ASO AC Teleconference 11 October 2017

ASO AC Teleconference
11 October 2017
Minutes

Attendees

AFRINIC

Omo Oaiya (OO)
Douglas Onyango (DO)

APNIC

Brajesh Jain, BJ
Tomohiro Fujisaki (TF)
Aftab Siddiqui (AS)

ARIN

Kevin Blumberg (KB)
Louie Lee (LL) – Vice-Chair
Jason Schiller (JS)

LACNIC

Hartmut Glaser (HG)
Ricardo Patara (RP) – Vice-Chair
Jorge Villa (JV)

RIPE NCC

Nurani Nimpuno (NN)
Filiz Yilmaz (FY) – Chair
Wilfried Woeber (WW)

Apologies

Fiona Asonga (FA)

Secretariat

German Valdez (GV) – Executive Secretary
Susannah Gray (SG) – Scribe

Observers

Nate Davis (ND)
Ron da Silva (RdS)
Sean Hopkins (SH)
Akinori Maemura (AM)
Carlos Reyes (CR)

Agenda
0. Welcome
1. Roll call
2. Agenda review
3. Approval of minutes
a. September 6 2017
4. Review open actions
5. ASO Review next steps
6. ASO AC subgroup on ICANN Empowered Community report
7. ICANN 60 Preparations
a. Questions for ICANN Board
b. Informal meeting(s) in Abu-Dhabi
8. AOB
a. Diversity requirement in ICANN Bylaws and potential impact of it on the Board seat selection process
b. APNIC 44 Policy Update
9. Adjourn

0. Welcome

FY welcomed everyone to the call.

1. Roll Call

GV went through the attendee list and declared quorum.

2. Agenda Review

FY outlined the agenda and asked for any additions or changes. Items 8.a and 8.b were added to the agenda under A.O.B.

3. Approval of Minutes

a) Minutes Teleconference 6 September

Motion to approve by TF, seconded by JS. No objections. Minutes approved.

FY asked GV to publish the minutes.

4. Review open actions

Action Item 20170906-01: KB and ASO AC subgroup on ICANN EC. Confirm to the ASO AC if they need to take further action on the Good Faith Guidelines and/or whether it would require legal advice from the NRO EC.

KB noted that three questions had been sent to the NRO EC, which had passed them onto the legal team. A response had not yet been received.

Action: OPEN.

Action item 20170906-02: FY to send a response to the CCWG WS2 regarding the Good Faith Guidelines.

Action: CLOSED.

Action item 20170906-03: GV to send a mail to the ASO AC to confirm who will be attending the ICANN 60 Meeting.

GV explained that this had been done and that another reminder will be sent before the final list is confirmed.
Action: CLOSED.
Action item 20170412-02: GV and JS to conduct another mock up election with different scenarios, for example, where there is close competition between candidates.

GV explained that he had drafted an email for consultation and will send this shortly.

Action: OPEN.

Tabled Action Items

Action item 20170503-04: Reminder for the AC to consider the status of observers for further discussion in NN’s thread. [TABLED]. “we were waiting for the ITEMS review, and because of lack of discussion. We should resolve this prior to next ASO AC face-to-face”. [TABLED]

Action Item 20161012-06: FY to Prepare Discussion Points on Grey Areas of Responsibilities between the ASO AC and the NRO EC. [TABLED]

Actions: REMAIN TABLED.

5. ASO Review next steps

FY asked if everyone had seen the final report and asked if there has been any response from the NRO EC.

GV noted that there has been no response from the NRO EC so far and explained that the plan is for each RIR to hold consultations during their respective meetings. He added that the NRO EC will hold a meeting in October and will discuss the recommendations in the report.

FY asked if the ASO AC would be informed of the outcomes. GV believed that it would.

FY asked if consultations had occurred at the recent APNIC and ARIN Meetings.

BJ confirmed that a consultation was held during APNIC 44.

AS added that the APNIC community has formed a working group and initiated a mailing list to continue the discussion. He explained that, during APNIC 44, only recommendation 18: “The NRO should initiate a public consultation involving the five RIR communities to determine the future structure of the ASO” was considered. The APNIC community suggested that the NRO should initiate a public consultation involving the five RIR communities to determine the future structure of the ASO.

DO asked if the consultations are to be led by the NRO EC or the ASO AC members.

GV noted that he thought that it is up to each RIR to decide how to manage the consultations but that this is a question that can be raised with the NRO EC.

FY noted that, as the impacted party, it would be good to have clarification on what is expected from the ASO AC members.

KB noted that, at the ARIN 40 meeting, there were no questions raised by the community during the ASO Update and there was no discussion or a formal consultation.

JS added that John Curran briefly mentioned the ASO Review and its effectiveness within ICANN. He noted that this presentation was informational and that he believed that that the NRO EC would communicate specific recommendations for changes at a later date and the ARIN community will not be engaged until this point.

FY said that the NRO EC should reach out to the ASO AC if it needs to take action.

FY noted that, in the RIPE region, there has not yet been any communication on this and that this point should be revisited after the upcoming RIPE 75 Meeting.

