Summary - Analysis of Submissions to IDNgTLD Petition and Charter Public Comment Forum
Summary and analysis of public comments for: IDNgTLD New Constituency Petition and Charter Comment period ended: 20 May 2009 Summary published: 5 June 2009 Preparation by: Robert Hoggarth, Senior Policy Director I. BACKGROUND In June 2008, the ICANN Board of Directors endorsed a series of recommendations on how to improve the structures and operations of the Generic Names Supporting Organization (GNSO). One of the significant drivers of those recommendations was the goal to maximize participation in the GNSO and its policy development processes. Among the various recommendations endorsed by the Board was that ICANN take steps to clarify and promote the option to self-form new constituencies as a means to increase participation in GNSO policy development activities. The current ICANN Bylaws provide that any group of individuals or entities may petition the Board for recognition as a new or separate constituency, in accordance with Section 5(4) of Article X. Such a petition must explain (1) why "the addition of such a Constituency will improve the ability of the GNSO to carry out its policy-development responsibilities" and (2) why "the proposed new Constituency would adequately represent, on a global basis, the stakeholders it seeks to represent." The ICANN Board has now received a total of four formal petitions from prospective constituencies, including the subject of this forum - the IDNgTLD Constituency. At the direction of the Board, the ICANN Staff developed a two-step process for potential new constituencies to follow. The proponent of the IDNgTLD Constituency completed the first step of the process on 09 April 2009 by filing a Notice of Intent to Form a New Constituency <http://gnso.icann.org/en/improvements/idntld-constituency-noif-10apr09.pdf> <http://gnso.icann.org/en/improvements/consumers-constituency-noif-28feb09.pdf> [PDF, 28K]. The proponent of the IDNgTLD Constituency completed the second step of the process - submission of a New Constituency Petition and Charter <http://gnso.icann.org/en/improvements/idngtld-constituency-petition-charter-redacted-18apr09.pdf> [PDF, 228K] and Introduction Letter <http://gnso.icann.org/en/improvements/idngtld-constituency-intro-letter-18apr09.pdf> [PDF, 109K] on 18 April 2009. Community comment on new constituency petitions and charters is an important component of the Board's evaluation of these petitions and will be used to inform the Board's decisions to approve or, at its option, to recommend any alterations or amendments to the various submissions. II. GENERAL COMMENTS & CONTRIBUTORS At the time this summary was prepared, a total of 58 community submissions were posted to the forum. One comment was unrelated to the topic at hand; thus, there were a total of 57 relevant comments. The contributors, both individuals and organizations, are listed below in chronological order by posting date (with initials noted in parentheses). The initials will be used in the foregoing narrative to identify specific quoted contributions. Organizations and Groups: * Philip Sheppard, AIM - European Brands Association (AIM) * Shahram Soboutipour (SS), Public Interest Registry (PIR) * Lana Andreff, IDN Internet Consortium, Inc., Canada (IDNIC) * Philip Sheppard, Business Constituency and Internet Service and Connectivity Providers Constituency (BC & ISCPC) * Alex from Russia, Legato LTD (AR) * Mila, Vipdecor.com (V) * Sergey Sharikov, Regtime, Ltd (RT) * JFC Morfin, Alliance.fra (AF) * Marie-France Berny, Chercheur (C) * David Fridman, Interdisciplinary Internet Center (IIC) * Nebiyu Yoseph, Dot Connect Africa (DCA) * Yang Yu, China Organizational Name Administration Center (CONAC) * Erez Shani, Amigour (AG) * Iliya Bozlyankov, Association Uninet (AU) * Alexey Mykhaylov, Ukrnames (U) * Alexei Sozorov, Regtime.net (RN) * Yoav Keren, DomainTheNet (DTN) * Steve Metalitz, Intellectual Property Constituency (IPC) * Brian Cute, Afflias (AFLS) * David Maher, Registries Constituency (RyC) * S. Subbiah, I-DNS.net, Inc. (SSH) * James Bladel, GoDaddy.com (GD) * Prashanth Suravajhala, CDAC Individuals: * Nick Explorer (NE) (This comment was off topic) * Khaled Koubaa (KK) * Mekdes Tekeleslassie (MT) * Helen Mekonnen (HM) * Sara Mekonnen (SM) * Fitsum Taddesse (FT) * Solomon Eshetu (SE) * Manyazewal Zewdii (MZ) * Abnet Gebretsadik (AG) * Mesfiu Telila (MT) * Marilyn Cade (MC) * Milton Mueller, (MM) * Vladimir Gevlich (VG) * Danlei Jin (DJ) * Tim S. (TS) * Ivaylo Iliev (II) * Alexey Ptashny (AP) * Yoshio Takeda (YT) * Lugman Hakim (LH) * Alexander from Russia (AR) * George Zhu (GZ) * Itai Galmor (IG) * Ren Fan Chen (RFC) * Людмила Скобенникова Bulgaria (B) * Mark Golan (MG) * Ephrem (E) * Tan Tin Wee (TTW) * M. Asif Khan (MAK) III. SUMMARY & ANALYSIS This document is intended to broadly and comprehensively summarize the comments of the various contributors