Proposed Consumer Constituency Charter - comments?

[Dan Krimm]

Beau,

This is a little puzzling to me:

> ... privacy
> [defined within the ICANN scope as registration abuse, safety, and
> stability]; WHOIS;

Is there a place in the CC for individual domain registrants, and
consideration of protection of privacy of personal registrant data in the
WHOIS database?

Some registrars offer a proxy level of privacy, but this is not ICANN
policy per se.  This is not just a free speech issue (protection of
anonymous speech), but also an issue of being harassed personally by
private entities like marketers/data-miners, identity thieves, stalkers,
etc.

While it may be less common right now for "garden-variety individual
consumers" to own 2LDs, speaking as one myself this may well become more
prevalent over time, if more consumers start seeing the advantages of
having a personal email and/or web domain (cloud-mail without giving your
data to Google, for example).

Am I welcome in your constituency as a personal, individual 2LD owner
without a corporate shield who wants to protect my personal data privacy
in the WHOIS DB?  I certainly feel mostly like a "consumer" -- certainly
not a "small business" (while my 2LD is in the .com TLD, I don't use it
for commercial purposes, and I am an individual NCUC/NCSG member).

Thanks,
Dan


-- 
Any opinions expressed in this message are those of the author alone and
do not necessarily reflect any position of the author's employer.