NN added that it is a matter of clarifying the process. She assumed that the NRO EC is responsible for driving this. She asked how the ASO AC sees its involvement in this process: should it have a dialogue with the NRO EC?

JS thought that it would be beneficial to not wait until the NRO EC has a fully formed proposal: it would be good to understand if there are some recommendations that the NRO EC is simply not going to accept. He thought it would be beneficial if the ASO AC could be informed of decisions per recommendation rather than waiting for an entire report.

DO noted that it is clear that the NRO EC will take the lead on this and the ASO AC should join in as required.

KB said he thought the AC should keep track of what is happening. The decision to act will come down to whether major recommendations are to be accepted by the NRO EC not. He added that it would be beneficial to the ASO AC to go through the report and see why certain recommendations where made and what changes may be implemented.

AS noted that it is the heads of the RIRs who should initiate the process: it has been done in APNIC and ARIN; the communities now need to take action.

JS asked what action the community is supposed to take.

AS said the community needs to determine the future structure of the ASO. He continued that the main question that people asked was “What is the NRO EC?” The community needs to ask whether people agree with this structure. If not, what is the alternative?

FY noted that it is not the ASO AC’s task to start a conversation about the role of the NRO EC. She noted that Recommendation 18 seems like a good starting point and added that she believed the NRO EC should be responsible for the initiation and coordination of the consultations.

NN agreed and noted that the ASO AC should review the recommendations and form an opinion. She added that there might be some recommendations that the ASO AC could comment on already, such as one regarding the ASO website – Recommendation 17: Update the ASO Website with recent presentations. She added that the ASO AC could already work with the NRO Secretariat to get this completed.

NN continued that as the APNIC community has already started its consultations, it would be good to know what the NRO EC is planning for the other regions.

JS added that the ASO AC should track how the conversation is developing in each respective region and bring it back to group.

FY proposed the following actions. There were no objections:

New Action Item 20171011-01: ASO AC to read all the recommendations relating to ASO AC procedures and develop ideas and come prepared for next meeting. ASO AC to also keep track of conversations happening in each respective region and report back to the ASO AC to ensure a global overview.

New Action Item 20171011-02: GV to communicate information about the NRO EC’s plans, timelines, actions and next steps for addressing the recommendations in the ASO Review. GV to also ask the NRO EC to communicate information on each specific recommendation as it has it, rather than waiting for a complete overview to be ready.

6. ASO AC subgroup on ICANN Empowered Community report

KB gave an overview of the Subgroup’s progress. He noted that the calls are extremely productive and that the group is on track to provide draft procedures to the ASO AC by 18 October. He added that he would delay this if the legal response requested from the NRO EC has not been received: without this information, the procedures will be confusing.

KB asked for comments to be made on the drafts via the Empowered Community mailing list: there is good participation in the calls but the list is very quiet and more input would be very helpful. He added that the mailing list would be made public in the future for transparency on how the process was created.

JS added that a skeleton framework has been prepared: many steps in the process are not relevant for the ASO AC and are for the NRO EC to deal with.

7. ICANN 60 Preparations

a. Informal meeting(s) in Abu-Dhabi

FY asked if there was an update on whether informal meetings between the NRO EC and the ASO AC would be happening at ICANN 60.

GV noted that this is still the plan but that he still needs to gain consensus from the NRO EC and would keep the ASO AC informed of progress on this. He noted that it would be good to discuss the ASO Review and the progress on the Empowered Community discussions.

FY noted that she would be happy to meet with the NRO EC and assumed the other ASO AC members present at ICANN 60 would like to take this opportunity too.

GV noted this.

FY noted that a Competition, Consumer Trust & Consumer Choice Review Team outreach session will be held on Sunday at 10:45. She added that this was a FYI: members won’t be representing the ASO AC during the session.

a. Questions for ICANN Board

FY noted that the joint session for the ICANN Board, NRO EC and ASO AC would take place on Wednesday from 8:30 – 9:30. She did not know if the NRO EC had communicated any questions to the Board as of yet. If there are questions from the ASO AC, they can be relayed and consolidated with the NRO EC’s questions.
RdS noted that the ASO AC has been requested to let ICANN staff know the topics it wants to discuss with the ICANN Board so that materials can be prepared in advance.

FY said that the Board mentioned that it would like to discuss GDPR. She reiterated that it is not her suggestion: in the communiqué she received, the Board noted GDPR as a potential topic for discussion.

FY added that she didn’t know if the NRO EC had responded to the question and asked if it is expecting input from the ASO AC.

GV explained that the NRO EC is currently drafting questions to bring to the ICANN Board but was unsure whether input from the ASO AC will be requested.
RdS noted that the impact of GDPR would be different for each RIR. Other topics that could be discussed are cross-community working groups, Empowered Community and volunteer burnout.

KB noted that he did not think the ASO AC could contribute much on the topic of GDPR. He continued that it would be useful to talk about volunteer burnout and the post transition workload on the ASO AC, which is a small SO comprised of volunteers.

BJ wondered whether the Board could be asked for more information about how the Community Forum works, as this was something that had come up in the Subgroup.

