I read the salient parts of the judgment ( page 59 onwards ) and there is damning culpability on the part of the Board. The panel held that the Board " failed to exercise due diligence and care...and failed to fulfil its transparency obligations..." ( ibid page 60, section 152). This is a very serious indictment and the Board must be held accountable.
I have not had the opportunity to read the entire judgment but at Section 52 the ICANN staff were not implicated - "no implicit foundation or hint one way or another of regarding the substance of the decisions of ICANN Staff". (Please correct me if I'm wrong)
The panel placed the onus on the Board who have oversight of ICANN staff. ICANN's staff actions/omissions thus have to be checked by the Board in the Board's review process and they failed miserably to conduct that exercise.
Even though ICANN staff seems to have "dodged a bullet" it nonetheless supports a critical investigation on the actions of ICANN staff AND the review process by the Board AND the incestous relationship between ICANN staff and the Board ( AND whether it renders nugatory any proper independent review process).
Such strong findings by the Panel cannot merely be ignored! It merits further action on the part of the Community(ies) who are invested in ICANN's proper operation. Moreover someone needs to explain how and why the Board fumbled so miserably and dropped the ball wrt its fiduciary duties.
This case underscores the critical importance of WS2 accountability and in particular Transparency and the review of operation of the Staff and the Board who are at the helm of the organisation.