[IRP] checklist of impact on internet users

[Dharma Dailey]

Max,

Here is the checklist I referred to in the meeting.   People should  
feel fully empowered to alter it as they see fit.  If anyone knows of  
similar tools I would appreciate the pointers.

Someone named Thomas in the ALAC Review meeting mentioned that  
assessment tools exist in the ICANN context but aren't used.  Does  
anyone know of these tools?

Cheers,
Dharma








On Mar 4, 2009, at 7:02 PM, Max Senges wrote:

> Hello everybody
>
> First of all thanks for participating in what i think we all felt  
> was a really productive session!
>
> As agreed i'd like to follow up and summon you to team up to tackle  
> the topics discussed. Let's be pragmatic and identify means of  
> influencing ICANN policies / practices - and then do it!
>
> +++++++++++ Registrants Right Charter +++++++++++++++++
> I setup a wiki-home for us http://internetrightsandprinciples.org/node/74 
>  where we can collabowrite and coordinate on the Registrants Rights  
> Charter
>
> @Dharma: Can you send your checklist which might be a good starting  
> point.
>
> @Jannik: Can you send a link for the best practice from denmark
>
> @Vittorio: is there any prior work we should be aware of?
>
> @Carlos or Bill: Can you please point us to the relevant point where  
> you raised to have a Charter in the RAA
>
> I think Jannik's idea to work on a Wikipedia article on registrant  
> rights is an excellent start!
>
> Please invite anybody you think will be interested in joining this  
> effort to go to the wiki and contact me to include in this  
> conversation.
>
> --------------------
>
> Below you find the draft statement we contribute to the At-Large  
> Summit Declaration. As well as the minutes from our meeting in  
> Mexico which i also put on our wiki page (and invite you to amend).
>
> -------------------------------
>
> Freedome of Expression - Domain Names, new gTLDs
> < : > < : > < : > < : > < : > < : > < : > < : > < : > < : >
> @Carlton: Can you please coordinate a text and (if possible) tell us  
> what we as ALSs can do
>
> Also a solution to resolve name legitimacy disputes was raised in  
> the GNSO wiki some time ago http://gnso.icann.org/issues/new-gtlds/icannwiki-01feb06.pdf 
> .
>
> ------------------------------
>
> As raised during the session I am really dedicated to coordinating  
> the Internet Rights and Principles Coalition and need YOU to committ  
> to leading the collaborations planned - please step forward team-up  
> and self-organize!!
>
> Greetings
> Max
>
>
>     < : > < : > < : > < : > < : > < : > < : > < : > < : > < : >
>
>     Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful,
>     committed citizens can change the world.
>     Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.
>     ?----------------------Margaret Mead
>
>     < : > < : > < : > < : > < : > < : > < : > < : > < : > < : >
>
>     Dr. Max Senges
>     Chair Internet Rights and Principles Coalition
>
>     www.internetrightsandprinciples.org
>
>     < : > < : > < : > < : > < : > < : > < : > < : > < : > < : >
>
>
> +++++++++Draft for At-Large Conference Declaration+++++++++++++++++
>
> The thematic session on "Internet rights and principles" was focused  
> on a number of rights-related issues that fall under the purview of  
> ICANN.
>
> First of all, it was noted that ICANN still lacks a coherent and  
> systemic approach to evaluate the impact that its policy decisions  
> have on rights in general, be them human rights, consumer rights or  
> other founding principles, as internationally recognized and/or  
> defined in the major national legislations. It was suggested that  
> ICANN should include in its policy development processes, prior to  
> final Board consideration, a formalized assessment of such an  
> impact, made by a staff function knowledgeable in the matter and in  
> ICANN's technical and business environment.
>
> About Whois and privacy: ICANN's inability to progress and to make  
> policies compatible with the various national laws was noted: ICANN  
> should cease aiming at a single global policy and accommodate  
> national differences instead, depending on the country of the  
> registrar and registrant.
>
> About freedom of expression and new gTLDs: there was general  
> unhappiness with the ongoing policy provision to allow ICANN to  
> reject applications based on morality-based objections. Most people  
> found inappropriate for the ICANN Board to take this kind of  
> decisions, and suggested deferring them to appropriate global  
> bodies, though one stressed the importance of full self-governance  
> instead. Nevertheless it was also acknowledged that this is a very  
> complex topic and a true challenge to find a globally applicable  
> solution that is satisfacory to all cultures. Therefore appropriate  
> time and occasion for disscussion that includes human rights experts  
> should be organized by ICANN.
>
> About the right to participate in cultural life of community and its  
> relevance to new gTLDs: there was unanimous consent that the  
> $185'000 application fee is too high and will exclude applicants  
