GAC/Board Consultation Tuesday, 15 March 2011 ICANN Meeting San Francisco, California >>PETER DENGATE THRUSH: Ladies and gentlemen, good morning. Could you take your seats, please. We're starting as soon as we can. Thank you. Thank you for taking your seats. Good morning, ladies and gentlemen of the board, ladies and gentlemen of the GAC, and members of the community. Welcome to a continuation of the discussions, very productive discussions, that we've been having in relation to receiving GAC advice on the new gTLD program. We, as most you know, had a very successful exchange in Brussels. Having received the GAC scorecard, the board then provided our response and we've discussed that, and we understand from the chair of the GAC that the GAC has now been working hard on the board's response and the GAC would like to take us through the response to the response. So Heather, over to you. >>HEATHER DRYDEN: Thank you, Peter, and good morning, everyone. As Peter pointed out, the GAC has been working on a written response to the board response to the GAC scorecard, and we've made good progress on that, but at this time we'd like to give more of an indication of some of the things we are considering for our response to the board. So this morning, we'd like to give you that indication. There may be some questions or things that we put back out to the board and to the community. Following the session yesterday, we heard some ideas and some inputs that we would like to have the opportunity to take into account and try to respond to. We thought it was a very useful afternoon to hear from the community. So that's the idea behind how we want to approach this morning, so thank you to everyone for being here, including our observers in the room. So we will walk through each of the topics. The GAC topic leads will introduce the topic, and as I say, provide this kind of indication or present some options or things that we might be considering as a GAC in our response. In order to give a general sense of where GAC priorities are, I would like to identify a number of particular topics where governments believe there should be focus or emphasis in trying to resolve those issues, particularly where there are 2s. Certainly related to the law enforcement recommendations that the GAC has made, this is an area where we see a great need to come to full resolution of the issues. Also, objections and sensitive strings. This is also very important for the GAC. Early warning is another topic. And community strings. So if that is an initial guide to you as to where the GAC would place emphasis, I hope that is useful to give you a sense of that. So if we walk through the topics in order through the scorecard, I think is perhaps the easiest way to do that. So the first topic identified is objection procedures, including the requirements for governments to pay fees. So I believe the United States is the lead? Ah. There. Okay. It's going to take me a moment to work out where everybody's sitting, so... All right. Are you prepared to introduce that topic? Thank you. Please go ahead. U.S. >>UNITED STATES: Thank you, Heather. And happy to be here, happy to start off the dialogue today, and wanted to thank ICANN, the board and the community, actually, for preliminarily yesterday providing us with feedback. I think as Heather noted, it was extremely helpful to us, since we have not yet completed our written responses and we think it's only correct to take your suggestions into account as well. On this one, I'm just going to go through the list. I don't think we need to explain ourselves, hopefully, again because you've all seen the scorecard, you've seen the board response. I think on number 1, we had originally proposed that the limited public interest objections procedure in module 3 be deleted in its entirety, and I think we have now reconsidered that and I think we understand your 1B to refer to the fact that you would like to retain it but you have accepted the premise that it would not apply to governments. So I don't think there's much to go through on that point. So if we move to 2.1.1, which is string evaluation and objections, here as a 1B, as you can probably appreciate -- and I think, Heather, I'd like to echo Heather's comment that we and the GAC would very much welcome the community's views on all of the 1Bs, because that's where, you know, the devil is in the details, certainly. But on this one, I think we have some questions for you, if we could. You have come back indicating that you accept the premise that we would use the GAC as the platform to review strings and to provide advice, but it's not clear to us that -- what kind of procedures or criteria you are considering that we adopt as we do that. So because we have operating principles which are on our GAC Web site, actually, so everybody can see how the GAC does what it does, it's not entirely clear to us what it is you are proposing and what -- whether you have criteria. So before, Bruce, I turn over to you, if I may, it's also not entirely clear to us -- so some clarification would be very, very helpful -- we think the early warning concept is linked to this, but -- and you have a 1B on that, and it seems to us -- and so please correct us if we're wrong -- that you are proposing that early warning is de facto, the 45-day initial review period, whereas I believe the GAC had considered early warning as an initial step prior to that. So that governments could take the opportunity -- and frankly, any member of the community, but just speaking from our own perspective -- to alert applicants to potential problems so that then the applicant had an opportunity to say, "Ooh, I had no idea that this was considered controversial or sensitive or potentially objectionable," and they could then make an objection on their own whether to continue with that particular proposed string or amend it. So we were thinking this would be helpful to the applicants as well as to us, so that we would have an early warning opportunity to review a proposed string. This links, also, to our suggestion which we will get to momentarily which you have assigned a 2 to of expanding the categories, so the whole purpose of the early warning is, again, to determine whether the string might fall into one of the categories that we have identified as possibly raising national, cultural, geographic, linguistic, religious -- I mean we have a fairly long list -- those sorts of sensitivities. So to us, these are all linked together, so I think it's critical that we get your views as to what is the process that you are proposing we follow. I'll stop there. Thank you. >>PETER DENGATE THRUSH: Thanks, U.S. I think Bruce is the topic leader from the board. You might be able to help a little bit with that. >>BRUCE TONKIN: Yes. Thank you, Peter. And thank you for that feedback. Firstly, if we're talking about Section 2.1.1, I think that we were expecting the GAC to perhaps give some clarity on how you would manage the advice in terms of time frames and processes and things, so I think we except you have general operating principles in the GAC, but I don't believe there's anything that I could look up there that said, you know, if you receive notice of a gTLD application, you know, you would meet and potentially give feedback within 45 days. So I guess we were really seeing that you might develop some of your own procedures that would become public and known to the community. I didn't -- I don't think we were envisaging that we were going to create those procedures. We just thought that you would adjust or add some additional steps in your existing procedures to take into account this process. Does that make sense? And so the 45 days was something that actually came from you, and we -- we put that in here. >>HEATHER DRYDEN: Thank you, Bruce. Did you want to respond, U.S.? Please? >>UNITED STATES: Thank you very much. Actually, this is -- we've spent some time trying to figure out, looking at the way the bylaws are currently drafted, the GAC simply provides advice. >>BRUCE TONKIN: Yeah, exactly. >>UNITED STATES: On any public policy issue. >>BRUCE TONKIN: Yeah. >>UNITED STATES: And there are no time limitations. >>BRUCE TONKIN: Correct. Yeah. >>UNITED STATES: When it comes to issues such as, you know, objectionable strings, controversial, sensitive strings, we find it makes an enormous difference for us to be able to meet face-to-face. I mean we do conduct a lot of work intersessionally as I think you now see, but when it comes to certain areas, we find it incredibly beneficial and would want to retain that opportunity to meet together as a collection of governments to share our national perspectives, and to find the common ground that we think we need to find in order to give you appropriate and effective and constructive advice. So we, too, are struggling a little bit. The 45 days, I think it was our understanding of the initial evaluation period. >>BRUCE TONKIN: Correct. Yeah, that's correct, yeah, yeah. >>UNITED STATES: So again, because we had proposed to complement that with an early warning period and we were trying not to be too prescriptive as to how long that might be -- >>BRUCE TONKIN: Yes, yeah. >>UNITED STATES: -- we are talking through, if you will, how to -- whether 45 days is enough -- >>BRUCE TONKIN: Yeah. >>UNITED STATES: -- to include also the early warning. >>BRUCE TONKIN: And I guess that's it, I think, Suzanne, is that we -- if you like, the current procedures as they're documented in the GAC would not give enough clarity for a new gTLD process for an applicant to understand that, you know, there is going to be this step and this step is going to take a certain period of time, and then we need to make sure that that aligns with whatever periods we have in our processes. So the whole concept, as I understand it, is that there is enough time for you to get back with some responses that contributes in what we refer to as an early process. So "early" for us wouldn't be two years, for example. It would be some number of days. So we're just -- I think that's -- it's just important that expectations are set, and so what we're hoping from the GAC is we've put -- we've essentially set down what our current expectations are, and, you know, we need some feedback from you as to whether those expectations are reasonable or not. And some of the other things we've put in here, you know, according to accountability and transparency principles, they're ICANN's principles, really, and so we're just confirming that, you know, however you create your deliberations, we get some rationale and some documentation, not just a yes/no but, you know, "We've considered this string and this is why we think it's inappropriate or appropriate," as the case may be. So does that -- and I want to come back onto your second part about early warning, but does that give you clarity about, you know, we're expecting you to come back with feedback on what your procedures would be to handle this? >>UNITED STATES: Thank you. We are working on that. We were just trying to understand whether you had anything in mind in particular that you wanted us to consider, as we develop this, because I think this is -- I don't know that we've ever taken two years to -- >>BRUCE TONKIN: No, I'm exaggerating a bit. But I just meant that it's days, know the months and -- yeah. >>UNITED STATES: The days, I think, is something that we all need to try to consider. And again, because we feel it fairly critical that we have the opportunity to first consult in capital and then consult with each other. >>BRUCE TONKIN: Yeah. >>UNITED STATES: And our work methods are probably slightly different from other constituencies, so that is something else to take into account. >>BRUCE TONKIN: Yes. >>UNITED STATES: I don't know whether the board has ever invited an SO or an AC -- and apologies to these groups for any ignorance on our part as to how you do what you do. We believe in certain communities you actually vote. Just as a little insight into how governments interact with one another, from a government perspective, if we have to resort to a vote, things are not going very well. That means we have failed, okay? So what we typically operate on in terms of, you know, there is a basic U.N. definition, if you will, of consensus and that typically means that there's no outright opposition. So you work the issue through until everybody is basically comfortable and then you advance that. So it's perhaps a different method of interacting than the rest of the community follows, so we were also curious, had you -- had you ever in the past had occasion to request from another SO or AC a particular type of decision in a particular time frame. That might be a case study that we could look at, if there is such a case study. >>BRUCE TONKIN: I think Rita -- >>HEATHER DRYDEN: Rita. >>RITA RODIN JOHNSTON: Yeah. I'm just looking for Peter, who is not here, actually. I'm just trying to figure out where we're going on some of this, to get too far into the details. I think the board wanted to hear about your positions today, and then we can take these back. I don't think it's going to be too productive to have the kind of one-on-one at this point. So maybe if we can just get a pithy summary, Suzanne, it sounds to me like with your questions when we were looking at this early warning, which was your request, we heard that this was one of your touchpoints, we thought -- right? -- being able to, early on in the process, come in and integrate the GAC into that evaluation. My understanding was that this 45-day period was what was going to be done overall for all gTLDs, so that the note there was to make sure the GAC does this kind of early warning analysis and you guys meet and decide that maybe there's a string that's objectionable within the time period that the rest of the applications are going to be considered. That was what our language meant to encompass. >>BRUCE TONKIN: Yes, yeah. >>RITA RODIN JOHNSTON: So if we need to put a finer point there, we will do so, if you have some questions. But again, we didn't want to provide a separate track. I think Bruce was being somewhat silly -- right? -- with the two years, but it was meant just to say that if we're going to allow people to come in, the GAC to come in early -- we understand why you want to do that; we were considering that -- but if you're going to do that, you're going to need to do it within the period within which the other applications are being considered and evaluated. >>BRUCE TONKIN: Yeah. Bertrand? >>HEATHER DRYDEN: Thank you, Rita. I see European Commission and then Bertrand. >>EUROPEAN COMMISSION: Thank you. Yes, let's avoid the one-on-one, actually, so I'll jump in. Bill Dee, European Commission. I sense that there's no real problem here, actually. I think it's just a question of drafting it and identifying this mutual agreement. We have a mutual interest here in facilitating applicants discovering, at the earliest possible time in the process, actually, that there may be a problem of a public policy issue for the GAC, you know, and I think it's just drafting. I mean one comment I would make is I think, you know, we need to introduce the idea of the early warning mechanism being the first phase of potential GAC involvement. Not exclusively, but the GAC would have to raise an objection within this 45-day period or it would lose the right to raise an objection later on, just for clarity actually. And I see you stopped nodding, actually, at this point, so that's why I mentioned that, because it's -- and it's a very practical problem, actually, that for us as public officials, we may find that one of our stakeholders comes to us with a legitimate problem that we have to raise with the applicant or with the board or with some other part of the ICANN universe, after that 45-day period, so we can't give up the right to raise it later. The intention of the early warning was in a best efforts way to give, wherever possible, actually, an immediate reaction to an applicant so that they can save their money, basically, and they have the right to withdraw, or that if they proceed, they proceed in the following that there may be a problem. And it wasn't intended to be an exclusive mechanism for the GAC to express concerns about an application. >>BRUCE TONKIN: Yeah. So let me just clarify the process, too. The way we had -- sort of saw the early warning is we actually have, in the process today, just to sort of walk you through it a little further -- and it's one of these things, a little flow diagram might help. Often when I'm in a small group I use a flip chart or something. But basically there is a date when all the applications are posted and that's public so everybody sees that, and then we open up a public comment forum where anybody can make comments about any aspect of one of those applications. So at that stage, we -- we imagine that the GAC would obviously be seeing that, and you would have some -- and I think what I was keen to understand is that you would have a procedure that you might have a -- within your own organization, maybe a call for any comments from your members, and maybe you schedule a meeting face-to-face for any discussion that needs to