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Nominating Committee | Open Leadership Positions 2010

13 November 2009

Candidates for all positions should be women and men with a high level of qualifications and experience with an international outlook including some familiarity with the Internet. They should be prepared to contribute to the collective decision-making process among ICANN's Constituencies, Supporting Organizations, and Advisory Committees.

About ICANN

The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) is a not-for-profit public benefit California corporation having responsibility for the security and stability of the Internet through the management of the Internet's assigned names and numbers. Created in 1998 by a joint initiative of the Internet's business, technical, academic, and user communities, ICANN has been gradually assuming the responsibility for a set of technical functions previously performed by the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA) and other groups. Under contract from the U.S. Department of Commerce, ICANN includes the IANA function that since the inception of the Internet has managed the Internet's naming and numbering functions.

ICANN's mission is: to coordinate, at the overall level, the global Internet's systems of unique identifiers, and in particular to ensure the stable and secure operation of the Internet's unique identifier systems. In particular, ICANN:

  1. Coordinates the allocation and assignment of the three sets of unique identifiers for the Internet, which are:
    1. Domain names (forming a system referred to as "DNS");
    2. Internet protocol ("IP") addresses and autonomous system ("AS") numbers; and
    3. Protocol port and parameter numbers.
  2. Coordinates the operation and evolution of the DNS root name server system
  3. Coordinates policy development reasonably and appropriately related to these technical functions. (http://www.icann.org/general/bylaws.htm#I)

ICANN is dedicated to preserving the operational stability of the Internet; to promoting competition; to achieving broad representation of global Internet communities; and to developing policy appropriate to its mission through bottom-up consensus-based processes.

Criteria and time commitments applicable to all positions

The Nom Com will use the Criteria for Selection of ICANN Directors contained in the ICANN Bylaws for all four sets of positions it will fill. These Criteria are:

  1. Accomplished persons of integrity, objectivity, and intelligence, with reputations for sound judgment and open minds, and a demonstrated capacity for thoughtful group decision-making;
  2. Persons with an understanding of ICANN's mission and the potential impact of ICANN decisions on the global Internet community, and committed to the success of ICANN;
  3. Persons who will produce the broadest cultural and geographic diversity on the Board consistent with meeting the other criteria set forth in this Section;
  4. Persons who, in the aggregate, have personal familiarity with the operation of gTLD registries and registrars; with ccTLD registries; with IP address registries; with Internet technical standards and protocols; with policy-development procedures, legal traditions, and the public interest; and with the broad range of business, individual, academic, and non-commercial users of the Internet;
  5. Persons who are willing to serve as volunteers, without compensation other than the reimbursement of certain expenses; and
  6. Persons who are able to work and communicate in written and spoken English.

Given ICANN's Mission and Core Values, appointees engage in discussions on the technical functions coordinated by ICANN and their impact on the global Internet operation, such as its stability and integrity, or the effect on the users of the Internet. Appointees interact in a diverse environment, involving ICANN Board, ICANN Supporting Organizations and Constituencies, or Advisory Committees, as well as the broad Internet community, by means of a continuous, transparent and informed dialogue, as it corresponds to the ICANN multi-stakeholder concept.

Appointees will be part of groups which function better in a collegial and cooperative manner but in which individuals must also be prepared for intense debate in which tolerance and reasoning are necessary to accommodate and synthesize conflicting views. Careful consideration of the issues, depth of study of the precedents and environment, and the ability to deal clearly with conflict, including potentially conflict of interest, are predictors of successful contributions to ICANN.

The Nom Com welcomes and encourages Statements of Interests from all members of the global Internet community. Although Candidates should be able to both work and communicate well in English, there is no requirement that English be the candidate's first language.

The time commitments identified below are a basic requirement and the Nom Com anticipates that in most cases people will spend more time rather than less. All appointees should expect to spend an additional significant amount of time when joining ICANN on training and learning about the organization, its mission, history and mode of operation.

ICANN holds three meetings per year. These meetings typically last for one week and are where the ICANN community gathers to discuss and develop policy and conduct ICANN's business. Meeting locations rotate across ICANN's five geographic regions, for example the first meeting of 2010 will be held in Africa region (Nairobi, Kenya), the second meeting will be held in the European region (Brussels, Belgium), and the third meeting in the Latin American region. Subsequent meetings in 2011-2012 will be held in locations in all five regions. All NomCom appointees are expected to travel and participate in ICANN meetings. Reasonable expenses incurred in attending meetings will be reimbursed.

