Meeting Report – CSG Meeting, Oct. 25
Dakar
Attendees:
To be added
1- Introduction - Marilyn Cade
Marilyn Cade, BC Chair (Marilyn) introduced the meeting and went through the meeting’s
agenda, before turning it over to Steve Metalitz, IPC Chair, (Steve) who participated in the
meeting remotely.
2- Discussion on hotel situation in Dakar/ Costa Rica – Marilyn Cade
Marilyn presented an issue encountered by several CSG members in Senegal due to the hotel
selection provided by ICANN staff on the meeting website. Complaints were filed by several
members of the CSG and of the ALAC who were assigned to the Hotel des Almadies in Dakar by
ICANN. Marilyn stated that there is a strong concern about the decision made by ICANN. She
mentioned that the BC was very pleased to be hosted by Senegal and that the judgment
decision about the hotel selection on the ICANN website was made by ICANN staff not by the
host organizer. Marilyn stated that she will raise this point about research validation and
verification by ICANN staff.
Marilyn also mentioned that a problematic situation has also risen for the upcoming Costa Rica
meeting since rooms at the venue are already fully booked. She intends to raise this issue in
Meetings for the Future and would invite CSG members to join her. What is suspected is that
the venue hotel was completely blocked by ICANN. BC members’ perspective is that there are
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no rooms available even before the hotel location is publicly announced. Marilyn presented this
point to the group since it was raised to her as an area of concern to BC members.
3- Debrief from CSG meeting with the Board
Steve shared his perspective of the CSG meeting with the Board. He mentioned there was an
extensive discussion about the ethics issues and a couple of Board members seemed interested
in some fundamental rethinking. He also mentioned the discussion about the Registrar
Accreditation Agreement where Steve Crocker stated that deadlock without progress is not
acceptable, and that we have a responsibility to make sure our process is working and we are
making forward progress. Steve’s response to this comment was that he considered it
interesting and indicative of a more active role on the Board’s part to try to solve deadlocks or
work around them rather than waiting for them to resolve themselves.
Tony Holmes, ISPCP Chair, (Tony), expanded Steve’s comment by mentioning that what he
noted from Bertrand De La Chapelle was that there is a need for original Constituencies but
agreed it should be up to the GNSO to define what the gTLD program means for Constituencies
and what its impact will be. Tony believes this is an issue that the CSG should look at proactively
and that the CSG should also embrace some of the other problems facing the GNSO, such as the
situation in regards to the RAA.
Marilyn added that in the Board reform there were suggestions of a new approach where there
would be an advisory/ consultative Board filled with experts. This point was raised again that
day in the Board meeting as a possible concept to be examined. CSG members discussed this
topic at length highlighting potential issues with this approach. Bill Smith, BC member (PayPal)
mentioned that if ICANN were to adopt this structure and fully compensate Board members,
they would be faced with a conflict of interests within the organization. Board members are
required to act independently, independent of their own interests. Chris Chaplow, BC Vice
Chair of Finance and Operations, (Chris), brought up the cost attributed to the Board in the
present FY12 for Board support and services ($3.4 million) and another figure of roughly $1
million attributed for Board remuneration. Marilyn added that the one million is not an
assumption of a fully compensated Board but an assumption of the additional insurance costs
to deal with liability and part compensation.
Zahid Jamil, BC Councilor on the GNSO, (Zahid) stated that, with respect to structural changes
and improvements, the CSG should start having ideas of solutions for the Board to take into
account.
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ACTION: Marilyn flagged that substantive reports from the SSR review team and the Whois
review team will be released for public comment on the floor in Costa Rica so the CSG
leadership will need to influence the meeting agenda to set aside a substantive on these
reports.
4- CSG Discussion with Xavier Calvez, Chief Financial Officer ICANN
Tony introduced the first guest in the CSG session. Xavier Calvez (Xavier) thanked the CSG for
giving him an opportunity to introduce himself to the CSG. He gave the CSG information on his
background to then move onto a discussion about the budget. Xavier mentioned that he would
like to turn the session into a questions and answers session, where he would ask questions as
well to enable an interactive session. CSG members thanked Xavier for joining them in this
session and that they look forward to some real improvements in the ICANN budgeting process
due to this opportunity.
Marilyn addressed the issue involving the mechanisms currently used for taking input in this
strategic plan or in the budget and operating plan, stating that they do not currently meet the
CSG needs. She asked Xavier to think about a possible enhancement to this procedure. She
previously proposed that, particularly with the development of budget committees or groups of
experts coming from the different supporting organizations and ACs, Xavier might think about
using the Friday afternoon after the end of the meeting to hold a working session with
representatives from each of the groups, and increase the approach that is taken on public
comment. Xavier responded that he imagined that this would be whether formally or not, a
budget working group across the community. Once this would be in place through this
structure, a more systematic and effective way of communication would arise at a level of
detail which according to Marilyn’s point, does not exist today. Xavier concluded his point by
stating that he would be thinking about this idea and that he perceived that this point would be
well received and not only in that meeting.
Tony concluded this section of the meeting by thanking Xavier once again on behalf of the CSG
and by stating that the CSG looked forward to working closely with him in the future.
5- Contractual Compliance Presentation – Maguy Serad
Brian Winterfeldt (IPC) introduced Maguy Serad, Director of Contractual Compliance ICANN,
(Maguy). Presenting with Maguy were Khalil Rasheed and Stacy Burnette. Maguy presented an
update of the Contractual Compliance team’s work since their last presentation in Singapore.
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The Contractual Compliance’s focus is on the area of process mapping and consolidating their
foundation. The team is staffed with eight full time employees and they currently have three
open positions that they are looking to staff globally. The team is also documenting their
procedures and standard operating processes. Their aim is to evolve into continuous
improvement, efficiency and effective. Another area of the team is exploring new metrics and
they have engaged with stakeholder groups soliciting their inputs. Maguy highlighted the
importance of enhancing communication and of outreach activities. Stacey Burnette would be
coordinating outreach activities in the DC area. The team will be testing outreach within their
area to them expand to different regions and countries, based on the success of the initial
outreach.
Enhancing collaboration is also an area of focus for the team, so stakeholder groups are
encouraged to share with them their expectations of the team. Khalil Rasheed mentioned that
the following day, the compliance team would be hosting an all-day session where anyone is
welcome to ask any further question. Since Singapore, he was tasked with looking at the Whois
activities and assessing the Whois systems, what worked, what tools worked and who was
using the tools. The team therefore looked at roughly 5,000 Whois since leaving Singapore and
manually assessed roughly 2,000. The results of these investigations can be found on their
slides LINK TO BE PROVIDED
Khalil also discussed the WHOIS Data Problem Report Ticketing Process to further explain how
they close tickets or complaints of alleged Whois inaccuracies with Registrars, when they keep
them open and why, which can lead to additional enforcement. The Compliance team also
does their Port 43 Whois monitoring at ICANN which is very important to CSG members since
they often attempt to access Registrars’ WHOIS services or WHOIS information. They have
therefore put together a methodology about the type of Whois monitoring they do: they access
each Registrar’s WHOIS service four to ten times a day and note when they are down and of
they are down for a sufficient amount of time, they escalate a compliance action. During this
past trimester, there were 46 instances, most of which were resolved through the new
prevention model that Maguy mentioned. Khalil also mentioned the UDRP compliance and in
the past trimester, they received 17 complaints of Registrars not implementing UDRP decisions.
Compliance team looked into each of these complaints and were able to resolve at least 11 of
the cases, with the Registrar implementing the decision in a suitable timeframe.
The CSG leadership thanked the Compliance team for joining them and look forward to the
following days opportunity to continue dialogue.
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6- CSG Interaction with GNSO Council Chair Nominee – Stephane Van Gelder
Marilyn introduced Stephane Van Gelder, current Chair of the GNSO Council, standing
unopposed for reelection. Stephane thanked the group for providing the opportunity of this
interaction and the meeting was opened for questions from CSG members.