to this forum but not to address every specific argument or position stated by any or all contributors. The Staff recommends that readers interested in specific aspects of any of the summarized comments or the full context of others refer directly to the specific contributions. Of the 57 respondents, 49 supported the petition and 8 did not support it. Background In order to better understand the comments, summary, and analysis, it may be useful to provide some background and links on internationalized domain names (IDN) to the extend that these are related to the IDNgTLD petition and charter. Domain names are a key part of the Internet Domain Name System (DNS). The DNS consists of a directory, organized hierarchically, of all the domain names and their corresponding computers registered to particular companies and persons using the Internet. (See ICANN FAQs at <http://www.icann.org/en/faq/#dns>. Internationalized Domain Names (IDNs) are domain names represented by local language characters. Such domain names could contain letters or characters from non-ASCII (non-Latin) scripts (for example, Arabic or Chinese). Many efforts are ongoing in the Internet community to make domain names available in character sets other than ASCII. These "internationalized domain name" (IDN) efforts were the subject of a 25 September 2000 resolution by the ICANN Board of Directors, which recognized "that it is important that the Internet evolve to be more accessible to those who do not use the ASCII character set," and also stressed that "the internationalization of the Internet's domain name system must be accomplished through standards that are open, non-proprietary, and fully compatible with the Internet's existing end-to-end model and that preserve globally unique naming in a universally resolvable public name space." (See Internationalized Domain Names at: <http://www.icann.org/en/topics/idn/>.) For the purpose of this analysis, it also is important to note that the stated mission of the IDNgTLD Constituency is to “primarily represent the views and interests of those who have been and/or are engaged and/or intend to be involved in the advocacy, promotion, provision, implementation, deployment, popularization, research and development of non-Latin Internatinalised Top Level Domain Names (“IDNgTLD”)…on the Internet.” Proposal Opponents: There were two broad arguments proposed by several opponents. In addition, there were a few specific concerns voiced by a few of the opponents. Of the broad arguments proposed by several opponents, the first is that the formation of a new IDNgTLD constituency is not a necessary condition for IDNs to develop or the best approach to developing IDN policies. The second argument is that the proposed IDNgTLD Constituency poses fundamental challenges to 1) ICANN’s new Stakeholder Group structure; 2) the division within ICANN’s structure of representatives from public and private entities; and 3) ICANN policy in that the IDNgTLD Constituency focuses only on policymaking as it relates to IDNs. Specific concerns are that the IDNgTLD should not be located in the Commercial Stakeholder Group (CSG), that the IDNgTLD Constituency should not be seeking funding from ICANN, and that it is not ICANN’s role to promote the rights of non-English, non-Latin script communities. 1. Formation of a new IDNgTLD Constituency is Unnecessary There are four opponents who argue that it is not necessary to form a new IDNgTLD Constituency. In particular, AIM agreed that IDNs were important, but argued that an IDN constituency is not a necessary condition for IDNs to develop. In addition, AIM asked whether a new ICANN IDN Advisory Group or permanent GNSO IDN Working Group would be a better approach. MC agreed that IDNs are important and that ICANN needs to do more work in this area. However, MC argued that creating a new constituency is a very narrow and restrictive approach limited to GNSO activities and could cause confusion about existing constituency members who participate in a single-purpose constituency. In addition, MC noted that a constituency in the GNSO cannot achieve breadth or scope of work and focus for IDNs and that a cross-ICANN 'forum' approach would be better. Similarly, IPC questioned whether formation of a new constituency is the best way to advance the goals of the petitioners. AFLS took the argument further, saying that an IDNgTLD is nothing more than a gTLD and the current model already allows for various types of gTLDs to be represented in the ICANN community. 2. IDNgTLD Constituency Poses Fundamental Challenges to ICANN The argument that the IDNgTLD Constituency poses fundamental challenges was first put forward by AIM and subsequently was echoed in the responses from BC/ISCPC, AFLS, RyC, and GD. AIM identified three challenges in its comments: structural, public-private, and policy. 