Milton's Dec 8th Draft & Commentary

[Rafik Dammak]

Hi,

To respond quickly to Stephanie question, the topic didn't surface in
council and I doubt it will as it is not related to GNSO council remit and
unlikely contracted party will be keen to discuss such matter in council.
I cannot speak for other councillors positions. For myself, I listened to
the arguments elaborated in several venues and not necessarily buying all
of them. I prefer to stick to what matters more from a NCSG standpoint in
ICANN context and think approach suggested in letter around adding
safeguards in registry agreement makes sense.

We don't have NCSG policy call this week because the GNSO council meeting
is next week.

Best,

Rafik

On Mon, Dec 9, 2019, 03:58 Stephanie Perrin <
stephanie.perrin at mail.utoronto.ca> wrote:

> I think Sam is raising an important point here, and support its
> inclusion.  I would also like to respond to Milton's comment that we have
> been wasting time....
>
> I think we have had a detailed, reasoned, and [mostly] polite and
> respectful discussion on an important issue.  That issue is complex to many
> of us who have not been following ICANN issues for the past twenty years,
> so regardless of whether those who are experts in the field think it was
> useful, I would like to remind us that one of the purposes of this list is
> to help our members get up to speed on the issues.  For those who don't
> know where to look for other views, it is helpful to post those other
> views, whether we hold them or not.  Those who follow the governance list
> are aware that there  there has been an interesting parallel discussion
> which has also been informative and [IMHO] largely polite and constructive.
>
> Finally I have a question.  What do our Council members think?  There is a
> Council meeting coming up this week...has the matter surfaced there at all?
>
> I agree with Milton that we should finalize a draft and get agreement on
> sending it.  There should be a policy committee meeting coming up this week.
>
> Kind regards,
>
> Stephanie Perrin
> On 2019-12-08 11:26, Sam Lanfranco wrote:
>
> I support the approach taken by Milton in his proposed draft of today (Dev
> 8th). I add the following commentary.
>
> Milton’s draft says: “*We do not begrudge ISOC its need to secure its
> financial future and eliminate conflicts of interest*”. This is one area
> where we should agree. Ethos Capital may not be the only way to achieve
> this, or there may be ways to constrain Ethos Capital to run PIR in the
> public interest. We need wider engaged stakeholder discussion at this
> point. As well, how the processed unfolded with ICANN’s cap removal, ISOC’s
> sale strategy, and who knew what when with Ethos Capital, is a story to be
> ferreted out and told by others. It should not be NCSG's primary concern.
>
> We should respect ISOC’s right to secure its future. Our primary worry is
> about the future of PIR and its registries, and Ethos Capital’s actual
> behavior as the potential owner. Our primary concern is what can be done to
> protect the integrity of the PIR’s registries, and the interests of their
> domain name holder community.
>
> We, as NCSG, are asking ICANN and its constituencies to listen to our
> concerns. At the same time we, as stakeholders, should be asking ISOC, its
> chapters, domain name holders and concerned communities in general, as well
> as Ethos Capital in particular, to participate in meaningful dialogue with
> respect to a satisfactory resolution of the issues around the future
> behavior of PIR and its registries.
>
> As for Mitch Stoltz’s suggestion that “*ICANN find an appropriate
> replacement for performing the functions of PIR by putting .ORG, .NGO, and
> .ONG up for public tender*.”, we can assemble solutions but I am not sure
> if we should be suggesting particular solutions at this point. I would
> prefer them to come out of meaningful dialogue.
>
> If Ethos Capital purchase remains on the table, I for one will be pushing
> for Ethos Capital to commit to making PIR a Benefit Corporation (B Corp).
> Many states, and Washington D.C. have legislation that allows incorporation
> as a Benefit Corporation [*Briefly: B Corp duty is to more widely defined
> stakeholders and not primarily to owner profit*].
>
> Ethos Capital’s proposed B Corp Certification for PIR is not enough. It is
> not Benefit Corporation incorporation. Certification is a Trust Mark,
> pledging one to “good behavior”, and is granted by the non-profit B Lab
> organization’s certification process. The B Lab Trust Mark is best used on
> existing companies whose track record can be assessed before issuing
> Certification.It would represent nothing more than a promise of “good
> behavior” in terms of how Ethos ran PIR. It is not legally binding on Ethos
> Capital as an owner of PIR, nor would it be on subsequent owners should
> Ethos sell PIR.
>
> Benefit Corporation incorporation of PIR is much more binding on Ethos and
> subsequent owners of PIR.
>
> Sam Lanfranco
>
>
>
>
>
>
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