Konchana Kanchuanasut, Jonathan Zittrain, Pavan Duggal, George Conrades, Tadao Takahashi, Izumi Aizu, Daniel Kaplan, Diane Cabell, Nii Quaynor, Oskar Robles, Siegfried Langenbach

Also present: Wendy Seltzer, Antoun Nabhan, Kimberley Isbell (all Berkman Center), Anne-Marie Plubell (assistant to Esther Dyson).

MAC Members not present: Greg Crew and Dan Steinberg

GC opened by suggesting that the MAC should give the Initial Board concrete suggestions, rather than simply framing contested but unresolved issues. The previous day's question had been whether membership should include individuals, corporations, or associations. GC noted (nods from several around the table) that other issues hinged on the group's decision on the "who is a member" question. SL argued that the differences of opinion were not so large. GC suggested that the group revisit that issue "and see whether we can nail it," which drew assent from all around. IA was hesitant, noting that his opinion on the definition of membership depended on the fee structure that was settled upon.

Topic 2: Who is a member? - Corporations/Associations/Individuals

DK was asked to present the argument for having organizations as members. He argued:

1) ICANN policy affects IP numbers and domain names, so ICANN should be beholden to the users of these resources. IP numbers and domain names are assigned to both "moral and physical persons," meaning individuals and organizations.

2) Organizations depend on the resources within the purview of ICANN policy. Therefore the organizations will try and find ways to affect policy covertly or indirectly even if they are not given direct membership. To make sure that the process works openly and transparently, these entities "should be represented strongly and clearly." "They're going to be there [anyway], so I'd like to see them."

3) Organizations have enough of a stake in the Internet that they are more likely to delegate representatives to the membership, and they are easier to reach out to than the whole individual user base of the Internet. Therefore, a membership that includes organizations is much more likely to reach the size necessary to guarantee stability.

IA then presented the argument for excluding organizations and allowing only individuals as members. He was assisted in this by PD and NQ:

1) Organizations, particularly large corporations, should pay a larger fee. However, it is counterintuitive to ask them for more money if they only get one vote in exchange - yet, we don't want to allow them multiple votes.

2) Large entities should not be able to "hijack the policy" - allowing them to vote as members gives them a disproportionate voice relative to an individual Internet user.

3) Everyone should have a voice, and it is possible to have a structure that allows corporations, etc. to be at the table in some advisory capacity but not have actual authority.

(KK arrives)

Discussion 1: Why are corporations evil?

NQ: They use money to capture decision-makers.

DC, DK, IA: they have interests opposed to the users (e.g., privacy standards, domain name trademarking, cost of access, implementation of IPv6.)

DK, GC, SL: But most Internet users use it for commercial activity, and most of the Internet's support comes from organizations and corporations. Corporations are held in check by their customers and shareholders and won't run amok over individuals. Organizations also provide the mechanism for overcoming the "collective action problem" (e.g., the German corporativa structure).

IA: In APIA, many think that individuals have "hijacked" the ICANN development process and bogged it down.

KK: Developing nations are not helped by organizations - you can't trust what the middleman is telling to or telling about the outside world. Individuals have to voice their own concerns.

Discussion 2: Can organizations be members without a vote?

PD: Membership means voting - otherwise, what value does it have?

JZ: Ask the Palestinian observer at the UN General Assembly.

(11:10-11:25 - Break)

TT: Tomorrow we'll meet people who think that nobody should be at the table at all besides individuals. I don't think any of us are that extreme - true?

Hands raised: KK, PD, IA, NQ. (4/10 present, with two missing. All believe that Greg Crew would have raised his hand, if present.)

Discussion 3a: What role should organizations have in membership?

IA and NQ agreed with GC, SL, DK that corporations, etc. should have an opportunity to present their concerns somehow. SL argued that if only individuals vote, each organization would just send an individual who will vote in the organization's interest. This, he said, is the same as if we had organizations vote but didn't allow their appointed representatives to vote on their own behalf. This became known as the "weasel point": Organizations will "weasel in" if the membership model only includes individuals.

Vote: "Is anyone in favor of giving organizations multiple votes?" (This came up in the context of a discussion led by IA on what organizations would get in exchange for higher fees.)

