Re: [Ianaplan] What's happening at ICANN?

[Seth Johnson <[e-mail]>]

https://twitter.com/qirtaiba/status/656155655414288384

"Sensing some anger from stakeholders at #ICANN54 that the US
government has circumvented its processes to enshrine DNS name rules
in the TPP"

:-|

On Mon, Oct 19, 2015 at 12:51 PM, Seth Johnson <[e-mail]> wrote:
> On Mon, Oct 19, 2015 at 9:51 AM, John C Klensin <[e-mail]> wrote:
>>
>> --On Sunday, October 18, 2015 7:23 AM +0100 John Curran
>> <[e-mail]> wrote:
>>
>>> On Oct 14, 2015, at 12:26 PM, Avri Doria <[e-mail]> wrote:
>>>> ...
>>>> All I was trying to say was IETF had a binding appeals tracks
>>>> that ICANN does not have.
>>>
>>> Indeed.   The appeals process is rather logical, allowing for
>>> appeal regarding whether the Internet standards procedures
>>> were properly followed, and (in the  extreme case) appeal to
>>> the ISOC Trustees "only in cases in which the procedures
>>> themselves are claimed to be inadequate or insufficient to the
>>> protection of the  rights of all parties in a fair and open
>>> Internet Standards Process."
>>>
>>> Such clarity of role might be helpful in the names community
>>> processes...
>>
>> Yes, but there is another difference between IETF appeals and
>> most of what has been contemplated for ICANN.  The IETF process
>> is designed to force what other bodies call "reconsideration".
>> The IESG is told to take another look and the IAB's maximum
>> authority in most scenarios is to tell the IESG to look again
>> and consider a specific set of issues.  The ISOC Trustees have
>> more power to actually make changes and final decisions (at
>> least the way some of us read the spec) but we have no actual
>> experience with the use of that part of the model to conclusion
>> in the 19 years since the ISOC BoT provision was introduced in
>> RFC 2026.
>>
>> The proposed ICANN model seems to be much more focused on
>> adjudication by higher authorities, which was considered
>> inappropriate for the IETF, in part because community consensus
>> is very hard to measure in controversial situations.  One
>> reading of the CCWG proposal is that they propose to solve that
>> problem by the time-honored position of declaring themselves
>> (pre-captured by part of the community) to be in charge and
>> representing everyone else.
>>
>> Another difference is connected to the reason I think that,
>> while ICANN procedures can draw inspiration from IETF ones,
>> almost all further analogies do not work.  In the IETF, at least
>> partially because of the technical underpinnings of much of our
>> work, there is general agreement on criteria by which success
>> can be judged.  It is only when we start adjusting our own
>> procedures to reflect social norms (e.g., recent anti-harassment
>> and perhaps privacy discussions) that consensus about success
>> criteria start breaking down.
>
>
> Not to make a habit of this, but I want to make the following comments
> once again in response here:
>
> The "more technical" areas have had the ability to operate in that way
> because they are in a stewardship context where governmental inroads
> have been proscribed.
>
> - and -
>
> As soon as the intergovernmental frame is in place and our own
> governments choose to lay claim to that legal basis, it will "simply
> apply," and you won't be in any sort of position to stand against
> intergovernmental [policy authority] (which is not subject to the same
> limits).
>
> I'll also say I sort of agree that the NTIA did not "ask the right
> questions" -- or more precisely, didn't frame the problem right.  And
> we haven't improved the defect -- the CCWG-Accountability stress test
> exercise completely fails to characterize the nature of the transition
> and therefore the nature of the problem.
>
>
> Seth
>
>
>> By contrast, disagreements about
>> what are ultimately success criteria are the norm in ICANN,
>> especially in names-related areas.  Is it better to block a
>> potentially-risky identifier or to allow it in the interest of
>> competition and "what someone wants to do"?   Is it better to
>> use the DNS's administratively distributed hierarchy to allow
>> (or even encourage) localization and diversity or to force
>> uniform rules to reduce the risks inherent in user confusion?
>> Is it better to keep the root zone small, perhaps thereby
>> encouraging deep hierarchy, or to make a very broad root in the
>> interest of competition (or greater profits)?  None of those
>> questions have completely objective answers; one has to start
>> with a particular perspective and set of preferences and then
>> try to reason from it.
>>
>> Similarly, if the IETF community becomes sufficiently concerned
>> about the behavior or performance of an individual or group of
>> individuals, we have a recall procedure.  Again, it has not been
>> fully carried out to the point of removing someone in circa 20
>> years.  The only time we ever came close involved absence and
>> non-performance, not malfeasance or ignoring the clear will of
>> the community.  In addition, out of fear of DoS attacks and
>> frivolous actions, we have made that procedure nearly impossible
>> to use, again evidenced by our failure to use it in even some
>> fairly egregious cases.  One can imagine, given the frequency
>> with which disputes arise, various dispute resolution procedures
>> are applied that leave almost no one happy. and almost as
>> frequent debates about whether "bottom up" (however narrow or
>> captured the bottom) means that the Board is obligated to accept
>> whatever comes to it or whether it is a final source for
>> consideration of cross-ICANN-community (or broader Internet
>> community) issues, much as the IESG is expected to encourage and
>> enforce cross-area review.  That set of differences, especially
>> coupled with recent ICANN history, suggests that a Board that
>> actually tried to exercise judgment and  consideration of broad
>> community needs and tradeoffs would be removed frequently if
>> procedures made that easy (as the CCWG recommendations appear to
>> do).
>>
>> Back to lurking... and wondering whether we (and maybe NTIA) are
>> asking the wrong questions.
>>
>>    best,
>>      john
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
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