Welcome Ceremony ICANN Meeting Sydney, Australia Monday, 22 June 2009 >> Ladies and gentlemen, let your imagination drift with the sounds and spirit of Australia's indigenous culture as we witness a presentation of historic dreamtime and welcome to country by the performers of Diramu. (Performance). >> Welcome, ladies and gentlemen. We are Diramu dancers, the traditional Aboriginal people of this great country of ours. [ Applause ] >> Welcome to Sydney. Thank you very much. That first little dance that we did was very important. That was a clearing dance to get rid of bad spirits and bad energy and only allow good spirits and energy to be with us. Thank you very much. Our next dance that we're going to do is the welcome to dance -- welcome to country. But before we did that, we're going to have a word from Glen, who is a traditional person of this part of the land. And he'll welcome to you country. >> My name is Glen Timberry. I come from a city on the northern side of Botany Bay named after the French explorer, Jean Francois La Pérouse. On the south siders were Captain Cook first planted the flag. The name of the tribe of this land around this area was the Wollongong tribe. When the Aboriginal people said that we are Eora, that will mean, "We are people. We are human. We are a race," just like you. And the word Gadigal and -- those are all part of the Wollongong tribe. And then in the city to the south half of the tribe, you take the "Os" out of Wollongong and you put in "A's," and you have Wallangang. Welcome, not only on behalf of the Wollongong tribe, but on behalf of all the aboriginal people right across the land. Welcome, welcome. [ Applause ] [ Performance ] [ Applause ] >> Thank you very much. Our next performance is the Australian native birds and animals. And you'll be able to identify some of those animals as you see them being portrayed by the dancers. And familiarize yourself with those native animals of ours and the way we dance them. Here we go, Australian native birds and animals. (Performance). [ Applause ] >> Thank you. We've got our last dance. And this is the -- one of our largest birds in this country. And it's the EMU. The EMU, of course, is a very, very special animal. In our culture, it is a guardian. It represents the caretaker's role. And as Aboriginal people, we take on that caretaker role of what the EMU does. He protects his chicks. And so we protect the country and the land and everything else that's within it. As protectors of this land, we protect everybody in this country through our song and dance. This is the EMU dance. Performance). >> Clap along to the beat if you want to. (Clapping). >> Shake, shake, shake, shake, shake. Shake, shake, shake, shake. [ Applause ] > Thank you, ladies and gentlemen and the organizers and the Hilton Hotel. On behalf of Diramu dancers, thank you very much, and have a great day. [ Applause ] > And now, ladies and gentlemen, with the spirit of Australia's indigenous culture, please welcome chairman of the ICANN board, Peter Dengate Thrush. [ Applause ] >>PETER DENGATE THRUSH: Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. And thank you, Diramu, for that welcome to this fantastic country on behalf of the Gadigal and the Eora people. And thank you for that tremendous demonstration and explanation of the didgeridoo. I still don't know how that works, how one person can keep a continuous sound while they're breathing. Extraordinary. And the introduction to the dreamtime history. And welcome to you all, to ICANN's 35th international public meeting. Something incredible is going on in this room right now. People from all over the globe are gathered in this place. And while you are here, you still are invisibly connected to the world. Some of you may already be on your laptops, tapping away into your e-mail, connecting with people thousands of miles away. Most of you are really making the term "mobile device" truly applicable, using your phones to e-mail friends and colleagues or download information from the Web. I have to remind you please have them off during the ceremony, and keep the laptops closed as much as possible. But to be more serious, what is exciting is that these connections in every corner of the world have only been possible in very, very recent history. The Internet's only 40 years old. It was only commercialized a little over 15 years ago. Facebook, YouTube are only six years old. And Twitter, which is bringing events to us from the Middle East as we speak, is only two and a half years old. Now, ICANN has been a crucial part of keeping the experience unique and stable. A tremendous community of interest and commitment at ICANN has worked for these 11 years to produce this result. Again, not long in the span of history, nothing compared to the 50 to 70,000 years that those dances were in the making. But a testimony to the fact that this model, the ICANN model of multistakeholder policy development from the bottom up, quite simply, it works. We have come such a long way in those 11 years. And I'm reminded because of the shortness of my trip for a change that some of you probably felt like it took that long to get here. Welcome to international travel. But more seriously, we have been thinking about what we've done in the last decade, because the equivalent meeting ten years ago in Berlin was where the first steps were taken towards the formation of the DNSO, the precursor to the GNSO. The first elements were placed at that meeting. And I noticed as I've been around the rooms in the last couple of days that some of the people who were at those meetings are still here. And at the risk of offending some, for example, who I won't mention, I've already run into people like Theresa Swinehart, Marilyn Cade, Ramesh Maharaj (phonetic), people who were at that very first meeting have stayed with the process and helped build the organization to where we are. None of us who started on that path could really have imagined back then where we could get to. Now we have an ICANN community that's built an international body that shows the world how bottom-up, instead of top down command and control, but how bottom-up, inclusive process can drive a key shared global resource. And we've harnessed that collaborative spirit of the Internet where decisions are made by the community, not by the center. Now, at that meeting, we will apply that process again as we continue to discuss the expansion of generic top-level domains. We've