Position and Roles, Eligibility Factors, and Time Commitments

Nominating Committee Job Descriptions

Nominating Committee Appointments to the ICANN Board of Directors

To fill three vacancies on the ICANN Board, the Nominating Committee is seeking accomplished persons of integrity, objectivity and intelligence who have:

  • a commitment to ICANN's mission and an understanding of the potential impact of ICANN decisions on the global Internet community
  • demonstrated capacity for thoughtful group decision-making and sound judgment
  • an understanding of the importance of good governance practices and an ability to contribute to the Board in this regard
  • a willingness to serve as volunteers, without compensation other than the reimbursement of certain expenses
  • an ability to work and communicate in written and spoken English (although there is no requirement that English be the candidate's first language)

In filling these positions, the Nominating Committee will be seeking to provide ICANN with a Board that reflects the global diversity of the Internet community and the wide range of technical, commercial and civil society activities that are impacted by the Domain Name System.

Time Commitment and Working Practice

The successful candidates will be appointed to the ICANN Board from December 2010 to November 2013. Exact timing will depend on the dates of ICANN's Annual General Meetings.

The basic responsibilities of an ICANN Director require a minimum commitment of time which when averaged out over the year is roughly equivalent to 20-24 hours each week. This includes participation in three ICANN meetings/year, two Board retreats/year and work on Board Committees. The time spent in these basic responsibilities is typically clustered around Board meetings and monthly teleconferences, but there is a constant flow of information requiring attention on a near daily basis.

Directors are expected to attend three ICANN meetings per year and depending on the location and including travel time and preparation this could be a commitment of up to ten (10) days per meeting. In addition, the Board occasionally holds shorter face-to-face meetings such as retreats.

Directors spend additional time in connection with their work on Board Committees, a commitment that varies in relation to the number of Committees on which they serve, the scope of the Committee's responsibilities, and their role as Chair or Member of the Committee.

For further details of the work of the ICANN Board see http://www.icann.org/en/general/board.html.

Nominating Committee Appointment to the ICANN Generic Name Supporting Organization Council

The Generic Names Supporting Organization (GNSO) is a policy-development body responsible for developing and recommending to the ICANN Board substantive policies relating to generic top-level domains. For more information on the work of the GNSO Council, see http://gnso.icann.org/. To fill one vacancy on the GNSO Council, Nom Com is seeking accomplished persons of integrity, objectivity and intelligence who have:

  • a commitment to ICANN's mission and an understanding of the potential impact of ICANN decisions on the global Internet community
  • an understanding of the DNS and the industry structure of the domain name market
  • demonstrated capacity for thoughtful group decision-making and sound judgment
  • an ability to chair or otherwise support a multi-stakeholder group in reaching consensus
  • expertise in [areas identified as relevant for that year]
  • a willingness to serve as a volunteer, without compensation other than the reimbursement of certain expenses
  • an ability to work and communicate in written and spoken English (although there is no requirement that English be the candidate's first language)

In filling these positions, Nom Com will be seeking to provide a Council that reflects the global diversity of the Internet community and the wide range of technical, commercial and civil society activities that are impacted by the DNS.

Time Commitment and Working Practice

The successful candidate will be appointed to the GNSO Council from December 2010 to November 2012. Exact timing will depend on the dates of ICANN's Annual General Meetings.

The basic responsibilities of a GNSO Council member involve a minimum of 20 hours per month on Council related activities, with those chairing or participating in Working Groups or Task Forces spending up to 60 hours a month or more. Depending on work load, for example during the weeks before the 3 face-to-face meetings, this can sometimes escalate to as much as 20 hours per week or more. The commitment for the 3 face-to-face meetings generally run about 7 days with council members having sometimes extensive responsibilities on most days. For those involved in Task Forces or Working Groups, there may occasionally be additional face-to-face interim meetings.

Nominating Committee Appointment to the ICANN Country Code Name Supporting Organization Council

The Country Code Names Supporting Organization (ccNSO) is a policy-development body which is responsible for developing and recommending to the Board global policies relating to country-code top-level domains (ccTLDs), nurturing consensus across the ccNSO's community, including the name-related activities of ccTLDs; and coordinating with other ICANN Supporting Organizations, Committees, and Constituencies. For more information on the work of the ccNSO Council, see http://ccnso.icann.org/about/. To fill one vacancy on the ccNSO Council, Nom Com is seeking accomplished persons of integrity, objectivity and intelligence who have:

  • a commitment to ICANN's mission and an understanding of the potential impact of ICANN decisions on the global Internet community
  • an understanding of the ccTLD issues
  • demonstrated capacity for thoughtful group decision-making and sound judgment
  • a willingness to serve as a volunteer, without compensation other than the reimbursement of certain expenses
  • an ability to work and communicate in written and spoken English (although there is no requirement that English be the candidate's first language)

In filling these positions, Nom Com will be seeking to provide a Council that reflects the global diversity of the Internet community and the wide range of technical, commercial and civil society activities that are impacted by the DNS.

