Executive Director's Report - 31 October 2006
Executive Director's Report to Council – 31 October 2006
Executive Committee Meeting Minutes
The minutes of the Executive Committee’s meeting of 18 November are attached. These minutes have already been circulated to the Council list.
Telecommunications Act
We had some concerns during October that the Select Committee arranged a non-public discussion with Telecom, but we now believe the meeting was to prepare Telecom for the announcements .
AntiSpam Legislation
The Act is currently 9th in Parliaments Orders, so there remains a chance it will be enacted before Christmas.
Legal advice has been sought from Lowndes Jordan on the amended legislation, and on the Code of Practice.
ISPANZ
InternetNZ back in September embarked on an initial work programme for ISPANZ. Most of this work is being undertaken by Richard Wood.
In October this involved press material preparation in relation to the Telecommunications Amendment Bill, and in response to a Telecom speech.
Also a submission on ISPANZ peering policy was produced for the MED, an Anti-Spam presentation prepared for the ISPANZ council meeting in early November, and work on updating ISPANZ Position Papers.
November/December work includes finalising Position Papers, writing one or two more from scratch, analysing Internet Code of Practice in preparation for ISPANZ consideration, reviewing ISPANZ workplan and working groups, and other work as it arises.
Internet Governance Forum
I have attached a separate report on the IGF Athens meeting.
ICANN Brazil Meeting
The agenda for ICANN Brazil (www.icann.org/meetings/saopaulo/#ScheduleandAgenda) is quite substantial, and ongoing debate on issues such as WHOIS, ICANN’s strategic plan, IDN’s, DNSSec etc will occur.
There are some new issues on the agenda, including a full day ccNSO Technical Workshop, which looks to be quite an ambitious but interesting agenda covering a significant number of technical issues faced by registry operators and managers.
Another new issue on the agenda is the ICANN Meeting White Paper (www.icann.org/meetings/white-paper.htm), which should be interesting for us as a recent ICANN meeting host.
A subject that is likely to arise on the agenda appears to be ICANN Directors Fees. There is some disquiet that despite ICANN’s budget growth and growing time commitment expected from directors, there are no directors fees paid. This may mean that the ICANN board may not be representative of the global community, as it can only comprise of directors who can afford to contribute unpaid time. With the 3 major meetings per year (at 9 days per meeting), plus conference call meetings, planning retreats, sub-committees etc, it is likely the average ICANN director would need to contribute 40 – 50 days per year to attend to the expectations of their role. As this is a subject not previously formally discussed by Council, I would appreciate a steer from Council so that I can participate in discussions in Brazil. It is my feeling that ICANN directors should receive some compensation, and I have drafted a recommendation at the conclusion of this report, which if accepted by Council, would allow me to advocate from this position.
Sibling Meetings
During October I attended meetings of ICT-NZ, ISPANZ, NZ Bankers Association, Netsafe and REANNZ, and TUANZ.
Pete Macaulay’s Scottish Trip Report
InternetNZ assisted with a small financial contribution to Pete’s October Europe trip, to enable him to visit Scotland to discuss their E-City Index initiative, which we had highlighted as being a possible model to emulate with NZ’s “Digital Communities” initiative. A copy of Pete’s report is appended, and further discussion will occur on the Digital Communities concept at the December Council meeting.
Cyberlaw Fellow
The 2007 Cyberlaw Fellow has been appointed and will commence in January. A press release will be made in due course.
It should also be noted that Fiona Alexander, from NTIA Washington, will be on a 6 month secondment to Wellington from January. Fiona is NTIA’s UN representative, counterpart to Suzanne Sene in ICANN.
New General Ledger / Accounts Structure
I have contracted Gavin Welsh to evaluate General Ledger packages for InternetNZ, and to facilitate the preparation of a new chart of accounts. Work will commence in late January, and the new ledger will be in place for the start of the new financial year on 1 April 2007.
Staffing
The final quarter of 2006 has been somewhat chaotic with some staff spending considerable periods away from the office. I was away for nearly 4 weeks in October / November, attending the IGF and then on leave, Jordan away for 2 weeks in November with APTLD Bangkok and European telco regulation issues, and Nick Wallingford will be in Australia for a week in December attending their IPv6 summit (www.isoc-au.org.au/ipv6summit) then the Australia-Korea-New Zealand Broadband Summit (www.plevin.com.au/aknzbbs2006/index.htm), which David Cunliffe will be attending. I am also away at ICANN Sao Paulo for the first week of December.
Nick Wallingford completes his 12 months with InternetNZ in December, returning to his position at the Bay of Plenty Polytech. I’d like Council to record my thanks to Nick for his efforts during the year, enabling us to progress technical aspects of our work significantly.
Membership
As at 31 October 2006 InternetNZ membership stood at 152, comprising the following:
Total
last month end 152
Less Void / Resigned 0
Plus new
members 0
-----
Total this month end 152
New rules on types of members applied from 1 October, which included the removal of the multiple memberships for corporate members, with the new membership rules providing a single membership in each instance. The above figures therefore reflect this change, and do not represent any significant reduction in membership. It also includes some members who were still unfinancial but were anticipated to renew during November.
Recommendations:
That the Executive Director’s report be received
That InternetNZ supports the concept of ICANN Directors fees being paid
Keith
Davidson
27 November 2006