already had two rounds of domain name expansion. And we're getting close to the next enormous expansion, which will lift the ceiling on personal expression. We're building towards the introduction of possibly thousands of new characters so people can have their name in what looks like their language on the Internet. So the connection that is come out of this room and across the globe and in as many directions as there are people here wouldn't be possible if it were not for one thing, and it's the reason we're all here today, the single globally interoperable Internet, something that ICANN stands for. And it's fitting to be here in Australia. This country has always played a significant role in ICANN. Your national government was a key part of ICANN's establishment. Australia provided the inaugural chair and secretariat to ICANN's Governmental Advisory Committee. Australian industry stakeholders fill prominent roles in the ICANN community, our board, and as chairs of supporting organizations and our advisory committees. And this city is home to one of ICANN's global offices, with financial support from the state government. And it makes sense for ICANN to be a Sydneysider. There are more than 30 languages spoken here, 13 of them from Asia alone. So you're as likely to hear Arabic and Cantonese walking down the streets of Sydney as you are English. With that backdrop, I would like to introduce one of our special guests, a Sydneysider, like ICANN, New South Wales' premier Nathan Rees. First elected for the member of Toongabbie in 2007, he was immediately named minister of emergency services and water utilities and soon after to head up the water portfolio. He became Premier of the state in September 2008. He has a commitment to the Internet revolution and it's a great pleasure to ask him to speak to us. Please join me in welcoming Premier Rees. [ Applause ] >>PREMIER NATHAN REES: Thank you very much, Peter. And congratulations to the winner for the weekend. Just in time to make them angry for when they play Australia. But good morning, everyone, Senator, the Honorable Stephen Conroy, Minister for Broadband Communications and the Digital Economy; Peter, of course; Paul Twomey, CEO and president of ICANN; and may I acknowledge my old friend and colleague, Paul Levins, who is vice president of corporate affairs for this unique global organization. At the outset, can I also acknowledge and pay my respects to elders past and present of the traditional ones of this land. Welcome to Sydney, New South Wales, and welcome to Australia. You are here as honored guests and friends, and I hope you find yourselves at home in our beautiful harborside city, and I hope the weather clears up for you. Well, ICANN may not be a household name, but what you do, as Peter just outlined, affects the whole planet. Dot com and its fellow domain names have become part of our daily lexicon. And life without the Internet is simply unimaginable. And so I want to begin by thanking each and every one of you for your contribution to the digital revolution, the revolution that has swept through our homes, through our schools, and through our workplaces over the last two decades or so. Our lives are more prosperous, more convenient, and more interesting because of the work you do. The ICT industry has created what no other technology or philosophy has been able to create, and that is, of course, the global village. People are connected like never before. Communities of interest are joined together by the first cheap, easy-to-use, mass participation technology in human history. And we've seen the Internet transform politics in last year's U.S. presidential election. And forcing politics back to the grass roots for the first time since television began. And we've seen it play a role in historic events in places such as the Ukraine, Lebanon, and more recently, Iran, giving people new courage and confidence to fight for their freedom all over the wormed. The Internet really is a revolution in every sense of the word. Because the Internet doesn't belong to anyone, or to put it another way, it belongs to everyone. That's where ICANN's role as a not-for-profit public benefit organization is so important. And after 11 years, clearly, this model works and has been vindicated. ICANN's role is deeply valued in Australia and right here in Sydney in New South Wales. And as was previously mentioned, my government is a supporter of ICANN's Sydney office. And we're very proud to offer that support, because we value ICANN's role and because ICANN's presence affirms Sydney's role as a global city and a gateway to the Asia-Pacific region. Sydney is also Australia's digital gateway, because Australia is the largest -- 11th largest ICT market in the world. And the bulk of that market has its home right here in Sydney. 76% of the overseas ICT companies such as Microsoft and Google, are based in Sydney. 42% of Australia's ICT businesses and 47% of the telco sector. We have a thriving $31 billion ICT industry employing more than 160,000 people in Sydney and New South Wales. We have a home of Australia's premier ICT forum, CeBIT, which is held every year just a short distance from here. And we proudly host the nation's leading ICT research and innovation bodies, including the Australian Center for Advanced Computing and Communications and the National Information Communications Technology Australia, Australia's largest independent ICT research body. We are also long-term partners in creating the nation's leading ICT hub, the Australian Technology Park. And we hope to become the headquarters of the new National Broadband Network, our federal government's visionary plan to bring broadband to every corner of our sprawling continent. We've seen how broadband can transform an economy. Witness South Korea. We want to do the same here, because if the Internet is the software, broadband is the hardware. And we need to emerge from the current global financial crisis freed of infrastructure constraints to seize future opportunities. The digital economy is central to our goal of building and broadening the state's employment and investment base. And that's why my government has embarked on a comprehensive plan to support ICT in our state by a number of measures. Firstly, strengthening the industry's global exposure through programs such as our Australian technology showcase and exporter's network. Secondly, nurturing new ICT products and services by supporting