[ncdnhc-discuss] Re: NCDNHC solicitation of candidate views

[Amadeu Abril i Abril]

Milton Mueller wrote:

> Dear prospective Board members:
> On behalf of the 3 Names Council members from the
> Non-commercial constituency who will vote in the ICANN DNSO Board
> election in September, we solicit your answers to the following questions.
>
> Please respond to discuss at icann-ncc.org

Milton and all,

I am really sorry for the delay in responding, as you know I was offline
on holidays when you sent your mail, and only could
answer it now. It is probably too late, but here are my answers anyway
(whcih, for the largst part, are already known and
predictable, in fact;-)))

>
>
> ====
>
> 1. What do you think would be your most significant contribution to
> the ICANN Board?
>

I think that my most significant contribution to the Board would be
exactly the same as it has been during the past two years:
never compromising on my principles and on the issues where I have
interpreted to exist large community consesnus. I have that I
have proven to be willing to devote a large amont of energy to this job,
and that I don't easily shut up or accomodate, but I am
always avilable for listening.

>
> 2. What is your most serious criticism of the performance of the
> ICANN Board to date?

Well, sitting there has been an uneasy experience. While everybody
discusses about top deown/bottom up.... nothngs comes form the
SOs, ie, form the Bottom. OTOH, the Board fails too often to provide
adequate guidance to the staff as to the direction of ICANN
issues... so finally it is the staff who really "makes the decisions"
(even if formally approved by the Board). Working out a
better equilibrium in this area has been, and will continue to be, my
top priority in this area.

>

>
> 3. As a Board member, which of the following issue-areas or problems
> would you see as the highest priority? (Please do NOT respond by saying
> "they are all important." We know that. We want to know your PRIORITIES. You may rank them in order of importance if you wish.)
>
>    A. Structural-organizational issues (e.g., DNSO Review, SO formation,
>        constituting the At-Large, dominance of ICANN policy-making by
>        unelected management and staff)
>    B. Supply industry regulation (registrar-registry relations, consumer
>        protection from unauthorized account transfers, fair access to
>        expired names, etc.
>    C. Intellectual Property protection; e.g., UDRP, WIPO 2, WHOIS
>         access, making sure new TLDs are restricted, etc.
>    D. Expansion of the name space. Rapid conclusion of
>        existing contracts, rapid authorization of new TLDs.
>
> 4. Do you believe that the non-commercial constituency should be
> deprived of a vote on the Names Council if it does not
> pay the DNSO $30,000 by the end of this year?
>

I do believe that ICANN is a self-funding organization where all groups
and part should make its best efforts to contribute to its
funding. And that, where ruyles exist, they should be applied. This does
not mean tha, as you say, NCDNHC should be deprived of
its voting rights, but it does not amount either to "whatever it
happens, nobody will ever be deprived of its voting rights". All
consituencies should act responsibly in tryuing to fund DNSO
actitivties. If this is the c<ase, I am sure that the NC will find
some temporary or more definitive solutions. So first, ask for the
effort to contribute. Then, if practically impossible, ask for
cnsensus within the NC to waive or rduce funds. Incase the voting rights
were supended, I owuld like the issue sent to the Board
for immediate review.

But nobody should pretend to have a free ticket to this train (and
Iassume this is not NCDNHC position as well).

>
> 5. Do you believe the UDRP procedures are currently biased in
> favor of complainants and need to be reformed? Do you believe the
> substantive policy of the UDRP needs to be significantly changed?
> If so, how?

I think that the "reality" is biased in favour of the omplainants, more
than the UDRP iteself ;-)) TM protection is a common
feature nearly everywhere, and TM holders, and complainants, tend to be
wealthier and be able to sue better legal advise.....
Besides that, I don't think that the UDRP is really "biased" in favour
of complainants. The statistics of the resolutions usggest
otherwise. It is out of doubt that some decisions reflect that some
panelist  have a bisased interpretation of the rules, which i
think is a different issue.

I would not claim that UDRP is perfect, far from that. Nor that it does
not need some redrafting, even in the sense of
reequilibtrating some features thur the complainant. But quite frankly,
UDRP is much more "balanced" than the TM laws that courts
apply in Europe, regarding all these issues.

As for concrete refrms, once again, I think that a Director should not
express its views at this stage of the game, with a
recently created UDRP reveiw task force within the NC just starting its work.

>
> 6. Do you favor the addition of an individuals' constituency to the
> DNSO? Do you favor any broad restructuring the DNSO constituency
> structure or more limited reforms?

"Favouring" is certainly not the espression I would use. I have
expressed many time (last one in my answrs to GA Chair questions
during this electoral process) that I see the DNSO structured around
"functions" more than "interests", and that "individuals"as
such do not fit easily under this conception. It is also a fact that I
have opposed past temptatives to create such constituency
that were not credible in any respect. Furthermore, it is not the
Director's job to promote or favour a new SO or constituency.

But I don't forntally oppose it. If there was a credible, self-organized
proposal that recieved the support of the other
constituncies, I would not oppos it.

