ICANN Blogs

Read ICANN Blogs to stay informed of the latest policymaking activities, regional events, and more.

Monthly Update

8 August 2014
By

In addition to the U.N. six languages, this content is also available in

null

To the Community,

This is no sleepy summer at ICANN! We've been very busy getting two important processes – the IANA Functions Stewardship Transition and the Strengthening ICANN Governance and Accountability track -- up and running. I wanted to update you on the latest developments for both.

The IANA Functions Stewardship Transition is now in the hands of a Coordination Group (ICG) comprised of members of communities representing both direct and indirect stakeholders. A complete list of ICG members, including relevant details of respective communities' selection processes can be found here.

I want to thank everyone who put in the work to create and execute the processes for selecting community representation to the Coordination Group. I recognize it was quite an undertaking in a short period of time. Despite the short turnaround time, the final composition of the ICG shows strong community representation.

The ICG met for the first time from 17-18 July in London. By the end of two full days of meetings, the ICG had established the basis for its own operations with the development of a draft charter and scope for its future work. The group also began discussing the creation of a timeline for developing the proposal, its own internal organizational structure, internal and external communications needs, and processes for community participation. All resources form the first meeting can be found here. In addition, we have created a new online resource that tells you all about the ICG members – photos, bios and the first of what we hope will be a complete set of video interviews with the group members.

From the perspective of a facilitator, a role that ICANN is fulfilling per NTIA's request, the first meeting was very successful. I felt reassured that the community will respond with a solid transition proposal, despite a rigorous schedule.

Next, the ICG will meet face-to-face on 6 September, following the 9th Annual IGF Meeting in Istanbul, Turkey. Similar to the London Meeting, the meeting will be streamed live through a Virtual Meeting Room and translated in seven languages. Additional details can be found here.

Switching now to the Strengthening ICANN Governance and Accountability track, the end of June brought to a close the window for public comment on the accountability draft process. This process on enhancing ICANN's accountability will be key to the success of the transition.

49 comments were submitted with a majority directly focused on the substantive areas of accountability, including suggestions of topics for discussion as well as proposed approaches. Again, I want to thank everyone who provided comments and who has engaged in the respective dialogues on accountability, particularly during the ICANN 50 meeting in London.

Over the past month, our staff has been reviewing the comments and preparing the next steps for the process, making sure it reflects the community feedback. We expect to provide an update this month on next steps.

These two processes are part of the four tracks of work Fadi described in his May blog as relating to the IANA stewardship transition. To ensure coordinated management of all four tracks – and the more than 30 projects underneath each – we will be pulling them all under one consolidated program. Stay tuned for more information about how we will report on this comprehensive program's progress and budget. We expect to provide an update about it later this month.

Trust and alignment are going to be important moving forward with both of these processes. The transition from the U.S. Government is an opportunity to showcase the strength of the bottom-up, community-led model in developing policy for Internet governance. However, with that opportunity comes significant responsibility. As the true owners of this process, I urge you to engage in conversations across your communities in the coming weeks and months to ensure that as many voices as possible are heard and taken into account.

In the meantime, continue to check the ICANN website, follow ICANN on Twitter, or like ICANN on Facebook throughout this month for immediate updates on these processes. I hope to return in a month with more progress to report!

-TS

Authors

Theresa Swinehart

Theresa Swinehart

SVP, Global Domains & Strategy