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NPAP Meeting - 25 July 2000

Meeting Room 9A
Australian Technology Park, Sydney

Present: Philip Argy, Evan Arthur, Sandra Davey, Mark Davidson, Kitty Davis, Steve Fielding, Odette Gourley,
Rowan Groves, Tony Hill, Mark Hughes (after 4.30pm), Keith Inman, Ron Ipsen, Cheryl Langdon-Orr, Jo Lim, Christine Page-Hanify, Peter Reynolds, Cathy Thawley, Derek Whitehead, Ross Wilson (until 4.30pm)

Teleconference: Brandon Gradstein, Stuart Hamilton, Ian Johnston, Steve Pretzel, David Purdue, Cliff Reardon, Daniel Rechtman, Josh Rowe, Leanne Schultz, Proxy for Tony Serong

Apologies: Ian Halliday, Geoff Morrison, Galen Townson

Actions:

1. DW and JL to draft minutes from meeting.
2. DW and JL to complete Stage 1 report, circulating a final version via the closed list before presenting to the auDA Board on 7 August.
3. DW and JL to revise Essential Attributes paper. Panel to further discuss and refine Essential Attributes paper.
4. Working group convenors to convene and moderate working groups for each set of issues, and draft progress report for each working group.
5. RI to establish web-based discussion lists for each working group.
6. LS to draft a short paper outlining the technical constraints of DNS policy.
7. DW and JL to start to develop a table of contents for the final Stage 2 report.

Decisions:

Stage 1 Report
The draft Stage 1 report will be revised along the lines suggested by panel members, and circulated via the closed list for any final comments before it is presented to the auDA Board meeting by the panel chair on 7 August 2000.

Essential Attributes
The Essential Attributes paper will be revised along the lines suggested by panel members, and circulated via the closed list.

Working Groups
Six working groups have been established as outlined in the Statement of Issues paper:

1. Right names: appropriateness of name in relation to entity
2. Legal names: IP issues (including well-known names)
3. Names with fences: ie names which cannot be used - objectionable, generic, geographic
4. Moving names around: portability, transferability, reselling
5. Disputes about names: dispute resolution
6. New names: introduction of new 2LDs in .au

The following panel members volunteered to convene each working group:

1. Michael Wolnizer (until end August)
2. Odette Gourley
3. Brandon Gradstein
4. Rowan Groves
5. Daniel Rechtman
6. Derek Whitehead

Ron Ipsen volunteered to establish a webmail board with individual conferences for each group, so that working groups can canvas their issues online. Convenors may also organise working group meetings or teleconferences as necessary.

Convenors are responsible for drafting a progress report from their working group for consideration by the full panel at the next meeting on 29 August. The aim is for each working group to produce a draft policy that considers all relevant issues and includes an assessment of the pros and cons of different approaches.

Two issues have not been allocated to working groups: retrospectivity and technical issues. The panel requested a background paper on technical issues.

See attached Working Group Guidelines.

Discussion:

1 Confirmation of 27 June Minutes
Panel members confirmed the minutes from the meeting on 27 June 2000, previously circulated via the closed list.

2 Stage 1 Report
Panel members discussed the draft Stage 1 report and suggested some amendments and additions, such as: identifying the purpose, delegate and policy-making mechanisms for each 2LD; including a short explanation of the technical requirements of the DNS; and including a disclaimer notice regarding the source and date of the policies.

It was agreed that a comparative assessment or critique of the current policies is not required by the Terms of Reference and would be inappropriate for a document of this nature.

Decisions made are listed above.

3 Review of Essential Attributes
There was wide-ranging discussion about the Essential Attributes paper. Panel members made the following points:

• purpose needs to be narrowed
• no values or attributes are absolute and will need to be balanced against each other as appropriate
  - this statement should be made upfront
• relevant government policies regarding consumer protection, privacy etc should be taken into account
• consistency (1st attribute) should be recognised as a goal but not necessarily a reality
  - note that 'consistent with' doesn't mean 'the same as'
  - different values attach to different 2LDs - maintaining the inherent value of different 2LDs is a matter of due process and integrity (5th attribute)
• 2nd and 5th attributes can be combined
  - both refer to issues of integrity, transparency, procedural fairness and due process
  - privacy concerns can alse be addressed here
• "protects rights" (3rd attribute) is not entirely accurate
  -change wording to "respect the rights of third parties"
  -note the system cannot confer or guarantee third party rights, but it should not facilitate violation of those rights
  -note that registrars should not be expected to protect or enforce third party rights
• "conforms with" international standards (7th attribute) is too strong
  -while international standards should be observed, .au needs to be free to pursue its own innovative approaches
  -change wording to "has regard to"
• stakeholder participation should be an 8th attribute
  -the DNS policy should operate for the benefit of all domain name holders and Internet users

Decisions made are listed above.

4 Review of Issues
Time constraints precluded a detailed discussion of the Statement of Issues, and the panel agreed to instead focus on how to take the issues forward. The panel thanked the authors of papers prepared for this agenda item, and noted that the papers will be useful background material for the working group activities.

5 Working Groups
Panel members discussed different ways of grouping and progressing the issues. Decisions made are listed above.

6 International Developments
The panel noted decisions made at the recent ICANN meetings in Yokohama regarding new gTLDs. Tony Hill attended the ICANN meetings and gave a brief report to the panel, pointing out that ICANN has not decided to adopt new gTLDs at this stage, it has merely decided on a process to consider the adoption of new gTLDs.

The panel also noted the recent Norwegian domain name policy developments.

7 Consultative Mechanisms
It was agreed that panel members should undertake appropriate consultation with their formal and informal constituencies. The panel noted the upcoming Small Business Coalition meeting and agreed it would be appropriate to provide some material for the Coalition's information.

Last Updated: 07/03/2006 09:15