[CCWG-ACCT] Concern over Proposed Core Value 5 (as per CCWG ACCT 82 discussion)

[Alan Greenberg]

At the meeting last night, I raised an issue related to the proposed 
Core Value 6. It was also raised in an e-mail several days earlier, 
but that did not attract any comments.

In the current Bylaws, Core Value 6 reads:

"Introducing and promoting competition in the registration of domain 
names where practicable and beneficial in the public interest."

The proposed version (now Core Value 5) is:

"Introducing and promoting competition in the registration of domain 
names where practicable and beneficial in the public interest as 
identified through the bottom-up,  multistakeholder policy 
development process."

In the context of the Bylaws, the expression "policy development 
process" is used only in the context of the ccNSO and GNSO PDPs. The 
problem is that not everything that ICANN does is "policy", and 
certainly not developed by the GNSO and ccNSO.

An example is the Strategy for Africa that was initiated in 2012 and 
by all reports is having very positive results. One of ICANN's 
strategic goals is to improve participation from the African region. 
An essential part of this is to build up the DNS industry there. The 
African strategy was certainly developed through a bottom-up MS 
process, but just as certainly not through a "policy development 
process" as described in the ICANN Bylaws.

Under the proposed wording, part of the African Strategy could be 
rules out of order, and the same goes for the Latin-America & 
Caribbean Strategy. I have to assume that this is not the intent of the CCWG.

I would be happy to simply replace "the bottom-up,  multistakeholder 
policy development process" by "a bottom-up, multistakeholder process".

However, for those who worry that this might be an escape hatch 
related to the GNSO and ccNSO PDPs, another alternative is:

"Introducing and promoting competition in the registration of domain 
names where practicable and beneficial in the public interest as 
identified through bottom-up,  multistakeholder processes and 
specifically the policy development processes when applicable to GNSO 
and ccNSO policies."

But I really feel that this is to much detail for a Bylaw Core Value!

Alan