ICANN, IIC Consultation Montevideo, Uruguay, 08/19/2008 This is the first consultation that we are having at a regional level, and we are very happy to have this very important participation of the Latin American and Caribbean community And we also hope to hear your comments. I would like to introduce you to those of us here at ICANN Shernon Osepa, is our new manager of Caribbean relations. He just joined our ICANN team in July. We also have Kieren McCarthy. He is responsible for everything having to do with "Public Participation" at ICANN, Kieren also organizes everything related to translations and remote participation at ICANN meetings. And finally, I will leave you with Raimundo Beca Many of you already know Raimundo Beca, he has been a member of the LACNIC Board of Directors, a member of the "Supporting Organization" of ICANN, who deals with management, and he is a member of the ICANN Board of Directors. He is also a member of the President's Strategy Committee, which was in charge of developing these documents that you have in your hands. Therefore I would like... to give the floor to Raimundo. All of your comments will be going to the President's Strategy Committee, to make up part of the post JPA strategic vision. I will now leave you with Raimundo for a moment while you enjoy lunch. The President's Strategy Committee has a mixed structure, part is made up of ICANN management, And people from outside With a multi-disciplinary, multi-regional perspective. We are essentially here to listen to you In order to know what the community thinks So if there are any questions, particularly clarifications of the questions, I myself and everyone else is here; I am going to moderate this debate but everyone can ask all the questions they feel are necessary. Thank you! (Applause) (Introducing himself) I am an engineer. My question is related to capture I cannot find a simple solution to avoid a term that we are using in the document... the community could go beyond the Board of Directors. What is a community, in our case? There is a very strong capture today in every region, since the registries (registries and registrars) are controlling the process. I will go even further; it seems that today the Internet, is captured by First World countries. We, those from the Caribbean, Latin America, Africa, Asia, have very little space in order to present our problems, our realities. The ICANN meetings have significant value for the gNSO, for new domain names But the IPv6 is not given the same attention It seems that ICANN management, with the exception of Raimundo and a few others do not talk about the transition from IPv4 to IPv6. And it seems that those of us from LACNIC should be placed very clearly on this consultation page... our comments about the concern that the largest body is not involved very significantly in the whole transition problem. I am Anthony Harris, from Argentina, I have been part of ICANN since its foundation, it seems to me that we shouldn't get confused when we speak about capture, thinking only in political terms and about the influence of countries in the North. At ICANN the issue- at least in my experience- in my perception, has to do with something else; it concerns economic interests. Economic interests at ICANN deal fundamentally with the activity that I call... the incumbents, the "registries" and "registrars" which are the the domain name registers, and then the registrars, which are the resale chain for these names. Those are the 2 groups whose existence, whose business tasks, fundamentally depend on ICANN resources, which is why there is a constant effort,- particularly notable in our Board-, the Naming Board, in order to ensure that your voice and your vote have adequate strength so that nobody can promote a policy... that impacts your business. I am not using this to criticize them, but simply so we keep in mind that it is not just a political question, when we speak about the influence of ICANN, but rather that it is also an economic question that is not minor I would like to make a comment along the same lines as both Harmut and Tony. I, in the quick reading that I am able to do with the documents presented, believe that is is almost decided... that the Joint Project Agreement will terminate in September. And from then on, ICANN will not have this connection, or rather the legal capture on the part of the United States government. What happens in the instance that the United States government does not accept any of this, and that happens? It is no longer MoU, it is no longer JPA or another "abc" name... the same legal capture will continue as the United States government system. It is a question that almost precedes this JPA consultation. Thank you.