happen. So in other words, there's some planning that you would have that happens post that date when these things are posted. In terms of the applicant being able to pull out, if the applicant pulls out during that stage, they can pull out and they get a refund of I believe something like 70% of their application fee. The bit that's a bit different in what you're saying is that they can modify their application, and that's currently not in our process. So our process is, you -- you submit your application -- so like an RFP- type process, you -- it's like submitting a contract or a tender. You don't generally change your tender after it's submitted. You might respond to questions, but you're not actually changing the substance of your application, generally. And so the way we would -- had envisaged that you submit your thing, you can definitely get early warning, and then you could decide, "Okay, I should withdraw," or maybe there are some questions that the community is posting in public comment forums and I guess as an applicant you can respond to questions. But you -- the idea that you would apply for one controversial string and go, "Oh, that didn't work, maybe I'll try another controversial string and see if that will work," you know, the concept of changing your string to see what will get through wasn't what we had envisaged. It was more you apply for a string, you have an application, and that's evaluated. If you fail in that process, then you would apply in the next round. It wasn't the concept of changing your application. So from what I thought I heard you say was they could then change the string or change their application. >>EUROPEAN COMMISSION: No. Sorry. Sorry to interrupt, Bruce. No, that wasn't our proposal, actually, no. >>BRUCE TONKIN: Thank you. >>EUROPEAN COMMISSION: I see from the scorecard that wasn't in there, and I don't think I mentioned that either. >>BRUCE TONKIN: I just must have misheard what Suzanne said. I thought she was saying after early warning, someone could amend their application. So I just -- did I hear that wrong or -- >>UNITED STATES: I'm sorry. I believe we used the word "mitigate concerns." >>BRUCE TONKIN: Okay. That's -- >>UNITED STATES: So the example we offered -- we tried to offer an example that we thought would kind of highlight why the GAC might come in and say, "This particular proposed string could potentially move forward with no objection from us, provided that," dot, dot, dot, dot, dot, dot, and so we could clarify that. Otherwise, you seem to be creating a system -- and I don't mean to sound cavalier, but we might as well cut to the chase -- you're creating a system where anything goes. So deep pockets, first in line, and you get to roll. There are -- what we're trying to convey is that there are certain strings that may raise sensitivities for a variety of reasons. I think the example -- and I don't want to pick on you, Bruce, but the example you cited in Brussels was, you know, why shouldn't a commercial entity from any country be able to apply for dot Maori. And of course New Zealand is not here but we're going to protect their interests yet again. From the perspective of the GAC, it is entirely up to the New Zealand government to say no. And that means nobody gets it unless they have identified the appropriate relevant entity responsible for all things pertaining to Maoris. And so if there is no dot Maori, ever, because they choose not to -- or they do not have $185,000 plus every other -- nobody gets it. That's kind of where we're coming from. So I think that that may be there are some differences that we'd like to explore a little bit further as to what is the hesitation on your part to sort of providing some boundaries that we think would actually permit us to sit back, then, and say, "Okay, we're fine, we're not concerned." I think another example we offered was dot bank. So again, a lot of us, I think, if we were to consult with our finance ministries -- in my case, it's the U.S. treasury department -- they've already conveyed their concerns to us. I think the Canadian finance ministry has already communicated concerns to ICANN. It's on the correspondence page. That is a string that would give all of us great pause because of concerns -- that's an example of our -- you know, admittedly later on, we'll get to this. We didn't use very clear terminology. But that is a regulated sector. So the concern we would have is, you know, how will that work. And obviously at the end of the day we are concerned that either it could be used for criminal purposes or certainly used to abuse consumers and consumer trust. So that's what we were trying to convey here was that if we could give the applicant and the board this early warning to say, "Oh, you don't even want to go there, this is fraught with problems." Instead, we seem to be faced with anything goes until fairly late in the day we have to use an objections procedure. That's what we are trying to make sense of, if that helps. >>HEATHER DRYDEN: Thank you, U.S. I'd like to go back to the speaking order. I have Bertrand, Rita, and Denmark. >>BERTRAND DE LA CHAPELLE: Thank you. I actually do believe that this exchange is getting to the core of the issue and it's useful. If I understand correctly, we're actually talking about messages that would come from the GAC or from members of the GAC to two different audiences. The early warning system is mostly directed at the applicants. It's basically a flagging thing that says there's a problem, this is a certain type of string. Whereas the GAC advice that we were detailing separately is more directed towards the board. It is a more formal comment, if I understand correctly. And this serves two purposes. The early warning can be relatively informal, and in this respect it makes, I think, perfect sense to use the 45-day period, which actually makes it an early warning that is open to everybody. Because there might be communities that will use this early warning moment to say, "Wait a minute. If you go this way, you didn't contact us, we will object in the future," or a trademark that was not aware. So it's basically a moment of pause where after the publication of the list of strings and the applicants with their purpose, everybody will very actively go through the list and see whether there is anything that they're worried about, and in the public comment they will say, "We have a concern" or no. The formal advice from the GAC is something that is targeted as a somewhat much higher level. It's more the string itself is unacceptable. It's not that there are some conditions that should be applied. The string is considered or not objectionable because this was the purpose of replacing the other modalities. In that case, inasmuch as it is very difficult for the GAC, of course, to relinquish, as Bill was saying, the right to make a comment or to give advice in due time and to follow the procedures of the GAC, the danger is on the other side that questions regarding the string continue to be bending while the treatment of the applications begin. And so the problem we're facing without referring to another topic that is very well-known in this community and that is current, the situation where all the processes regarding an applicant registry agreement and all the validation of the precautions is ongoing and in the end of the process, after several years, you might end up with still having a debate about whether the string should exist or not, is something we absolutely want to avoid in the process. And so the question that we cannot solve right now is how to make sure that the two things do not overlap and that there are periods that are dedicated to the string. Whether it is 45 days is probably too short, I understand, given the procedures, but how long and when do you stop that. Because it cannot continue forever. Finally, there's a third element which we will address later on because it's directly related to this community category or not, is the notion of certain strings and the fact that in the early warning or in the GAC advice, as Suzanne said, there could be a "it would be okay, provided that." And the difficulty of the "provided that" if it introduces additional criteria. Especially if there is no way in the mechanism to modify the proposal. So I think it will come to the definition of the types of strings that require that sort of special treatment or also -- if any. Thank you. >>HEATHER DRYDEN: Thank you, Bertrand. I have Rita, Denmark, Mike, and Erika. >>RITA RODIN JOHNSTON: I just wanted to briefly, now that Peter is back, just understand the format. We have a lot of issues to get through today. We just want to make sure we don't devolve into too much commentary and just listen to what the GAC's points are. Just really quickly, Bill, I'd love to say that the GAC can't ever object to anything. But we can't, right? The board can't say that. So I think, to your quick question, you guys wanted to formally be part of the early warning, which, I think, is why we said do that within the initial period that all the strings would be evaluated. If, at some point in time, the government wants to provide advice and object, we can't stop you doing that, right? >>HEATHER DRYDEN: Denmark, please. >>DENMARK: Thank you. I would just like to flag, as I did in Brussels, that the early warning system or the initial evaluation period and the public comment period in that is going through the electronic system and will end up in a panel and, again, this is not part of how governments work and not how we in the GAC work only. And so I guess that would also be a problem if we are only able to go through that. >>HEATHER DRYDEN: Okay, thank you, Denmark. >>BRUCE TONKIN: We weren't suggesting that. What I was doing was just explaining what the current process is and kind of where it would fit into the timeline. We're not assuming that you need to go to the public comment forum. We are assuming you provide your advice in the normal way, which would be a GAC communique and post it on your Web site with a link to us, et cetera. >>HEATHER DRYDEN: Thank you for that clarification, Bruce. Okay. Mike? >>MIKE SILBER: Thank you for that. Just to clarify, I'm not wanting to add anything. I'm just getting a little confused here. My understanding of the GAC request for the early warning was for you to give us, as the board and as the organization generally as well, clear notification to the applicant, clear and advance notice that there was potentially a problem with the string without having to go through the formal processes, that the GAC goes through in order to generate formal advice to the board. So this would be an early warning. You would be notified of the string, the applicant and the fact of the application. You would come back and say, We do not yet have a consensus position which would be considered advice but we have a problem with the string or potentially there is a problem with the string, potentially there is a problem with the applicant, or potentially there is a problem with the combination of the two or possibly there is a problem with all of those. And my understanding of what we discussed in Brussels is that the GAC would come back and give us some proposed process around that so that it was absolutely clear to applicants as well as ICANN the organization and ICANN the board so that we understood what we were likely to get. And the GAC would go into a little more of the detail. So, for example, would the GAC advise us how many countries had raised the concern? Would the GAC identify those countries? Would it be generic? Would they be categories that Suzanne was referring to earlier in respect to which that potential objection had been raised or in which the warning had come up? Or would it just be a generic warning? Those are some of the detail that I think we're looking for to understand the mechanism. But the principle that we don't need to wait for formal advice to be established and that the GAC can come back to us with a gut feel in the same way as many of the other constituencies do within this organization, to say we don't have a formal position yet but this is what we're thinking, it would give the GAC the opportunity. We would then need to work out exactly how we take that gut feel that we're getting back and factor it in, whether it is additional consideration or additional verification of the string or of the applicant or whatever it may be. But we need to work the process around this. I think the principle is well accepted. It's the detail, and I think we need -- and I'm not trying to absolve ourselves of responsibility. But I think we need some detail from the GAC in terms of how you would like to send this through and what you would like us to do with it, that we can look at it and say this is acceptable or this needs to be tweaked or this can't work. >>HEATHER DRYDEN: Thank you very much, Mike. I think that has been a very clarifying comment for the GAC. It also helps us to understand that ICANN would be notifying the GAC of both the string and the applicant. That helps us visualize, then, what steps may follow for the GAC. So thank you. Erika, you are next. >>ERIKA MANN: Actually, Heather, I can withdraw my comment because it was very similar to what Mike raised, and I really would prefer we go on. The only one point maybe, it's important, and Suzanne mentioned it and Mike referred to it, that we need to be -- really become clear about the procedures. And as soon as we are clear about them, I think we will not have any difficulties further on. >>HEATHER DRYDEN: Thank you, Erika. I have Germany next. >>GERMANY: Yes, thank you. I concur with the positions mentioned right before because I think it is really necessary to be clear what we are talking about. The term "early warning" seems for me to be quite shiny. And if I heard the discussions before, they seem to differ a bit. For me "early warning" was not only directed to the applicant, yes, it was, sure, but it was also directed to ICANN certainly. I think if I heard Bertrand, we maybe have a different position and understanding what is really "early warning" and that is something we should clarify before we start further discussion and evaluating some model which everybody has another understanding for. Thank you. >>HEATHER DRYDEN: Thank you, Germany. Okay. United States? >>UNITED STATES: Thank you. I did want to thank Mike for -- excuse me -- his very, very helpful intervention. And I think -- May I ask once we get the transcripts -- unfortunately for those of us on this side of the table, we can't see the screen because that screen isn't showing also. So apologies. But once we get the transcripts, would it be acceptable that we use Mike's intervention to further clarify what is currently on the scorecard as the board's response? Because that is an extremely helpful next -- further clarification. Otherwise, we're left with what's in writing and that does not reflect what Mike said. So I just -- if we can get an understanding of that, a green light, I think that gives us quite a bit to work with. Thank you. >>HEATHER DRYDEN: Thank you, U.S. I think that's very helpful. I understand that the transcripts are going to be distributed quite quickly after this session this morning. We're going to aim to run through all the topics this morning. And then the board is going to take some time this afternoon to discuss and report back at the end of the afternoon today. So we're just going to see how we manage this morning. So on that note, I think we can move to the next section which is community strings, which I believe is also the U.S. lead. So if I can ask you to continue. Thank you. >>UNITED STATES: Of course you may. Thank you. Quite candidly, the GAC is disappointed that the board has categorically rejected the core components of our advice on this point. And you appear to be substituting what we would like to see with flat out objections procedure. Just that's the only mechanism. There's no opportunity for the prior differentiation. So quite candidly at the present time, from our perspective, your response is not actually responsive to the concerns we're trying to convey. And perhaps we are more than willing to go back and try to refine our points. But just to further clarify where we're coming from, all of us represent domestic constituents. And we need to be mindful of the fact that they should have a reasonable expectation that applicants for new gTLD strings that clearly suggest they represent specific communities -- and, again, whether they are linguistic or ethnic or religious, et cetera -- that they need to be required to indicate that. Right now there is no requirement for an applicant to clearly, affirmatively identify that they relate to a specific community. They get to self-determine that, and so that's a concern we have. I believe Amadeu made a very good point more than once yesterday. It is not just the string but it is the intention behind it, which for us also there is a third point: And who's the applicant? So, again, to go back to doubt -- let me use a more whimsical one. Let's say dot martian. We would be interested to know how the applicant intended to use dot martian, so what was the intent. And we