 
submitted by the public at:

http://forum.icann.org/lists/gtld-guide/ (v1 of DAG)
http://forum.icann.org/lists/2gtld-guide/ (v2 of DAG)

and see for themselves if ICANN is meeting its mission to serve the public, 
instead of dictating to them.

Sincerely,

George Kirikos
http://www.leap.com/