gTLD for developing regions was Re: [] knitters needle

[Avri Doria]

I call for remediation, not (self-) flagellation. but i expect you would not support that either.  

I think JAS started up late and met resistance every step of the way.  But it broke through the perceptions to where many, if not all, realize the obligation toward developing countries.  So I think that if we start working now on doing better in the next round, then maybe our expectations won't be a quixotic.

As for demand, seeing the demand in the developed world, I can only assume that the demand may develop in the developing world.  Though Evan has argued well for the fact that new gTLDs are so much old tech and that no one really needs new gTLDs at all (allowing for the possible exception of IDNs).  So the two of you may have a common point on demand.

As for being a grinch, if I remember the story, he eventually came around.  We can only hope.

avri


On 6 Jul 2012, at 10:42, Milton L Mueller wrote:

> These are good questions, Grace.
> There are many economic and business reasons why one would expect far fewer per capita applications from developing economies than from well-developed, richer ones:
> -          Distribution of domain name technology business expertise, which is concentrated in developed West
> -          Costs of application. We are talking about a 3-6 year time line from the point of conception to point of entry into the root. Even with JAS subsidies, putting together a staff and proposal to go through all this s***t is not cheap. Even applying for JAS subsidies takes time and knowledge. JAS program came very late in the day.
> -          Demand. Let's face it, the sale of domain names is a fairly rarified and non-fundamental service. Most users in developing economies have more basic forms of demand and more limited budgets, like basic connectivity, computers/handsets, local content, etc. A cool domain name is something you look for AFTER a hundred other things are taken for granted.
> -          Dominance of the Internet economy, esp. DNS economy, by government/ccTLD operators in many developing countries
>  
> I know I will be viewed as a Grinch, but I think we let our expectations get way out of whack here regarding the expected number of new gTLD applications from poor or developing countries. The idea that we should flagellate ourselves or ICANN for doing something wrong just doesn't fly with me. Even if some program had artificially inflated the number of applications in order to make things "look better" we would have quickly seen many of those applications go under.
>  
> From: NCSG-Discuss [mailto:NCSG-DISCUSS at LISTSERV.SYR.EDU] On Behalf Of Grace Mutung'u (Bomu)
> Sent: Friday, July 06, 2012 9:18 AM
> To: NCSG-DISCUSS at LISTSERV.SYR.EDU
> Subject: Re: [NCSG-Discuss] gTLD for developing regions was Re: [] knitters needle
>  
> I am following a discussion on the same at a local IGF (Kenya IGF). Forgive my questions because sometimes ICAAN is complicated but I would like to understand:
> a) did anyone apply for the "aided" application that is supposed to be cheaper?
> b) if yes, were these from developing countries? 
> c) if these "aided "applications were few, just like those from developing countries, really, why is this so?
> d) and thinking aloud, did these applications even achieve the initial intention? is there an alternative to this system or have we(developing countries) been left behind in the next revolution?
>  thanks!
> 
> 
> 2012/7/6 klaus.stoll <klaus.stoll at chasquinet.org>
> Dear Friends
> 
> Greetings. I am very happy that the topic of registrars from developing countries has come up as it is indeed very important. Here are my current five cents worth.
> 
> First of all it is not just a numbers game, it is not important how many registrars from a developing region, but their overall quality of them and who they in fact represent. Secondly, we need to look what is going wrong inside our ICANN box that seems to keep registrars from developing regions out. So what I means we need to look inward and outward at the same time on this topic.
> 
> Secondly we need to look for opportunities to change the situation and I think given the scope and mandate of ICANN I think here we need to look also outside the ICANN plate to get the situation resolved.
> 
> As ED of GKPF and as a NPOC member I want to be practical and offer our existing infrastructure and contacts towards this cause, in particular as this is a clear win/win situation for all involved as this allows us to serve our members better.
> 
> 1. Talking about members: GKPF has a number of African region members and I am happy to use our contacts to get the message through and get things going, but it would be up to us all what the message is and what the action would be. (BTW, GKPF has also good contacts to other developing regions which can be used.