would be interested to know, to the extent we could, does the applicant actually have the approval of parent planet Mars? So, you know, hopefully maybe using a whimsical example helps explain our concern. It is a continuum because if they cannot demonstrate that they have the approval of the martian central command, then we would suggest that, hmmm, maybe there is no good reason to have dot martian in the root zone file because we're not entirely clear how it is going to be used. We're not entirely clear how it could potentially be abused. That's where we're coming from. >>HEATHER DRYDEN: Thank you, U.S. Bruce to respond. Thank you. >>BRUCE TONKIN: So I think, firstly, in terms of what the application actually has in it, it would have the name of the string. It would have the identity of shareholders, directors, et cetera, so you understand who is applying for the string. And it also has the mission and purpose of what the string is going to be used for and also the procedures for deciding who gets to register in that string. So you do have all that information. Secondly, a particular string, let's say dot Mars, there's also at least in Australia, a popular candy called a Mars bar. So I'm not sure that the company that makes Mars bars would need to get the permission of the martians to have dot mars. But the way the objection process is intended to work is if there was a community, we've yet to find them on Mars. But if there was, they could actually raise a community objection if they felt that the fact that an organization that makes Mars bars, they would be concerned about that. So the concept that we had and we thought -- we did articulate this in our last meeting, is that words may mean -- may be used for the purpose of a community but words may also be used in lots of other ways as well. And so we weren't predeciding a particular word as being a community word or being, you know, a name of the product. But what we did say is that if a community felt that they were going to be affected, that they would have the right to object. Now, all that information is available for that community to make a better determination of whether they feel they would be affected. And that's where there is the objection process. So the exception to this is in the case of country names and capital city names where we've said that they would actually need in that case the approval of the government. So if you wanted dot Paris, for example, that is an example where up front you do need a letter of approval or non-objection from the relevant authority. But apart from that category, we're assuming that names have different meanings. Sometimes they might be used in the purpose of the community, and other times they might be a legitimate product name. So that's kind of where our perspective was. >>HEATHER DRYDEN: Thank you, Bruce. European Commission. >>EUROPEAN COMMISSION: Thank you, yeah. And thank you, Bruce, for that explanation. I think this is one of the issues actually where it is not a lack of understanding or clarity, I think there is a difference of opinion. I think I understand very well actually the arguments put by the board. I think what the GAC is saying, and if we take the example of dot bank, again, actually, that it would be inappropriate to expect the community to have to object. We think it is better that the applicant should have to demonstrate that they have support. That's it in a nutshell. You know, when I listen to the arguments, you know, I have increasing concerns about the approach that's proposed by ICANN. For example, if we are talking about ethnic communities, cultural descriptions, you say they will have access to the information to object. Well, supposedly it is not in one of the languages that ICANN actually produced the guidebook in -- it is a monster. It is a horrendously complicated procedure. What happens if an ethnic minority actually finds that somebody else is operating a TLD with their description on it? They're unaware that ICANN existed. They're unaware of the objection procedure or they didn't understand it. I think they're the kind of concerns we have. And that's why it's unbalanced. It is not because we don't understand that many of your arguments are legitimate. I think we just feel unbalanced, the needle goes the other way. And the more conservative and safer approach actually would be where you have an application that appears to most reasonable people to relate to, you know, a distinct community that they should be asked for community support. This is not to say that would be easy. It's not to say they wouldn't be great cases. It is not to say that there would be some applicants with trademarks who may have problems for that. I don't think we are pretending that any of these approaches are easier. I think we are just saying from a public interest perspective, it would seem sensible to take a more conservative, safer approach actually, if you get applications and it looks like a duck and it quacks like a duck, then let's assume it is a duck and let's go and ask the duck community whether they support it. Thank you. >>HEATHER DRYDEN: Thank you, European Commission. I see no requests. Ah, Bertrand. >>BERTRAND DE LA CHAPELLE: I would just like to make a distinction in the scorecard the GAC has produced because I'm not absolutely sure that the two groups, or the two types, that you are putting together should get or should be treated in the same way. The whole part that is related to religious, ethnic, cultural, linguistic and so on is probably closely related to the notion of community and what the GAC is requesting is, basically, to make compulsory the choice of the community existing framework. The other topic we have circled a little bit around in Brussels and yesterday, it is actually not a question of community. It is much closer to the notion of industrial sector or it is much closer to a notion of verticals, because you remember in Brussels, it was extremely difficult to see where we want to stop. Is it purely -- where you want to stop. Is it purely the regulated industries, whatever they are? And even on that criteria, it could be extended. But where does dot music stand? Where does a dot hotel stand? I'm wondering whether those two issues shouldn't be, in any case, separated because they do not cover or raise the same type of problems. And in the case of the second group, which is more industry verticals, the question is, basically, the stakeholder groups that are concerned. So it's -- the notion that is in the scorecard that says they should be somehow an obvious manager for that, there's no way they can be an obvious manager for dot bank. Whatever the rules we could design, there is no single, obvious international manager for dot bank. The question you're raising, if we are looking at the objective -- and I think the board and the community share this objective -- is to make sure that there will be no misuse of a dot bank or other sectors. So that's the difference. It is not that there is only one manager, it is to make sure the stakeholder groups that are concerned are involved in the TLD. >>HEATHER DRYDEN: Thank you, Bertrand. I have Erika, United States and Denmark. >>ERIKA MANN: I have two points. One point about a procedure because I'm very keen that we get through on to noon because we need time to consult, and I'm very concerned if we go into details on all of the topics, although they are very important -- but I would really prefer to get an understanding about all of the issues. But let me just make one point back to the GAC, and I hope it is not a discussion point. Having been a member of the parliament -- actually, I would prefer the classical objection procedure the way it is defined yet because if you have -- you know, if you have such a broad understanding about possible community strings from all cultures, all religions, it is so broad. It covers so many possibilities, that a procedure -- a priority procedure, I think it is very difficult. I would really rather prefer the classical objection procedure, understanding case-by-case evaluation, and then really -- I get your point where you are concerned that certain groups will have not a possibility to participate. But I think that's an educational effort we all have to get engaged. But the States, or globally as well, that they take responsibility on those kind of issues as well. I think it is something we should evaluate when we reach this stage, and we see, you know, how many critical issues are coming up to really feel comfortable to make a decision. I think it's not -- will not be an elegant government procedure to foresee all worst-case scenarios which can pop up. It might play out very differently in reality. >>HEATHER DRYDEN: I think it is managing the risk that preoccupies the GAC to be viewing things from a public interest perspective. You need to anticipate worst case. Okay. So next I have United States, Denmark and Italy. I would just add before you take the microphone that because these are the issues that are of greatest interest to GAC members and where we have some 2s and 1Bs that I don't have concerns with us spending more time on this. I think for some of the other issues we can place them at the end of the morning and get to them if we can. But I think it's worth us spending a bit more time on these issues. Okay. United States, please. >>UNITED STATES: Thank you. And I was planning and hoping to kind of wrap up, but I think Heather is right. We are really trying to get our concerns across about the potential risks. So I think Bill used a very good word "conservative," and I'm just going to offer just from one country's perspective -- but I'm guessing a lot of my colleagues are going to start nodding. Quite candidly, if there is any contentious or applicant for something like a dot bank, we would probably at the end of the day feel a lot more comfortable if it simply doesn't proceed. It is totally baffling to us that strings -- it could be dot pharmacy, it could be dot you name it, strings that represent either highly regulated sectors in all of our countries or more vulnerable sectors or activities or more exposure to parts of our domestic constituents who are vulnerable, the elderly, children, et cetera. And if there was any amount of contention and disagreement, we would suggest that goes off to one side, that you simply should not want to proceed with that single applicant if there's so many objections raised as to does that entity represent that community effectively? Is the community comfortable that that proposed would-be registry operator is, in fact, the one agreed? Or do you find out that somehow through some ownership connection that's way buried, that that's a criminal enterprise that's been given a top-level domain that could do major harm? So that is where we are coming from, just to sort of, again, reinforce our concern about being more conservative and imposing more requirements on the applicants themselves. It simply cannot be anything goes by the first in line. So just to close up, we do think we need to discuss with you a little bit more on 2.2.4 where we suggested that -- and I think you agreed, you said staff would return with revised wording to address the concern we had that objectors must demonstrate, quote, material detriment to the broader Internet community, unquote. So we look forward to seeing that language and providing you with feedback. And then, finally, on 2.2.5, that's another 1B, "ICANN will investigate a mechanism for the forth-coming round under which GAC members could be exempted from paying fees for objections in some circumstances." So the "some circumstances" is of great interest to us. So we cannot respond at the present time. We'd like to have more detail and then I think we are done with this section. Thank you. >>HEATHER DRYDEN: I think it's managing the risk that preoccupies. Thank you, United States. I do have questions from Denmark or Italy. And I want to ask them whether they want to comment or whether we can move on to the next. Please, go ahead, Denmark. >>DENMARK: We also find that it's, as has been said, it's very important that we take a cautious approach and that we not only rely on the objection procedures. They are very cumbersome and expensive. And there will be many people who don't even know they exist. And that's why we're trying to mitigate the risk in the beginning. And, in doing so, if we want to mitigate misuse, it is definitely better to have the applicant to affirmatively identify them. And the whole process will be -- of evaluating the string will be easier as well when we know what's behind it. Thank you. >>HEATHER DRYDEN: Thank you, Denmark. Italy, do you still wish to speak? >> ITALY: Yes, very briefly. I would like the board to understand that the GAC simply mentioned this problem that is quite difficult, as Bertrand explained, to define in all the aspects beforehand. But, certainly, we have been anticipating kind of problems that will come out from experience. This is not that. And so, ideally, in the -- with the new gTLDs, we would like that new gTLDs are targeted to specific community. And this is something good as a wish, let's say. While we never have been talking especially that we want new gTLDs to be like a sponsor at gTLDs. This is another family. But, in a way, we have to demonstrate that in any new gTLDs is profitable useful for part of the community. So -- and I can agree on an observation that then, after making this broad definition, then the problems really would be -- have to solve in a case by case. Perhaps the definition will come more clear from experience. Thank you. >>HEATHER DRYDEN: Thank you very much, Italy. Okay. So let's conclude on that topic and move through the list. I propose that we move root zone scaling until the end of the list. And we will deal with that, time permitting. Which brings us to market and economic impacts where we have Portugal as the lead. So, Portugal, can I ask you to take us through the topic? Portugal, are you prepared to introduce us to this topic? Should we move to the next? >>PORTUGAL: Sorry. I was here solving some problems about the new gTLDs. Okay, on this issue of the market impact, what we suggest is that the board proactively initiate efforts to develop criteria to measure the costs and benefits of introduction of new gTLDs, not as an evaluation of the applicant, but to make the applicant accountable. For purposes of the review called for in the IOC under 9.3. These criteria shall be set on the basis of expert advice coming from reliable sources as OECD or from the economies ICANN is already working with as Katz, Rosston and Sullivan. So I think that's what I have to say for the time being. Thank you. >>HEATHER DRYDEN: Thank you, Portugal. Would the board like to respond or ask questions? >>RAY PLZAK: As the board lead on this, thank you for those comments. And we will take those, and we will work with you on that. >>HEATHER DRYDEN: Thank you for that, Ray. Are there any requests to comment? Portugal, do you have anything to add on this topic? >>PORTGUAL: No, I don't. As Ray said, I think we're going to work together. So I don't have anything to add for the time being. >>HEATHER DRYDEN: Okay. Thank you, Portugal. United States, did you have a comment? I did. Thank you for that opportunity. I think there was another comment in our proposal. Ana covered the first one very eloquently. There was a second element where we had recommended that the applicants be requested to provide some statements in their application of the expected benefits. And I believe the response -- you said you wanted to explore that further. And so we wanted to sort of offer up something that we're aware of as -- that could perhaps inform this process. It seems to us that there is a process that exists today that a -- in the context of the registrar accreditation agreement that, when a registrar comes to ICANN seeking accreditation, they are required to provide a business plan. So there's all sorts of data that needs to go along with that. We think it could be useful to explore whether you could simply add -- you know, you have those requirements which are already built in. But you just build on that obligation with an additional statement that would specifically address, from the applicant's perspective -- and surely they have a view on this, I would think -- the benefits the applicant expects it would accrue from its application. We don't consider this to be unduly burdensome. Simply, frankly if the applicant is really keen on their string, which we assume they would be, strikes us that they would be quite willing to add a statement or two as to what they expect the benefits to be. So, again, we are just trying to build into the process. To us this doesn't seem to be an additional burden. Just build it in so that people are clear as to what the expected benefits would be. So we offer that up as a suggestion. >>HEATHER DRYDEN: Thank you, U.S. Any comments? Okay. All right. So let's move onto the next topic, which is registry/registrar separation where I believe we have the European Commission leading. Yes, thank you. And thank you for the board response in writing on this issue, actually, which has