On Jun 1, timed for the NTIA proceeding and Thursday's hearing before the House Energy and Commerce Committee, ICANN released a report of the President's Strategy Commission (PSC), “Improving Institutional Confidence: The Way Forward,” that discusses some of the new accountability measures PSC has been considering, and makes some specific proposals. Three of note:

1. A new mechanism for the community to require the Board to re-examine a Board decision (see Appendix B). As proposed this mechanism would have a high hurdle: it would be invoked by a two-thirds majority vote of two-thirds of the Supporting Organization Councils and two-thirds of members of all the Advisory Committees. For the Governmental Advisory Committee, a consensus statement from all the members present at a physical meeting shall suffice for the purpose of this vote.

2. Rejection of the “nuclear option” of unseating the entire Board (Recommendation 2.9)

3. A slightly strengthened Independent Review Tribunal (see Appendix C). The standards for review of decisions would be improved, but ICANN makes an argument that according to California nonprofit public benefit law, the decision of the review panel cannot be binding on the Board.

IGP will comment in more detail on these proposals when it submits comments to the Commerce Department NOI.

3 thoughts on “ICANN makes new “tribunal” proposal

  1. ICANN is Grasping and Gasping at Straws
    It does not matter what anyone says to the NTIA. It is a waste of valuable people-time to deal with ICANN. There will not be any new useful TLDs.
    If anything, the new reports show that .BIZ and
    others should be pulled from the root. They are
    mostly just a source of trademark violations, spam, etc.
    ICANN is a division of Verisign and will be there as long as the .COM cash cow funds the road shows.
    The only way out of that situation is to deploy parallel .COM infrastructure in the spirit of more stability via a duplex database.
    People need to show that a simple web-based system can be used. The archaic ICANN system of faulty emails being sent back and forth between Registrars (who never respond) can be dropped.
    A better .COM infrastructure operated for FREE
    may help to get someone's attention at the NTIA
    and with .COM owners. Sending comments and
    playing the fool in the ICANN-VERISIGN-GAC
    triangle is a waste of time.

  2. The Grand Ayatollah – Vinton Cerf – Calls for End of ICANN JPA/DOC/ITU/Obama/Meddling
    http://www.ntia.doc.gov/comments/2009/dnstransition/009.pdf
    Cerf points out that IANA is where the real crown jewels are kept.
    Cerf of course also points out what a success the irrelevant massive ICANN machine has become.
    Howard Hughes likely thought the Spruce Goose was also a “success”. Maybe ICANN can become a tourist attraction ?

  3. ICANN is history….
    Cerf is Now Meddling With the NSF-Funded GENI.NET Projects
    http://www.geni.net
    Fifth GENI
    Engineering Conference July 20-22,
    2009 Sheraton Seattle Hotel; Seattle, WA
    Hosted by the University of Washington
    Baker, Fred Cisco Systems Fellow
    Barford, Paul University of Wisconsin Professor
    Cerf, Vinton Google VP and Chief Internet Evangelist
    Collins, Bradley Clemson University Research Assistant
    Evans, Joseph University of Kansas Professor
    Freeman, Peter Georgia Tech Emeritus Dean & Professor
    Golubitsky, Chaos BBN Technologies System Engineer
    Iwata, Atsushi NEC Corporation Senior Manager
    Juang, Michael Clemson University Research Assistant
    Leasure, Jen The Quilt President
    Mergen, John-Francis BBN Sr Tech Dir
    Narcho, Graciela National Science Foundation Program Manager
    Parmentelat, Thierry INRIA Research engineer
    Wang, Kuang-Ching Clemson University Assistant Professor
    Yang, Xiaowei Duke University Assistant Professor
    Yeh, Henry BBN Technologies GPO Project Manager

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