leading research organizations and linking them with government and industry. Third, facilitating alliances and clusters, including New South Wales dot net, embedded systems Australia, and the open source ICT industry cluster. Fourth, working with major ICT companies such as IBM, Fuji, Xerox, Polaris Software, and Accenture to grow their operations and attract new high-value functions to New South Wales. And, finally, promoting New South Wales as a competitive leader in ICT, undertaking targeted overseas business missions and supporting major international ICT trade shows, such as CeBIT Australia, CommunicAsia, and NASCOM Leadership Forum. The fact is, and you all know this better than I do, the fact is that ICT remains the world's fastest growing industry. And the global recession is only a temporary pause, a period of consolidation in which we can prepare for the next period of growth. And for ICANN, that means developing a new generation of policies to ensure that the Internet remains a flowing super highway, open and accessible to all. Now, I note that a major topic at this conference is new generic top- level domains. And my government is closely following this issue, including the possible registration of geographic and city names. And I note with interest that the mayor of Paris is supporting a dot Paris. And there are proposals for many others. Dot Berlin, dot London, and so on. Well, New South Wales has a strong interest in this issue. Because it represents a new and exciting way of being represented on the Internet. My government would certainly welcome and support a dot Sydney domain. I also acknowledge the importance of internationalized domain names as an issue for this conference. This state of New South Wales is one of the most multicultural places on earth. Mandarin, Italian, Cantonese, Arabic, Greek, Vietnamese, and dozens more languages are spoken on our streets alongside English. So we understand the sensitivity associated with this issue, because not every culture uses Latin script. So this is an important debate for the worldwide Internet community, which we will follow with interest. Certainly we would be highly interested in seeing registrar companies located in Sydney as non-Latin domain names are introduced. A linguistic and cultural diversity, some 200 nations represented here in Sydney, combined with our strengths in ICT, make this an ideal location. So, delegates, there's a very important agenda ahead of you this week, and your complex deliberations underscore the immense effort required to keep the Internet so fast and simple. And that, perhaps, is your finest accolade. You have rendered highly complex applications and processes into a system literally children can use. It's a magnificent achievement, an achievement that has changed the world and one in which you should all take immense pride. On that note, I welcome you all to Sydney once again, and I wish you well in your deliberations. I reaffirm my government's support for ICANN and I proudly declare your 35th international public meeting officially open. Thank you. [ Applause ] >>PETER DENGATE THRUSH: Mr. Premier, thank you so much for taking time from your busy schedule to share those thoughts with us today. Thank you. When I think as I was a moment ago of the period ten years ago, I also think of one Australian who was involved from the very beginning with other members of the international community in shaping what would become ICANN and the ICANN model. As many of you know, this is Paul Twomey's last international ICANN meeting as president and CEO. Since he came to that position more than six years ago, he has helped guide ICANN through a period of incredible growth. All the projects our communities are working on today started on his watch. New gTLDs, IDNs, openness, transparency, and the accountability audits, regional liaison offices, the growth of the number of ccTLD agreements, the formation of the ccNSO, just to name a few. I encourage all of to you take the time over the next few days to stop Paul and thank him for his incredible work and his leadership. And there will be more time this week, including tonight, in this room, at 7:00, to celebrate ICANN's achievements with Paul at the helm. And I invite, I urge you to come to that occasion tonight so we can pay more fitting tribute to Paul for his achievements and ICANN's achievements with him as the leader. And I say with great pleasure that Paul -- I see with great pleasure that Paul's parents are in the front of the auditorium today in a seat of honor. You can be very proud. [ Applause ] >>PETER DENGATE THRUSH: You can be very proud of your son's achievements. So, ladies and gentlemen, will you please welcome ICANN's president and CEO, Dr. Paul Twomey, who will say a few words and introduce our next guest. Paul. [ Applause ] >>PAUL TWOMEY: Thank you, Peter. I can assure everybody that at 7:00 there will be free alcohol. [ Laughter ] >>PAUL TWOMEY: And that's why I expect to see you there. I will be brief because I have my presidential report after this. First of all, I would like to say thank you very much to all of you here in attendance and thank you for coming to Sydney. This hotel booked out the fastest of any conference hotel in ICANN's history. And I think we haven't got the full registrations numbers yet but this is a very high registration, so it's good to see people are here. Secondly, for all of those who think I have a broad Australian accent -- [ Laughter ] >>PAUL TWOMEY: -- how did you find the taxi driver? Moving along. I would like to quickly introduce Senator, the honorable Stephen Conroy. Stephen is the minister for broadband, communications and digital economy. A little secret in Australian political speak. The department is now known as BACARDI. and he is also leader of the deputy government in the senate. Stephen is a senator from Victoria. He has been a longstanding powerhouse within the Australian labor party. But I think this is only his second love. He is a ferocious love of Australian football. The game they play to the south of here. And at any opportunity you stop him, he will probably talk more about football than he will about the politics. The Minister with his colleagues I think totally surprised and delighted the Australian ICT community two months ago when they announced what would really have to be a world-leading initiative of establishing a national broadband network. And I know the Minister will speak