been helpful in facilitating. Peter can't hear me. Is that better? Yeah. So just thank you to the board, actually, for providing a written response, actually, to the GAC scorecard proposal in this area. I think the initial reaction from my colleagues dealing with competition policy and antitrust was that I think we'd request a more reasoned argument, actually, for why ICANN feels -- why they've rejected the GAC advice for ex ante measures and prefer an ex post, actually, for this. I did hear comments from the chair the other day, when we discussed this, which I thought were very interesting. And I reported those back. And I don't have a reaction yet. I'm not entirely sure -- now Rita can't hear me. Okay. I'm not entirely sure how much further we can take this today. But I just share the observation I think one of the concerns that my colleagues have is that, with ICANN's history and with the nature of the market, the DNS, gTLD market, there has been a long-established practice, which ICANN have pursued for registry/registrar separation or cross-ownership. I think what's particularly confusing is that last year there were two board decisions, one which said that the board would maintain strict separation. And this didn't raise any eyebrows because this was expected and this was normal. And there was no reason -- there'd been no complains about this, as far as we knew. And then later in the year the board appeared to make a 180-degree turn on that, actually, and go the other way. I think that's still an element of the information that's missing for my colleagues. We have seen the staff papers in January, but we don't feel that addressed that particular question. Thank you. >>HEATHER DRYDEN: Thank you, European Commission. Does anyone want to comment on this topic? Okay. >>PETER DENGATE THRUSH: I'm the topic leader on that. I think we understand Bill's position. Thank you. >>HEATHER DRYDEN: Thank you for that. Okay. So let's move on through the list of scorecard topics. Let's move to consumer protection, where I believe we have the U.K. as the lead. >>UNITED KINGDOM: Thank you, chair. Actually, I think it's for the U.S to lead on this, if you agree. >>HEATHER DRYDEN: As you prefer. U.S., are you prepared to introduce consumer protection? We can come back to it, if you would like a moment. Okay. Please go ahead. >>UNITED STATES: Apologies for the confusion. I thought IP preceded consumer protection. >>HEATHER DRYDEN: It does. But we can deal with this later on, I think, towards the end as one of the more complex issues where we're waiting for some information from the board. And I think they're looking for information from us. So let's deal with that towards the end. Okay. >>UNITED STATES: Happy to. What we have here -- let me just figure out what number I am at. I think it is 6.4. Apologies everybody. I clearly have not had enough caffeine this morning, but I'm getting there. We'll rev it up here. I believe we have a 1B on that. Please correct me, colleagues. And I think there were some questions that you had as to whether this requirement that we are proposing that registry operators would cooperate with law enforcement agencies, and we had tried to broaden it to try to help you understand that, in some countries, an agency that actually does have responsibility for things like consumer protection may not typically fit under what you would traditionally consider a law enforcement agency. So we're trying to -- we will be clarifying for you that what we're referring to is any government agency or agency endorsed by a government that is going to -- that is in the process of conducting a lawful investigation or official proceeding inquiring into a violation of or a failure to comply with any criminal or civil statute or any regulation, rule, or order issued pursuant thereto -- you can see I had legal advice here. Pursuant thereto -- and must respond in a timely fashion to any request for information concerning any name registered in the top-level domain. So we understood that the board had expressed some hesitation as to whether we were asking registry operators to do more than they would be required by national law. And, of course, we would not be doing that, because that doesn't really make sense. Irony of ironies if we were to try to propose that. So we're trying to clarify just the scope of the entities. But they would have to be, you know, endorsed by -- officially, by a government. So it isn't just anybody claiming to be a law enforcement entity. I think there was also a question that you may have had as to, if there were any question on the registry operator's part, whether the request was legitimate. I think there are quite a few registry operators in the room here, whether they're gTLD registry operators or ccTLD operators who are, in fact, quite adept at working these things out. Typically, if there is a question, the operator could go to its own law enforcement entities and inquiry as to whether this request is a legitimate request. So there is an enormous amount of cooperation and collaboration that already exists globally among and between law enforcement agencies. And, again, maybe at some point we could schedule a little seminar. And I'm sure I'm not trying to set you up, but I know there are very responsible registry operators in the room who have considerable experience in handling these kinds of requests. So, from our perspective, this wasn't unduly burdensome. It wasn't creating a new obligation. It's simply so we can have confidence that the registry operator understands up front that there is this obligation to please respond in a timely fashion to a legitimate request for information in accordance with the national laws. I hope that is helpful on that point. And I'm happy to take any questions. >>PETER DENGATE THRUSH: Thanks, Suzanne. Gonzalo was on the working group. I think the topic leader was Ram Mohan who, has stepped out. Gonzalo, are you able to help with this? >>GONZALO NAVARRO: Thank you, Peter. I'm not going to speak on behalf of Ram, which is the leader on this team. But, thank you. This is really helpful, Suzanne. Because I remember the conversations we had in Brussels over this issue. My only question at this moment, because we still are -- we have some question -- or we put some question on the table in Brussels regarding law enforcement to the GAC is that do you have a list of possible institution organizations or law enforcement bodies that will be -- I don't know -- endorsed or have a category of endorsed institution? >>HEATHER DRYDEN: U.S., please. >>UNITED STATES: Thank you. That, we would call a wish list, which we would all love to have. And, in fact, there are quite a few people in the room, I believe, who -- and, certainly, several of my colleagues, one to my right and Elise Lindeberg to my left -- we sat in on the February 24/25 -- and so did Erika Mann. And Steve Crocker came in at the end. There was a session hosted by EU Commission between U.S. and EU cybercrime folks and registries and registrars. And, of course, we discussed -- this issue came up. And it does come up, periodically. And so we are very mindful of the motivation and would like to be as responsive as we possibly can. The challenge is compiling such a list. You may -- you know, as always is the case with lists, once you create one, you inevitably forget to put somebody on it. And then they might be misunderstood as somehow not being legitimate because they weren't on the list. So there is a willingness to explore whether, for example, in Europe, Europol probably maintains a list of, certainly, its members. Interpol certainly has a list of its members. It's once you go down below that level. And it's very, very challenging. So, again, that is, obviously, something we would all like to have. But then it sort of begs the question as to whether, once you compile a list -- let's assume, you know, we can actually produce such a thing. Then you'd have to maintain it and update it and have somebody somewhere assume the responsibility of verifying that the entities on the list remain the legitimate law enforcement entities. And so this is a task that, actually, Interpol is not set up to do. That is not what its members -- we are all members -- pay for. So we understand the challenge. And I think we're very aware of it and trying to work on it. There was a very practical suggestion that came out of that 2-day session -- so just one of several -- was that law enforcement and registries and registrars would collaborate on a template for these requests -- template for these requests so that in the template it would be clear, you know, who this entity was, what jurisdiction it was based in, et cetera, et cetera. So that it is going to become a little bit more simple, hopefully, once the template is created and agreed. I hope that is somewhat responsive to your question. >>GONZALO NAVARRO: Thank you, yes. Yes. What is important to us to understand is more than maybe the list or the kind of agency that you are thinking or you have in mind is the kind of law that you're trying to enforce, the extension of the law that you are trying to enforce. Because it's not the same -- I'm not trying to enforce drug-related or maybe -- I don't know -- IP international infringements. So it's really helpful to have that kind of map or that scope of the law that you guys have in mind at the moment to present this kind of law enforcement. Thank you. >>HEATHER DRYDEN: Thank you, Gonzalo. I do have Bertrand in the speaking order and now European Commission requesting the floor. Bertrand. >>BERTRAND DE LA CHAPELLE: Very quickly. I understood the problem with lists. And the more detailed they are, the more difficult they are to maintain. In order to move to a very operational simple step, would the notion of point of contact for each country, at least one, be an interesting element. So that, for instance, the actors that are contacted have an interlocutor just like in the registries or registrars, there's the need for point of contact? Would that be a simple list or a shorter list that could be maintained so that there is an interlocutor? >>UNITED STATES: Not being a law enforcement -- I'm sorry, Heather. Not being a law enforcement representative myself, I'm going to characterize what I believe I understand to be the case. There are law enforcement agencies in every jurisdiction. So it is -- and I would imagine jurisdiction by jurisdiction they're fairly readily identifiable. So, if a registry operator in a particular jurisdiction had a question about the incoming request -- let's say we get our template, which I believe we will have -- the first step will be -- if it wasn't clear on the template, they would contact their own national law enforcement entity to help them confirm. So that strikes us as being a fairly logical step in this process. I apologize, if that's not entirely responsive. >>HEATHER DRYDEN: Thank you, United States. I have European Commission and U.K. >>EUROPEAN COMMISSION: Thank you. And thank you to U.S. reminding me about that workshop in Brussels, actually, just before the board meeting. That was very useful. Thank you to the registrars who took part, particularly if they're in the room here now. And, of course, law enforcement colleagues. And part of that day, which I found particularly interesting, was devoted to a presentation by ARIN, the regional Internet registry for North America, how they deal, actually, with cooperation with law enforcement and dealing with complaints about potential criminal activity. It was very interesting, actually. And I came away with the impression that they don't have this problem of identifying who they should operate with or who they shouldn't operate with. I suspect they apply a lot of common sense. But it may very well be that they have a best practice that could be drawn on. And maybe other parts of the ICANN community also have existing gTLD registries. The other regional Internet registries who have a history of cooperating with law enforcement without -- in the absence of a list. I imagine none of them have a list of public authorities that they should work with. Many of them are global in nature, such as the gTLDs, or regionals such as RIPE and ARIN and APNIC. There may be a solution there, actually, is to ask them how they do it. Thank you. >>HEATHER DRYDEN: Thank you, European Commission. If I understand the question coming from the board, it's around what kind of abuse, what would constitute abuse. Is that correct? >>GONZALO NAVARRO: I've not phrased it in that direction. But, yes, the intention is to know what kind of law are you trying to apply? And it's connected with the entity which is in charge of enforcing that particular law. But I think that we have enough material to work on this topic. And that's pretty much what I have to say by the moment. But I don't know if my colleagues on the board are -- have another opinion or maybe other questions. >>HEATHER DRYDEN: Thank you. I have United Kingdom. >>HEATHER DRYDEN: Thank you. I have United Kingdom. >>UNITED KINGDOM: Thanks very much, chair. I just wanted to add to that, partly in response to the question about listings of the kinds of government bodies and so on that we're talking about here. We have been talking about law enforcement, but of course general consumer law is quite often in administrations undertaken not by police authorities but by bodies that are responsible, really, for the enforcement of general consumer law. So for example, in the U.K. you've got the office of fair trading and trading standards bodies that basically pick up on issues that consumers are raising about unfair practices, about fraudulent activity, and so on. So we really wanted to capture in this text the extension of the coverage of entities that registries should be mindful of and be responsive to, including, as I say, bodies that are tasked with enforcing consumer law at the national level. So I just wanted to ensure that that sense of undertaking by registries that they should respond to consumer complaints, if they're coming from those bodies charged by governments with enforcing the level of consumer protection within their populations, in addition to law enforcement police activity with regard to pursuing fraud and so on. Thanks. >>HEATHER DRYDEN: Thank you, U.K. I see Greece and then I would propose that we move into the -- the law enforcement item on the agenda because it's closely related to this. Is that all right? So Greece, please go ahead. >>GREECE: Thank you, Heather. Criminal law is very much national law. I'm saying this because I don't think it is necessary to produce a huge list of all national law enforcement and consumer protection authorities to which every single registry would respond, upon request. The essential thing is that a registry which is located in a country is familiar with the authorities in that country which are likely to ask its support. Requests coming from third countries would have to go through the internal national procedures. They would have to pass the internal law enforcement, so to speak, or other authorities. So it's not that every registry should know the hundreds of authorities all over the world and immediately respond to any request. I don't think this would be in line with national criminal laws. It is sufficient that the authorities know their own -- the registries know their own authorities, which would be probably 5 or 10 or -- but not more. >>HEATHER DRYDEN: Thank you very much, Greece. Okay. I see no more requests. >>PETER DENGATE THRUSH: Can I just close on that, because I think we have to be clear. This isn't a pushback on the principle of cooperating with law enforcement at all. The principle here is trying to create clear, enforceable contract terms for the registries, and if it's -- I very much appreciate Greece's clarification. If it's agreed that all of those requests are going to come through a national agency, then there's very little difficulty. The problem -- the kind of problem we see is when a law enforcement agency in, say, Africa is wanting to contact a registrant -- a registry operator in Asia, but -- when they don't know each other, they don't know what the law is, what are the obligations, so I find that very helpful. Thank you. >>HEATHER DRYDEN: U.S. to respond? >>UNITED STATES: Yes, please. And then I'm happy to move on into the two other consumer protection and then law enforcement issues. Actually, no, I think we need to keep it as flexible as possible, Peter, that the request for information could come, to use your example from a law enforcement entity in -- from the huge, vast continent of Africa to a registry operator based somewhere in Asia directly. Should the operator have a question as to the status of that entity making the request, they can, of course, seek clarification from their own law enforcement entity who can help verify that this is a legitimate request. I hope that helps. And if we could just move on fairly quickly to complete the other parts of the consumer protection issue, we wanted to thank ICANN for its commitment, public commitment in Brussels and now in writing, to increase -- to strengthen ICANN's contractual compliance function, and it would