Hi there NCUC'ers:

I thought I'd post a few words to the list about the Sao Paulo ICANN 
meeting.

1.  LSE Report on GNSO Reform
Our constituency should get its comments in regarding the 
recommendations in the LSE Report on GNSO reform within 2 weeks.   
Milton has already provided some comments and I don't mind making the 
next edit to his comments and then posting that to the list.  Our 
statement should be in within 2 weeks.

2.  New gTLDs and Draft GNSO Recommendations
Our constituency should submit its comments on the draft proposal for 
the new gTLDS within the next few weeks also (due 20 Dec).  The current 
proposal is terrible.  It would model speech for the Internet on ancient 
19th century treaty language (trademarks) and forbid any words in new 
gTLDs that have religious, sexual, or political connotations.  It would 
put ICANN in a position to engage in massive censorship and choose 
between competing standards of morality and religions.  Besides being 
wrong on pure censorship grounds, the proposal is completely unworkable 
and would put an enormous burden on ICANN staff to evaluate "worthiness" 
between competing claims, evaluate business plans, review financial 
statements, etc of new gTLD applicants.   It would also put a lot of 
legal liability on ICANN and open it up to numerous lawsuits from any 
party who felt ICANN wrongfully awarded a gTLD to a competitor.  I can 
post more detailed comments on this issue to the list so we can begin to 
prepare our constituency statement.  Its very important we provide 
comments on this issue.

Also at our meeting with the GAC, we were told the GAC wants to be 
mostly content-neutral and isn't pushing for the same level of 
restrictions as the current GNSO draft recommendations are.   But GAC is 
clearly concerned about controlling geographical terms in new gTLDs.

3.  Contractual terms
This was discussed on the list and I believe Mawaki submitted NCUC's 
comments.

4.  WHOIS
The NCUC workshops on whois were interesting.   I estimate about 40 
people in the room at the end of the 1st workshop.   Martin Boyle of the 
UK was not able to attend after all due to the GAC vote on whois (GAC 
could not reach an agreement on whois).   A representative from the FTC 
attended and asked a lot of questions.  Rodin did not have much to say 
to indicate what her views on the whois issue are.  Vittorio joined the 
panel and described the situation in Italy.   I wasn't able to attend 
the 2nd workshop because I had to go to the GAC-Board open meeting.  But 
I was told it was a very engaging discussion (although with less people).

Avri, Wendy, and I submitted a proposal to waive publication of whois 
data - except the DNS technical contact.  The proposal is in line with 
the Wellington GNSO vote confirming the narrow technical purpose for the 
whois database.  The proposal is in response to the new IPR/Biz Const. 
"special circumstances" proposal that attempts to over-ride the 
compromise OPOC proposal.  The "special circumstances" proposal puts 
enormous barriers in front of anyone who wants or needs to protect their 
privacy.

5.  NCUC Elections
  ** Important:  We need to have elections - like now.   We need to have 
re-elections for our executive committee and a GNSO seat.   Who is in 
charge of elections around here?

6.  ALAC won the ICANN soccer tournament.

That's all I can remember at the moment.   What else?

Norbert?  Mawaki?  Carlos?    ..... Bueller?

:-)
Robin