to this. But this network, which is to encompass all of Australian premises in a wholesale model and structural separation, I think really for our community and for all of those of us who are interested in where the Internet is going, this is going to be one of those beacon projects, because there will be nowhere else in the world where somebody has tried to comprehensively supply both structural separation in the provision of the services and to ensure that very high-speed broadband is delivered to all citizens and businesses. So just for that, Stephen, thank you very much. And we welcome you here to speak. [ Applause ] >>SENATOR STEPHEN CONROY: Well, thank you, Paul. Everyone always says who is responsible for this mess called the Internet? And now we know. [ Laughter ] >>SENATOR STEPHEN CONROY: I'm only joking to his parents. It is a great pleasure to be here for the 35th meeting of ICANN. Thank you for the opportunity to speak here today. On behalf of the Australian government and the Prime Minister, I would also like to thank the organizers and sponsors of this important forum for returning to meet again in our country. It is a particular pleasure to extend a warm welcome to those of you who have traveled from overseas to be here this week. ICANN holds a key position of the heart of the Internet. It plays a vital role, helping manage the Internet as we know it today, and preparing to meet the evolving needs and requirements of users. As the Internet continues to develop as a global network, ICANN has an important role to ensure its continued security, stability, and interoperability. Without effective management and the evolution of Internet addressing and protocols, we risk limiting opportunities for improved trade, productivity, and social participation. All of these are on offer in the online environment. Ensuring the Internet continues to meet the needs of the global community is imperative as we work to develop the global digital economy. In Australia, the Rudd government has made a strong commitment to ensure that Australia thrives in the digital economy. This is because we have identified significant opportunities for the Internet and connected digital technologies to improve the way that we deliver services and address a whole range of social and economic challenges. We understand the substantial efficiency and productivity gains to be made in the digital economy, and the need to prepare today to ensure that we fully exploit future opportunities. Many of you will be aware that in April, the Australian government made one of the most significant infrastructure decisions in our country's history. The government is moving boldly to ensure that Australia has the infrastructure it needs to grow and prosper into the 21st century. This includes investing with the private sector to build a high-speed, fiber-to-the-premise broadband network connecting 90% of homes and businesses. It also includes deploying next generation wireless and satellite to service the remaining 10% of homes and businesses. Already there have been strong statements from players within the telecommunications sector about the attractive nature of the opportunity and the potential to become involved. The national broadband network will be the single largest nation- building infrastructure project in Australian history. It will be Australia's first truly national, wholesale-only communications network. It will drive employment and business activity in the short term, helping to stimulate the economy for our recovery from the global economic recession. Indeed, investing in the national broadband network will create 25,000 jobs in Australia for each year of the 8-year build, peaking at 37,000. It will also form the platform of our future economy, ensuring that we are best placed to capitalize in the years ahead. I know that all of you here today are keenly interested in the future of communications. You understand the importance of not falling behind other countries that are forging ahead in the digital economy. Unfortunately, Australia is in the bottom half of OECD countries for broadband take-up, 16th out of 30 last year. Australians pay more for broadband than most OECD countries -- 20 out of 29 in '07. Australian small businesses pay more than all but two other countries for fixed-line services. Our decision to develop a national broadband network is a watershed moment for the telecommunications sector in Australia. As I said this will be the country's first truly national wholesale-only communications network. This will resolve structural issues in the industry and stimulate availability of affordable high-speed broadband. This in turn will drive innovation and provide the basis for Australia to maximize its potential in the post-recovery environment. As I've said, this is not just about short-term gains. This is about national infrastructure that supports our national interests for the decades to come. High-speed broadband can support smart grids that improve energy efficiency and reduce carbon emissions. In health and age care, broadband can support in-home care, reducing the need for hospitalization and providing a better quality of life for patients. In education, broadband offers the chance to break down geographic barriers and ensure the resources for students, regardless of where they live. Broadband can secure our long-term investments with smart infrastructure that helps owners to manage and maintain their assets. Broadband also presents the opportunity for new trade and partnership opportunities, opening new markets for regional businesses and Australian innovators. These opportunities are the same opportunities I know that ICANN is working to enable on a global basis. It's worth noting that in addition to its technical work, ICANN is also an advocate for improving the way we address global, economic, and social challenges by harnessing the Internet. It is an advocate for competition, and for maximizing access to what is fast becoming a vital tool for communities the world over. The issues to be discussed this week are central to the operation of the Internet and will have broader implications for the future global digital economy. Issues such as Internationalized Domain Names and the adoption of new type scripts are vital for the globalization and increased utility of the Internet. The introduction of new generic top-level domains promises to foster a whole new wave of innovative online activity. It