> 
> 2. GKPF is involved with the Annual Innovation Africa Digital Summit which reaches all of Africa and on a particular governmental and industry level. (Last year the .Africa Applicants made a big splash at the meeting in Addis). I am more hen happy to get talks going with the organizers to see what can and should be done, but again, first we need a plan.
> 
> 3. GKPF is the chair of the Program and Content Committee of the upcoming Computer Online Protection Conference Africa 2013 ,(together with ITU). There might be some synergies that could be exploited.
> 
> 4. WSIS. The WSIS preparation for the WSIS Forum in 2013 is just starting and GKPF hopes to play a large role in it. I think the WSIS process is one of the ways to get things done.
> 
> These are my first initial thoughts. I hope that you accept my challenge and that we can start working on concrete things with concrete results in and outside and through the ICANN box.
> 
> I also want to let you know that I was extremely saddened by some of the comments made about GKPF at Prague as a organization non existent and irrelevant. Yes, GKP took a 2 year “time out” to reinvent itself as GKPF and has come out of the process the better and stronger and as I said it is very sad to hear people holding it against us that we did the not popular but the right thing.
> 
> In the hope that you found the above helpful.
> 
> Yours
> 
> Klaus
>  
> From: Rafik Dammak
> Sent: Thursday, July 05, 2012 2:52 AM
> To: NCSG-DISCUSS at LISTSERV.SYR.EDU
> Subject: Re: gTLD for developing regions was Re: [] knitters needle
>  
> Hi Avri,
>  
> 
> The one on RAA is critical as this is s till under discussion.  Perhaps you can develop that theme into a comment that NCSG/[NCUC, NPOC] can endorse.
>  
> Thank you Avri, I like NCSG way to volunteer each other  ;), I think that is better if I start to draft something and share with NCSGers. I am not sure about the format, and should we include it in a letter/comment to detail NCSG position regarding RAA, something to coordinate with efforts started by Wendy.
>  
> 
> Some of the other topics are long term, but perhaps we can figure out ways to work on them over the longer term, so at the right time we are ready to contribute well developed proposals.
>  
> indeed, long-term work,a kind of strategic planning we have to think about and also to allow enough time to outreach the different SG of the community.
> 
> I am not yet thinking about cross-community working group :)
>  
> 
> I think helping local populations create RSPs and Rrs in developing regions is one of the key means of raising the capacity of developing regions and one of the ways to insure there are qualified applicants ready to take on the challenge of applying for new registries without needing to chain themselves to incumbent RSPs and Rrs (ie yet another variant of cyber-colonialism).
>  
> I guess that is close to what you proposed for JAS, something that we can develop and improve,
>  
> Rafik
>  
> 
> avri
> 
> 
> On 4 Jul 2012, at 11:14, Rafik Dammak wrote:
> 
> > Hi Avri,
> >
> > while we can continue the work about new gTLD program, we should also cover another topic which is about having more registrars from developing countries to serve users there. we had such discussion when we presented the JAS 2nd milestone report last year and we had same comments  again during ICANN meeting in prague. there are some particularities and issues like payments methods (yes credit card is not something common), pricing etc which limit the access to domains to registrants especially individuals from developing countries. new gTLD could fix some problems with more community-based registries and benefiting the more relaxed vertical integration rules, but ICANN missed such opportunity.
> >
> > I am also wondering if the new RAA with new provisions creates de facto  new economic and technical barriers to new entrants from developing regions and only benefits to incumbents (what about competition and anti-trust?) while possible provisions like validation and verification won't encourage those incumbents registrars to operate in Africa for example. For RAA negotiations, that can be another point to work on it in addition to our concerns about privacy, FoE and anonymity.  All these are good to question the public interest task for ICANN and its role to encourage real competition and diversity for the benefit of registrants like non-commercial with more operators serving their communities.
> > I guess that we need on work on that,
> > and still work to be done for support applicant for second round if there is,
> >
> > Best,
> >
> > Rafik Dammak
> > @rafik
> > "fight for the users"
