September 4, 2002
The Honorable Donald L. Evans
Secretary
Department of Commerce
1401 Connecticut Avenue, N.W.
Washington, D.C. 20030
Dear Secretary Evans
On April 11, 2002, a group
of international private industry, professional organizations and trade
associations sent you a letter regarding our support and commitment to ICANN
as the global coordinator of key aspects of the global Internet and related
policies. We are now writing to affirm our continued support for ICANN's
Evolution and Reform process; to pledge our continued engagement in the
process of implementing the Blueprint for Reform where some critical issues
remain to be fully resolved; and to offer our views on priority issues where
the United States Government (USG) must provide further support and leadership
throughout this critical period of ICANN's evolution, including continued
outreach to other governments to ensure broader global support for ICANN.
The signatories to this letter
represent entities who are investing in the basic infrastructure that enables
the global Internet--telecommunications and backbone providers; users of
the Internet, including multi-national corporations, small businesses, scientific
and research organizations, educational research leadership and nonprofit
organizations who represent global users; intellectual property stakeholders,
and the legal community, that represents their concerns about jurisdiction,
piracy, and trademark recognition. Participants in this group bridge geographic
regions and industry sectors, and represent individuals, corporations, and
associations with a national, regional, and global presence. We are confident
that the views we express are widely shared in these communities.
Our comments, described in
further detail in the attached Appendix, address the following:
1. Support of ICANN's
mission and related policy statement, as articulated in the Blueprint for
Action, is essential. ICANN has a limited, but critical role in those policy
areas that are affected by or related to core technical coordination and
management functions. Stability of the global Internet is about more than
management and technical coordination.
2. The ICANN Reform process must provide ICANN with stable, accountable
resource funding. Funding should be based on an appropriate balance among
the gTLD processes (the primary source of funding) with contributions from
the Regional Internet Addressing Registries (RIRs) and the broad ccTLD community.
3. Consensus based, bottom up policy recommendations are the responsibility
of the Supporting Organizations (SOs). Therefore, continued global participation
and diversity within the constituencies' representation to the policy councils
should be assured. The Government Advisory Committee (GAC) liaison will
help to facilitate a role for the GAC in this effort.
4. Involvement in the ICANN policy making process should not be limited
to "contracted parties," but should embrace the participation
of non-contracting and "affected parties," or risk inciting the
need for greater, not less, governmental oversight to ensure a representative
and legitimate process.
5. Further development of relationships with key stakeholders, including
ccTLDs, RIRs, and Root Server Operators, are crucial to accomplishing ICANN's
mission. Relationships are developing and should be given time to evolve,
with interim agreements, as necessary. Promoting consistent policies across
all TLDs is in the best interests of all Internet users, taking into account
the unique character of ccTLDs that may, in some cases, require adjustments
to this principle.
6. Education, awareness, and outreach should be developed, and events,
supported by the GAC, SOs, and ICANN staff, should be scheduled at the ICANN
meetings. While we do not support changes in the advisory role of governments/governmental
representatives, we support improvements in communication and collaboration
via the GAC liaison and urge all governmental entities to work within that
process, welcoming these opportunities for better communication.
7. Evolution, not revolution, will ensure ICANN's success.
In addition to the ICANN Evolution
and Reform process, the USG is considering the Memorandum of Understanding
(MOU) with ICANN. The MOU must provide the framework to ensure that ICANN
can achieve success in accomplishing its mission and objectives. Many will
urge you to eliminate or strike key parts of the MOU. We believe that the
USG should be re-establishing some key tasks, revising others (to implement
goals which are achievable in staged timeframes), and working with other
governments via the GAC over the next two to five years to ensure the effective
evolution of a global governmental advisory process.
We urge that you continue your
commitment, as we have, to a long-term supportive role with ICANN. The private
sector's coordination and management of the technical functions of the global
Internet, combined with the development of associated polices, offers the
best possible solution for all - users, suppliers/providers, and governments.
While the USG must continue to be a leader in the Internet space, we support
efforts to establish broader global support from other governments, through
the GAC processes, to ensure ICANN's success. We urge you to foster an effective
ongoing consultation with leading stakeholders and with other governments,
and offer our availability to support such consultation.
To this end, we look forward
to further dialogue with you and to working together, with others from the
private sector and from governments, to ensure ICANN's success.
Names of Associations,
Companies, and Organizations
American Intellectual Property
Law Association
American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers
AT&T Corporation
Broadcast Music Inc.
BT North America, Inc.
CABASE
ECOM-LAC
International Trademark Association
Internet Commerce Coalition
Internet Software Consortium, Inc.
Motion Picture Association of America
RNA Associates
Software and Information Industry Association
The Darwin Group
U.S. Chamber of Commerce
US Internet Industry Association
Verizon Communications Inc.
WorldCom, Inc.
CC:
Phillip Bond, Chief of Staff to the Secretary, and Under Secretary for the
Technology
Administration, Department of Commerce
Ted Kasinger, General Counsel, Department of Commerce
Bruce Mehlman, Assistant Secretary of Commerce for Technology Policy
Nancy Victory, Assistant Secretary of Commerce for Telecommunications and
Information
Richard Russell, Chief of Staff, Office of Science and Technology Policy,
White House
Chairman Hollings, Senate Committee
on Commerce, Science, and Transportation
Senator Burns, Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation
Senator McCain, Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation
Chairman Tauzin, House Committee on Energy and Commerce
Congressman Dingell, House Committee on Energy and Commerce
Chairman Upton, House Subcommittee on Telecommunications and the Internet
Congressman Markey, House Subcommittee on Telecommunications and the Internet
Congressman Shimkus, House Committee on Energy and Commerce
Appendix
ICANN's mission and related
Policy Statement. We welcomed the Blueprint for Reform and noted the
inclusion of a continuing commitment to the key principles of the White
Paper - stability and consensus-based policy. We also agree that ICANN has
a limited but critical role to play in generating policy decisions in areas
that are related to its core technical coordination and management functions.