> from developing countries or organizations of a non-profit nature,  
> though it was reported that other ICANN constituencies do not share  
> the same view. A comparison to spectrum allocation where frequencies  
> are given for free or very low fees to communities and non-profits  
> has been brought up. Several reasonable proposals for differentiated  
> or progressive fees have been posted in past months to ICANN's  
> public comment fora, but they were openly ignored: it is clear that  
> such exclusion is actually desired by ICANN.
>
> Finally, there was general support for the idea of a standardized  
> statement of registrant rights (Registrans Rights Charter) to be  
> compulsorily shown by registrars (and resellers as well) when a  
> registrant buys a domain name. Participants agreed to work on a  
> proposal for its substance as well as means to include the charter  
> into ICANNs policy body as a follow-up to the meeting. Anybody  
> interested in joining this effort please go to http://internetrightsandprinciples.org/node/74
>
>
> +++++++++++++++++Minutes of the Meeting++++++++++++++++++++++
>
> Max: General introduction of the session. Presents agenda (see first  
> slide). Introduces main participants. Summarizes his paper's  
> distinction of three-layered commons, with ICANN being key in the  
> lower level "infrastructure commons". Shows the value chain of gTLD  
> domain name registration.
>
> Dharma Dailey: How can we be practical? Formulate rights in terms of  
> checklists, need to streamline policy-making process so that rights  
> issues are clearly flagged in advance. In US there is the "negative  
> declaration" - entities have to declare that what they do does not  
> harm or flag the opposite.
>
> Wolfgang: Need to differentiate two layers - human rights / consumer  
> rights, where there is established law and we need to understand how  
> does it apply, plus privacy / freedom of expression, where there is  
> no global standard and so ICANN has to find new ways. And also need  
> for new situations - need to bridge engineers with the lawmakers and  
> rights advocates and ICANN is a good place.
>
> Max: You also have to convince them to talk with each other, even in  
> the same place they don't meet. Let's start from privacy and Whois.
>
> Holly (ISOC-AU): What is required for the functionality of the  
> system? People should have the right to withhold the information  
> only when it is reasonable.
>
> ? (Denmark): Anti-terrorist laws attacked privacy after 9/11. In .dk  
> you (if individual registrant) can hide your data entirely for free,  
> and registrars hate it because they'd like to sell data. You can  
> denounce and get domain names immediately if inaccurate information.
>
> VB: Fundamental issue: ICANN was born from a narrow community of  
> business and technical people, they are not bad but they are not  
> used at considering rights issues. We need to educate them and also  
> to put things in a less theoretical and aggressive manner, and in a  
> more constructive and practical one. ICANN should hire a rights  
> expert or at least task someone so that a "rights impact assessment"  
> is made as a standard part of any PDP. However, it is still today  
> very hard to get many ICANN leaders to recognize that there are  
> rights issues in this.
>
> Max: There were even problems to get this session approved by ICANN  
> staff.
>
> VB: About Whois: the problem is that there are very different and  
> incompatible cultural approaches to privacy throughout the world. I  
> would focus the discussion on understanding how can we have  
> different policies according to the country of the registrant,  
> rather than pretending to have a "one size fits all" solution;  
> unfortunately, most participants in the discussion seem to just push  
> their vision and require that ICANN adopts it for everyone.
>
> Sergio Salinas: It is a problem that no translation was arranged for  
> this session. Whois is a very important theme for us, and also the  
> issue of freedom of expression in the use of domain names. How do we  
> prevent children to get to inappropriate content by mistyping a  
> letter in the domain name. I hope that next time I can speak in  
> English.
>
> Holly: The AU laws are actually European-style, with support for  
> anonymity. Why can't we insert into these discussions the need to  
> consider rights?
>
> Max: Move to freedom of expression and new gTLDs.
>
> Holly: It is not in ICANN's remit to evaluate where gTLD names are  
> offensive, yet it's still there.
>
> Carlton Samuels: I agree, we in ALAC drafted a strong response to  
> that. Moreover, the current proposal raises a strong barrier of  
> entry to smaller proposals, which also hinders the ability to  
> express. ... is offensive. ICANN said that at implementation time  
> they will find a way to accommodate concerns, but they will ignore.  
> We should have a proposal on this to response if they move forward.
>
> Carlos Affonso Pereira: It's been one year since we were shown the  
> parameters for morality objections. At that time the list included  