> >
> >
> >
> > 2012/7/4 Avri Doria <avri at acm.org>
> > Hi,
> >
> > This is something worth working on.
> >
> > While I was very much against working according to categories in this round, it was largely because I thought the categories were something emergent.  I don't think we all could have agreed on the set categories before.  But now we can. Or at least can come close.
> >
> > I think that the developing region applications are obviously a category that was not sufficiently included.
> >
> > As we start to think and plan for the next round, I think we could/should consider limiting it to categories, i.a. such as developing regions.  I beleive remediating failures in diversity etc should be one of the primary goals of the next round.  I expect that this may be a controversial perspective, perhaps even within NCSG, so it is going to take some discussion on:
> >
> > - whether a next round should be constrained across some but not all categories
> > - if so, which categories
> >
> > It might be good to start figuring out if we, as NCSG collectively, or [NCUC, NPOC] separately, have viewpoints on such issues.
> >
> > avri
> >
> > PS: I love the way threads wander and morph in a living list.
> >
> > On 4 Jul 2012, at 09:15, Adam Peake wrote:
> >
> > > On Wed, Jul 4, 2012 at 4:17 PM, Alex Gakuru <gakuru at gmail.com> wrote:
> > >> Is Africa, really, part of ICANN? the 'reveal' showed that 99.99 per cent of
> > >> new gTLDs were from outside Africa which only managed to submit a palty 0.88
> > >> per cent of the 1930 applications. As developed economies IP industry and
> > >> brand owners entrench themselves deeper on ICANN, we're wondering, what's
> > >> wrong with this model for Africa?
> > >>
> > >
> > >
> > > Alex, not just Africa, developing countries/region generally. Also
> > > equal lack of applicants from Latin America and Caribbean, and
> > > majority of Asia Pacific.
> > > <http://gtldresult.icann.org/application-result/applicationstatus>
> > >
> > > Plenty of applications from the Asia Pacific when taken across the
> > > whole region, but only from the developed markets (China and India in
> > > the ICT sector can be classed as developed.)
> > >
> > > Failure of outreach, or just a reflection of economics. NCSG should
> > > talk with the GAC about this.  GAC's quite animated, complained to the
> > > board.
> > >
> > > Adam
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > >> On Wed, Jul 4, 2012 at 9:34 AM, Alain Berranger <alain.berranger at gmail.com>
> > >> wrote:
> > >>>
> > >>> Hi Avri,
> > >>>
> > >>> It is clear to me too that NCUC/pre NPOC NCSG is a community of some kind
> > >>> - I just don't quite grasp its essence yet, but what is sure is that I don't
> > >>> yet feel part of it.
> > >>>
> > >>> Looking back to Prague, at no times were any of the 5 NPOC members there
> > >>> made to feel full members of that community. For instance, at your own dot
> > >>> gay event at the sky bar, all NCUC members present were invited, but not a
> > >>> single NPOC member was invited. When NCSG EC had informal gatherings, never
> > >>> once were NPOC members included. That said, NPOC members there did not lack
> > >>> social interaction with other Constituencies.
> > >>>
> > >>> Yes Avri, you and I agree on the need for an NCUC email list for the NCUC
> > >>> community.. Keeping NCSG list for building the new NCSG community made out
> > >>> of both NCUC and NPOC members.
> > >>>
> > >>> Alain
> > >>>
> > >>>
> > >>>
> > >>> On Tuesday, July 3, 2012, Avri Doria wrote:
> > >>>>
> > >>>> Hi,
> > >>>>
> > >>>> Sorry to hear that.
> > >>>> It is part of what makes us a community instead of just a SG.
> > >>>>
> > >>>> Would have enjoyed hearing your voice as well.
> > >>>> Though I guess I just did.
> > >>>>
> > >>>> BTW:  I still think we need an announce list of the news and only the
> > >>>> news for those members whole don't like all the touchy feely group, aka
> > >>>> unprofessional, participation.  I would like the NCSG EC to reconsider its
> > >>>> decision from last year not to create such a list.
> > >>>>
> > >>>> avri
> > >>>>
> > >>>> On 3 Jul 2012, at 11:13, Michael Carson wrote:
> > >>>>
> > >>>>> Hello,
> > >>>>>
> > >>>>> Whoever is in charge of adding/removing email addresses to this
> > >>>>> listserv, I am requesting that my email address be removed.
> > >>>>>
> > >>>>> This sort of exchange is fruitless, a waste of time and unprofessional.
> > >>>>> This is not the first time I have received these types of email exchanges.
> > >>>>>
> > >>>>> Again, please remove my email address.
> > >>>>>
> > >>>>> Regards,
> > >>>>>
> > >>>>> Michael Carson
> > >>>>> YMCA of the USA
> > >>>>>
> >
>  
> 
> 
> 
> -- 
> Grace L.N. Mutung'u (Bomu)
> Kenya
> Skype: gracebomu
> Twitter: GraceMutung'u (Bomu)
>