NZOC Report to Council 22/08/02

Office of the Domain Name Commissioner
InternetNZ
Level 4, 4 Bond Street
P O Box 11881, WELLINGTON
www.dnc.org.nz

20 August 2002

Council
InternetNZ

Report from the .nz Oversight Committee

The .nz Oversight Committee met on 5 August. We were initially concerned to discuss process issues:

1. External observers: bearing in mind Council's feedback (and our own inclinations) that NZOC processes should be as open and transparent as possible, the time & date and agenda for our meeting was advised to InternetNZ members 6 days prior to the meeting, and intending attendees were invited to notify me 48 hours in advance. This was so that I could inform the NZOC ahead of time. In the event, no-one indicated they wanted to attend and there were no observers present. The Committee agreed that they would welcome external observers at future meetings but reserved the right to go into committee when necessary.
   
2. Policy development policy: we spent some time on this matter and provisionally agreed a draft policy, which will require final sign-off at the next meeting because the draft required some amendment to emphasise the relationship with InternetNZ and the objects in its constitution. The draft policy closely reflects the InternetNZ policy on this matter and will be referred to Council for approval following the next meeting.
   
3. Ironically, we then went on to discuss the need to short circuit the public consulting process outlined in our draft policy development policy over the first urgent set of policies and procedures required for the Registrar Implementation Kit mail-out on 6 September. We established that this timing was critical and that there was no room for delaying the date. It was noted that most of what is being worked on in the policies and procedures has been widely consulted on with those most closely affected by Rose Percival and Doug Mercer in their planning of the SRS. Proposed content of the policies and procedures is in line with the general policy principles agreed for the SRS and these have been widely publicised. This should help ensure that the general direction of the policies is understood and accepted. In addition, the NZOC has agreed that the policies will be subject to a review, which will include an opportunity for wide public comment, after the SRS has been implemented.
   

   Other key decisions and activities arising from the meeting held on 5 August include:

4. Agreement of the list of policies and procedures required for the SRS implementation. This took up most of the meeting. Details of the policies themselves will be agreed by email discussion in the period leading up to 6 September.
   
5. Copies of the draft policies and procedures will be placed on the Councillors only portion of the InternetNZ web site. These are for Council only, and all comments on them should be forwarded to the Domain Name Commissioner at dnc@dnc.org.nz.
   
6. The implementation, migration and risk plans were discussed. It is gratefully acknowledged that the formal paper NZOC put to Council for an e-vote resulted in Council voting to recognise the risk that one or more parties may not be ready to meet an October date. Council also voted to have an independent person QA all parties involved in the project to assess the status of each and has accepted NZOC's recommendation that Ad van der Tol be approached to undertake the QA. The DNC has been in contact with him to finalise arrangements.
   
7. There is a paper submitted to Council regarding the implementation of maori.nz. The recommendations of the NZOC reflect the request of the applicant, the New Zealand Maori Internet Society. Also discussed was the proposal for bank.nz. It was agreed this application could advance to the Request for Discussion. Sue Leader has kindly agreed to co-ordinate this for us.
   
8. The NZOC agreed to a formal request being made to Council to transfer the international responsibility, and budget, back to the International Affairs Committee for this financial year and to look at clarifying the roles and responsibilities for 2003/2004.

A copy of the report from the DNC to the NZOC is enclosed for your information.

Frank March
Chair, .nz Oversight Committee

© 2001 InternetNZ
Last updated 21 August 2002