As for DNSO restructuration.... perhaps it is a bit early to express my
views. I am trying to digest the ALSC and waiting for
comments on some of its portions. Its disfunctionality is a fact (it is
frustrating to sit in the Board and seeing "no"
recommendations form the DNSO.....). But I am afraid that we still don't
have a consensus on the solutions.

>
> 7. Do you favor the secession of the ccTLDS from the DNSO and
> the creation of a separate country code SO?

Again, I feel unconfortable with the notion of "favouring". No , I don't
"favour" or "encourage" a ccTLD SO. But tbhis does not
mean that I oppose it, The ccTLD mangers option represents on one hand,
a failure of the DNSO, which I regret. OTOH, it is their
preferred option for trying to solve a number of problems
(disfunctionality of DNSO; unadequate representation of ccTLDs; ccTLD
issues and specificites not suffiiciently taken into account....) that I
respect and share for its most part. The SO it is not
"my" favourite solution, and I have expressed some scepticism about its
ability to really be the best way to solve all the
problems it tries to address. But it is the undisputed and  unanimous
(or neaqrly) option of the ccTLDs, and I should not, and
would not, try to imoose my personal preferences on theirs. This means
that I would support their proposal, indeed, under the
ccondition (as I've explicitly told to gthem) that there is not
widespread opposition to such new SO from other DNSO consituencies
or SOs.

>
> 8.  Do you favor a public voice and representation on the board for the
> community at large.  How would you define At Large?

I favour part of the Board being elected by some at large mechanism,
yes. The problem is that At large is not easily defined ;-))
I think that keeping it to domain name holders is rahter reductive, even
if this choice would undoubtly ease the electoral process
to a great extent. Defining at large as all those individuals having an
interest in ICANN-related activitites, and choosing to
participate in its internal electoral and/or decision-making mechanisms
sounds better.... but is far more difficult to
operationalise.

I do confess that I have read the ALSC draft report only once, and the
NAIS one only partially. What is clear to me is that we
need some AL concept and mechanism that helps "tying" AL to ICANN
process for longer than the electoral process, ie, we need some
AL SO, structure, council etc. But no, I don't have d, as a Director in
charge right now, and if i was selected to serve again, my
obligation is more to listen and follow community consensus (which i
don't see yet) than trying to imose my own ideas (admittedly
contradictory on this topic).

>
> 9.  Do you think board members should be elected by direct vote or
> selected indirectly. Why?

I contest the view that only direct elections are democratic. There are
many perfeclytlegitimate political institutions where
indirect vote perfects perfectly well. I favour inidrec vote for the
SO-selected Direcdtors. as for At large, I opposed direct
elections of 9 directors as direct elections are much more exposed to
capture and "nationalistyic contests" than indirect ones,
and 9, as i have often repeated, 9 is half the Board, with a de facto
veto power and the right to apoint the CEO, thereby becoming
a possible majority. So, in principle, i am not that fond of direct
elections. But if this was for a smaller set of directors,
like the 5 we elected last year or 6 as proposed by the the ALSC, I feel
that we could, and should keep experimenting and refining
a direct vote mechanism (but Ido insist: no, I don't see this as a top
priority question).

There is one iddue i would like to reiterate here (it is and old
proposal, that i made during the old gTLD-MoU days and reiterated
at the Singapore meeting). I am concerned about the "regional" division
for AL elections. Not only because it tends to rapidly
evolve into "national challenges" but also because it tends to favour
the more developed (and Internet-developed) areas within
each region.... that, for Internet matters, tend to have fairly
equivalent views. I am not that concerned about having "European
represnetation" or "African representation" as to have divesity of
views. And it is a fact that thre Internet, seem form Ghana and
Us, looks pretty different, and this is the diversity of veiws we need
to ensure. But if the European seat(s)are always taken but
EU-Switzerland-narway; the AP setas by Jaopan-Australia and so forth
diversity is in fact fairly reduced. Cultural diversity is
not the only factor: I) do insist, we do need peoplewhose daily
experience comes form parts of the world where the Intenet is
acceessed and used in a way that is differnt form those of the most
developed countries. This is shy, regardless of which region
they come from, I would like having at least one or two seats allocated
to non-OECD residents/citizens (this could even be the
"sixth region" proposed by ALSC).

>
> 10. Should board decisions continue to be made in private closed meetings
> that are open to participation by certain privileged parties but not
> to the public for observation?

Here it is a point where I have changed my position, and I don't mind to
admit it publicly. When I first came to the Board, it
realy sound strange to me that al mmetings had to be public (this is NOT
the case in our , contenetal european, corporate and
administrative tradition). But over the time I got convinced that ICANN
would gain mora than it would loss if its teleconfs where
also recorded and then made publicly available (the way Brett Fausett
does for the NC). It is a fact of life that Directors will
then find other channels to convey some of their questions or discuss
some issues, but still I think that having all meetings
where decisions are taken public desserves consideration (except for
obviously reserved matters, like personnel, priviledged
information about lawsuits or other legal issues, etc).