[EC-NCSG] NPOC membership issues

[Alain Berranger]

Hi colleagues, FYI and consideration
Best, Alain

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: *Robin Gross*
Date: Friday, June 22, 2012
Subject: NPOC membership issues
To: Alain Berranger <alain.berranger at gmail.com <javascript:_e({}, 'cvml',
'alain.berranger at gmail.com');>>


Alain,

Please send your argument on voting vs participating to the entire NCSG-EC
list.   This is a matter for discussion for all members of the EC - not
just me.

Thanks,
Robin

Begin forwarded message:

*From: *Alain Berranger <alain.berranger at gmail.com>
*Subject: **NPOC membership issues*
*Date: *June 21, 2012 6:59:54 AM PDT
*To: *Robin Gross <robin at ipjustice.org>
*Cc: *"Klaus.Stoll" <klaus.stoll at chasquinet.org>, Lori Schulman <
lori.schulman at ascd.org>

Dear Robin,
E
The NCSG-EC needs to distinguish between "voting" and "participating".

Section 6.2.6 of the GNSO Operating Rules and Procedures (ORPs) already
limits "voting".  Section 6.2.6(d) specifically prohibits a legal or
natural person from being a "voting" member of more than one Group. So NCSG
simply has to apply those rules during the voting periods.

However, there is no specific limitation to "participating" in the GNSO
rules and the NCSG rules in particular clearly permit an entity to name a
"representative" without limitation. Also,  GNSO's ORPs, Section 6.2.6(c),
permits voting members of groups to appoint proxies to vote in their place.

NCSG-EC cannot make decisions based on what we think are the intentions of
a prospective member or its representative, but on reasonable and objective
application of ICANN rules and procedures.

If you check here:
http://gnso.icann.org/council/gnso-operating-procedures-16dec11-en.pdf ,
you will see that Chapter 6 contains many of the applicable principles
related to the current disagreement that Mr. Bikoff has with the way that
the membership process is currently being applied by the NCSG-EC. Please
refer to your exchanges with Jim for the details.

Meanwhile, you probably have learned that Jim Bikoff has filed a complaint
about this.

In the spirit of San Jos? agreement between NPOC and NCUC, I ask you to
bring this issue to the NCSG-EC soonest so we can review the situation and
come to a revised decision in line with NPOC, NCSG and GNSO Rules and
Procedures.

On a more generic level re NPOC/NCSG membership, I think we have made good
progress with the new NCSG form. I ask that you please make it an NCSG-EC
priority in Prague to resolve the small procedurial points raised by Klaus
in order to eliminate quickly the long list of NPOC's pending and new
membership applications on hand. Delays have already been detrimental to
the organic growth of NPOC and cannot be tolerated anymore.That done, we
can resume new NPOC recruiting using the new form. But I do not wish to go
back to NPOC Applicants to resubmit their application: Klaus is willing to
carry out himself the workload of an additional step with the pending NPOC
members to respond to the missing info on the new NCSG form, as if they had
filled the new form back whenever.

I think this a reasonable approach.

I am looking forward to discuss and solve the specific and generic issues
in Prague.

Best and travel well, Alain

On Tue, Jun 19, 2012 at 1:48 PM, Robin Gross <robin at ipjustice.org> wrote:

Hello Alain,

The main problem with Mr. Bikoff and his firm is that they are already
members of the Intellectual Property Constituency in the Commercial
Stakeholder Group.

Several times during the Costa Rica meeting, when Mr. Bikoff would take the
floor to lobby on behalf of his client of the IOC, he would start his
intervention by declaring he was a member of the IPC.  Also see his Statement
of Interest  <https://community.icann.org/display/gnsosoi/james+bikoff+soi>where
he declares his a member of the IPC.

So the problem is not only that he is a commercial law firm wanting to
represent his client's interests under the "noncommercial" umbra, but
mainly that he is trying to participate in BOTH the CSG and the NCSG to
advance those client's interests.    Why is Mr. Bikoff so unwilling to
accept the same rules as everyone else?   Rules that are intended to ensure
fairness of representation.  We do not want to create incentives for gaming
the system to obtain a larger share of votes in GNSO policy, as Mr. Bikoff
proposes.

Even if we wanted to bend the rules and let Mr. Bikoff participate in NCSG,
there are still GNSO rules prohibiting cross-SG participation.   With all
the pressure on ICANN to tighten the loopholes for conflicts of interests
of its participants, it would be unwise for NCSG to propose to loosen those
protections against conflicts of interests further.  The board and the GAC
have spent considerable time in recent months working to get rid of
loopholes that encourage conflicts of interests, and it would not look well
for NCSG to move in the opposite direction with a more permissive attitude
about conflicts of interests.

Thanks





-- 
Alain Berranger, B.Eng, MBA
Member, Board of Directors, CECI,
http://www.ceci.ca<http://www.ceci.ca/en/about-ceci/team/board-of-directors/>
Executive-in-residence, Schulich School of Business, www.schulich.yorku.ca
Treasurer, Global Knowledge Partnership Foundation, www.gkpfoundation.org
NA representative, Chasquinet Foundation, www.chasquinet.org
Chair, NPOC, NCSG, ICANN, http://npoc.org/
O:+1 514 484 7824; M:+1 514 704 7824
Skype: alain.berranger
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