[kictanet] Cartagena Statement of the African ICANN community about the Support for new gTLD applicants

[Alice Munyua]

Dear all,

As you are aware ICANN is meant to introduce  new gTLDs, however, during 
the just ended meeting in Cartegna, various stakeholders continued to 
raise a number of controversial aspects of the new gTLDs programme, 
which include but not limited to geographic names, root zone, scaling, 
economic analysis, malicious conduct, etc. The ICANN board resolved to 
provide more time to  stakeholders to discuss and work through the 
remaining issues.   Africa ICANN representatives remain very concerned 
about thehigh costs for applications/process, which  is likely to 
exclude those without the level of financial resources required, e.g 
cultural and other non-commercial groups, among others  from benefiting 
from the opportunities the new gTLDs  will offer.

Please see Draft Applicant Guide (DAG) book: 
http://www.icann.org/en/topics/new-gtlds/draft-rfp-clean-12nov10-en.pdfand 
send in comments.

See Africa ICANN statement below.
best

Alice




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Following ICANN Board's resolution 20 in Nairobi meeting whereby "The 
Board requests stakeholders to work through their SOs and ACs, and form 
a Working Group to develop a sustainable approach to providing support 
to applicants requiring assistance in applying and operating new gTLDs ."

. We, members of the African Community, consisting of AFRALO and 
AfrICANN, at the ICANN meeting in Brussels, jointly welcomed the Board 
resolution 20 and expressed our gratitude to the Board members for their 
consideration of the community concerns about the cost of applying for 
new gTLDs that might hinder applicants, especially those from developing 
countries.

.    We adopted a statement in which we expressed the expectations of 
the African Community from the so-called resolution 20, which statement 
was sent to the ICANN Board and the JAS Working Group which was formed 
for the purpose.
In its retreat in Trondheim (Norway), the ICANN Board decided late 
September 2010 that Support to applicants will generally include 
outreach and education to encourage participation across all regions, 
but any direct financial support for applicant fees must come from 
sources outside of ICANN. It also decided that the fee levels currently 
in the Applicant Guidebook will be maintained for all applicants.

.    While we welcome the decision of providing outreach and education 
support to applicants who require assistance, we, members of the African 
Community, in Cartagena express our deep concern regarding the non- 
consideration of the fee reduction that we, and the JAS Working Group, 
proposed.
. We consider that without application cost reduction, the developing 
countries, and especially those of the African region, as well as the
disadvantaged communities willing to apply for a cultural, linguistic or 
ethnic gTLD will be excluded from this new gTLD program, that the 
resolution 20 wanted it to be inclusive.

. We strongly believe that assistance should be provided to the needy 
applicants at the upcoming first round of application, and not at some 
possible future round, because:
o Without assistance for applicants needing support, all of the most 
obvious names, including IDNs, will be taken by rich investors, leaving 
little opportunity to local community institutions and developing 
country entrepreneurs
o Even if it is intended to open a second round, its date is at best 
uncertain regarding the experience of the 2001's round.
.    We strongly support the milestone report of the JAS Working Group, 
and look forward to the consideration of its recommendations by the 
ICANN Board.
.    We are supportive of all on-going work as per the recommendations 
of the JAS WG Charter.

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