[registrars] Report on ICANN Board meeting held 30 April 2008

[Eric Brunner-Williams]

Bruce, and also Adrian, Tim and Thomas,

I concur with Marcus Faure.

First, the primary locus of work is face-to-face in Marina del Rey, and 
secondarily via conference calls that are a challenge for time-zone 
distant participants, and a challenge for participants from less 
developed voice and data regions, and thirdly via email which forfits 
the adantages of face-to-face, and the disadvantages of time zones and 
the lack of voice quality data.

Reduction of the weeks of work available to the community other than 
staff for the most effective means of work from three to two will have 
the effect of making staff more important to the sum of all activity, 
and non-staff less so.

This is a good choice, if the outcome desired is a relatively effective 
staff and a relatively ineffective non-staff.

As a non-staffer, this isn't my preference. In fact, quarterly like 
clockwork, four working weeks a year, is better than three.

Second, just looking at the RC's meetings and the RC's process, and the 
history of issues over the lifetime of the RC, were RC meetings to be 
diminished to one every six months it would be less effective to attempt 
to schedule complex issues for face-to-face meetings, where the 
signal-to-noise ratio is the highest, and so the policy input of the RC 
would be likely to diminish.

I don't think going the way of the "business constituency" of the "isp 
constituency", into non-functional shells dominated by narrower groups 
of interest is a win for the registrars in the ICANN market, and 
anything that may, over time, reduce the utility of the RC to registrars 
should be avoided or mitigated.

Eric
>> Hello All,
>>
>> Below is the report on the Board meeting held last week.
>>
>> Key items were:
...
>>
>> (2) ICANN meetings - discussion about reducing from 3 main meetings to
>> two main meetings a year
>> - useful to get feedback from the GNSO on whether this would be good or
>> bad.
>>     
...
>> ICANN Meetings Discussion
>> =========================
>>
>> Paul Levins introduced this topic on the agenda by reminding the Board
>> that at the New Delhi meeting the Board had asked staff to deliver on
>> three outcomes in the meetings area: first, to make an early public
>> notification of the Paris meeting and get the meeting schedule out
>> earlier than usual; second, decide upon the location of the ICANN
>> meeting from November 2-7, 2009 to be held in Africa; and third, prepare
>> a paper on meeting management and logistics that would promote a
>> discussion about reform. 
>>
>> Paul advised that this paper and the meetings related item to follow
>> delivered on these requests. This paper regarding the meetings describes
>> moving from three to two ICANN meetings a year and to a hub arrangement.
>> Paul clarified that the hub locations are to be determined in each of
>> the five regions. The Chair asked if the proposals in the paper would go
>> out for public comment. Paul Levins confirmed that it would be published
>> for public comment. 
>>
>> Bruce Tonkin asked if the main motivation for moving from three to two
>> meetings per year was to reduce costs. Paul Levins said that in part
>> this was the case, but it was mainly about reform to the meetings
>> process and the investment of time and anecdotal information received
>> from the community that up to 20 days per year is a big investment in
>> community time in meeting time, especially for a volunteer community
>> many of whom had to rely upon their place of employment to support them.
>>
>>
>> Bruce Tonkin was concerned that the savings in time and money achieved
>> by going from three to two meetings per year may be diminished if other
>> meetings had to be planned to compensate for the loss of the third
>> meeting. For example it would not be desirable to have, say, ten smaller
>> meetings replace a single larger meeting. Paul Levins noted that concern
>> and said the paper did not countenance more regional meetings but the
>> same number as presently held. 
>>
>> Janis Karklins advised that for the GAC, the diminishing number of
>> face-to-face meetings would result in a slow down in the work. The GAC
>> is already finds the workload difficult to accommodate in three meetings
>> and would need to discuss how to deal with the situation. It may need
>> another face-to-face meeting in addition to the two regular meetings. 
>>
>> The Chair advised that any group that needs to meet can do so, but asked
>> Janis to expand upon the problems in doing that for the GAC. Janis
>> advised that GAC rely on ICANN support services during meetings, and
>> they have no physical resources and will need ICANN's support. This may
>> have expenditure implications. Janis Karklins said he was not formally
>> asking for more than three meetings, but simply noting that meeting only
>> twice a year will not allow the GAC to keep up with expectations. The
>> Chair noted that the GAC would want staffing support for a third
>> meeting. Bruce Tonkin considered that not only the GAC, but also the
>> GNSO and ALAC amongst others may want additional meetings. 
>>
>> Paul Twomey suggested that the paper should also include an
>> effectiveness quotient of the value in having inter-sessionals to drive
>> through work. Bruce Tonkin noted that the budget might not change. The
>> Chair agreed that there should be a paragraph concerning inter-sessional
>> meetings included in the paper. 
>>
>> Steve Goldstein noted that the former Board Meetings Committee had
>> discussed the idea of hubs and that the feature of a hub is that it
>> would be used often. He considered that if there were five in rotation,
>> there would not be any advantage from using a facility once every five
>> years, and suggested using one hub. Paul Levins provided clarification
>> on the hubs, noting that while there are some cost efficiencies, there
>> are higher savings in returning to one location, it is also about the
>> convenience and access of not having to go through two or three stops to
>> get to a location. 
>>
>> Harald Alvestrand shared Steve's concerns about the hubs saying he would
>> want clarification of how this would work before it was presented to the
>> community for input and additionally suggested that it is important
>> having meetings in all five regions. The Chair asked Paul Levins to add
>> that concept as an option. 
>>
>> The Chair considered that the paper is designed to get people to think
>> about meeting regularity generally and that there should be full
>> consultation. 
>>
>> Janis Karklins considered if the one of the concerns is budgetary
>> constraint it would be useful to have a comparison of three meetings
>> versus two per year as well as expected requests for others, some
>> general idea of budget should also be provided to the Board. The Chair
>> agreed that financial information would be useful, including comparative
>> costs. Paul Levins noted that the object of this was about meeting
>> reform and discussion around meetings and less budgetary concern. Bruce
>> Tonkin noted that the cost of meetings has been growing and from a Board
>> governance sense we need to be aware of this. 
>>
>> The Chair asked Paul Levins to circulate the paper back to board for
>> further consideration before distribution to the community. The Chair
>> considered that it would be good to have this out and discussed at the
>> Paris meeting. 
>>