Don't think I can post to the GNSO Council list, so
will an NCUC Councilor please pass along this message. Thank you!
Robin
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Dear GNSO Councilors:
It is completely unacceptable for the structure of
the new NCSG to be defined and shaped by commercial users and contracting
parties. Noncommercial stakeholders can and will define their own
structure suitable to themselves and not be manipulated by other stakeholder
groups who might seek to undermine its effectiveness. It is naïve and
disingenuous to pretend that the different SGs don't have competing and often
conflicting interests.
[Gomes, Chuck] What gives you the impression that
the NCSG will be defined by commercial users and contracting
parties?
We note that no one has invited NCUC or ALAC to
participate in defining a new structure for the Commercial SG, or the
Registrar and Registry SGs. This kind of discrimination among SGs will
discourage additional noncommercial entities from participating in ICANN's
GNSO.
[Gomes, Chuck] What discrimination?
Please note that NCUC has already proposed a
structure for the NCSG that has the overwhelming support of the noncommercial
stakeholders currently active in ICANN. We have conveyed it to At Large,
discussed its principles in public meetings in Cairo, and are in conversations
with staff about it now. While we welcome efforts to amend it from new
constituency proponents and relevant members of At Large, that proposal will
serve as the basis for any NCSG proposals that go to the Board.
We have no objection in principle to working with At
large members and RALOs in this process, and as noted before we have already
tried to include them in our ongoing process. But we also note that
individual or organizational At Large members may also be commercial users and
thus ineligible to join a future noncommercial SG, and thus have no legitimate
role to play in the definition of our structure.
The Board Governance Committee has made it clear on
numerous occasions that Stakeholder Groups themselves should play a leading
role in defining their structure. Explicit statements to that effect have been
made by Roberto Gaetano, former Board members and BGC member Susan Crawford,
and Harald Alvestrand. This is, quite obviously, the right
approach.
[Gomes, Chuck] Agreed. I am just not clear on why you think
it would be different than this. My understanding is that
each Constituency Renewal request and Stakeholder Group Charter will be
developed by the applicable constituencies and Stakeholder Group members
and submitted to the Board for Board approval, not to the GNSO for GNSO
approval. And the Board will judge each renewal request and SG
Charter against the recommendations that they approved for GNSO
improvement.
Best,
Robin Gross
Chair of Non-Commercial Users Constituency
IP JUSTICE
Robin Gross, Executive Director
1192 Haight Street, San Francisco, CA 94117 USA
p: +1-415-553-6261 f: +1-415-462-6451