Stability of the Internet is
about more than mere technical coordination. To our community of concerned
stakeholders, the role of associated policy development is essential. We
urge you to ensure that our governmental representatives support this role,
both domestically and globally.
We are continuing to participate
in the refinement of ICANN's defined boundaries related to its mission and
activities. We believe that the present evolution is the best process to
ensure legitimacy of and broad agreement to ICANN's mission and activities.
We welcome the GAC's comments
on these issues and look forward to working closely with the USG representatives
throughout this process.
More broadly, we will remain
engaged in the process of implementation of the Blueprint for Reform, where
some critical issues have not yet been fully resolved.
2. Stable funding is a critical
success factor for ICANN. Users of the Internet are the ultimate funders
of ICANN's services. The cost of delivering a service includes the cost
of oversight, accreditation, enforcement of agreements, or external audit.
ICANN's operation should be funded by its users, via a process where the
registries and registrars act as aggregators. Funding should be based on
an appropriate balance among the gTLD processes (the primary source of funding),
the Regional Internet Addressing Registries (RIRs) and the broad ccTLD community.
Funding for core secretariat
services to all Supporting Organizations (SOs) and Advisory Committees should
come from the ICANN budget. As a transition matter, this might also be extended
to the GAC, although governments should agree as soon as possible on a method
to fund the GAC Secretariat. This would allow SOs and Advisory Committees
to focus any additional funding generated on outreach activities and awareness,
supporting sponsorships among attending participants in ICANN's meetings
to ensure geographic diversity in participation. The goal should be to ensure
neutral, reliable, stable secretariat services, so that participants in
policy development can do a professional and effective job. Utilizing a
centralized funding of core secretariat services, with an agreement of neutrality
on ICANN's part, will help ensure the stability of administrative functions.
3. Consensus based, bottom
up policy recommendations are the responsibility of the supporting organizations.
The Board should consider and approve policy recommendations for implementation
by staff via appropriate contractual and consensus mechanisms. There must
be a continued commitment to geographic diversity and cross-industry representation
within the constituencies that constitute the gTLD Supporting Organization,
with a continued balance of interested stakeholders participating in the
development of policies involving gTLDs.
We acknowledge that not all
decisions ICANN makes are policy, and in those settings where policy is
made, deliberated or tabled, mechanisms should be available for the staff
and Board to develop and implement processes to seek information and comments
to guide such decisions.
Policies related to ccTLDs
should be undertaken within the separate SO, with agreements between the
gTLD SO and the ccTLD SO to identify and collaborate on those policies of
mutual concern and impact, and to establish effective processes and procedures
to undertake such collaboration.
4. Exclusion of non-contracting
parties: Some are seeking to limit participation in policy development
and consultation to only those with whom a contractual agreement has been
reached with ICANN. Such a result would ignore the impact that ICANN's actions
have on users including but not limited to domain name registrants. Excluding
the participation of affected stakeholders in consensus based, bottom up
processes will only weaken and destabilize ICANN, and can lead to an increased
concern from governments about the need for more direct involvement, beyond
an advisory role.
5. Further development of
relationships with key stakeholders, such as the ccTLDs, RIRs and Root
Server Operators: ICANN is working toward improved and documented relationships
with these key stakeholders, and these efforts need continued nurturing
to evolve into mutually acceptable agreements. Positive interactions and
pledges of cooperation, with GAC participation, were developed at Bucharest
and may provide further support to identifying and developing strengthened
relationships. Such initiatives need time to develop and require additional
flexibility on everyone's part. Thus, interim approaches to foster cooperation
will likely be necessary.
We further note that harmonization
of certain policies across all TLDs would be in the best interest of all
users of the domain name system. The differing roles and obligations of
ccTLDs and gTLDs may limit the ability to achieve this; appropriate development
of policies for ccTLDs and gTLDs will recognize this reality and approach
harmonization of policies taking into account the unique character of some
ccTLDs.
The relationships with the
RIRs and the Root Server Operators are also critical. We support ensuring
better relationships and interaction across all of ICANN's SOs, and will
urge that ICANN meetings include participation and convening of all SOs
via a cross-general assembly. This will foster communication on issues where
collaborative opportunities can be identified. We believe that the GAC should
attend such sessions.
6. Awareness, education,
and outreach: In its next phase, education, awareness, and outreach
must become key elements of ICANN's functions in order to ensure that collaboration,
understanding and mutual agreement develop. An excellent example of a successful
approach to this role was in the development and presentation of the issues
related to security of the global Internet. Such education and awareness
events helped to educate others about what ICANN does not do, as well as
where it does have a role. We urge the RIRs, ccTLDs, and GAC members to
meet and work together, with ICANN to support further efforts of this nature.
These meetings should be held in conjunction with the ICANN meetings. We
look forward to both supporting and participating in such activities.
7. Evolution, not revolution:
Finally, we urge caution with regard to the desire of some for too many
changes implemented at one time. ICANN is a very young organization. It
is undertaking critical changes; but can be expected to continue to evolve.
A balanced approach to evolution will allow for implementation of changes
over a multi-year time frame where necessary. In the meantime, achievable
tasks should be established to measure progress.