2.1 Structural Challenge: With respect to the structure challenge, AIM argued that the IDNgTLD Constituency composition doesn't fit the GNSO’s new stakeholder group structure. Specifically, AIM notes that the IDNgTLD Constituency proposes a membership of the following groups: commercial users, non-commercial users, registries, registrars, and specialized government agencies. Because of this broad membership, AIM argues that the new constituency does not fit with the ICANN Board’s proposed future structure of the GNSO, which divides the GNSO into a bicameral (two-house) structure with a Contracted Party House and a Non-Contracted Party House. (See Council Organization > Structure & Composition at <http://gnso.icann.org/en/improvements/structure-en.htm>.) Similarly, in their joint comments the BC and ISCPC noted that the IDNgTLD Constituency conflicts with the new Stakeholder Group structure because its membership includes every one of the proposed new Stakeholder Groups. The IPC agreed, adding that the IDNgTLD Constituency’s membership is too broad and would fall under all of the four new stakeholder groups. IPC added that contracted versus non-contracted cross-membership also is a problem and that the new constituency would set a precedent of a constituency with a membership that cuts across stakeholder group structures. RyC argued that the IDNgTLD Constituency’s proposal to include both commercial and non-commercial entities in a single constituency is premature because there are not yet ICANN procedures to prevent abuses from potential double voting by constituency members. Moreover, GD noted that the charter's broad criteria for membership would appear to be in conflict with the charter of the Commercial Stakeholder Group, which does not extend eligibility to non-commercial entities, or any party under contract with ICANN. GD added that membership eligibility as defined in the petition makes it difficult to identify any specific SG whose charter would allow it to form. 2.2 Public-Private Challenge: With respect to the public-private challenge, AIM argued that because the IDNgTLD Constituency may have members that are specialist agencies of government or public-private partnerships interested in IDN issues, governments (via their agencies) may have a say in the vote for the selection of Board members via the GNSO seats. AIM says this argument stems from the fact that in the current ICANN structure and under the new bicameral Stakeholder Group structure, government/political entities are excluded from being members of the six current constituencies as well as in the proposed Stakeholder Group charters under the new structure. This is because ICANN was established under a private sector approach (rather than a treaty-based approach), whereby it receives input from governments through the Governmental Advisory Committee (GAC). (See GAC, About Us, at: <http://gac.icann.org/modules/About_Us/gac-outreach_English.htm>.) Thus, AIM argued that by allowing specialist agencies of government, the membership of the proposed IDNgTLD would allow governments to have influence in ICANN beyond that which they would have through the GAC. Similarly, RyC argued that the IDNgTLD Constituency’s proposal to include governmental agencies in its membership is inconsistent with the fundamental structure of ICANN in which governments participate in an advisory capacity through the GAC. AFLS also argued that having an IDNgTLD constituency with governmental members having voting representation poses challenges with regard to the role of government in ICANN and could result in representational disparities. 2.3 Policy Challenge: AIM argues that the IDNgTLD Constituency poses a policy challenge because it is dedicated to one policy issue of many addressed by the GNSO. Because of this narrow focus, AIM questions how the IDNgTLD Constituency would contribute to other GNSO policies such as ASCII TLDs. In their joint comments, the BC and ISCPC also raises the concern that the IDNgTLD Constituency is a single-issue constituency. 3. Specific Concerns The joint comments of the BC and ISCPC noted that the IDNgTLD Constituency doesn't belong in the CSG because the CSG bars registries and registrars as members because of conflicts of interest, and it bars non-commercial organizations because of duplication with the Non-Commercial Stakeholder Group (NCSG). Similarly, GD argued that the IDNgTLD Constituency charter's broad criteria for membership would appear to conflict with the CSG charter, which does not extend eligibility to non-commercial entities or any party under contract with ICANN. AFLS posed two additional arguments. First, that the IDNgTLD Constituency's restricted membership rights (not open to anyone from a "Latin TLD), are potentially discriminatory. Second, that ICANN's primary role is in the technical coordination of the DNS, not to promote human rights for "non-English speaking or non-Latin character writing communities." IPC argued that the IDNgTLD