is looking at the Domain Name System security extensions, which will play an important part in driving new levels of public confidence in the online environment. The effective resolution of all of these issues and others on the ICANN agenda this week will enable the next generation of Internet applications. They are critically important to digital innovation and development. I'm pleased to say that Australia has been a long-time supporter and contributor to ICANN since its inception in 1998. Australians have played and continue to play a prominent role in the organization's administration. The dot AU domain administration makes regular and important contributions to ICANN. The Australian government has also been a key contributor to one of the essential elements of ICANN: The Governmental Advisory Committee. Of course, outgoing ICANN president and CEO Dr. Paul Twomey, an Australian, as most of you may have noted from his accent, was the very first chairman of the committee in 1999. Previous to this, he was the founding CEO of Australia's National Office for the Information Economy. In 2003, after working in the private sector, he was elected to the ICANN board as CEO and president. Congratulations to Paul for his contribution in shaping the Internet as we know it today and will find it in the future. I wish him well in his future endeavors following his completed tenure with ICANN. So once again, thank you for the opportunity to speak to you this morning. It is a great pleasure to be with a group of people so intimately linked to the operation and development of our digital economy. As usual, ICANN has set itself an ambitious and exciting agenda for its international meeting, and I look forward to hearing about the outcomes. Welcome once again to everyone from around the globe, and good luck with the discussions that take place this week. Thank you very much. [ Applause ] >>PAUL TWOMEY: Well, thank you very much to the departing guests. Certainly the Minister Conroy has to get a plane straight to Canberra, this is a sitting week for the Australian Parliament, and as you might have picked up in the newspapers, there's always a political entertainment in Australia. [ Laughter ] >>PAUL TWOMEY: For those of you wondering what a ute is, it's a small utility truck. [ Laughter ] >>PAUL TWOMEY: Right. So the president's report, as you will recall when we have been continually improving these meeting formats, is an opportunity to point out what are the key things that are taking place throughout the week. And particularly for those parts of the community, the constituencies, that the chair and myself visit on Tuesdays to ensure that we stop saying the same thing in every meeting we go to. So we get to say it once now. So let me take you through what I think is actually a very intense meeting, a very interesting meeting, and a meeting where there's a lot of real hard work to be done. Okay. So this is -- Look at that. Forward and reverse. It works! So the agenda, broadly, I am going to speak to is obviously the new gTLD program. The implementation of the IDN ccTLD fast track. The 2010 operating plan and budget. Improving institutional confidence, and that's a very important topic I want to speak to. New accountability mechanisms which is part of that. Enhancing security, stability and resiliency. The interim solution with DNSSEC. The joint Supporting Organization and Advisory Committee meeting. Some updates from IANA. The public participation update on some really fantastic work being done to continue to improve public participation in ICANN and in this meeting. Some update on contractual compliance. Some policy development. An opportunity to speak and introduce you to two of our new board members. So where are we now on the new gTLD program? There will be an overall session held in this ballroom at 11:00, starting at 11:00. The analysis of public comments on the Applicant Guidebook has been made available. So it's sort of version 2 point 2 point something, if you like, of the Applicant Guidebook. Issues of particular concern have been specifically pulled out there. Excerpts of updated modules have been posted for comment, and that will end on the 20th of July. I am very pleased to have received the IRT recommendations on trademark protections. So a very big topic, a very comprehensive part of the ICANN Web site, and I would draw your attention to a lot of the materials on that and obviously we will have the overview session coming shortly. There are a series of overarching issues. If you go to the Web site, and the link is here at the bottom of this page, and I'm sure the people at the back of the room can read that very easily, this is all available online. The Web page is very comprehensive. There is a new interactive time line that actually if you scroll down that page, you will actually find a time line taking you through all the various events that have led up to where we are now. And there are some overarching issues -- trademark protection, economic analysis, impact on security and stability, and malicious conduct issues -- and we have established a Wiki there which allows members of the community to participate and share your thoughts and ask questions. So again, if you go to that part of the page, you can click onto the Wiki and either hear or remotely be part of the dialogue around these four key areas. And a major area for discussion is economic analysis. Two aspects of that. One is the questions of consumer benefit, and the analysis of consumer benefit of new TLDs, and the second one is the vertical integration issues, particularly around registry and registrar separation. I am very pleased that we have been able to arrange this afternoon in Function Room 5 and 6 at Level 2 a panel session chaired by Joe Sims, one of the U.S.'s leading antitrust lawyers and a good friend and obviously major force in the formation of ICANN, and Professor Steve Salop, and Professor Josh Wright, who are both formerly economists with the Bureau of Competition or the Bureau of Economics at the Federal Trade Commission in the United States. And they will be there speaking to these particular topics. There will be opportunity for registries and registrars, I think, to speak and for others to speak from the floor in a dialogue, panel dialogue, around the issues of economic analysis. And I can assure you that members of the board will be in attendance and will be listening very carefully to that dialogue. The