[Gnso-igo-ingo-crp] FW: Proposed Revision of Consensus Levels

[Reg Levy]

As you say, there's no brightline. I would have expected 25% to be "significant" and anything less "a small minority". I get your argument that "important" and "noteworthy" are synonyms but if only one person objected with what they felt were important or noteworthy arguments, I don't agree that this would mean there was "significant" opposition.

My 2¢

--
Reg Levy
Director of Compliance
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UTC -7

> On 12 Jun 2018, at 12:54, Corwin, Philip via Gnso-igo-ingo-crp <gnso-igo-ingo-crp at icann.org> wrote:
> 
> Resending as I apparently used an incorrect email address <>
> 
> From: Corwin, Philip
> Sent: Tuesday, June 12, 2018 2:54 PM
> To: 'Gnso-igo-ingo-crp' <gnso-igo-ingo-crp-bounces at icann.org <mailto:gnso-igo-ingo-crp-bounces at icann.org>>
> Subject: Proposed Revision of Consensus Levels
> 
> Following up on the statement I made during our WG call earlier today, I believe that the initial designations of support for Options 1 and 4 are incorrect and that they should be changed from “Consensus” to “Strong support but significant opposition”.
> 
> Section 3.6 (Standard Methodology for Making Decisions) of the GNSO WG Guidelines (https://gnso.icann.org/sites/default/files/file/field-file-attach/annex-1-gnso-wg-guidelines-30jan18-en.pdf <https://gnso.icann.org/sites/default/files/file/field-file-attach/annex-1-gnso-wg-guidelines-30jan18-en.pdf>) describes those designations as follows:
>                 Consensus - a position where only a small minority disagrees, but most agree.
> Strong support but significant opposition - a position where, while most of the group supports a recommendation, there are a significant number of those who do not support it. (Emphasis added)
> 
> So the relevant question is whether the opposition to Options 1 and 4 constitutes a “small minority” or “a significant number”.
> 
> Option 1 for Recommendation 5 received support from 11 WG members and opposition from 3; those opposed constituted 21.5% of all members expressing a view.
> 
> Option 4 for Recommendation 5 received support from 10 members and opposition from 3; those opposed constituted 23% of all members expressing a view. That is just shy of one-quarter of all responses.
> 
> There is no bright line test in the Guidelines for discerning the dividing line between a small minority and a significant number, and  reviews of dictionary definitions of “significant” are not of much value in this context. While there can be no doubt that results above 20% are statistically significant, the most common definitions of the term are “important” or noteworthy”. My personal view is that a “small minority” would be 10% or less, but that when more than a fifth and nearly one-quarter of those expressing a view are in opposition to a given position it should be regarded as a “significant number”.  The fact that just three members are in opposition cannot be used alone to designate them as a “small minority” given the very small size of the total group expressing a view – if the responses were multiplied by 10 there would be 110 in favor of Option 1 and 30 opposed, and 100 on favor of Option 4 and 30 opposed, and in both instances the opposition should be viewed as significant.
> 
> If the Chair does not alter the initial designations I will include this statement in my Minority Report.
> 
> 
> 
> Philip S. Corwin
> Policy Counsel
> VeriSign, Inc.
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> "Luck is the residue of design" -- Branch Rickey
> 
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