Marilyn asked Stephane to explain to the group how he sees the role of the vice Chair.
Stephane that there are two ways of looking at the vice chair, his way as Chair and the
Council’s perspective. His expectations for the vice Chair are to allow the Chair to
concentrate on the management of the Council itself. The person taking on the role of vice
Chair for each House needs to work in close collaboration with that House and bring
everything back at leadership level. The vice Chairs also play a very important role in
providing substance to the Council agenda for each meeting, making the vice Chair the
spokesperson for the House. Stephane mentioned that is was very important for the
House to have a very close relationship with its vice Chair, to help them guide the issues
that are important to the House.

Ayesha Hassan, BC member asked for Stephane’s perspective on how to improve the GNS
Council. Stephane replied that there are two elements that the Council should be looking
at. The first has to do with workload and the ability to tackle the projects that are before
the Council in an effective way. The second is about the atmosphere within the GNSO
community. Stephane mentioned that he has received feedback regarding the new
structure stating that it is not working. He reiterated the importance in acknowledging that
this is an attempt to improve the balance between two sides of the same Council, that is
why it is now a bicameral structure.

Steve Metalitz, IPC Chair: What is Stephane’s view about the circumstances under which he
speaks for the GNSO Council, particularly in the world outside ICANN. Stephane replied
that the GNSO Council Chair cannot speak on behalf of the GNSO Council unless he has
Council approval

Ron Andruff, CSG representative for the BC mentioned that the Chair sometimes has to
play about the Constituency role looking at all Constituencies neutrally and identifying how
they’re contributing to the work of the whole in a neutral and productive manner as
opposed to a particular Constituency.
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7 – Conclusion – Marilyn Cade
Marilyn concluded the meeting by thanking Stephane for joining the CSG in this interactive
session and mentioned her appreciation for having a chance to hear Stephane state some of
the issues of concern, as opposed to just hearing how he might handle certain things as Chair.
The full transcript of this meeting can be found here: LINK TO BE INSERTED. The meeting was
adjourned.
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