Time Commitment and Working Practice

The successful candidate will be appointed to the ccNSO Council from December 2010 to November 2013. Exact timing will depend on the dates of ICANN's Annual General Meetings.

An average ccNSO Council member would spend at least 12 hours per month on Council related activities, with those chairing Working Groups or Task Forces spending at least 30 hours a month. (The commitment involves a minimum of 6 hours per month based on an average of 1.5 two-hour teleconferences (or physical meetings) per month plus about two hours of preparation for each meeting for reading task force reports and potentially discussing with the community. Participation in committees of the council and/or task forces could easily double that minimum time commitment.)

Nominating Committee Appointment to the ICANN At Large Advisory Committee

The At Large Advisory Committee (ALAC) is the ICANN body responsible for representing the voice of the end user in policy and operational discussions. For more information on the work of the ALAC, see http://www.atlarge.icann.org/.

To fill two vacancies on the ALAC (from European and North American regions), Nom Com is seeking accomplished persons of integrity, objectivity and intelligence who have:

  • a commitment to ICANN's mission and an understanding of the potential impact of ICANN decisions on the global Internet community
  • an understanding of the DNS and the impact of ICANN policy on end users
  • demonstrated capacity for thoughtful group decision-making and sound judgment
  • an ability to chair or otherwise provide leadership and support for a multi-stakeholder group working to reach consensus
  • expertise in [areas identified as relevant for that year]
  • a willingness to serve as a volunteer, without compensation other than the reimbursement of certain expenses
  • an ability to work and communicate in a multilingual environment in either English, French or Spanish

In filling these positions, the Nominating Committee will be seeking to provide a Committee that reflects the global diversity of the Internet community and the wide range of technical, commercial and civil society activities that are impacted by the DNS.

Time Commitment and Working Practice

The successful candidates will be appointed to ALAC from December 2010 to November 2012. Exact timing will depend on the dates of ICANN's Annual General Meetings.

The basic responsibilities of an ALAC member involve a minimum of 20 hours per month on Committee related activities, with those chairing or participating in working groups spending more time. Committee members are expected to make a commitment to attend all Committee meetings and to participate actively in policy issues and other working groups. The ALAC operates in a transparent manner and publishes participation statistics on its website. Committee members will also be expected to attend ICANN's three face-to-face meetings each year, which generally run about 7 days with Committee members having sometimes extensive responsibilities on most days. There may occasionally be additional face-to-face interim meetings or regional meetings.

Domain Name System
Internationalized Domain Name ,IDN,"IDNs are domain names that include characters used in the local representation of languages that are not written with the twenty-six letters of the basic Latin alphabet ""a-z"". An IDN can contain Latin letters with diacritical marks, as required by many European languages, or may consist of characters from non-Latin scripts such as Arabic or Chinese. Many languages also use other types of digits than the European ""0-9"". The basic Latin alphabet together with the European-Arabic digits are, for the purpose of domain names, termed ""ASCII characters"" (ASCII = American Standard Code for Information Interchange). These are also included in the broader range of ""Unicode characters"" that provides the basis for IDNs. The ""hostname rule"" requires that all domain names of the type under consideration here are stored in the DNS using only the ASCII characters listed above, with the one further addition of the hyphen ""-"". The Unicode form of an IDN therefore requires special encoding before it is entered into the DNS. The following terminology is used when distinguishing between these forms: A domain name consists of a series of ""labels"" (separated by ""dots""). The ASCII form of an IDN label is termed an ""A-label"". All operations defined in the DNS protocol use A-labels exclusively. The Unicode form, which a user expects to be displayed, is termed a ""U-label"". The difference may be illustrated with the Hindi word for ""test"" — परीका — appearing here as a U-label would (in the Devanagari script). A special form of ""ASCII compatible encoding"" (abbreviated ACE) is applied to this to produce the corresponding A-label: xn--11b5bs1di. A domain name that only includes ASCII letters, digits, and hyphens is termed an ""LDH label"". Although the definitions of A-labels and LDH-labels overlap, a name consisting exclusively of LDH labels, such as""icann.org"" is not an IDN."