[kictanet] New Chairman of ICANN Elected Unanimously

[Wanjira, Alice Munyua]

New Chairman of ICANN Elected Unanimously

Handover represents organization's move from foundation to steady performance

2 November 2007

LOS ANGELES: Peter Dengate Thrush, a New Zealand lawyer, has been elected unanimously as the new Chairman of the Board of the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers.

"I am delighted that my colleagues have placed their confidence in me for this challenging and important role," Dengate Thrush said.

Peter practices civil litigation, specializing in intellectual property, competition, and Internet law. He has been involved in ICANN since its inception. As a member of the Boston Working Group, he provided comment in 1998 on the early drafts of the ICANN bylaws, and he co-chaired one of the pre-formation meetings of the Intellectual Property Constituency in Wellington, New Zealand.

He has been President of InternetNZ, a leader of the country code Top Level Domain (ccTLD) community in the formation of the ccNSO, and was selected as a board member after an international vote of ccTLD managers in the ccNSO in December 2004. He is currently on the President's Strategy, Board Finance, Board Governance, and Executive committees.

Retiring Chair Dr Vint Cerf sees Dengate Thrush's appointment as a clear signal that ICANN has matured.

"ICANN has moved from a foundation state to a steady state. Peter understands that and the Board's role and is a great choice to keep the organization strong and focused," Dr Cerf said.

Dr Paul Twomey, ICANN's President and CEO, also welcomed the appointment.

"This is great news. Peter's long involvement in ICANN since before its incorporation means he knows the history as well as the current players and issues," Dr Twomey said. "His legal training gives him a strong understanding of contracts as a key mechanism in ICANN, and his networks within industry, particularly the ccTLD community helps ICANN with its global responsibilities."

Speaking after the vote, Dengate Thrush gave some perspectives on the organization and its future.

"ICANN is a unique model supporting a global community. The model works because it stands for one global Internet that is coordinated not controlled," Dengate Thrush said.

"After nine years ICANN is well placed to face the challenges of the future. The fact that it is so well positioned is a tribute to Vint and of course the staff led by Paul Twomey who have taken us out of foundation mode to become the right organization to meet future challenges," Dengate Thrush added.

"I think our biggest challenges are about serving the global audience. At a technical level there is the challenge of introducing international scripts at the top level for both gTLDS and ccTLDs, as well as new processes for introducing what may be a large number of generic top level domains," Dengate Thrush said.

"At the organizational level we need to expand our global activity and constantly increase international involvement, as well work on the completion of the Joint Project Agreement with the United States Government," Dengate Thrush added.

The Board also unanimously re-elected Roberto Gaetano as Deputy Chair. Gaetano was selected by the 2006 Nominating Committee to serve as a Board Member

"I look forward to supporting the Board and the community in this exciting period for ICANN," Gaetano said. "The Internet is constantly evolving and that means ICANN's responsibility to ensure one stable foundation is all the more important."

Gaetano has a degree in Mathematics and an MBA. He has more than 30 years of experience in telecommunications and information technology, acquired working for different organizations in different countries and works for the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) . He is fluent in five languages.

He has been an active participant in the Internet and the ICANN policy-making process since 1997. As a representative of ETSI (European Telecommunication Standards Institute), he played important roles in the formation of CORE (Council of Internet Registrars), the policy discussions around the U.S. Government's White Paper.
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Vint Cerf Releases 'Looking Towards the Future' Statement

2 November 2007

LOS ANGELES : Vint Cerf, the retiring chairman of the board with the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, today released "Looking Towards the Future," his Legacy Letter to the ICANN Community.

In the Introduction to the letter, Dr Cerf writes:

"Today, ICANN is larger, more capable, more international, and better positioned to fulfill its mandate. It stands for one global interoperable Internet and the model of stakeholder representation has worked.

"But the Internet and its vast user population have grown during the same time by a factor of over 20 in all dimensions. The 50 million users of 1997 have become nearly 1.2 billion users today. The 22 million hosts on the network have increased to nearly 500 million today. The bandwidth of the core data circuits in the Internet have grown from 622 million bits per second to between 10 and 40 billion bits per second.

"This dramatic growth in physical size has been accompanied by an equally dramatic growth in the number and diversity of applications running on the Internet. All forms of media now appear on and are carried by Internet packets. Consumers of information are producing more and more of it themselves with email, blogs, instant messaging, social and game playing web sites, video uploads, and podcasts.

"The Internet continues to evolve and while ICANN has achieved more than most people realize, it must continue to evolve along with it."

The entire statement is online at: http://www.icann.org/documents/vint_cerf/lttf.htm
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