> not only blasphemies or violence, but also obscenity or incitement  
> to disobey the law non-violently. The new version of the application  
> now mentions only a few, but the procedure to examine morality  
> objections now foresees an ICC-appointed expert that lets the ICANN  
> Board decide, and why is the Board the authority to decide?
>
> Annette: The issue is also who has access to new gTLDs, e.g. pricing  
> (both for applying and for registering) or restrictions to allowed  
> registrants (generic words used as community-only TLDs).
>
> Wolfgang: You have 40 years of discussion on these matters, we  
> should use them. If you see the exchange of letters between Vatican  
> and Twomey, the Vatican raises the issue of .catholic and similar,  
> and what to do with competing claims and possible disputes. Twomey  
> replied that they can object. However the objection process is  
> vague, and the board gets to be come a political decision making body.
>
> VB: If you start from a practical point of view, you realize that  
> there's stuff that clearly should not be approved (e.g. .blasphemy),  
> but once you get there, then someone has to decide - and who? It's  
> simplistic to say "just approve everything", that could lead to  
> major political uproar and even to break up the Internet;  
> or .catholic: the problem is there, people have been killing each  
> other for thousand of years, you can't just give it away to the  
> first who applies. I am sympathetic to the difficulties that ICANN  
> is having, it's not an easy task.
>
> Thomas Schneider: Who has the right to decide who gets controversial  
> stuff (.tibet etc)? It's not ICANN's competence. In Europe you could  
> defer to specialized rights offices, or the Council of Europe, or  
> rights courts. What could be the appropriate UN institution to  
> decide or appoint experts? Also which process, or appeals?
>
> Alejandro Pisanty: There is clearly need to understand better how  
> self-regulation of the DNS is important. Deferring to the UN would  
> be sort of recognizing a world government or discharging ICANN's  
> responsibilities. Let's think more deeply at how we can self- 
> regulate. .xxx will get back. Everyone thinks that freedom of  
> expression is of utmost importance, but... here we have no muslim.  
> Or would you approve a TLD devoted to demeaning women, though that  
> is legal? We need to involve experts of 3rd-4th generation rights.
>
> Max: We recognize we are somewhat biased towards a young Westerner  
> view. It's good to involve other views. Now move to IDNs.
>
> Dharma: Our NA secretariat is from the Arctic circle using their own  
> script, they'd never be able to pay ICANN fees.
>
> VB: TLDs could be very important to protect disappearing minority  
> languages and cultures, but even in developed countries and in Latin  
> scripts fees are too high. ICANN is not considering at all the goal  
> of promoting cultural diversity.
>
> Holly: Many many people yesterday commented that fees are too high  
> and will disenfranchise applicants or raise final prices to  
> registrants.
>
> Izumi Aizu: People from developing countries should be given a level  
> playing field. However some ALAC members said "that's not a big  
> amount of money", and registry/registrar people will say the same.  
> There could be incremental payment as you proceed.
>
> Holly: You never looked at the budget of an average NGO...
>
> Izumi Aizu: When the At LArge membership fee in 2000 was reduced to  
> zero, we got too many.
>
> VB: There have been registries giving away tens of thousands of  
> domain names for free for 12 years and running without problems, you  
> don't need millions to run a TLD. Also all sorts of clever proposals  
> were already submitted to ICANN to solve this problem and make the  
> system accessible to all depending on their project, but ICANN just  
> won't listen.
>
> ?: ICANN did not accept to reduce the $185'000 figure but they were  
> unable to justify it. It is important to insist on this.
>
> Thomas Schneider: Allocation of these fees is important, there is no  
> transparency on how they will use them.
>
> Jannick: Don't forget about the objection fees. In the end who has  
> the most money will win.
>
> Max: Move to registrants rights charter.
>
> VB: Idea that came when the RAA was being revised - ICANN could  
> require registrars to show registrants a statement of their rights  
> when they buy a domain name. Not everyone buys from registrars  
> (there are resellers) but at least some do. It should be a standard,  
> short, easily understandable message available in several languages.
>
> Max: Can we work on this online?
>
> Dharma: How do we follow up? However, we should be ambitious and  
> also get it to resellers.
>
> Max: We will collect emails and exchange views. Please contribute, I  
> can't take the lead. We could endorse the request by consumer  
> associations to work on the RAA.
>
> Carlton: GNSO has offered ALAC to work on this. ALAC would like to  
> bind resellers exactly as registrars (via registrar-reseller  
> agreements).
>