On Mon, July 4, 2011 8:16 pm, Beau Brendler wrote:
> Avri wrote:
>
>>>But I still have to say that after a couple of years of this being on
>>> the table I've still not heard a really crisp and clear definition of
>>> what it would work on substantively that isn't already being followed,
>>> however unevenly, by existing groupings and people.  Maybe if there's a
>>> new construction with a big sign it will draw new bodies into the
>>> ICANNsphere and increase the level of engagement on a distinctive set of
>>> issues, but one does have to wonder.<<<
>
> Having written the charter more than three years ago now, and having seen
> it go through several rewrites over the course of at least three, possibly
> four public comment periods, I can tell you what you are looking for is in
> the words of the mission statement:
>
> "...serve as the conduit for consumer interests as they relate to the
> Internet and defined within the scope of ICANN.  The major areas of
> consumer interest are fraud, spam, phishing, identity theft, and privacy
> [defined within the ICANN scope as registration abuse, safety, and
> stability]; WHOIS; the Registrar Accreditation Agreement and the behavior
> of registrars, registries, resellers, domainers and other entities
> [defined within ICANN's scope as "compliance"]..."
>
> This language was written in part out of frustration with the then
> At-Large, and with the then NCUC. The at-large did not take much of an
> interest then on these issues; its interests seemed primarily in
> self-analysis and realizing the dream of new gTLDs. The NCUC, much smaller
> then, was focused on issues of free speech and freedom of expression, to
> the degree that its ideology ruled out just about any other issue as
> co-opted by moneyed interests. In addition, it appeared, to me anyway, the
> NCUC's focus or hope was to limit ICANN's power and scope as much as
> possible, and make it go away. Actually, in my opinion, if ICANN doesn't
> do a better job of enforcing contracts and compelling compliance, then it
> should go away, because it would then be a big waste of time and money and
> a fraudulent construct that does more harm than good by pretending to do
> something it isn't. But it doesn't appear to be going away soon so its
> behavior needs to be challenged on behalf of the public interest. The
> contracted parties should not be winning every argument the way they do
> now.
>
> If it's the name of the constituency that seems to confuse people, well,
> change its name to the contract compliance constituency or something. But
> arguments for its continued existence or non-existence should be based on
> merit, not on whether it may or may not have too many quasi-commercial
> parties involved. That's just a smokescreen -- the consumer constituency's
> charter had always been much more stringent about who it would or would
> not allow to be a member based on commercial ties or interests than the
> NCUC's or the NCSG's. The way the consumer constituency's charter has been
> written, you can't be a member and own a registrar. You can't make a
> principal living off consulting for governments or companies on ICANN
> matters and be a member. And so on. We need to move past that now.
>
> If it takes constituencies to flesh out the NCSG's scope of policy work to
> include broader matters than freedom of speech and expression, then new
> constituencies should be welcomed, not feared. We need more people working
> on RAA issues and contract compliance and defining registration abuse and
> the rights of registrants (and how their behavior effects the general
> public) outside the core group of people doing it now, who also tend to be
> the same people who are interested in seeing the consumer constituency go
> forward).
>
> -----Original Message-----
>>From: Rosemary Sinclair <rosemary.sinclair at UNSW.EDU.AU>
>>Sent: Jun 30, 2011 3:34 AM
>>To: NCSG-NCUC-DISCUSS at LISTSERV.SYR.EDU
>>Subject: Proposed Consumer Constituency Charter - comments?
>>
>>Hi all
>>
>>Here's the link Avri has set up to the docs...
>> https://community.icann.org/display/gnsononcomstake/Consumer+Constituency+%28CC%29+-+candidate
>>
>>Here's the submitted version of the Mission....
>>
>>1.2	Mission
>>The intended purpose of the Consumers Constituency is to serve as the
>> conduit for consumer interests as they relate to the Internet and defined
>> within the scope of ICANN.  The major areas of consumer interest are
>> fraud, spam, phishing, identity theft, and privacy [defined within the
>> ICANN scope as registration abuse, safety, and stability]; WHOIS; the
>> Registrar Accreditation Agreement and the behavior of registrars,
>> registries, resellers, domainers and other entities [defined within
>> ICANN's scope as "compliance"]; and new gTLDs.  The focus of the
>> Consumers Constituency will be to ensure that consumers' safety,
>> security, stability, usability, access, and other appropriate concerns
>> regarding the DNS are adequately represented within ICANN policy
>> development.
>>
>>Let's get feedback around the version of the Charter that reflects the
>> interest of the people who support the
>>Proposed constituency - we might be able to find a way through or at
>> least clarify the views
>>
>>Cheers
>>
>>Rosemary
>>
>>Rosemary Sinclair
>>Director | External Relations
>>Australian School of Business | Level 3 Building L5 | UNSW | Sydney  NSW
>> Â 2052 Â 
>>Direct: Â +61 2 9385 6228 | Fax: +61 2 9385 5933
>>Email: rosemary.sinclair at unsw.edu.au  www.asb.unsw.edu.au
