Please note that all documents referenced in the agenda have been gathered on a Wiki page for convenience and easier access: https://community.icann.org/x/yIBXDg. 

This agenda was established according to the GNSO Operating Procedures v3.5, updated on 24 October 2019.

For convenience:

• An excerpt of the ICANN Bylaws defining the voting thresholds is provided in Appendix 1 at the end of this agenda.
• An excerpt from the Council Operating Procedures defining the absentee voting procedures is provided in Appendix 2 at the end of this agenda.

GNSO Council meeting on Thursday, 24 August 2023 at 13:00 UTC: https://tinyurl.com/2h2mdzcd. 

06:00 Los Angeles; 09:00 Washington DC; 14:00 London; 15:00 Paris; 16:00 Moscow; 07:00 Melbourne 

GNSO Council Meeting Remote Participation: https://icann.zoom.us/j/97891627902?pwd=RURCTitiNEVwd2UySEk1QkRESmlFZz09

Councilors should notify the GNSO Secretariat in advance if they will not be able to attend and/or need a dial out call.

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Item 1: Administrative Matters (5 minutes)

1.1 - Roll Call

1.2 - Updates to Statements of Interest

1.3 - Review / Amend Agenda

1.4 - Note the status of minutes for the previous Council meetings per the GNSO Operating Procedures: 

Minutes of the GNSO Council meeting on 14 June were posted on 01 July 2023.

Minutes of the GNSO Council meeting on 20 July were posted on 06 August 2023.

Item 2: Opening Remarks / Review of Projects & Action List (0 minutes)

2.1 - Review focus areas and provide updates on specific key themes / topics, to include review of Projects List and Action Item List. 

Item 3: Consent Agenda (5 minutes)

• Approval of the 2023 Customer Standing Committee (CSC) Slate - In accordance with Section 17.2 (d) of the ICANN Bylaw and per the CSC Charter, the full membership of the CSC must be approved by the GNSO Council. The Council approves the full slate of members and liaisons, noting that the SSAC has declined to appoint a liaison

Members

Dmitry Burkov (EU) 

Appointing Organization: RySG 

Term: 2023 - 2025 

Federico Neves (LAC) 

Appointing Organization: ccNSO 

Term: 2023 – 2025 

Brett Carr (EU) 

Appointing Organization: ccNSO 

Term: 2022 - 2024 

Rick Wilhelm (NA) 

Appointing Organization: RySG 

Term: 2022 – 2024 

2 Liaisons: Holly Raiche

Appointing Organization: ALAC 

Term: 2023 - 2025 

Milton Mueller 

Appointing Organization: GNSO (Non-Registry) 

Term: 2023 - 2025 

Gloria Atwine Katuuku 

Appointing Organization: GAC 

Term: 2022 - 2024 

Ken Renard 

Appointing Organization: RSSAC 

Term: 2022 - 2024 

Amy Creamer 

Appointing Organization: PTI 

Term: No term limit

Alternates: In line with recommendations of the second CSC Effectiveness Review Team included in its Final Report, the ccNSO and GNSO Councils requested that the liaison appointing organizations each appoint one (1) alternate, and strongly encouraged the ccNSO and RySG to each appoint one (1) alternate in addition to members. While some appointing organizations have chosen to appoint alternates later in the process, to date the following alternate appointment has been made: 

Ejikeme Egbuogu

Appointing Organization: ALAC

Term: 2023 – 2025

John Gbadamosi 

Appointing Organization: GNSO (Non-Registry) 

Term: 2023 – 2025

Item 4: COUNCIL VOTE - SubPro Small Team Clarifying Statement (20 minutes)

During its informal session at ICANN76 and the subsequent Council meeting, the Council discussed and agreed to task a small team of interested councilors to review the recommendations that the Board placed in a pending status and suggest to the full Council how the underlying concerns that caused the pending status can be best addressed (i.e., a limited triage exercise).

Since ICANN76, the Council SubPro Small Team has met several times and has completed a comprehensive review of the issues chart, with Board member input on why the Board placed specific recommendations into a pending status. The Council discussed the main output of that triage effort, the proposed paths forward for each pending recommendation, during an Extraordinary Meeting on 4 May. During that meeting, the Council agreed to further task the small team with taking interim steps (e.g., provision of clarifying information, developing speaking points) in order to support the Council’s dialogue with the ICANN Board on 22 May. The Council debriefed after the dialogue with the ICANN Board and discussed next steps. 