JZ presented two possible proposals, worded differently, that allowed organizations to designate a representative who would publicly avow his/her affiliation and vote on behalf of the organization; this individual could not also vote on their own behalf. NQ and SL, both argued that the two models really differed based on the wording "only individuals can vote." (This was in the first, but not the second, model.) The MAC discussed at length the example of Mr. Takahashi of Japan, who is head of seven organizations that might potentially be At-large members. The parties agreed that it was legitimate for him to hold seven votes if he truly represented seven groups, but that such a structure made it too easy for a person to "manufacture" multiple fake organizations in order to have multiple votes. SL argued that this was not a problem - so long as everybody had this power, all the fraudulent organizations would balance out each others' votes. The discussion proceeded to topic 4 (below) before the MAC reached consensus on this issue.

Discussion 4: Should At-large membership exclude SO members?

DK made the argument that Internet "suppliers" should be in the SOs, and the At-large membership is for "users." SL agreed, several others nodded, GC supported this principle. JZ noted that implementation is difficult. The first question was what organizations would be represented by the SOs. This was still an open question, since the SOs were still working on their own membership criteria. The MAC decided to make some assumptions about the makeup of the SOs and then proceed based on that.

JZ suggested that this question was tied to the question of organizational voting in 3 (above).

PD argued that a person who represented an organization in an SO should also have the right to vote as themselves in the At-large - otherwise the structure is discriminatory because it excludes certain individuals. SL and others argued that this discrimination was justified. DK and others added that SO members would have too much influence if they also had the opportunity to be At-large members - even without voting in At-large. He also argued, in response to IA's question on fees, that organizations will pay more than individuals just so they can "say 'we are here,'" and have a real voice.

The group also discussed the possibility of having a yearly general assembly or some sort of "shadow membership" that provided a set mechanism for allowing corporations, etc. to have a voice, without giving them a vote.

Discussion 3b:

After discussion of SO overlap, the MAC turned back to the voting status of organizations. Debate crystallized around three alternatives: Either 1) individuals vote as themselves, and organizations must "co-opt" multiple votes, or 2) each individual may sign 2 ballots - one on their own behalf, and one on behalf of all of the organizations s/he represents, or 3) each individual may vote on their own behalf and hold multiple votes, up to the number of orgs. s/he represents (e.g., 8, in Mr. Takahashi's case).

JZ argued, primarily against AM-P, that ICANN was a quasi-regulatory body, which therefore couldn't allow proxies to vote and had to ensure that each organizational vote represented "real," and not manufactured or fictional groups. SL responded that these fraudulent groups would either balance out, if there were many, or be obvious if they were few in number.

(Break 1:30-2:30 for lunch)

After lunch, the discussion turned to possible "capture" scenarios if organizations were allowed to send voting representatives. This culminated in general assent that option (3) above was not good - a representative of an organization should not be able to vote more than two ballots (their personal ballot and their representative ballot) even if they represented more than one organization. MAC used, for an example, a US$50 fee for individual membership and a US$500 fee for organization membership.

However, the MAC could not reach a consensus on whether (1) or (2) was preferable:

All agreed to take this issue to the ICANN Initial Board.

Most agreed that there should be some sort of sliding scale fee structure based on ability to pay. IA began by arguing that fees should be on a contribution basis - members would pay what they could. PD said that members in developing countries might be excluded by even a de minimis fee. He further argued that it was imperative to build as large and broad a membership as possible very quickly; this meant having no fee at all for the first year (or other interval), at least until a membership base was in place and ICANN's budgetary needs were known.

SL noted that in one organization of which he is a member, they send an invoice with their membership materials, without intending to receive anything back. 90% pay the invoice, but those who do not are not sanctioned.

Several MAC members thought that a fee might be too small to be worth processing, particularly in developing nations where the payment infrastructure is still unwieldy.

JZ noted that, to the extent that ICANN has regulatory functions, it might appear strange to require a "poll tax" for participation in ICANN's decision-making process. He felt that that the obvious reason to charge a fee was to defray costs, but another important purpose was to reduce fraud - make it more difficult for an individual to register multiple fictitious organization votes. Several members argued that corporate donations to sustain ICANN gave the appearance of impropriety. JZ suggested a blind trust so that you couldn't tell who was making donations.

