Question: (Korea internet Forum)Some people suspect that WIPO controls the actions of ICANN. What would you do to protect the interests of non-corporate entities and individuals from WIPO policies and keep the two organization separate and apart?

Nominee Replies

Sureswaran Ramadass - posted on 2000-10-09 04:12:19 The 2 must be kep apart. If not ICANN cannot really be seen as the protector of the Internet community. It will be seen more as a corporate entity. Masanobu Katoh - posted on 2000-10-05 14:44:38 Currently, there is no control mechanism between ICANN and WIPO. ICANN is asking WIPO for its legal and technical expertise when, for instance, ICANN adopted the UDRP or when WIPO was selected as one of the ICANN-accredited implementation organizations for the URDP. The fact is that ICANN did not adopt the WIPO draft UDRP as it was. However, we always need to be careful so that ICANN is not influenced by any one specific organization. Johannes Chiang - posted on 2000-10-05 00:52:37 I guess that you mean the suspicion that the current URDP is a result of an earlier WIPO report which was adopted under much protest by ICANN at the Berlin Meeting. Perhaps, the suspicion comes also from that the GAC recommended that ICANN adopt the recommendations of the WIPO report. Do you mean these? I think it is also because the Domain Name owners have not been so adequately represented in the ICANN policymaking structure that WIPO has been able to influence the ICANN Board to such an extraordinary extent. Hence, I believe in the first place this election is very important for the future of ICANN and we have to bring preventive thinking into the strategies, rules and working procedures for UDRP. Of course, the decision process in the future should be more transparent.