IP: Joint IANA and NSI ByLaws for the New Internet Corporation

[David Farber <farber () cis upenn edu>]

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From: Jon Postel <postel () ISI EDU>
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Subject: Joint IANA and NSI ByLaws for the New Internet Corporation
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                                                      17 September, 1998


       A Brief Explanation of the Joint IANA and NSI Documents
                  Defining the New Internet Corporation


Background: As many of you are aware, the Internet Assigned Numbers
Authority (IANA) and Network Solutions (NSI) have been in engaged in
more than two weeks of intense discussions toward defining the new
corporation that will oversee key administrative functions of the
Internet including the coordinating functions for domain names and
numbers. Together, IANA and NSI in a spirit of cooperation have
released a new set of jointly developed bylaws and articles of
incorporation. This joint effort followed earlier drafts independently
published by both parties. The new documents consist of the best
elements of earlier drafts and include broad inputs from Internet
stakeholders and users while remaining true to the guiding principles
set forth in the US Government?s White Paper. The goal was to capture
the best ideas from all sources, including the International Forum for
the White Paper (IFWP), the business community, the Internet technical
community and other stakeholders.


Consensus of the community: Throughout the discussions and
negotiations both IANA and NSI have been keenly aware of the literally
hundreds of persons and organizations that have provided comments and
ideas that we believe are reflected in this final draft. In the
drafting process, attention to the months of discussions, meetings and
Internet traffic were considered. It has been our good faith effort to
put forward this final draft as the consensus solutions that best
meets the challenges set forth in the White Paper and to meet the
deadline by the end of this month. Although we believe that this
document reflects the opinions of most stakeholders, we accept the
fact that some suggestions for specific changes will be desired. Any
such suggestion must, however, be received within the next day or two
and should be very specific text changes, not substantially different
concepts, because it is simply not possible to make significant
concept changes at this stage. It is now important that closure occur
on these initial basic instruments.


Openness and membership provisions: While all the substantive changes
from earlier versions have been noted in the drafts, there are two
general areas of change that some will view as particularly
significant. First, openness has been a paramount concept to include
in the draft instruments for the new corporation. In a variety of
places but predominately in Article III, additional language has been
added to ensure that there will be adequate notice of the new
organizations?  actions, opportunities for input from all that are
interested, and an explanation of the organization?s decisions. In
addition, Article III directs the Board to adopt procedures through
which affected parties can seek reconsideration of Board actions.
Second, we have strengthened the language directing the Board to try
to find a way to provide for some form of membership and electoral
process of the At Large members of the Board. While the decision
remains for the Initial Board, there now is strong presumption in
favor of some form of membership structure.


Important steps remain: We have pressed forward with this as our final
consensus draft so that hopefully the new corporation can come into
existence very soon and assure an effective transition of functions to
the new corporation can be established by at the end of this month.
This will allow incorporation to proceed and the transition from US
Government stewardship to a true self-governing structure. With this
progress, however, many other key actions must take place to bring the
new corporation to reality and it is important that all interested
parties remain involved and participate as we all jointly go forward.


Support and Stability: We believe that the concepts and language this
document contains do in fact command the support of a clear consensus
of the global Internet community. Perhaps most importantly, we believe
that the drafts provide what is necessary for a stable functioning
Internet for business and users worldwide. As a result, we believe
these instruments (along with any specific improvements that are
received in the next day or two) can and should form the basis for the
creation of the global consensus non-profit corporation called for by
the White Paper and allow the Internet flourish into the 21st century.


We look forward to working together and with other stakeholders to
implement this plan.


Sincerely, 


Jon Postel      Gabe Battista 
         


Contacts for Comments: 


Don Telage      tel: +1 703.742.4707 
Joe Sims       tel: +1 202.879.3863 
Zita Wenzel      tel: +1 310.822.1511 
Chris Clough      tel: +1 703.742.4706


For the full Articles of Incorporation and By Laws, please see:


        http://www.iana.org/description2.html
or
        http://netsol.com:8080/policy/icann


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