(Esther Dyson comes in)

Upon taking a straw vote, all members except for IA, PD, and KK favored at least a sliding scale de minimis fee, with DK indicating he favored it primarily as a means of fraud control in the absence of better anti-fraud mechanisms. TT favored a fee to allow ICANN to recover costs with a liberal policy for non-payers. PD expressed the feeling that the Internet has grown as a free medium, and that this should be maintained for individual members, with ICANN covering its costs though fees paid by corporate members. KK expressed the feeling that users were already paying for Internet access and shouldn't have to pay an additional amount to have a say in how it was regulated. She did not have a problem with assessing ICANN fees from domain name registrations. DC indicated that, either way, users would be paying fees to ICANN, either directly or through their ISP fees, and asked if it would be better to give individuals a choice about joining or not.

Topic 4: Membership Qualification

KK started by asserting that membership shouldn't be limited to IP address or domain name holders, and that it needs to be a person. PD listed several criteria, including an application requirement, proof of citizenship, mental sanity, lack of criminal record, and others. The others quickly took exception to the requirement that they not have a criminal record, citing the problem of dissidents.

Access to the Internet was proposed as a possible criterion, with discussion as to what exactly "access" entailed, and agreement that it included use of CyberCafes and communal e-mail addresses. IA and KK resisted the formal inclusion of a requirement that a user have Internet access, suggesting the possibility that voting could be conducted via land-based mail. Most agreed that, as a practical matter, most of ICANN's relations with its membership would be Internet-based, making ability to receive e-mail a self-enforcing, if unofficial, requirement. Subsequent discussion showed all members favored a minimal set of criteria: must be a real person, must apply, and must provide a contact e-mail address (which doesn't necessarily have to be unique to the member).

(KK leaves)

The committee next discussed what types of authentication a member should be required to provide. DC suggested a number of methods of proving identity, tied to what was appropriate for a given region (such as credit card number, phone number, etc.). TT expressed the view that ICANN should not attempt to verify identity at registration, but verify an identity when that identity is challenged. DK indicated that under French law, that could be a problem, since someone could challenge the entire list of members and obtain an injunction until the list is certified. JZ suggested handling this through a random audit, either before or after the election, to determine fraud in the membership pool before election certification. He further suggested requiring a land-based mail application with a signature, accompanied by a photocopy of a government-issued picture identification. NQ indicated that picture IDs weren't common in Africa. PD suggested the use of cybernotaries, as is occurring in India currently.

Eventually, the committee agreed to require an on-line application that would indicate a land-based mail address. A unique membership number would then be sent to this address, which would be used to complete registration on-line.

Topic 6: Regional Representation

The problem with the current regional representation requirements of the by-laws, which was noted at the Jan. 23rd Workshop, was discussed next. DC recommended that the by-laws be reworded so that the at-large elections wouldn't be upset by the regional origin of SO candidates. PD argued that the membership should be limited to voting for board members from their own region. His fear was that, given a choice between two candidates from (for example) Asia, the candidate chosen would be the one more palatable to users in North America and Europe - even though such a person might be less representative for his/her region of origin. DK and others on the committee had a problem with this, feeling that members should be able to vote for whomever they thought would do the best job, regardless of whether they were from a different region or not. The consensus was in favor of global voting.

The Jan. 23rd Workshop had come up with three ways to handle nominations: self-nomination, self-nomination with a show of user support, and a nominating committee. MAC members felt the idea of a nominating committee was inappropriate, at least for the first election, since the choice of the committee would have to be made by the interim board who hadn't been themselves elected. The consensus which evolved included: 1) a period of self- and third-party nomination, 2) a requirement that candidates agree to run by answering a standard set of questions, with answers to be posted for perusal by the membership, and 3) a global vote.

DK suggested that a candidacy should require more than one third-party nomination, and perhaps several nominations, before the candidate is contacted by ICANN. The discussion then shifted to a possible timetable for elections to be held. All agreed that, since the registration process involves the use of land-based mail as well as Internet registration, a sufficient amount of time should be built in between the opening of registration and elections. A best-case scenario would probably have the Initial Board voting on a membership structure at the May 28th Berlin meeting, with registration opening soon thereafter. JZ suggested a "checkpoint" census after three months, to determine how the membership was shaping up. If the membership was found sufficiently large and diverse enough to support an election, elections would be scheduled, possibly for the fall. TT suggested that the census would likely look similar to ISOC membership; figures from ISOC indicated that out of 6000 individual members, 2500 were from the US. The second-highest number was 300 from Thailand, followed by less than 250 each from Germany, France, and other countries.

(Meeting Adjourned 7:50 PM)