draft IDN implementation plan, fast-track plan, has been posted. The public comment period ends on the 15th of July. It is still the expectation that the final plan will be ready before the October meeting in Seoul. And you will see there's a series of explanatory memoranda, particularly the revised document of responsibility, some revised IDN table development, and also thoughts about financial contributions. So again, today, that will be an item for discussion. The financial year 2010 operating plan and budget is due to be, as it is the proper cycle, due to be considered by the board on Friday here, and this is the last process of a six-month consultation process on that plan and budget. So a few things to point out. That the executive management and the board are committed to limited growth. We understand the economic slowdown equals slower growth to revenue and participation. But we've also moved to try to ensure that there's been an incentive put in place for the registrars to adopt the new Registrar Accreditation Agreements. You'll understand that we have over 900 agreements with registrars. They don't all come to fruition at the same time. So if you want to get a lot of people to change a contract, you probably have to give them an incentive. And so we have actually done that. That rate of 18 cents is now a 25% discount on the contractual transaction fee that we have with the registrars. And we are committed to operating expenses being constrained to less than a 5% increase while still completing large resource-intensive projects such as the new gTLD implementation planning process. There is more community consultation and detailed feedback. As I said, we expect to take this to the board on Friday. The functional reporting was introduced in financial year '09 and is included in this year's plan and budget. But per community feedback from the Expense Area Group, we have now actually got reporting now about expenses across all areas. And that's a bit hard to see but that will be part of the presentations, and it's also available online. And I also would keep reminding people that we have a dashboard, and the dashboard on the ICANN Web site gives you lots of detail of operational activities within ICANN, including financial details. So if you want to at any time check the details of what's going on in IANA performance or what's going on in terms of budgets or what's going on in expenditure, you can go to that dashboard and get real-time updates. The President's Strategy Committee completed its work on improving institutional confidence. At the last meeting, resolution of the board was to ask staff to take those reports and come back with some potential implementation plans for the board to consider. And that was posted 15 days before this meeting started, and there will be a workshop on it specifically on Wednesday between 1:00 and 2:30. There are some overarching themes, especially board accountability mechanisms, some further updating on where we are on discussions around internationalization, and also some proposals on the table for further dialogue between the board and the GAC, and potentially others, on the role of the GAC. I want to particularly stress two instruments that are presently being discussed for accountability mechanisms. And you can see on the left of this slide, we have a full range of existing accountabilities, including a series of accountabilities under U.S. law. But our bylaws require a whole other range of accountabilities, and there is actually a thing called the operating principles, management operating principles, which is some 28 or 29 pages which outlines all the accountability mechanisms that we presently have. However, in response actual the feedback the President's Strategy Committee received, there are several proposals that we have put forward for additional accountability mechanisms. The first one which received broad, broad support was that there be a mechanism for a community vote to request the board to reconsider a board decision. And the documentation put forward prior to this meeting, there was some wording proposed for bylaw amendments. Now, I must stress, this is not yet board policy, it is not the board's work. The board is yet to consider it. But it's been put out for public notice. The proposal that if -- that within 90 days or, whichever is longer, the next international meeting of ICANN, if there was to be a vote -- at present the proposal is two-thirds of the supporting organizations and advisory committees, if two-thirds of those were to vote for a request to reconsider, the board would be forced -- would be required to reconsider its position at the next meeting. That was fairly much supported throughout the community. A second proposal was put forward and the PSC itself recommended that there be a mechanism put in place which would allow the board to be completely reconstituted on a very special vote from the community. The more time went on, the more that particular item, which became known a little bit as the nuclear option, became less and less popular. In fact, we received a lot of feedback from governmental and other members of the community concerned that that would be a destabilizing mechanism. So the staff have not recommended specific issues on a vote for reconstitution of the board. The third item that has been put forward, and I think is very important, is to review -- and this is on advice of a range of international legal experts for whom we have consulted -- to review or to revamp one part of our accountability mechanisms in the independent review panel, to take that and expand that and augment that by basically establishing a standing independent review tribunal. Now, we may even change that name. Which would essentially be a standing group of senior appellate judges and technical experts who would be available for any affected party to bring action before, if they considered the board had made a decision that was basically effected on the three grounds: that the board had not followed essential fairness or proper procedures in its activity, that it had not shown fidelity or faithfulness to its mandate and to its mission, or, thirdly, that the decision failed on test of rationality. That basically the decision was so unreasonable that you could not say it was a rational decision. Now this is a summation of a series of administrative law principles that apply in many countries, particularly in Europe, some parts