> Jannick: Make a Wikipedia article on registrant rights.
>
> Thomas: The problems is that many contractual aspects are national,  
> so need to accommodate that. How do you get this psoted on the front  
> page of the sales website? Self-regulation only works when there is  
> public pressure or governmental pressure.
>
> Max: Maybe registrars could use this to make their image better.
>
> ?: Maybe we could start from a ccTLD, to act as example.
>
> Alejandro: Let's make sure what sphere these rights belong to: are  
> these consumer rights? This could remove opposition. Also if they  
> are consumer rights they are protected in several countries. This  
> self-regulation is a big pyramid of private law where you need to act.
>
> Max: Thank you. We will circulate the notes.
>
>
>
> -----------------------------------------------------
>
>
>
> On Tue, Mar 3, 2009 at 6:08 PM, Annette Muehlberg <Annette.Muehlberg at web.de 
> > wrote:
> fyi, this is what i wrote some years ago on the alac-icannwiki. at  
> this point, not discussing the issue of prices but the problem of  
> restriction.
> greetings
> annette
> --
> The introduction of new TLDs should serve public interest not  
> particular interests. To expand the use and usability of the  
> internet it is important, that generic TLDs are not restricted to a  
> certain group of domain name applicants (eg. arbitrarily chosen by  
> the sponsor of the TLD).
> If the name of a new TLD has a general meaning, such as >.god<,  
> >.food<, >.love< etc., the use of such a TLD has to be open for  
> everyone. By sponsoring and running a generic TLD one must not any  
> longer gain the right to choose its users (as it already happened  
> with .travel and others).
>
> The continuation of this policy of restricted TLDs would cause  
> unsolvable conflicts: What, if the first sponsor for a new TLD .god  
> belongs to some fundamentalist branch of a religious group and wants  
> only members of this group give the right to use it? >God< belongs  
> to everyone, even to atheists, >food< is important to every human  
> being and cannot be restricted to eg. food companies, >love< not to  
> marriage brokers...
>
> Communication is a matter of public interest and generic TLDs, as  
> platforms for worldwide communication, must be open to everyone.
>
> The idea, that a Top Level Domain guides people through the world of  
> communication like an index-system in the library does not work. The  
> meaning of a Top Level Domain gives some guidance to the users, but  
> the meaning it has to the users differs, especially in a global  
> world. The meaning and usage of a generic TLD cannot be strictly  
> defined in a top down process by those who come first and have the  
> money to start a TLD. This is not what internet communication is  
> about.
>
> People want to have the free choice to use a TLD what they think  
> serves their communication-interests. A generic TLD lives from the  
> bottom-up, from the creativity of the people and their will to  
> express themselves and do business in a free manner.
>
> Different languages, cultures and legal systems set a limit to a  
> clear defined restricted use of generic TLDs. For example: >.pro<:  
> What is it supposed to mean? >Pro< as counterpart of >against<?  
> Eventually, this is the most logic interpretation of >pro<. So that  
> TLD might be restricted for advocacy groups. It is not. Especially  
> non-english speakers have to learn it is about professionals, sort  
> of. To be an expert of your profession is not enough to be able to  
> register.
>
> >The registration is restricted to persons and entities that are  
> credentialed by appropriate entities (such as through governmental  
> bodies and professional organizations) to provide professional  
> services within a stated geographic region (a Licensing  
> Jurisdiction)... <
>
> How do you make totally different systems of education, professional  
> certifications and organisations worldwide compatibel? This is  
> impossible. Who in all the different countries of the world are the  
> appropriate entities going to give these credentials? The  
> >appropriate entities< differ too much to make any sense to a  
> reliable internet-users guidance.
> TLDs cannot accomplish what generations of politicians did not  
> achieve   to make the political and social systems compatible and in  
> all languages understandable.
>
> Restrictions to the use of generic TLDs do more harm to the  
> creativity and freedom of expression by the users than giving them  
> real guidance through the labyrinth of the internet.
>
> No process for creating a list of reserved strings for TLDs could  
> create a complete set given the myriad cultural, religious, legal  
> and political reasons that a particular string might not be  
> appropriate for designation as a TLD. The process itself would take  
> significant time, the results would be outdated immediately, and the  
> persons creating the list necessarily could not take account of any  
> unique circumstances presented by a specific future application
>
>
>

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