>>
>>Â Â Â Â  Â Â EQUIS accredited for 5 years
>>
>>
>>-----Original Message-----
>>From: NCSG-NCUC [mailto:NCSG-NCUC-DISCUSS at LISTSERV.SYR.EDU] On Behalf Of
>> William Drake
>>Sent: Wednesday, 29 June 2011 4:42 PM
>>To: NCSG-NCUC-DISCUSS at LISTSERV.SYR.EDU
>>Subject: Re: Results of the Chartering process
>>
>>Hi
>>
>>On Jun 28, 2011, at 10:47 PM, Avri Doria wrote:
>>
>>>  I would like to point out that there is nothing wrong in us helping
>>> the commercial actors in the Consumer area to find their way to the
>>> CSG.  Just as the CSG has leant a helping hand in the NCSG growth, I
>>> think it appropriate that we should now try to help them as much, not
>>> only to show our gratitude but also to allow them to experience the
>>> same benefits we have found in diversity.
>>
>>Diabolical, I love it. Certainly, if there must be a new "consumer" space
>> then it should cut across both SGs.  But I still have to say that after a
>> couple of years of this being on the table I've still not heard a really
>> crisp and clear definition of what it would work on substantively that
>> isn't already being followed, however unevenly, by existing groupings and
>> people.  Maybe if there's a new construction with a big sign it will draw
>> new bodies into the ICANNsphere and increase the level of engagement on a
>> distinctive set of issues, but one does have to wonder...
>>
>>More generally, while I take Avri's earlier point that irrespective of
>> what we were discussing in the past re: focusing on interest groups,
>>
>>> Constituencies mean Nomcom committee seats and the possibility of
>>> filling comments that the Board is willing to read because they are
>>> from a known entity, and because any resources from ICANn will be given
>>> to constituencies
>>
>>I'm still having difficulty getting my head around the substantive
>> arguments for proliferation.  The Academic Constituency concept is a case
>> in point.  Unless we're talking about higher ed operational issues (which
>> presumably would fit in NPOC), what set of GNSO-related issues are
>> specific and distinct to academics and not addressed by NCUC?  If,
>> alternatively, having distinctive issues to work on is unnecessary and
>> we're viewing constituencies more as sort of affinity subgroups, here too
>> I have to wonder about the need.  Academics, including those here, have a
>> variety of intellectual/political orientations and areas of
>> specialization, there's no particular "academic perspective" that needs
>> to represented and isn't now, and we already work together in NCUC.  As
>> to the Avri's organizational points, we already don't have enough time to
>> file comments and having a constituency might not change that, and
>> resources have hardly flowed to our existing constituency (whereas I
>> couldn't help noticing Danny Younger saying on an ALAC list that At-Large
>> and ALAC Support Activities are budgeted at $5,427,000.).  The Nomcom
>> committee seat case is more obvious; there was recently a brief
>> discussion (i.e. about three emails) concerning the "academic" slot on
>> the nomcom, which someone in the ALACsphere argued had to remain set
>> aside only for university network administration folks.I pointed out that
>> academia's a bit broader than that but nobody replied so voila it stayed
>> that way..
>>
>>Anyway, if people decide they really want to do it I imagine I'd join an
>> Academic Constituency, but first wouldn't it be useful to specify the
>> potential benefits of launching multiple constituencies in NCSG.?
>>
>>Thanks,
>>
>>Bill
>>
>>
>>>
>>>
>>> On 28 Jun 2011, at 16:12, mary.wong at law.unh.edu wrote:
>>>
>>>> Hi - I support the concept of a CC in both the CSG and the NCSG. Not
>>>> that it's NCSG business to push for one in the CSG, but the
>>>> possibility should clear the way for a purely NC CC to be formed
>>>> within the NCSG. If one does eventually form within the CSG, the two
>>>> CCs could work together to advance a fuller consumer agenda and
>>>> awareness. For now, the CC that could form within the NCSG will have
>>>> to follow both the newly-approved constituency formation process AND
>>>> abide by the new NCSG Charter (once formally approved by the NCSG
>>>> membership).
>>>>
>>>> On a possible Academic Constituency, Rosemary and I thought it would
>>>> make sense given (1) the number of individuals that are academics and
>>>> researchers who span a number of specialty areas, from technical to
>>>> law to political science and who are already involved in NC issues;
>>>> (2) the possibility that NCSG members can join more than one
>>>> constituency; (3) the possibility that some academics and researchers
>>>> may wish to be more closely associated with an Academic Constituency
>>>> than any other and so choose to join that rather than, say, NCUC or
>>>> CC; (4) the indications from the Board, Nom Com etc. that greater
>>>> academic participation at ICANN is to be welcomed; and (5) the value
>>>> that an Academic Constituency may be able to provide, in the form of
>>>> papers, public comments and so on.
>>>>
>>>> Rafik, since you were the NCSG Councilor the Board thought would be
>>>> the one to reach out to the academic community, I'd be interested
>>>> (like Rosemary) to hear your thoughts as I don't want to impose or
>>>> tread on anyone's turf either.
>>>>
>>>> Hope everyone who was in Singapore had a productive meeting and an
>>>> enjoyable visit, and are safely home without suffering too much jet
>>>> lag!
>>>>
>>>> Mary
>>>>
>