Constituency should not be seeking funding from ICANN. In particular, it noted that the Constituency's primary objective is to obtain funding from ICANN, but other constituencies provide funding to ICANN. IPC added that the CSG can't finance a new constituency while existing constituencies devote considerable financial and other resources to participate in ICANN. Proposal Support: Proposal support falls into three categories: 1) those who argue that the IDNgTLD Constituency supports non-Latin script languages; 2) those who argue that an IDNgTLD Constituency is necessary to represent non-Latin script gTLDs to develop and define better policies; and 3) those who rebut the opposition arguments concerning structural, public-private, and policy challenges, as well as specific concerns relating to whether the new constituency belongs in the CSG. Closing remarks from SSH, the petitioner for the IDNgTLD Constituency, will also be briefly summarized at the end of this section. 1. Support for Non-Latin Script Languages There were 16 comments (2 of which were duplicates) in which supporters argued that the IDNgTLD Constituency would provide important support for specific non-Latin script languages. Of these, 7 (MT – twice, HM, SM – twice, SE, and MZ) said that the new constituency would be “great” for the Ethiopian Amharic language and 3 (FT, AG, and MT) said it would be “great” for the Ethiopian Tigrigna language. LH said that the new constituency would, “champion the right of communities and languages in the borderless Internet” and specified Malay, Indonesia. Similarly, AR said that the new constituency was necessary to solve the problem that “non-English speaking and non-Latin character languages can't use their own languages without restrictions.” GZ said that non-English languages would benefit, IG cited the importance of addressing the needs of the Jewish/Hebrew community, MAK, cited benefits for the Arabic script, and CDAC noted that the constituency would help speakers of Indian languages. 2. IDNgTLD Constituency is Necessary There were 24 comments in which supporters argued that the IDNgTLD Constituency is necessary to represent non-Latin script gTLDs to develop and define better policies. While the comments varied in some of their details, it was clear that the respondents strongly supported the creation of a new constituency to represent the interests of, and develop policies for, non-Latin script gTLDs. Some examples include KK, who stated that the IDNgTLD Constituency would provide the ability to develop best the policies for specific issues related to new IDNgTLDs. Similarly, SS agreed that ICANN needs a place where IDNs' differentiations and conflicting issues can be decided and that IDNs are the face of the new Internet, which will not just be English. Several supporters noted that IDNs have not received enough attention in ICANN and many identified with the extensive comments provided by MM, who stated that the new constituency is necessary because IDN advocates have been disenfranchised in ICANN. He added that there is no place for organizations that intended to become registries but weren't in the root as a contracted party, yet GNSO policies directly affect entry into the market for domain name registrations. DJ also emphasized that the new constituency would boost the status of IDN issues at ICANN adding that the new constituency might inject new blood into the conventional ICANN model and could shed light on disputes concerning IDN issues and act as a lighthouse for countries eagerly expecting IDNgTLDs. DCA agreed and emphasized that approving this constituency will show that ICANN is attempting to address and accommodate the view that the real world is made up with borders, nations, cultures, and languages. Two supporters emphasized that the new constituency also was necessary to address technical issues relating to IDNs. Specifically, AF noted that there was technical governance urgency for an IDNgTLD constituency to deal with natural language and script-related issues, and C added that only an IDNgTLD common working group or constituency can offer the necessary forum and permit consensus in cases of IDNgTLD technical conflicts. 3. Rebuttal to Opposition Arguments There were 10 supporters who rebutted opposing comments relating to structural, public-private, and policy challenges, as well as whether the new constituency belongs in the CSG. 3.1 Structural Challenge: In their rebuttals all respondents disagreed with the contention made by AIM and others that, because of its broad membership, the IDNgTLD Constituency does not fit into ICANN’s structure. MM argued that there are no structural challenges except insofar as noncommercial users and these would be welcome in the NCSG. DJ said that mixed membership is not an issue as long as they share the same interests and work towards the same goal and might cover issues beyond IDNs. TTW noted that the new constituency fits into the stakeholder group structure and is consistent with existing practices of members within the ISPCP and BC. SSH, the petitioner, noted that the Charter strictly limits any member from holding high-office if they already survey in similar capacities in another constituency. 