just be very helpful for us to know -- to have some details, if we could, in the near term to identify the number of personnel that you are seeking to add to your -- to the staff to support the compliance function, and the time line that you might be contemplating to do this. In particular, it would be helpful to know how many staff you intend to have in place prior to the launch of the new gTLD program. And a suggestion that -- from our part that you may have already contemplated, in fact, is to -- we would encourage that ICANN ensure that it does have sort of global distribution of staffing so that you could use regional compliance officers that might help add an element to the program. With regard to the vetting of certain strings -- and certainly yesterday it was a very useful exchange that we had, and we do agree that perhaps our terminology was certainly not at all clear and there is no internationally agreed definition of "generally regulated," so we think we have a constructive practical solution and we certainly heard one yesterday, I believe, from Mason Cole, the registrar community. They support the concept of more intense vetting. So we think that is a very constructive suggestion, just increase the vetting of all would-be applicants. The bar should be set really, really high, from our perspective. If you're going to have -- get approval to operate a top-level domain that goes into the root, potentially, forever and ever and ever, then the screening should be fairly intense. If we are just moving on, then, to the law enforcement proposals -- >>HEATHER DRYDEN: U.S., if I can make a suggestion. I hadn't realized that there was additional -- there were additional points under consumer protection, so why don't we take a break at this point and then -- and then reconvene again in about 15 minutes. Okay. All right. So 15 minutes, please be back in the room. Thank you. [ Break ] >>PETER DENGATE THRUSH: Ladies and gentlemen, we're well past 15 minutes. Let's take our seats and resume, please. >>HEATHER DRYDEN: Hello again, everyone. If you could just take your seats, we'll begin in a minute or so. Okay. Let's begin again. >>PETER DENGATE THRUSH: Just before we get back into the substance, I thought it might be helpful to explain, perhaps to observers. I know today is constituency day for many people and you're balancing attending here and your constituency. The plan that we've discussed with Heather -- that I've discussed with Heather and the board is working on is that we will stay here with the GAC, listening to the GAC on its response to our scorecard and discussing items. Until that's finished, we suspect that will take till about 12:00, 12:30. Then we will break for lunch. We are then going to go away and work on our board small groups to digest the material that we have had from the GAC and the material we've got yesterday from the public forum and the written statements that are coming in, and then we'll work to get a response, and our suggestion is that we come back to the GAC between 4:00 and 5:00 and report our progress and see where we are from there. We've then got another public forum tomorrow, and further discussions with the GAC on Thursday. So that's the outline as we see it. We're here to listen and get as much as we can from the GAC, and then we need to put all that together with the information that we got yesterday. Thanks. >>HEATHER DRYDEN: Thank you for that, Peter. Just a note on the public community session tomorrow. The GAC will be in its plenary meeting, so we unfortunately will not be able to participate in that, but -- but we are aware that this schedule has been altered to include such a session on new gTLDs. Okay. So we just completed consumer protection, which has strong links to law enforcement, so I propose that we continue and move into law enforcement as our next item, and we have the United States as the lead on this from the GAC side. So if you wouldn't mind walking us through our initial response. >>UNITED STATES: Thank you, Heather. I'm happy to do that. But before I do that, if I may, you know, it's great to have the microphone because you get a little bit of a bully pulpit, but I wanted to, again, go back to yesterday's public session and to thank the members of the community for their comments on these issues, consumer protection and law enforcement. In particular, I think Steve Metalitz made a very, very useful intervention yesterday to suggest -- because frankly which is how some of us in capitals are struggling with what appears to be a -- somewhat of a disconnect between recognizing that there is the potential for risk. We know of the vast amounts, quite candidly, of criminal activity and consumer abuse that currently occurs, and so I do think it's important that we keep reminding ourselves that this is a shared goal of everybody in the community, we would like to think, of minimizing harms to consumers, minimizing risk, mitigating malicious conduct and abuse of the DNS. That that would be a shared goal, and we embrace that a little bit more affirmatively, if I may say, than is currently coming across in the document. I also wanted to thank the presentation from Debbie Hughes of the Red Cross. It's always useful to have very concrete examples of the kinds of risks that an entity like the Red Cross is also subject to. So that is exactly where we are coming from in addressing these issues and making our proposals. So shifting gears from consumer protection straight into law enforcement, which of course is quite logical, when we had our exchange in Brussels, the board presented us with several very concrete, very useful questions, so why don't I sort of go to those questions and our proposed responses. Again, this is our current best thinking as to how we are going to be responding in writing. I think the question was -- we were talking about including other criminal convictions as criteria for disqualification, and the response we had from the board was that you accept in principle, of course, that screening should be as effective as possible and that you're willing to meet with law enforcement experts to ensure that all available expertise is focused on this issue. And you note, quite correctly, that there is no consistent definition of "criminal behavior" across multiple jurisdictions. So the first question we had was: What kind of drug conviction or other conviction is the GAC envisioning? And what we are thinking of is anything other than simple possession. So we're talking about the illegal sale, manufacture, or distribution of illicit or pharmaceutical drugs. In addition, we think the background screening should inquire about acts of terrorism, arms trafficking, human trafficking, money laundering, smuggling, including weapons, intellectual property crime and cybercrime, including civil or criminal judgments involving spam, hacking, or the deployment of botnets. In addition to the criminal conduct, we think due diligence should also inquire whether the applicant or any individuals named in the application have been subject to court or administrative orders involving violation of laws prohibiting unfair or deceptive practices. So that's our answer to Question Number 1. And then our next proposal had been that -- encouraging ICANN to assign a higher weight to applicants offering the highest levels of security, to minimize the potential for malicious activity. And particularly, for those strings that we believe present a higher risk of serving as venues for criminal, fraudulent, or illegal conduct. And again, the examples we might offer are those strings that might relate -- have anything to do with children, healthcare, financial services, the elderly, et cetera. The board response, as we understand it, is that you would consider providing extra points in some aspects of the qualification, evaluation, scoring process, while noting again that you have some -- believe the idea of categories is, again, inherently problematic, to use your term. So the question we had from you on this point is: Has the GAC determined parameters to determine what strings are more easily to be used as venues for criminal conduct? In thinking this through, we've actually stepped back a pace, and we believe that higher weight -- we would appreciate, certainly, that higher weight would be assigned to those applicants who are affirmatively coming to you and offering up higher levels of security. And we know that there are many who probably would be quite willing to do this, so we think it's quite reasonable to, if you will, incentivize people to do that, and then to reward them. We would also recommend that you publicly disclose whether the applicant has, in fact, offered augmented security levels. It's just very useful for everybody to be more aware of that. And of course in our point on categories, we'd just refer you back to our suggestions on the consumer protection concerns. The next proposal from us had to do with adding domestic screening services local to the applicant to complement what you are already proposing to undertake. So again, your response is very positive. You accept the principle that screening should be as effective as possible, and you're willing to work with law enforcement and other security experts to flesh that out in greater detail. And you suggest that international screening is likely to include the reports of local agencies and could, therefore, be duplicative. So the -- the question was: What level of local screening is the GAC considering as appropriate? Our proposed response would be: Yes, we appreciate the fact that you agree with us. Screening should be as effective as possible. Right now, it's hard for us to know what kind of screening services that you intend to use. It's not clear in the guidebook at all. So what we are offering up from our countries and our respective law enforcement agencies could recommend -- depending on what you intend to do, once we know that, that you could -- we would then recommend the use of additional services to supplement, rather than replace, the existing screening, to ensure a comprehensive, but not duplicative, search would be conducted. Again, to cite an earlier example from Bill Dee, because we had a very comprehensive and yet concise presentation from Leslie Nobile of ARIN during the law enforcement session at the end of February in Brussels, and it was clear that ARIN uses a number of different sources when it conducts background screenings prior to IP address allocation, including Noex (phonetic), Dun & Bradstreet, Westlaw, and relevant federal and state Web sites for corporate and financial information. So we just want to put that out there and appreciate your willingness to work with law enforcement agencies in our respective countries. The next proposal had to do with adding criminal background checks to the initial evaluation, and again, you've come back very positively, accepting in principle but you've reminded us that there is no consistent definition of "criminal behavior" across multiple jurisdictions, which of course we accept. So your question to us, in that regard, was -- you pointed out that the background screening that happens before the initial evaluation does check for criminal convictions. Is the GAC proposing moving this to the initial evaluation as opposed to before the initial evaluation? And the second question was: Is the GAC considering something different from the criminal background checks that are already envisioned in the guidebook? So our proposed response is that: No, we're not proposing to change the time line for the background screening, but rather, to expand its scope to ensure a comprehensive review. So as noted in response to the earlier question, we would think the screenings should include the illegal sale, manufacture, or distribution of illicit or pharmaceutical drugs, acts of terrorism, arms trafficking, human trafficking -- the same list we had before. We'll, of course, be providing this in writing. And in addition to criminal conduct, we would hope that the due diligence would also inquire whether the applicant or any individuals named in the application have been subject to court or administrative orders involving violations of laws prohibiting unfair or deceptive practices. I believe the next point we made was to amend the statement in the guidebook that the results of your due diligence efforts would not be posted, and we are asking you to amend that to a more positive statement that indicates that, yes, you will be making the results of your due diligence publicly available. You have indicated that you would explore ways to make the results public but you were concerned that posting such information poses concerns about privacy that we should further explore. So we appreciate that you are willing to further explore these issues, and we want to engage with you on that, but at a minimum it strikes us that the individuals named in the application -- such as the officers, the controlling shareholders, et cetera -- should, in fact, be publicly released. The disclosure of the identity of these individuals is actually necessary, we think, for stakeholders to have full information when filing objections or submitting public comments. Particularly if they might be aware of other matters related to these individuals that could be of concern. So we would ask you to reconsider that, and we do stand willing, especially via the offices of our respective law enforcement entities, to work with you to further flesh out these particular points. Thank you. >>HEATHER DRYDEN: Thank you, United States. Would anyone like to comment further or ask for clarifications to that? Gonzalo? >>GONZALO NAVARRO: Thank you, Heather. Thank you, Suzanne, and thank you to the GAC for the responses. Well, we have a lot of material to work on, so since this is the first time that we have the opportunity to see the answers, I would like to receive this information. We are going to work on it and let's see what -- how can we move on on this issue. Thank you. >>HEATHER DRYDEN: Thank you very much. Okay. Seeing no further requests to speak, let's continue with post-delegation disputes. And I believe we have Norway to present the initial GAC response on this topic. >>NORWAY: Thank you, Heather. This is, as we have discussed before, quite a simple issue, as we see it. It is basically about securing a mechanism, or legal tool, to ensure that the agreement between government and registries under your name is possible to enforce, if that is needed. On Point 7.1, we have an ICANN response that sets -- not -- they don't want to put "we comply" into the registry agreement because ICANN's commitment to comply with legally binding decision is made to governments and not to registries. Therefore, it's not necessarily in the interest of ICANN or of governments to place that obligation in the registry agreement, giving registry operators the ability or perhaps duty to enforce ICANN to implement decisions in every case. The GAC response to that is that ICANN cannot take the role of judging or denying the consequences of a legally binding decision under different jurisdictions; that, in fact, that ICANN is -- that is, in fact, what ICANN is doing when the possibility is kept open in the registry agreement on whenever -- whatever ICANN may follow a legally binding decision taken on a national level. So I just want to ask a question, for clarification and augmentation, of ICANN. Can you explain or give an example in a case where a legally binding court decision, on the national level, is not in the interest of a government to follow? Can I just ask maybe Bertrand will answer? >>PETER DENGATE THRUSH: Bertrand is the topic leader on this, and we've been happy to respond. >>BERTRAND DE LA CHAPELLE: The dimension that has been put forward is the first element regarding the nature of the letter of support and non-objection. The way it has evolved, this is an instrument that is now in the possession of governments to actually establish a certain framework regarding the constraints that the government is putting on giving or not giving this authorization or this support. And so there is a great latitude for the government to put in the document elements that relate to its relation with the applicant for that specific string. So it is an instrument that has been created by the program to give a great variety. So fundamentally, the elements that are in this draft document are not compulsory in any way for the government. The government has the possibility to amend the different aspects. But the contract that the -- that ICANN does with the registry is binding ICANN and the registry, and what I understood -- and that may be a failure of my understanding of the difference between environments with common law and other types of environments. What I understood and what has been explained is that this is a commitment that ICANN is making to governments, but not a commitment that ICANN is making to the -- to the applicant that is in operation. And so the hypothesis that has emerged in our discussion in the board is a situation where if, for instance, there is a court decision at the national level that is in disfavor of the government and, for