NN said that she was also concerned about the ASO AC’s workload but noted that it’s not necessarily the Board that generates this work: some of it comes from the broader community. She added that the challenge is that it is hard to make the community aware of the work it generates and talking to the Board about it probably can’t solve the challenge. The ASO AC’s communications could be a lot better, for example by putting clearer information on the website.

FY agreed with NN that the workload issue is not something that Board can solve. There are separate tracks at ICANN 60 to discuss this issue.

JS noted that a lot of work is generated because the ASO gets swept into all generic SO work, which might not be so useful.

AM noted that if the workload is a concern for the ASO AC, the Board will find it valuable to know this. GDPR was on the agenda that was sent to the SOs because it may be of concern for the RIRs but if it is of no concern, perhaps this can be communicated to the Board.

FY noted that the Board sent the questions to the ASO, and the ASO includes the RIRs, the NRO EC and the ASO AC. She noted again that she was not proposing that the ASO AC makes any comment on this: she was just informing the group. She continued that any response should come from the NRO EC, possibly from RIPE because this is an EU legislation.

FY asked the ASO AC to circulate any other questions they may have for the Board and the NRO EC will be asked to communicate them to the Board. There were no objections.

New Action Item 20171011-03: ASO AC to share input for questions to ask the ICANN Board at ICANN 60 by 13 October.

8. AOB

a) Diversity requirement in ICANN Bylaws and potential impact of it on the ASO AC Board seat selection process.

FY explained that ICANN Bylaws, the Board election process, and diversity requirements were being discussed on email threads where it was pointed out that the SOs might have an issue with one particular Bylaw, Section 7.5, which deals with regional requirements.

FY continued that the each SO has its own election processes and diversity requirements and the NomCom also has its own processes/requirements. There is concern that following the ASO’s diversity procedures might cause a conflict with the overall diversity requirements set out in Section 7.5.
There was some discussion on this.

RdS commented that the clause related only to the eight NomCom-selected Directors. There is no requirement for the SOs to comply with the geographic diversity requirements in place for the ICANN Board. He added that it is good for the NomCom to get information about nominated candidates from the SOs so it can use that while considering its own selections.

FY said that confirmation was needed because the wording seems to apply to the SOs too. The clause talks about Board of Directors and not just NomCom-selected Directors. She added that some of the SO Chairs are interpreting this as also applying to SO-selected Directors. She noted that the question of timing and cycles also needs to be addressed.

KB noted a general concern in regards to any changes being proposed or made to an election process while the election is in progress: the ASO AC elections are now in the nomination phase.

JS noted that the ASO’s restriction is that its two Board members can’t be from same region. He added that it is a question of timing: is the NomCom being given information about the ASO AC’s selections in time for it be useful during the NomCom selections, which has been an issue in the past.

FY agreed: if all SOs and the NomCom are using their own diversity rules, there may be a case during a particular cycle where the ICANN Board will not meet the diversity requirements as outlined in the Bylaws.

JS noted that the Board would meet the requirements because the NomCom would have to adapt its selections during each cycle based on the candidates proposed by the SOs.

RdS confirmed that with each cycle, it is the NomCom that has to rebalance the Board. The NomCom has to comply with the geographic diversity mandate at the time of appointment. He added that if the SOs appointed Directors after the fact, meaning the Board would not be in compliance, the Board would be rebalanced during the next cycle.

JS noted that this sounds reasonable but that does not match the text in Section 7.5 which states ‘…at all times no Geographic Region shall have more than five Directors on the Board’.

WW suggested asking for legal advice.

FY agreed and noted that there doesn’t seem to be too much concern about this at this point but that it would be good to know that it’s not an issue for the next round of SO appointments to the ICANN Board. She suggested asking the NRO EC and ICANN for legal advice. There were no objections.

New Action Item 20171011-04: GV to ask the NRO EC/legal team to work with CR to get clarification on whether the diversity requirements for the ICANN board as outlined in Section 7.5 of the ICANN Bylaws apply to the ASO AC or effect the ASO AC’s procedures.

RdS also suggested that this could be a topic that could be raised with the Board at ICANN 60.

b) APNIC 44 Policy Update

AS gave an update on policy discussions at the recent APNIC 44 Meeting. He highlighted that Prop-116 – Prohibit to transfer IPv4 addresses in the final /8 block has passed after two years of discussion. He explained that under this policy, no one with space from the last /8 block will be able to transfer their resources for the next five years. He added that the APNIC EC immediately put a moratorium on all transfers: anything received after 14 September is now on hold until the policy comes into effect.

KB noted that he would give a report from the ARIN meeting on the next teleconference.

RP noted he would shortly send the LACNIC report to the mailing list.
Other

AS noted that he had received a request to be part of the Newcomers’ Program at ICANN 60 but will not be at the meeting.

FY noted that she has asked the ICANN staff to send requests to the Chair and asked CR to follow up with staff on this.

New Action Item 20171011-05: CR to follow up with staff regarding requests going to individual ASO AC members. Requests should go to the Chair.

KB volunteered to attend the Newcomers’ session. There were no objections.

9. Adjourn

Motion to adjourn: WW. Seconded by TF. Meeting adjourned at 12:44 PM (UTC).

Last modified on 29/01/2020