of North America and some parts of the Asia Pacific, and it's an attempt to try to take them out of those particular jurisdictions and put some key principles. It is, I think, a very important international accountability mechanism. It means that any affected party anywhere in the world could bring an action in front of an international panel, which will not be run by ICANN. It will be run by some independent dispute resolution provider, and that there could be a way in which to bring, if you like, a court action to say on these particular grounds, we're looking for some reconsideration. That wording is also available for bylaw consideration. As I said, it's not yet board position, but I just wanted to reinforce for people these propositions are on the table, and we're going to be discussing them later in the week. The -- Enhancing the security, stability and resiliency plan has been out for public comment since 19th of June. There has been a co- sponsored DNS security, stability symposium with Georgia Tech earlier this year on diverse experts looking to analyze major systems of risk. There is going to be a consultation on this at Wednesday between 2:00 and 3:30. There will be a forum on the abuse of DNS also on Thursday. And I think people who have an interest in this area, it's well worth attending for a couple of reasons, not least of which is to hear more about the work that ICANN -- both the SSAC, but also, importantly, ICANN staff -- have been doing with the TLD community on the Conficker worm to block the use of the DNS to propagate malicious code and the lessons that we're learning out of that experience. The U.S. government, VeriSign and ICANN have worked to develop an interim solution to sign root zone as soon as feasible. The DNSSEC rollout process involves testing and then production deployment. It will require large-scale consultation with the Internet technical community. And ICANN and VeriSign are collaborating on operational and cryptographic issues. There is a workshop here on this, again, here on Wednesday. There will be the joint Supporting Organization and Advisory Committee meeting here in the ballroom, I think it's this ballroom, at 2:00 to 4:30. And there's a series of topics there for discussion that the chairs of those committees wish to have up for discussion. The IANA is initiating -- one of the big issues here is initiating the deployment of what we call either the root zone management or e-IANA, depends on which religion you have, in cooperation with VeriSign and the U.S. NTIA. There is a six-month testing period with specific exit criteria and that's about to commence. A couple of other things I would point out is that we continue to develop the support necessary for insertion of IDN ccTLDs and new gTLDs in the root zone, and that's part of the increased budget allocation, the small amount we're talking about in terms of making sure we have resources in place to do that for next year. We are looking at moving to really drive business excellence program in financial year 2010, potentially looking at getting some sort of accreditation for the IANA function under some of the excellence programs that are available. So we have been working on steady improvement of the IANA function for quite some time, and this year we want to officially sort of launch internally a business excellence program that might end up at some stage with some form of accreditation under one of the industry excellence awards, international awards. The ITAR is going to increase in use, and this is the mechanism for TLDs to register their DNSSEC details. Public participation. There is a lot of work being done to continue to improve public participation. I'd particularly like to thank the Public Participation Committee of the board who have been leading this. We have now a new 10-day and 15-day working day document deadlines in place for ICANN meetings. One of the board members will be participating remotely here for Sydney, particularly, Rita. I know the GAC, and this is the GAC chairs participating remotely. But, actually, I think Janis is in the room, but is a long way away. He is remote. But I understand that the GAC itself utilized these tools during its meetings. That more documents are being translated into more languages for every meeting. We have interpretation in French, Spanish, and local language at all meetings. No, you will not get interpretation of Australian accent. Just get used to it. [ Laughter ] >>PAUL TWOMEY: And we're doing a lot to try to improve the chat rooms. Here, there will be full remote experience for the main room using Adobe connect for people who are remote. There's an online question box in five languages. We will have daily videos that will be streamed. We have an improved ICANN.mobi site for people who are using that to -- particularly people here using that to find out what's going on in what room. And there's Twitter feeds of ICANN-related information. So we continue to use all the technology we can to get the message out. There will be a meeting of the PPC here on Wednesday. Contractual compliance, we have quite a number of things underway there. It's a very important priority. Perhaps the thing I'll stress mostly is that we have a workshop on WHOIS data accuracy on -- in function room 3 on Wednesday. And we have done the work to start the studies on WHOIS data accuracy for registered gTLD names. And that will include also looking at percentage of gTLD names registered by privacy and proxy services. There will be an update during the constituency days. This is a very big item. It's been an item of great interest to the GAC, intellectual property community and others, obviously to the registries and registrars. There is a lot of work going on on those studies, those of you who have been interested in it for so long, please make certain you understand what's happening with the study. There is a whole range of additional work that you're working on, which is great. There is -- the GNSO is still looking at the GNSO improvements and trying to finalize the new constituency work. Geographic region review charter is ready for the board approval. I said research on WHOIS requirements, the expired domain name recovery changes are being discussed. The interregistrar transfer policies are also up for discussion again. And fast-fluxing and cybercriminals is review work going on under the GNSO. The ccNSO is to look at relaunching its DNSSEC survey, relationship with