instance, there may be additional recourse or the government is contemplating whether it should appeal this decision, this provision in the agreement would enable the TLD to tell ICANN, "You must implement this decision that is in our favor, irrespective of the further recourse." That's the way I think we understand the problem, but others may contribute. >>HEATHER DRYDEN: Norway. >>NORWAY: Government sets conditions to provide support and non- objections, and they base the agreement, if they have an agreement, on the law in their own jurisdiction. And of course the government, in the case of a dispute -- and you have to say that we are talking about a legally binding decision. So of course you can appeal. You can have to wait until it's legally binding, finally legally binding. But in the case of a finally legally binding decision, governments will want to follow up on that decision also if it's not in the favor of the governments, because it is a legal decision under their own jurisdiction, and of course governments would want to follow up on that one also when it's not in their favor, okay? >>BERTRAND DE LA CHAPELLE: So I think there are two elements that we are seeing here. One is the distinction that we agree that it would be a finally legally binding, so not in the course of possible appeals or things like that, okay? The second element is in the case where there have been several or multiple letters of support and non-objection, how should we handle -- I mean it's a question mark. How should we handle a decision in one court, for instance -- imagine you have two countries that have agreed and given an authorization that a linguistic and cultural TLD has been developed. How should we handle the situation when one court has taken a decision and the other government is opposed to the consequences it has on the TLD? >>NORWAY: Thank you. As I said, it's two different subjects, really. If you have one governmental approval, you will not have a question about what is the legally binding decision because it comes from one -- one jurisdiction. So that's one case and we might be able to get an agreement with you on that. The other situation, as we described, is regarding if you have support from several governments, and if the guidebook doesn't have any writing on that one, it should have. We have a suggestion. Maybe you should then ask for some sort of agreement or some sort of clarification on what jurisdiction will have the final writing. Maybe it's possible. You have those agreements in other areas that you say that, "Okay, we come from different jurisdictions and we decide that to get this into the root, we decide that it will be -- it could also be California law, "That kind of thing, but you just have to make a decision on what kind of legally binding decision you will follow and which jurisdiction is relevant in that case, maybe. That's a suggestion. Thank you. >>PETER DENGATE THRUSH: We thought it might be helpful if Kurt Pritz actually both asked a clarifying question and then perhaps provided an answer because this is dealt with in a number of places in the guidebook. Kurt? >>KURT PRITZ: Hi. So does your question go to ICANN's obligation to follow the legally binding decisions of courts in all jurisdictions? Or does your question really go to what if there is a conflict between courts in two different jurisdictions? >>NORWAY: I think you are the one who brought both those issues up because, basically, you give us the tool in some cases, in some geo name cases to have conditions. And as we see it, if you don't say anything in the registry agreement about -- to kind of warn the registry that if you are in conflict with the agreement you have with a government, if you break the contract, the terms, we will have to act on that because we have promised the government to act on that. And as we see it, if you don't have anything in the registry agreement, first of all, it will be difficult to held the registry responsible for the breach of the contract with the nations. And, also, the governments will not have an assurance because you don't have the tool to the registry. So that's -- I don't know if that's the answer to your question. But one answer, I think. >>KURT PRITZ: So thanks. So certainly, you know, ICANN has the obligation to follow those decisions. And, certainly, it's in the guidebook, and it's going to be augmented to put the language back to where it was in previous versions, that ICANN has that obligation. But we thought that our obligation is to the governments, not to the registries, so that we put it in different areas of the guidebook. If you're describing that we want to create an obligation in the registries to follow court decisions also, you know, I would -- I will talk that over with John and our legal counsel about -- you know, because they already have that obligation, I think. But we can talk about how we can raise -- we can use the registry agreement to raise an obligation in registries. But ICANN's obligation to governments, we just want to make them to the governments. We don't want to make them to the registry. >>NORWAY: I see that. But if you put some -- I don't know. Maybe it's kind of a different legal framework you have in different countries. But at least we think -- don't you have to warn the registry that you have an obligation for the governments -- to the governments to follow up on the decision like that? >>KURT PRITZ: Well, I don't think -- I don't know. I don't think we need to tell the registries we need to follow the law because we certainly will. And so I'm not the best one to be talking here. There could be a risk, if there is conflicts of courts -- we don't want decisions from courts enforced by registries on ICANN, right? We want to comply with -- we want to comply with the rule of governments and have them enforce the law; and we will, of course, follow the law. >>NORWAY: But as we see it, it would not be a problem for the registry to have some terms in the contract with you that they have to follow up on the national agreement. They have gone into this agreement with the governments with open eyes. We have given the approval in certain terms, which is okay for them, basically, because that's why they have applied for the string to use. So then we say that for the registry, it shouldn't be a problem at all. But you say or warn them that you have to be cautious of the terms that you got, the approval of non-objection. Okay. Thank you. >>BERTRAND DE LA CHAPELLE: Actually, there was in there not only the question of the commitment by ICANN to comply with those decisions but also the distinction between court decisions and legally binding decisions. I understand the clarification, and it is useful that we are talking about a final decision in case of a court process. The concern that still remains and needs to be explored is the exploration legally binding decision can be relatively extensive. And in Brussels, I think there was a discussion about the fact that it can be an administrative decision or just by the ministry in a country. Just like Elliot Noss said yesterday, there are good registrars and bad registrars. There are good I.P. lawyers and bad I.P. lawyers. There are, let's say, governance frameworks in different countries that are better than others. And in terms of the predictability and the certainty of the framework that registrars are going to be operating in, there is a strong difference between the processes provided by court decisions in case of dispute and the processes that are applicable by pure administrative decisions. There can be situations where imagine that after all the process of complying with a certain number of rules their TLD is, basically, authorized to begin to operate and then for whatever reason, there has been a change, an administrative movement, and just by a stroke of the pen the authorization is revoked and it is then not a dispute between the government and the operator. It is an authoritative redelegation of sort. How can we avoid that kind of situation so there is a minimum of predictability and a minimum of process to guarantee that the operator has the capacity to defend and the decision to create the TLD is relatively stable? >>NORWAY: It is difficult to have a 100% secure system for this. But I think you don't have any other choice that if given the governments -- each government a possibility to say yes or no on terms, you don't have any other choice than to follow a decision in that jurisdiction. Of course, they will have -- >>PETER DENGATE THRUSH: Perhaps I could intervene at this point. I think we are probably getting down to a debate on a fine point. This is really a very complex legal question. Let's see if we can't get the lawyers in a room. I think we understand your concern. We've got our lawyers, and maybe we can sit with you -- It is a complex question. There are multiple parties, and now we can figure out a way. >>BERTRAND DE LA CHAPELLE: Peter, if I can make a brief comment on this. >>PETER DENGATE THRUSH: One brief one because we need to close on this. >>BERTRAND DE LA CHAPELLE: The capacity is given to government to have an element of control or supervision on something that is going to be established most likely on their territory. Once a TLD has been established, it will not necessarily serve only actors that will be in this jurisdiction. So there is a global public interest challenge in making sure that ultimately a later decision by a government a sovereign government, will not have an impact on other governments or other territories. Because if somebody from your country has actually registered a domain name in a gTLD that is established in another one and if the government of the other country in its own sovereign right is completely changing the conditions unilaterally of how this TLD should operate, your citizens are harmed. And so the question we're trying to address here is how to make sure that the right that governments have to establish rules are not at the same time the right to change things that will impact other governments and other citizens. So it is a balance between your sovereignty and the necessary sovereign right and the responsibility towards other governments. >>HEATHER DRYDEN: Norway, please. >>NORWAY: I will make this very short. We can discuss it further. But I think the main point is that a registry going into an agreement with a government, they know their own government, they know their own systems. So it is not like you have this super stable situation and you go in and suddenly everything changed so your legal system goes bananas or you have somebody taking it back for personal reasons or whatever. You kind of know the terms that it is stepping into when you go into an agreement. But we don't have to discuss the details. Thank you. >>HEATHER DRYDEN: Thank you, Norway. Denmark had asked for the floor. Would you like to comment before we close on this topic? Please go ahead. >>DENMARK: Thank you. And following on my Norwegian colleague, this is crucial for governments. And we governments make legally binding decisions every day. We explain what we do, and then people can go to court and challenge that. We do that every day. This is our right. Yeah, thank you. >>HEATHER DRYDEN: Thank you for that, Denmark. Okay. So the next topic we have is use of geographic names where there are a number of issues of considerable interest to the GAC remaining. Germany is the lead on that topic, so I will ask Germany to please give a sense of what the GAC is contemplating on these issues. Thank you. >>GERMANY: Yes, thank you. The discussion on geographic names is one of the oldest ones we have because it is -- it appears in our GAC principles in a very early stage. And I think -- and I'm looking forward to develop it to an end. But unfortunately we have in the GAC response two Number 2s and these Number 2s are in very crucial positions. Therefore, it is unlikely to come to a very easy and swift solution. But I will try it again. The public forum yesterday showed various positions in regards to geo names. I understood that all had one in common. There is a sense of uneasiness regarding the current definition of "geo names" as it stands in the applicant guidebook. And having considered the position of the board in regard of geographic names, we still think that as the public comment period allows free-of-charge comments on every applied-for string, individual governments, as the entire GAC, could inform ICANN which strings they consider to be good geographic names. ICANN should commit to process applications for strings that governments consider to be geographic names only if their respective governments does support or at least non-object to the use of such strings. I will give some explanation why I think this is -- or could be an adequate solution for defining of geographic names because, first of all, as a governmental representative, it would allow to safeguard our interests. That's one issue which is a simple one. It would allow the a balance of interests -- and that is important for me -- between applicant and governments to come to individual solutions. In this point, I want to make clear such an instrument should not be understood to give GAC a tool to block any TLD which GAC considers to be a geographic name. I think it should rather be understood as instrumental to establish a mediation procedure between applicant and a responsible government. Such an instrument as suggested by the GAC would provide a pragmatic approach to solve outstanding issues on geographic names. These issues that we discussed for at least three or four years now and would allow an immediate introduction in the applicant guidebook. Let me make in this position clear what may be in some discussions misinterpreted. It is the role of the government, and I think it is not a role that governments create obstacles for commercial activities. I think as a contrary, we want to make clear and predictable rules that allow applicants to undertake commercial activities. And, therefore, I think we also would ask that we have this process at the very beginning of this comment period, at the very beginning of the process, that the applicant knows what he may face or what is the position of the government to this. If, however -- And what the situation as it stands is the board cannot accept the GAC proposal. So GAC would be prepared to discuss alternative procedures. We see the need for discussions regarding the following issues I want to shortly mention. One issue is to extend the name of protected names for geo TLDs. I think I mentioned it in the last four or five GAC meetings and ICANN meetings, exchanges with the board, that in particular common used abbreviations are not in this list and there is a need for clarifying how to integrate it. Yesterday I heard some considerations that another list might be integrated. This is a welcomed approach, but it would not probably solve every problem but may be an important step. And we have to consider this internally within GAC. The next one is we need to refine is the community objection procedure. In its current form, it does not meet the requirements of the governments. One general view is that from the GAC point of view, a panel ruling regarding community objection should not concentrate on deciding whether or not a gTLD should be introduced. And it is now a panel decision whether a gTLD might be introduced or a string might be used or not. We would prefer that this panel should establish, yes, a balanced position and establish safeguards that allowed balancing the interest of the governments on one side and the applicant on the other side. I think this is a bit more sophisticated approach and it needs probably further consideration. I don't -- I can go in depth and mention several issues which I think are very difficult for governments to follow in respect of the community objections. But I think in having in mind that we should not concentrate too much on detailed discussions, I would prefer not to go in this discussion. But you have to be of mind that from our point, it is very important that this objection procedure would have been to revise if we don't have this early warning process, as I mentioned before. A third issue I also want to mention is that ICANN needs to develop some instruments or safeguards that if an applicant that wants to use geographic names for non-community purposes may not misuse it. There is some safeguard probably already in the application period, but maybe we need this kind of safeguard also as a post-delegation instrument. We have a post-delegation instrument for clear geographic names which have the support or non-objection from the local government. We don't have established such instruments for standard TLDs which use geographic names that are not community TLDs in this context. And, further, I would like to seek clarification in regard the issue of 8.1.3. This point ICANN refers to post-delegation procedures for non-community TLDs. And I wonder how ICANN or a government could refer to post-delegation mechanisms for standard TLDs where the registry did not restrict itself to -- in its domain policy. I wonder how we could use a post-delegation instrument in