[bc-gnso] report from Toronto session: proposal to consolidate meeting locations

[Steve DelBianco]

ICANN's Public Comment page for the proposed strategy is here<http://www.icann.org/en/news/public-comment/meetings-proposal-2012-02oct12-en.htm>.
The "RATIONALE FOR CONSOLIDATED MEETINGS STRATEGY PROPOSAL" is here<http://newgtlds.icann.org/en/about/trademark-clearinghouse/matching-rules-24sep12-en.pdf>.

Summary of the proposal for ICANN meetings in 2014, 2015, and 2016:
Asia/Pacific gets 1st meeting of each year
Europe gets 2nd meeting of each year
North America/Africa/Latin America alternate for the 3rd meeting.

Discussion:

Kieren McCarthy: over half of ICANN participants come from North America.  It's more pragmatic to make North America one of the regular annual locations.        Chris Disspain asked, and Nick confirmed that North America has the best availability of suitable venues.  But Chris argued against using North America as a regular annual venue because of ICANN's global outreach priority.

Avri Doria: VISA availability is key.    Nick: If we pick a facility for re-use, we do better negotiating visas there.   Avri: “A good reason not to use North America is that  North America is not nice about visas”

DelBianco (NetChoice):  The title “Consolidated Meetings” implies fewer ICANN meetings.  I don’t see how we can get our work done with just 2 meetings instead of 3.   Asked if this 3-year plan is actually a transition plan to cut the meetings.
Chris said no.  Nick Tomaso said “Consolidated” was a term with respect to the meeting locations.   Chris agreed.

Euralo secretariat said that those who were denied a Canadian Visa will be on a list that could deny them future visas. (Is this even remotely true?!)

Hungary GAC rep: the South Africa GAC rep said they were not consulted about Durban location selection.   Chris disagreed.

Marguerite (Chilean participant): some countries don’t have venues large enough to meet ICANN’s big-meeting requirements.  Asked for flexibility.  Chris said it doesn’t work so well if participants have 20-minute bus rides to the meetings.

--
Steve DelBianco
Executive Director
NetChoice
http://www.NetChoice.org and http://blog.netchoice.org
+1.202.420.7482

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