Bill and NCSG Colleagues,
I have earlier address part of Bill's concerns but let me unpack his
concerns into the single core point, which is clear in what has been
written about the Singapore Pathfinder webinar. The core focus of NPOC
efforts is the operational concerns of Not-for-Proft and Civil Society
organizations, and since Not-For-Profits are Civil Society
organizations, in the interest of brevity NPOC is using the term Civil
Society organizations, and occasionally pointing out that the concerns
and issues being address are individual concerns as well, just to remind
all that NPOC is not forgetting about that area, but that is why NCUC
exists as a sister group under NCSG.
Civil Society organizations face a number of operational concerns, both
around DNS and in general in the Internet ecosystem. For the most part
their own "brand protection" issues go beyond and are a bit different
from those for commercial organizations. They have to do with integrity,
with abuse and with fraud. They are not mainly about the issues that
would trigger "in house" ICANN processes, or even make it to court. The
current proposed trademark protection regulations being considered by
the EU/EC, where NPOC took a position, is a case in point. This was not
something to be brought to ICANN, although ICANN and its constituencies
could take positions on the regulations. If there is a confusion here it
is that NPOC is looking at operational concerns from the perspective of
its constituency, Civil Society organizations, and not just from an
ICANN-centric perspective. I am prepared to defend that wider
perspective should someone wish to debate it.
As for who works with whom on what here, and the involvement of IP
lawyers and ICANN staff in this Webinar, first, that has to be
understood in the above context, the operational concerns of Civil
Society organizations, and not the history of these issues with ICANN.
Second, we expect the Webinar to be a learning experience not only for
the participants, but also for the presenters, including NPOC, the IP
community, and ICANN itself. This is about the operational concerns
faced by Civil Society organizations today, and those challenges coming
on the road ahead, of which there are a number. It is not about
marketing this or that, or dealing with the baggage of old intra-ICANN
issues. Let the initiative be judged by its fruits, not within a context
of old outdated intra-ICANN differences.
Sam L., Chair, NPOC Policy Committee (/In planes for the next 20+ hours
so I will be slow to respond to further comments/)
On 2015-02-04 5:42 AM, William Drake wrote:
> Hi Lori
>
> Actually, I think this is very healthy and useful discussion. I don’t
> actually sense that there's antipathy at work here, but rather just a
> desire for clarity and transparency about what we’re all doing why and
> who we’re doing it with. That is in everyone’s interest.
>
> I think it’d be great if NPOC really focused in on operational
> concerns such as trademark protection for CSOs. That it would do so
> was the understanding we reached with Debbie and Amber at the
> Cartagena meeting in December 2010 when they agreed to change the name
> from the proposed Not-for-Profit Constituency (which was problematic
> since NCUC’s members are also nonprofit) to the Not-for-Profit
> Operational Concerns Constituency, but subsequently things often got
> more blurry. ... [Text deleted ]
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