[cooperation-wg] Any response to the NRO/ASO request to ICANN?

> On 10 Feb 2020, at 11:24, Chris Buckridge <chrisb at ripe.net> wrote:
> 
> Jim, you’ve raised an important point here, and I wanted to give an answer from the RIPE NCC perspective, particularly given some of the complexities involved. 
> 
> First, it is important to note that this is a request to the ICANN Board from the NRO Executive Council ... So the decision to send this request to ICANN was not the RIPE NCC’s alone.

I never suggested it was.

> The text of the request itself attempted to detail the reasoning, but I am happy to paraphrase: the ASO (that is, the five RIR organisations) believes that any decision made by ICANN in regard to the PIR sale would represent a significant Internet governance event, not simply in relation to its impact on the DNS; as such, it would be an important decision for ICANN, its board, the organisation and the community. As a “Decisional Participant in the Empowered Community”, the ASO felt it important to be fully aware of all relevant information ahead of any such decision being made, in the interests of due diligence. 

Thanks for the response Chris. I’m even more confused now.

According to the ASO MoU, one the NRO/ASO AC’s responsibility is "providing advice to the Board of ICANN on number resource allocation policy”. There is nothing in that MoU which says the NRO/ASO AC can advise the ICANN Board about anything else. Though I'm sure the board is happy to receive such advice - even on topics which are out of scope for the ASO.

The NRO’s MoU says it serves "as the coordinating mechanism of the RIRs to act collectively on matters relating to the interests of the RIRs”. That *might* allow some wiggle room to comment on the PIR sale. But I’m struggling to find a justification. At the very least, I would have expected some sort of community consultation to take place beforehand -- “Here’s what we’ll send to ICANN. Any comments?” -- or to have involved the ASO AC/NRO NC in preparing that advice. Neither of those things seems to have happened.

It’s perfectly fine for the NRO (or one of its personas) to act on behalf of the numbering community. And when the need arises, do that on a numbering issue without community input. That’s one of the things it’s tasked to do.

However it’s not fine to do that on matters that are out of scope - at least not unless there was some bottom-up demand for the community to act. Apart from this thread’s meta discussion, I’ve not seen any comments on any RIPE list concerning the PIR sale. Maybe things were different on the lists at the other RIRs.

What I’m looking for is the community input and endorsement to support the NRO/ASO advice to the ICANN board. If this doesn’t exist, that raises serious questions of transparency, accountability and mission creep.

It’s still not clear who decided to send that advice to ICANN board, why they did it and why/how it was in scope for some permutation of ASO AC/NRO NC/NRO/ASO.

So, for the second time could somebody please explain?

PS If the ASO AC/NRO NC/NRO/ASO considers the sale of PIR to be a significant Internet governance event, it sets an ugly precedent. Will it interfere in a proposed change of ownership or status of any other TLD? Perhaps it could get dragged in to the battles over .amazon or something like that. I would hope the ASO AC/NRO NC/NRO/ASO kept well away from these sorts of issues.