the IDN ccTLD operators. As I point out before, this is a major item for discussion here in this meeting. We're looking -- they're looking at the timetable for IDN ccTLDs. And there's also quite an interest in ccNSO, but particularly in the ASO for global policy for recovered IPv4 address space. I point out that the Security and Stability Advisory Committee has come up with several reports or things they're looking at characters from local languages and domain name registration records. That's a very important issue. DNSSEC status report, study protection domain name registrations, and a review of recent attacks against registrants. And I think also, very importantly, has just brought in a report pointing out the real dangers of wild card -- uses of wild cards in TLDs, particularly the potential use of wild cards in IDN -- especially in IDN ccTLDs, but TLDs generally. That's a very important report. The board is taking and listening to it very seriously. And I would recommend that all members of the community look at that report from the SSAC very carefully in terms of what issues they are raising. Just to finalize with the board, we have two new board members. Many of will you know Ray Plzak. Is Ray in the room? There he is in the back. He often is in the back. Standing in the back, waving. Ray's been involved in Internet registry operations since '91. He's, of course, famous for having been in other words former president and CEO, this time of ARIN, the North American -- not just North American, but American Internet Registry. And has been a big force in the Number Resource Organization and also in issues of Internet governance. We're very pleased to welcome Ray to the board. And the second one is Michael Silber, who's also been involved with ICANN issues for a very long time. Mike's in the room somewhere, I think. I thought I saw him. Well, that's what he looks like. [ Laughter ] >>PAUL TWOMEY: Mike is -- has -- has been involved with dot ZA and the management of the South African country code top-level domain for a long time. He was involved in the whole process of redelegation of dot ZA for those of us who have a long memory of times gone past, which was a complex redelegation and change process. And he's a founding member of the ISOC dot ZA. So just like to welcome those two to the board. [ Applause ] And I'd like to say, thank you, glad you're all here. Please have a productive meeting. [ Applause ] >> And now, ladies and gentlemen, I'd like to introduce general manager, public participation, Kieren McCarthy. [ Applause ] >>KIEREN McCARTHY: Hello. So my job is to tell you how to actually participate. So the main thing you want to know about is the Sydney meeting site, S-Y-D.icann.org. And you can bring that up on the screen. That's where you should have everything that you need. The schedule's there on the left. We have remote participation I'll talk about in a minute. General information, the public forum, details, maps, Twitter feed, et cetera, et cetera. Everything that you need should be on there. If you go to the schedule and scroll down, and we can see, for example, Monday, the session we're in now. There you go. The welcome ceremony. And that's got all the information you should need: Presentations, the chat room, the audiocast and the different feeds that -- we've got it in Spanish and French in the main room, I think. And if we can go back to the front page, yeah, so remote participation. We did an experiment last meeting with the ccNSO using this Adobe connect software that Paul mentioned, which I think is -- which they loved so much, they came up with a resolution. So now we're trying it out in the main room, which is here. And you can see me there. So there you go. So we have -- the presentation is run live. We have the video running live. We have a chat room running live. It's all in one window. Any point in this meeting, you find that, click the remote participation, bring it all up. And the great thing about this as well is we can archive it. So we'll be archiving all of these sessions and putting them up as videos as well. So you'll be able to see the sessions in real time after the meeting is over. And we're going to transcribe them and should basically be able to capture the work that we do for the future. We've also got the ICANN.mobi site, which a lot of people like, because you can -- while you're wandering around, you don't have to pull bits of paper out of your bag. You can get on the mobile site. If you go to -- we've got the schedule, you can see useful information, so on and so forth. If you go down to interact, we tried out Twitter last time. And everyone's gone crazy for Twitter. So we're Twittering away. I think we've got about 400 people following ICANN. But, anyway, we feed -- if you know about Twitter, if you put the hash tag ICANN, it will come up on the feed, on the ICANN.mobi feed and you'll be able to read it. And we also have that on the front page of the Sydney site. If you go down to a new thing that's added in -- I should thank dot mobi for this, by the way, they have built most of this, along with us. We have live images, if you upload something to Flickr and tag it with ICANN or ICANN Sydney, it will automatically appear on their live image page as well. So you can interact with taking pictures. We sometimes get good pictures, which we'll print up, I imagine, in a book at some point. And one last thing which I want to make you all aware of. If you go to the front page of the main ICANN site, actually, on each page, we have got a -- we're running a usability study. One of the most consistent complaints that I hear is that people find the Web site difficult to use, hard to find information, so on and so forth. So we're running a usability study. One part of that is this online form. So if you've ever had any trouble with the ICANN Web site, please click on that link and fill in the survey. We've hired some experts in this sort of field to take all those results and look at it. And hopefully, at the end of the process, we'll end up with a much better ICANN Web site. So you should be able to find things easier. And that's it. I hope you all enjoy the meeting. If you have any questions about participating, you now know what I look like. And have fun. Cheers. [ Applause ] >> Ladies and gentlemen, the next meeting in this room will begin at 11:00 this morning, the new gTLDs overview. Coffee break is just outside. Please enjoy coffee. Thank you.