During the ICANN77 Day 0 Session, the Council heard from the members of the Board regarding the Board’s views on potential “landing spots” on the pending recommendations. Following this discussion, the Small Team has drafted clarifying statements for items in landing spot one (“Provision of Clarifying Statement to the Board”). During its meeting in July, the Council received an update from the Small Team on the proposed clarifying statement.

Here, the Council will vote on the clarifying statement. 

4.1 – Introduction of topic (Paul McGrady, SubPro Small Team Chair) 

4.2 – Council discussion

4.3 – Council Vote 

Item 5: COUNCIL DISCUSSION - GNSO Council Committee for Overseeing and Implementing Continuous Improvement (CCOICI) Recommendations Report on Review of the Statement of Interest (SOI) Requirements (20 minutes)

The GNSO Framework for Continuous Improvement Pilot was initiated in June 2021 to determine whether the framework, as outlined here, could serve as an approach for dealing with the various projects that are focused on improvements to GNSO processes and procedures.

The CCOICI tasked the GNSO Statement of Interest (SOI) Task Force to address the following questions:

1. Is the original objective of the SOI, as stated in the BGC WG Report, still valid? If not, why not and what should the current objective be?
2. Based on the response to question 1), is the requested information to be provided as part of the SOI still fit for purpose? If not, why not, and what would need to be changed to make it fit for purpose?
3. Are there any further measures that should be considered from an enforcement / escalation perspective, in addition or instead of those already included in the requirements?

The Council Committee for Overseeing and Implementing Continuous Improvement (CCOICI) submitted to the GNSO Council for consideration its Recommendations Report following its review of the Recommendations Report submitted to the CCOICI by the GNSO Statement of Interest Task Force based on their review of the GNSO Statement of Interest (SOI) Requirements as well as their review of the input received in response to the public comment forum.

Here, the Council will hear an overview of the CCOICI Recommendations Report on the SOI Requirements.

5.1 - Introduction of topic (Manju Chen, CCOICI Chair)

5.2 - Council Discussion

5.3 - Next Steps

Item 6: COUNCIL DISCUSSION - Chartering the Standing Predictability Implementation Review Team (“SPIRT”) (15 minutes)

In its Final Report, the Subsequent Procedures Working Group recommended “the formation of a Standing Predictability Implementation Review Team (‘SPIRT’) (Pronounced ‘spirit’) to serve as the body responsible for reviewing potential issues related to the Program, to conduct analysis utilizing the framework, and to recommend the process/mechanism that should be followed to address the issue (i.e., utilize the Predictability Framework). The GNSO Council shall be responsible for oversight of the SPIRT and may review all recommendations of the SPIRT in accordance with the procedures outlined in the GNSO Operating Procedures and Annexes thereto.”

Here, the Council will hear from the two Council Liaisons to the SubPro Implementation Review Team “IRT” regarding the chartering of the SPIRT.

6.1 – Introduction of Topic (Anne Aikman-Scalese and Susan Payne, SubPro IRT Liaisons)

6.2 – Council discussion 

6.3 - Next Steps

Item 7: COUNCIL DISCUSSION - SubPro Pending Recommendations - Expected Non-Adoption (20 minutes)

During its informal session at ICANN76 and the subsequent Council meeting, the Council discussed and agreed to task a small team of interested councilors to review the recommendations that the Board placed in a pending status and suggest to the full Council how the underlying concerns that caused the pending status can be best addressed (i.e., a limited triage exercise).

Since ICANN76, the Council SubPro Small Team has met several times and has completed a comprehensive review of the issues chart, with Board member input on why the Board placed specific recommendations into a pending status. The Council discussed the main output of that triage effort, the proposed paths forward for each pending recommendation, during an Extraordinary Meeting on 4 May. During that meeting, the Council agreed to further task the small team with taking interim steps (e.g., provision of clarifying information, developing speaking points) in order to support the Council’s dialogue with the ICANN Board on 22 May. The Council debriefed after the dialogue with the ICANN Board and discussed next steps. 

During the ICANN77 Day 0 Session, the Council heard from the members of the Board regarding the Board’s views on potential “landing spots” on the pending recommendations. 

Here, the Council will hear an update on the proposed path for the recommendations the Board is not expected to adopt. In addition, the small team is requesting Council for further instructions now that it has reached the solution building stage; as well as input on whether or not it is time to invite the GAC to participate more formally in the small team's work and how that would work practically. 