regard of this -- in these cases. As mentioned before, the post-delegation process works for classical gTLDs with the support of governments as defined. But it would work, I understand it, for city names that are used for non- community purposes. I think, in a nutshell, that's our position on geo names. Thank you. >>HEATHER DRYDEN: Thank you very much, Germany. Bertrand, did you want to comment as the lead? >>BERTRAND DE LA CHAPELLE: Yeah, actually. On the different points, the first element is if we use the early warning or a mechanism that allows the GAC, for instance, to raise the nature of a geographic name that is not in the list, if I use your procedure, that would mean, if I use your explanation of mediation procedure, that something that was not in the application that was submitted will actually be required. Imagine that the GAC says, This is a geographic name and you should have the support or non-objection by the relevant government. According to the current mechanism, this applicant, if the geo name is not in the list, doesn't have to produce those documents. It is an open question, how to handle this additional criteria or this additional information that the applicant should obtain. The second element -- I'll take the last point as a second point. If I understand correctly, and I'm trying to rephrase, what you are saying is that in the current systems, the post-delegation dispute resolution is not useful if the string was not qualified as a community or as a geographic name in the first place. Because if the applicant has said, "I am not going to use this as a geographic name," it goes in as a standard and then the post-delegation procedure is not available. Is that the problem? What would be a solution to that? Because I believe there is an element here. What would be the solution, and what kind of post- delegation recourse would the GAC envisage to respond to this perceived lack? And the second point you mentioned was a little bit more fuzzy. I think the question of lists we shouldn't get into details. It is an open thing that can be explored if there are additional lists that are usable. I think the board is interested in exploring anything that can really be used. But the second point you mention, I'm not sure I completely understood the point about the community objection procedure, the banner ruling should not be on whether the string should be introduced or not but rather about something else. If you could clarify and sorry for my misunderstanding on that. >>HEATHER DRYDEN: Germany or others, would you like to respond or make further comment? >>GERMANY: Yes, may I? >>HEATHER DRYDEN: Please, go ahead. >>GERMANY: Yes, regarding the last question, I think yes, the community objection procedure as it stands does not meet the requirement of governments. And maybe I will give also improved some requirements in this objection procedure. One requirement is objection needs to demonstrate that there is substantial opposition. That is more a question how, do you accept -- if a mayor comes to ICANN or to the panel and says, "I do not want it," would it be substantial opposition? Or would it be required that there is some surveys additional organized by the city and showing that the largest population doesn't want it? From my point of view, a bit difficult because the mayor of a city as an elected politician should be entitled and empowered to decide whether or not there is substantial opposition in its community. And, by the way, this instrument seems for me to be rather expensive and disencourages, by the way, also communities which are not so wealthy. The wealthy communities -- wealthy cities may have the possibility to spend and invest in lawyers, in, yes, translations -- that is one issue -- and maybe also in surveys or whatever to prepare for these kind of procedures. Poorer communities probably also from developing countries might be disadvantaged in this respect because they probably will not have some means -- the money to simply -- to raise these kind of objections. And this is something, I think, that's not balanced. Another one is the objection needs to prove a strong association between the applied string and the community. In many cases, this might be. But if we come to abbreviations, there may be some difficulty even if this abbreviation is commonly used. And one other issue is the governments need to approve the likelihood of material detriment. Also, this is one issue which I think is ex- ante very difficult to anticipate what are the damages for a local city when this is introduced. Just to raise -- it is not complete, but there are some issues where I think it would need to be further elaborated, this objection procedure. Thank you. >>BERTRAND DE LA CHAPELLE: If I can summarize, in general, it's the bar on the objection procedure is too high? >>GERMANY: Yep. >>BERTRAND DE LA CHAPELLE: Okay. >>HEATHER DRYDEN: Bruce, you have a question. >>BRUCE TONKIN: Really just a question. I noticed the examples here using words sort of like -- sometimes I hear the word "city." Sometimes I hear the word "community." One thing that we have defined, I guess, is the country also. That's also a large geographic region. Do you have a sense of what size you are talking about? Do you actually really mean cities and there is some definition of "city"? Or do you mean a town of ten people could object to a string? I just want to get an idea of scale here. Are you trying to say something really big, or are you saying any town even though it might only have one person living in it? >>GERMANY: Sorry. The conception and design for this community objection procedure is not established by GAC. It was a procedure that was established by ICANN and staff. I think it might serve very well for community and, therefore, I sometimes mix up because in the text, it refers also to -- always to communities. But in our context, we would mean in this regard cities. And, therefore, yes, every city has a possibility to object, and there is no restriction to the size of the city. >>BRUCE TONKIN: So is there a definition of the word "city" anywhere? Because that's something that I know we ended up defining "capital city" because that's a very defined term. Each country has a capital. But do you, from a government perspective, have a definition of a "city"? What is a "city"? >>HEATHER DRYDEN: Germany, yes. >>GERMANY: Yes, thank you. Frankly, this is an issue we did not discuss within GAC. And, frankly, probably we have a definition within our administration. I wonder whether there is a general global definition for cities, but I would be very surprised if it was. Thank you. >>HEATHER DRYDEN: Thank you, Germany. I see Greece asking for the floor. >>GREECE: I'm not sure we need a definition for a city because the point here is that the size is not important. It is not really a question of defining a city as compared to a town or a village. Any geographical point which has inhabitants in which may qualify us being called a town, a village or a city. And the people who live there know they are inhabitants of that village, city or town. And they are the local community, would be the same position to be able to object to the name of their place of living being used or abused by whoever. It is not a matter of city vis-à-vis village or town. >>HEATHER DRYDEN: Thank you, Greece. I have France. >>FRANCE: Thank you, Heather. Just a quick word to support what my German colleague just said and just to express our concerns for other issues like, for example, the champagne. Champagne is a region and, as you know and I hope you like it, is a beverage. Our point is there can be two gTLD projects. One for the beverage, one for the region in France. I hope the answer will be conventions maybe between the local authorities and the champagne producer. But, if it is not, I think it's their right to object to it if the Champagne region doesn't want a dot Champagne, it's an objection for any reason. I don't know why. It's same thing in Bordeaux or for Bellegarde. So for me the clear way to solve this problem is for the French government to say if this thing is geo or not, because no one else has the legitimate right or position to say it. So maybe it's the clear framework for all the applicants in the end. Thank you. >>HEATHER DRYDEN: Thank you, France. I have Netherlands. >>NETHERLANDS: Thank you, Heather. One thing we should take into account is companies have trademarks. And they are protected. And geographic communities or towns or whatever or villages don't have this. And I think, Bertrand, you were right. In this kind of dispute resolution, there should be kind of recognition that not only trademark owners with commercial interests should have their guarantee that their commercial reputation or -- is -- interest is going to be damaged. But also, if you translate this to communities and to geographic whatever, communities, towns, cities, they have also potentially damaged. The reputation can be damaged, their image. So, basically, I think what's also -- Hubert is saying is we should take much more recognition that cities and geographic towns, whatever, should be much more recognized to have potential damage for the interest. Thank you. >>HEATHER DRYDEN: Thank you, Netherlands. I see Senegal. >>SENEGAL: Thank you, Heather. I want to come back to the city. I think it's not fair for us to give the definition of the city as a high city or the big one or the small one. I think that if you have a geographical name and the authority, the local authority which is on this geographic region, send objection on the string, I think ICANN has to take care with this. Because most of the time, if you have some trademark using the name of the city, most of the time the city comes -- if you look the history of the city, the city was there before the trademark. So why, if it is a trademark, you give the string. If it is a city or a geographic name, you have to ask for additional things. Thank you. >>PETER DENGATE THRUSH: Can I just give a very quick answer to that? The point is the trademarks are publicly searchable on a register. There are -- I think Bruce has said before, there are six million geographic names in Australia. And many of them are not unique. They're the same names occur all over the world. So you get into a scope and searchability and definition problem with just geographic names. And that's why we worked hard to try to use lists of country names or capital city names, so that there's predictability and searchability around those. >>HEATHER DRYDEN: Thank you. Are there any more requests to speak on this topic? Norway? >>NORWAY: Thank you. Just to echo France, I think it was mentioned that if it is difficult to identify, as Germany said, if a mayor is -- for a small village is high enough on the level to, let's say, protest against a geographical name, it must be the solution to go to the national governments for them to decide which level is supposed to be able to object or take a decision on behalf of the governments during the use of a name. I think that would be useful to go to the central government for those questions. Thank you. >>HEATHER DRYDEN: Thank you, Norway. U.S? >>UNITED STATES: Thank you. I -- well, I think that there are some different structures around the GAC tables as to who is the relevant government authority. I think we have used that in the past. But I understand the point, so I'm certainly not going to disagree. I actually wanted to make a slightly different point on this, which we will be more clear on in our written responses. But a lot of the concerns that are being addressed by Hubert on the geo names and the challenges of the -- as presently drafted, which we hope will be amended, community-based objections process, we had flagged earlier concerns related to the range of strings that could be sensitive to governments. So it's geographic, religious, linguistic, cultural -- all of that. So we'll try to make sure that in our written submission, we will clarify the overlaps there. Thank you. >>HEATHER DRYDEN: Thank you, United States. I have Nigeria next. >>NIGERIA: Thank you. I just want to ask for clarifications. Because I know that, when you talk about governments, cities, communities, their villages, their language, and cultural issues involved in the geo. Some might not be -- some might not know about it. I'm still very, very -- it is very difficult for me to know how the handling of a trademark name and a city or a village or language could be differentiated. A trademark, yeah, there's trademark protection. But, when it comes to cities -- for instance, in my country, there's a state called Delta state. And we have Delta Airlines. And -- pardon? Yeah. So who will be given the preference to own that name? That's a worry to me. I don't know how we're going to handle that. If Delta Airlines comes first and takes the Delta, dot Delta, and my state is -- state of my country says, "Look, it's a state name in my country." So how would ICANN balance the two applications is a bit of a worry to me. Thanks. >>PETER DENGATE THRUSH: I think Bruce has a quick response and then Erika. Bruce? >>BRUCE TONKIN: I believe state and provinces that are on an ISO list actually do require the approval or non-objection from the government. So, if Delta is an actually an official state of your country, then you'd have an approval or non-objection for that. So the issue is not so much states or provinces. It's the issue of this definition of cities and towns, et cetera, which is the problem. >>PETER DENGATE THRUSH: Thanks, Bruce. Erika? >>ERIKA MANN: Yes. To follow up the point, I think we are in the same situation which we faced before that we try to reinvent the wheel. In many cases, we will have and we will see clashes, I mean, that's natural. But that's the way -- I mean, we see our world. I mean, if you look around, you have a perfume, which is called Paris. We have Paris, which is a city. I mean, I'm talking about our real world. I'm not talking about the world which we're trying to foresee how it will shape out on the new gTLD world. So that's something we will also have to live with. And I think it's part of our structure of how we composed our world. So there will be areas of clashes which are natural. Some which we can solve, some which I think we'll have to take them when they come and when they pop up and when they show up. Again, just like I did before, I'd like to warn in areas where we cannot clarify everything, that we take the risk, actually, to wait when the case shows up. And then we can solve it to some degree. The idea to have a completely predefined list which covers all cities of the world independent of size, of everything, where we have kind of a checklist and all of those names will be banned, I don't think so. That's -- that's an idea I would love. And I don't think so. Most of us would not like this idea. >>PETER DENGATE THRUSH: Thanks, Erika. Can we come back to Germany, and I think we're then ready to move on. >>GERMANY: Thank you. And I want to refer to Erika. Exactly that is our proposal, if I may say so. In this early warning system, I think we -- having failed to define extent of lists which include every name, I think instead of trying this, our proposal goes in the direction to say okay, let's check them. Let's give the governments a role where a city says I think that needs to be protected. And I think this would integrate. As I mentioned before, it is not that we want to block these names. I think we should try to find a way how to come to some consensus between, as a respective city on one hand and the applicant on the other hand. We're not talking about blocking economic activities. Thank you. >>PETER DENGATE THRUSH: Thank you, Germany. And the U.S? >>UNITED STATES: Not to prolong this debate, but, actually, if I could sort of throw a question out for our board colleagues, since you will be going off this afternoon, Erika, you, I think, said it quite well. We can anticipate that there will be these problems. So I wonder, one of our perspectives on the issue of whether something -- there is a great deal of contention or disagreement either over the string or whether the entity applying for it is the appropriate entity. In other words, to the -- in the case of a city name or a geo name, do they have the approval? In the case of some of the other categories, we know that's a bad word, but it helps us think this way. Say for a religion. If there were any contention, has the board given consideration to the possibility that a significant degree of contention would cause you to simply put that application in a pending bin? I mean, that you would not proceed? Because it's hard for us to understand the value of an application that is subject to intense disagreement and contentiousness going forward. Very hard for us to see that through. So it would be useful for us to understand if there is a prospect, that a great degree of disagreement, contention, a number of objections, would, in fact, cause you to say this really shouldn't proceed. We really only want to be approving strings that have a fairly high and visible documentable evidence of community consensus. And then you could make the case -- you would be in a stronger