Sam, your list of issues to be dealt with for the oversight issue (last
paragraph) is one I agree with. But I do not see why we miss the
opportunity of creating an international oversight body (if the
separability trend wins and a separate oversight is created) -- which
does not need to be under the USA laws to hold ICANN accountable.

Unless the international nature of its services is "flexible" enough to
become national when convenient for the insiders who do not wish to risk
being under true independent accountability oversight. I do not have to
mention examples of this in other areas (for the bad or good of it),
multilateral or private. I would dare to say there is not much to be
done for NRO to become an international oversight body of the IANA
function "IP addressing system", for example.

This would politically be a tremendous advance (if approved, of course)
in the face of the group of governments who keep advocating for a UN
takeover of the addressing system. With international, pluralist
oversight in a body based outside of the USA (I vote for Uruguay), this
would help defuse a lot of this unending campaign to move addressing to
the purview of the ITU or similar other multilateral schemas.

Some of us (many?) cannot see anything of this sort being possible
outside of the USA. But reducing it to an office within ICANN? Sad joke.

fraternal regards

--c.a.


On 05/05/2015 01:15 PM, Sam Lanfranco wrote:
> Carlos,
> 
> Thanks for your comment and flagging the issues of an outside
> international oversight body, the  ombudsmans (ombudspersons?) office,
> and the possibility of another office within ICANN to address “these
> strategic challenges”. Here are some quick comments from the small to
> the big in terms of challenges here.
> 
> In terms of the choice between the ombudsman and some other new ICANN
> office, my personal view is to prefer the ombudsman, and not just
> because it would be less expensive in a time of serious ICANN budget
> constraints (another challenge). I find it hard to envision a new ICANN
> office dealing with DNS strategic challenges where that office would not
> become a lightening rod for a wide variety of external forces interested
> in issues that would amount to pressure for ICANN scope creep. As well,
> administrative theory and evidence suggests that a new office, in and of
> itself, would risk scope creep within its own work agenda, to bolster
> its existence, especially in times of constrained budgets.
> 
> As for an international (outside) oversight body, for me the core issues
> are: (a) what principles are to be upheld; (b) keeping clear what should
> be inside the ICANN DNS system remit; and (c) what within the DNS system
> should be addressed elsewhere. The primary role of an oversight body is
> to hold an entity accountable to its remit. How does that get defined in
> a way that an oversight body: (i) doesn’t foster scope creep by asking
> ICANN to be accountable for the wrong things, and (ii) helps re-direct
> DNS concerns (especially content and intellectual property issues) to
> other appropriate venues?
> 
> Sam L.
> /
> On 05/05/2015 11:35 AM, Carlos A. Afonso wrote:
> /
>> /Dear Sam,
>>
>> Powerful message indeed. ICANN needs an outside international oversight
>> body which would, among other tasks, decidedly help in tackling these
>> strategic challenges.
>>
>> But we (NCSG?) seem to agree on this oversight being reduced to an
>> office within ICANN. What would be the real difference between this
>> office and the ombudsman? My answer: the ombudsman is much cheaper.
>>
>> fraternal regards
>>
>> --c.a./
> 
>