7.1 - Introduction of Topic (Paul McGrady, Chair of SubPro Small Team)

7.2 - Council Discussion

7.3 - Next Steps

Item 8: COUNCIL DISCUSSION - Closed Generics (20 minutes)

In March 2022, the ICANN Board requested that the GAC and GNSO Council consider engaging in a facilitated dialogue to develop a framework for further GNSO policy work on the issue of Closed Generics. The GAC and GNSO Council agreed to the Board’s suggestion and each appointed six participants for the dialogue. One participant and one alternate from the ALAC were also appointed. Should the GAC-GNSO facilitated dialogue result in an agreed framework, the agreements will be further developed through the appropriate GNSO policy process.

Following an initial, informal meeting at ICANN75 in Kuala Lumpur, the dialogue participants have since been meeting regularly via Zoom and held a substantive two-day face-to-face meeting in Washington, D.C. in late January 2023. The dialogue is hoping to deliver a draft framework around the end of April 2023 to the ALAC, GAC, GNSO and other SOACs for community input. At this stage, groups are expected to have approximately four weeks to review the document. 

During its meeting at ICANN76, the ICANN Board passed a resolution adopting a substantial portion of the outputs from the New gTLD Subsequent Procedures PDP, setting in motion the start of the implementation process for the next round of new gTLDs. As part of the resolution, the Board established deadlines for key deliverables that will impact the development of the implementation plan. 

The GNSO Chair, GAC Chair, and ALAC Chair plan to send a separate communication to the ICANN Board that reflects the decision they took and, as stated in the letter, expressing the collective view that:

(1) closed generic gTLDs should not be viewed as a dependency for the next round;

(2) until there is community-developed policy, the Board should maintain the position from the 2012 round (i.e., any applications seeking to impose exclusive registry access for "generic strings" to a single person or entity and/or that person's or entity's Affiliates (as defined in Section 2.9(c) of the Registry Agreement) should not proceed; and

(3) should the community decide in the future to resume the policy discussions, this should be based on the good work that has been done to date in the facilitated dialogue.

Here, the Council will discuss the current state of work and the proposed communication to the Board.

8.1 - Introduction of Topic (John McElwaine, Council Liaison to Closed Generics Facilitated Discussion)

8.2 - Council Discussion

8.3 - Next Steps

Item 9: ANY OTHER BUSINESS (15 minutes)

9.1 Update from NIS2 Outreach Team (Thomas Rickert, Chair of Small Team)

9.2 ICANN78 Planning (Terri Agnew, ICANN org)

9.3 Discussion Paper on .Quebec

9.4 Grant Program implementation update to Chartering Organizations

 _______________________________

Appendix 1: GNSO Council Voting Thresholds (ICANN Bylaws, Article 11, Section 11.3(i))

See https://www.icann.org/resources/pages/governance/bylaws-en/#article11.

Appendix 2: GNSO Council Absentee Voting Procedures (GNSO Operating Procedures, Section 4.4)

See https://gnso.icann.org/sites/default/files/file/field-file-attach/op-procedures-30jan18-en.pdf

References for Coordinated Universal Time of 13:00 UTC 

Local time between March and October in the NORTHERN hemisphere

See https://www.timeanddate.com/time/change/ for Dates for Daylight Saving Time and Clock Changes

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California, USA (PDT) UTC-7  06:00

San José, Costa Rica (CDT) UTC-6  07:00

New York/Washington DC, USA (EDT) UTC-4  09:00

Buenos Aires, Argentina (ART) UTC-3  10:00

Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of Congo (WAT) UTC+1 14:00

Paris, France (CEST) UTC+2   15:00

Moscow, Russia (MSK) UTC+3  16:00

Singapore (SGT) UTC+8  (Friday)  21:00

Melbourne, Australia (AEST) UTC+10 23:00

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US and Canada: DST starts on Sunday 12 March 2023 (with exceptions)

European countries: DST starts on Sunday 26 March 2023 (with exceptions) 

DST ends on Sunday 29 October 2023 for most European countries.

DST ends on Sunday 05 November 2023 for most of the US and Canada

Some parts of Australia: DST ends on Sunday 02 April 2023 

Some parts of Australia: DST starts on Sunday 01 October 2023

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For other places see http://www.timeanddate.com and https://tinyurl.com/2h2mdzcd