position, we presume, of making a good case that it is in the global public interest. So I guess I would just like to throw that out. And, if you might be able to give us some -- even if your -- their preliminary thoughts when we come back. Thank you. >>HEATHER DRYDEN: Thank you, United States. I think we've touched upon early warning to a significant degree as part of this discussion. So, if there are additional points to be made regarding the early warning mechanism, let's do that now. Let's take care of that item on the list. And I can see France asking for the floor. Is that right? >>FRANCE: Just a quick on geographic name. Considering champagne, as a sign of goodwill, if we come to an common agreement between GAC and the board, I promise to do something about it and to have a drink all together in Singapore, Mr. Chairman, Mr. President. [Applause] >>SWITZERLAND: Will you consult Switzerland? >>HEATHER DRYDEN: Thank you, France. Okay. So finishing up on geographic names, and any additional comments that we may wish to make at this point to the board on early warning? Brazil, please? >>BRAZIL: Just a very topic comment. It was an agreement in our preparatory meeting of the GAC is that, although we still are defining a lot of specific topics regarding the early warning, one issue that's very important is that the early warning has to coincide with -- at some point, at some extent, has to coincide with ordinary meetings of the GAC, precedential meetings. This is important in order for us to discuss the topics further and try to reach a consensus. Thank you. >>HEATHER DRYDEN: Thank you, Brazil. I think it's an important note on how the GAC works and that face-to-face meeting would be really key when planning for the process. Okay. Greece, you're next. >>GREECE: Thank you, Heather. I would only like to state the obvious. I hope from our discussion this morning, it has been made clear to the ICANN board how important an effective early warning period would be in preventing problems which might come up if this was not there, including on geographic names, on sensitive strings, on possible other problems that the GAC would be able to identify early and avoid them and make the whole system as less harmful as possible, as less costly as possible, as best as possible. >>HEATHER DRYDEN: Thank you, Greece. An important point. I have Germany next and then Italy. >>GERMANY: Yes. I want to concur with the position of many of the colleagues about the importance of the early warning. And I just also want to make clear that it is not only the governments who participate in this early warning process. It's also other parts of the community. And I am missing still a bit how ICANN really integrates the results of the early warning system into the application process. I think -- and I think what Suzanne mentioned before is going in the correct direction. If you realize in the beginning of the process that there is a strong objection that says there may be some objectors that have legal problems, say, seeing that their rights are infringed. Maybe also for trademarks there may be objections because somebody may say I have trademark in this -- for this name and it must not be used. All those issues and objections, I wonder how ICANN will integrate some in the process. And I think also for liability reasons this might be very helpful for ICANN to do that. Thank you. >>HEATHER DRYDEN: Thank you, Germany. I have Italy. I think Italy will be the last speaker on this topic, unless someone feels the need to speak. Okay, U.K. And then I will try to move us to the next topic. Okay, Sweden. All right. Please, Italy. >>ITALY: Early warning from the GAC should be just signifying to the board that this particular strings might generate some problems, discussions, and so on. In the light way is simply notifying that. But, in other cases, should be also justified and also giving some arguments how to -- and suggestions on how to avoid problems on these strings. And we have to do it in such a way that never this should be considered or promoted as a veto power of the GAC. This is very, very important. >>HEATHER DRYDEN: Thank you, Italy. U.K? >>UNITED KINGDOM: Thank you. I just want to echo that very much. It's really in the spirit of governments wanting to help the community, to help the applicant, to help ICANN in its distribution of its resources that some sort of signal is provided coming from governments that this proposal is going to be problematic. It's going to be resource intensive to handle. It's going to raise legal issues. It's going to raise governmental approval issues. So it's very much in the spirit of helping the community, the process, and alerting the applicant if the applicant has blundered into a costly application process and hasn't realized the extent of the problems that they might face. So it's really in that kind of approach. And, as I say, I echo very much what Italy has said on this in terms of not being the government's seeking to intervene in a kind of veto mannered approach. Thank you. >>HEATHER DRYDEN: Thank you, U.K. I have Sweden, and the final speaker will be Nigeria. Sweden. >>SWEDEN: Thank you very much Heather. I concur very much with many things said by my colleagues. I don't have to repeat that, of course. But about the early warning system, I think this is a tool, actually, the proposal from the GAC is a tool not only to help the governments -- I mean, we have certain procedures. And the way we work is different from maybe other stakeholders. But this tool should be helpful for anybody to be able to minimize objections and other problems. But, in general, I would like to say, if you listen to the discussions -- and sometimes we go a little bit into details and so on. But, in general terms, from my point of view, I think we try to point at the processes in the different parts of the launch of the new gTLDs and sometimes also the lack of processes. So sometimes we go too much into details. But I think the processes themselves are actually the main focus, at least for -- from my concern. Thank you. >>HEATHER DRYDEN: Thank you, Sweden. Nigeria, please. >>NIGERIA: Thank you very much. I just want to add to what my colleagues said. Not repeating all. I just want us to consider why do we do WHOIS? How do it? Why do we search when we want to register a name? Is it not to know if it's available or not? So we consider early warning as saying is this name actually available or not? So in that case it's not that the government wants to take over. But the fact is that, just like my colleagues have said, it will be a tool for the benefit of everybody -- the applicant, ICANN, and the government. Thank you. >>HEATHER DRYDEN: Thank you, Nigeria. Okay. So on that point, let's conclude with this topic. I believe that we may be able to move to providing opportunities for all stakeholders next, unless Germany sees a need to raise legal recourse for applicants in this session. Yeah, Germany. Please. >>GERMANY: Thank you. We discussed -- we didn't discuss the legal recourse issue within the GAC. From my point of view, but maybe colleagues have another impression, this issue is solved. I think it is the first one, as far as I see. But as lead, I can say -- but I hope that -- [Applause] Thank you. >>HEATHER DRYDEN: Yes. So let's celebrate that and move on. Excellent. Okay. Thank you, Germany. So next we have providing opportunities for all stakeholders where I believe Kenya is the lead. And, if we can deal with this, then I propose that we not address root zone scaling, unless the Netherlands sees a particular need in this session. No. Okay. And then we'll just give a status update from our side on intellectual property. And you can do the same as well as a board. And we can work out the next steps. So I don't anticipate that being a substantive exchange but more of a status update. Okay. So providing opportunities. Alice, Kenya. >>KENYA: Thank you, Heather. After the Brussels meeting ICANN's response or the board's response on the issue of cost considerations was that we're waiting for the JAS working group report and that the board was going -- we were going to be provided a deadline for this work. And our response is that we really do welcome the commitment of the board towards implementing the necessary mechanisms and ensuring that, truly, this process is inclusive taking into consideration developing country needs. What we'd appreciate is clarity from ICANN and whether the cost considerations are really going to be considered. And, more importantly, that the final report proposed very sound mechanisms for sustainable implementation for cost considerations. So that's one. The second one was on -- that we share the same concerns regarding the challenges that the board expressed in terms of how do you define a needy applicant. And in this case we're asking that the JAS team really considers that in terms of providing a mechanism but also welcome input from the community, the ICANN community at large. On language diversity, here we welcome the -- the concurrence of views between GAC and the board on language diversity and also recommend that any outreach and communication strategies on new gTLDs are developed with this in mind, the language diversity issue. On technical and logistic support, GAC welcomes the provision. But we also request further clarity on what is meant by set mechanisms for technical and logistical support that ICANN has agreed to support. I think that's about it on developing countries. >>HEATHER DRYDEN: Thank you very much, Kenya. Did Katim or others wish to comment? Otherwise, you have a summary of points and questions from the GAC at this stage. Katim, please. >>KATIM TOURAY: Heather and Alice, just to say very much, I think it's wonderful to hear the very -- what I consider -- well, not quite resounding but still a very strong approval of the -- you know, of the effort that's been made by the board. And I think I would be speaking well if I say that this is very highly appreciated by, you know, my colleagues. And we're certainly looking forward to working with you and the community to ensure that we implement something that we can all be proud of. Again, thanks. >>HEATHER DRYDEN: Thank you, Katim. Any other comments? Okay. All right. So now to move to a comparative status update, I will ask the U.K. to brief us on intellectual property. >>UNITED KINGDOM: As the meeting will recall, the GAC submission to the board in the scorecard focused on the three rights protection mechanisms -- the trademark clearinghouse, Uniform Rapid Suspension, and post-delegation dispute resolution process. As the meeting will recall from the very productive deliberations jointly between the GAC and the board in Brussels, the board at that meeting tabled some questions and then followed up in written form with 15 questions for clarification, which clearly would help the board to finalize their responses to a number of the GAC proposals in the scorecard. We have provided 14 written answers to those questions. One is still the subject of some discussion amongst GAC members. We and the board have to apologize to the community that those responses weren't actually posted. But I think there is an effort now to post those GAC responses to the ICANN board questions. As I understand it, the board and staff are reviewing our answers. And so the present position, the present status with regard to a number of the scorecard issues is perhaps in some state of fluidity contingent on taking account of our clarifying answers. So there's that situation just to account in terms of the responses received to the scorecard issues, for the clearinghouse, there were two 1As, three 1Bs, and three 2s, three rejections. For the URS there were five 1As -- so excellent progress there, I think, demonstrated by that -- three 1Bs and seven 2s. And then there were seven clarifying questions tabled by the board side with regard to the URS. And for the PDRP there was one 1A, zero 1Bs and four 2s. So clearly that's an area for further discussion. There was one request, a written request for a clarifying answer relating to the PDDRP, so that's the status as I understand it. Good progress to date. Clearly some need to move forward on some issues, taking into account answers provided by the GAC and we look forward to further discussions. But I hope that generally accords with the board's understanding of where we are. Thank you. >>HEATHER DRYDEN: Thank you, U.K. Would the board like to comment? Rita? >>RITA RODIN JOHNSTON: Thank you, Mark. Yes, we are looking at your responses. I think that to some extent, the documents crossed in the mail. Some of the questions and clarifications in your response were already taken into account, so I think some of the things you asked us to do were already done in our scorecard, so I don't know if you've had a chance to compare that, but I think that some of the things that you asked for have already been done, so if you could confirm that also, that would be helpful. But we'll break out into a smaller session this afternoon to go over your comments. I think that from the board's perspective, hearing from the community yesterday was quite helpful. I think there was a prioritization of what the real issues were by them, and I think that was very helpful for us in continuing these deliberations. So those comments and calls for balance and respective consensus are all things that we've been doing thus far, but we're reenergizing by hearing those yesterday and we're going to kind of continue to apply those principles this afternoon when we review these issues. >>HEATHER DRYDEN: Thank you, Rita. U.K., did you have any further comments or -- Okay. All right. So I think we've gone through the topics that we needed to this morning. So may we move to close? Peter? Okay. Perhaps you could describe the next steps, and we can go from there. >>PETER DENGATE THRUSH: Yes. Thanks, Heather. I think from our side, what we're going to do now is go back and have some working lunches in our small groups and take the input from each of these topic leaders into our small groups and the community feedback from yesterday and the community statements that are coming in from some of the constituencies. There are now small groups who will report back to the whole board and we will put together a further response and come back at between 4:00 and 5:00 today and report to the GAC where we're at. And I think that what that will lead to then is an analysis -- or what will fall out of that is quite clearly what we need to talk about more on Thursday. We understand that you're not available for the Wednesday consultation with the community, and so we will -- we will have another think about how we use that time to best effect, if you're not there. It may still -- the community may still want some further discussions with us. So then we'll have a list of things -- I think one of the things we need to do probably on Wednesday, you and I perhaps, Heather, is prepare the agenda for Thursday so that we know how much time each of these remaining topics -- so that's how we see it. Thanks. >>HEATHER DRYDEN: Thank you for that, Peter. Are there any quick reactions? I saw the United States and I see Greece. Please, go ahead. >>UNITED STATES: Yes, Heather, and thank you very much. Not to take up too much time but to say that, you know, regrettably the GAC does have a plenary session on Wednesday, so it creates a bit of a disconnect. However, I think -- I don't think I'm stepping on my colleagues' toes in saying that we would certainly welcome input and feedback from the community on all of the 1Bs. I believe yesterday you were asked to comment on all the 2s, and we would certainly welcome your feedback and input on the 1Bs. Thank you. >>HEATHER DRYDEN: Thank you. Okay. Greece. >>GREECE: A very simple question, Heather. Will the GAC benefit from a long lunch break now or are we planning to meet? >>HEATHER DRYDEN: I think it's yes to both. So let's reconvene in this room at 2:30. It will be a GAC closed session where we'll continue working on our new gTLD drafting in this room, yes. Because our regular room is occupied. Rita, you wanted to comment? >>RITA RODIN JOHNSTON: I just wanted to do a quick closing comment. I understand you guys have the plenary tomorrow and that might have been a little bit of a mess-up in scheduling but I wanted to express the board's appreciation for your attendance yesterday through Heather, your wonderful chair, sitting up on the dais. I think there was some speculation that would the GAC come, and I think it meant a lot to the board and to the community that Heather was sitting there and was listening to the comments. I think that was very, very helpful and we're really happy about that. >>HEATHER DRYDEN: Thank you, Rita. >>RITA RODIN JOHNSTON: But visibly on the dais, I think that was really important to the community. >>HEATHER DRYDEN: Thank you. That's good to hear. We were pleased to join and be in full attendance. So on that note, we will reconvene, Board/GAC, at 4:00, and GAC 2:30, please, in this room. >>PETER DENGATE THRUSH: Thank you. For the board, lunch is in the staff room. If you could collect your lunch, we need to go back to work. Thanks. [ Break ]