3.2 Public-Private Challenge: With respect to the opposition contention that by allowing governmental entities as members the IDNgTLD Constituency would allow governments to influence the selection of Board members, supporters in their rebuttals unanimously contended that this was not an issue because other constituencies also had government entities as members. In particular, MM noted that the presence of a few government agencies doesn’t disrupt the ICANN structure because many constituencies’ members are affiliated with government agencies, such as government-owned ISPs in the GNSO. CONAC agreed and emphasized that ICANN shouldn't block entrance of government or affiliated organizations in a constituency because many countries have government-supported agencies involved in ICANN policy issues. Similarly, DTN argued that historically there have not been clear divides between government and non-government entities in ICANN. He gave the example that there are many ccTLDs that are either government-run or government controlled that belong to the ccTLD/ccNSO side of ICANN whose operations are being de facto outsourced and run by large ICANN registries that in the past seem to have aligned themselves with government-controlled ccTLDs. SSH, the petitioner, emphasized that on the issue of direct government participation, the IDNgTLD Constituency’s current founding group does not include direct government representation but rather government-related agencies, such as CONAC and that the Charter to be revised creatively to limiting direct government involvement. 3.3 Policy Challenge: Similar to the arguments provided to rebut the public-private challenge, some respondents argued that single-issue constituencies already exist in ICANN so the IDNgTLD Constituency would not be setting a precedent on this issue. However, some of the same respondents also argued that the new constituency is not focused on a single issue. For example, MM argued that ICANN has a trademark constituency (IPC) despite the fact that trademark protection is only one aspect of DNS policy. He added that if trademark owners can look out for their special interests across a wide range of DNS issues, so can IDN advocates. Nonetheless, MM emphasized that IDN will affect WHOIS, security, and trademark issues, as well as new gTLD and registrar policies. AU agreed but also noted that one could argue that others are single-issue constituencies, such as IP, ISP, and BC. 3.4 Locating the New Constituency in the CSG: Those who responded to the opposition argument that the new constituency did not belong in the CSG disagreed with this argument. For example, MM argued that the CSG is the appropriate place for this constituency because it is analogous to ISPs/connectivity providers and service providers, some of whom are commercial. However, he added that there could be room in NCSG for academics and non-profit researchers involved in IDNs for cultural, educational, and research but that this should note impede acceptance of constituency in CSG. SSH noted that the Charter has addressed the contention that the new constituency’s cross-membership prevents it from joining the CSG. In particular, he emphasized that while the Charter left membership open in general, the IDNgTLD Constituency does not have existing contracted registries in the constituency’s present founding membership and are open to restricting future membership of contracted registries and registrars. Also, he noted that the constituency had already allowed for only limited and transparent cross-memberships. 4. Closing Remarks of SSH In his closing remarks, SSH described the difficulties he and his colleagues encountered three years ago when they endeavored to join an existing constituency in order to participate in a GNSO IDN Working Group. He explained that they were prevented from joining the BC and by the time they joined the IDN Working Group as observers most the policymaking was already completed. SSH added that he is petitioning for an IDNgTLD Constituency because there is no effective voice within the GNSO for the IDN community given his previous inability to participate under the existing constituency structure. IV. NEXT STEPS The ICANN Board is likely to consider all the relevant community input and move forward with guidance regarding all the new constituency submissions as soon as practicably possible. Any decisions with respect to the approval of the new constituency charters will likely take place in the context of the GNSO Improvements implementation processes. Attachment:
IDNgTLD Public Forum Summary and Analysis (FINAL).doc |