Budget: Reserves still not on the level they should be. Ended up where budget was supposed to. Contributions to reserves not being what hoped in an ideal circumstance, but that's because of budgeting for ccTLD contributions. Board will consider special appropriation for cost of recuriting replacement for Stuart Lynn; retiring "March or earlier should that work out". Staffing: 20 staff on board, budget approval 21 end last year, approval for 27 this year. Personal announcements: Andy McLaughlin now half time, given up post of vice president; half-time consulting role. Vitzthum (ccTLD liaison) will be leaving ICANN in the end of this year for personal reasons. Anne-Rachel Inné will join staff playing role in ccTLD liaison work and policy analysis. Recently played consulting role on outreach issues in Africa. Steve Conte has joined ICANN technical staff. Denise Michel joined consulting staff. Administrative staff turnover. Other postions open: Registry liaison, webmaster. More recruiting to come.
Audit report is late; auditor fell of a horse doing field work. Unaudited figures given earlier will track precisely the audited figures; no reason to assume otherwise.
DoC has signed MoU extension. Improvement over earlier MoUs. Earlier MoUs had broad areas ICANN needs to accomplish, without time frame. New MoU has specific tasks to be accomplished in the shorter term. Accomplishing these tasks is a challenge for ICANN. Also a challenge to the community, in terms of what community wants to see happen (or doesn't want to see happen).
ccTLD relationships: Several agreements will be signed in the next few weeks. Complete some by this meeting; consolidation over the next few weeks. Difficulties in relationship between IANA function and some ccTLDs; differences of view over interpretation of policy. Legitimate differences of view. AXFR requirements for name server changes. Trying to channel those differences into more constructive framework. Security and stability committee has undertaken the task to think about how to improve DNS stability. Staff tied some things together which should better be considered separately. More constructive direction now. ... Hard to find one policy which fits all kinds of name server changes. Hopes that CCNSO will be a way to work together to do hard thinking on what is the rigvht framework for this. IANA is a function and not a policy part of ICANN. Responds to what it believes the policy framework is. Work out that framework.
Dot-org: Awareded to ISOC/PIR. Eleven very serious and very thoughtful proposals. Proposed agreement with PIR has been posted. Board members can raise policy questions until Friday. If no objections, Stuart signs next week. If objections, there'll be a special meeting to discuss this. Constructive collaboration between Verisign and Afilias. Transition going to happen on December 31.
New gTLDs: Presented NTEPPTF report in August. Proposed three-part action plan which will be presented later today. No action on it at this meeting; action plan has not been posted. Post next week; possible board action in Amsterdam December 14/15. Location: Sheraton at Schiphol airport in Amsterdam.
2003 spring meeting will be in Rio de Janeiro; sandwiched between carnival and grand prix. First meeting in North America outside Marina del Rey will be in Montreal, June 23rd through 26th. 2003 fall meeting will be in Africa, probably November. Details still to be decided.
Closing comments: Reform will be main topic of the day. Put together document last february which got universal acclaim and agreement (laughter in the audience). Community, board and staff have worked hard in putting forward reform proposals. Appreciate effort. Three primary problems: Funding, process, stakeholder relationships. Addressing the first two of those, but have much work to do in terms of relationships with certain communities. Lot of work to be done. Constructive thinking is going on. Looking forward to some dialogues. Third area clearly needs to be done. Transition planning still to be done.
