[AfrICANN-discuss] Resending letter to ccTLD Managers (.Africa'sposition)

Mon Oct 22 13:46:25 SAST 2007

Hi Sophia,

Interesting & generally acceptable answers to the questionnaire. But I would
like to ask for clarity on .africa: who is .africa right now? Are you part
of a particular structure appointed to coordinate .africa? Who owns it? How
far is this project?

Best regards,

Vika Mpisane

.za Domain Name Authority

Johannesburg, South Africa

  _____  

From: africann-bounces at afrinic.net [mailto:africann-bounces at afrinic.net] On
Behalf Of Sophia B
Sent: 22 October 2007 06:31 AM
To: ccnsosecretariat at icann.org; africann at afrinic.net
Cc: AfTLD Discuss; support.dotafrica at gmail.com
Subject: Re: [AfrICANN-discuss] Resending letter to ccTLD Managers
(.Africa'sposition)

Dear Mr. Disspain:

Speaking as a member of an African community, I have respond to your
questions below.

1. Do you believe that the local community in your territory has a 
pressing need for an IDN ccTLD?

re:There is a need in Africa as urgent as anywhere else (percentage of 
English users is low) but the Internet infrastructure problems are 
different (lack of Unicode scripts to low connectivity).

2. If so, is there yet agreement in your territory on the scripts and 

the string within the script(s) for which delegation of an IDN ccTLD 
would be sought, and could you indicate which strings and scripts are 
of interest?

re: From .Africa perspective, no africawide dicussion on this topic 
has been mooted (but one could imagine at least a couple of languges like 
Amharic are ready for it). Probably on an individual country basis from 
Afriaca, there would be some time needed to coordinate, with the present 
survey being an early step.

3. Do you believe the delegation of an IDN ccTLD under a fast 
track/interim approach would be of interest to your community?

re: Fast/track delegation would not be a benefit to African community 
if done without African particpation (as is liklely) - or at the very 
least selecting and setting aside IDN equivalents of African cctlds 
before launching any fast/track script anywhere.

Additionally, by the attached document, please be advised of the position of
.Africa towards this end.

Thank you for the opportunity.

Kind regards,

Sophia Bekele

On 11/10/2007, Anne-Rachel Inné <annerachel at gmail.com> wrote: 

Dear All,

Please respond either to the email of Chris Disspain I gave you yesterday or
to this one:

 <mailto:ccnsosecretariat at icann.org> 

Thanks in advance

AR

***********************************************
Dear All,

This letter is from Chris Dispain, Chairman of the ccNSO at ICANN. Please
share with any ccTLD managers you know. Thanks. 

Dear ccTLD Manager, 
I am writing to you, in my capacity as Chairman of the Country Codeames
Supporting 
Organisation (ccNSO), about the introduction of ccTLD Internationalised
Domain Names (IDN 
ccTLDs). The input I am requesting from you is very important and your
response will be
much appreciated.
At the end of this email is a Background and References section that
provides some 
background information and links to various documents.
Based on work done by the ccNSO and discussions amongst ccTLD managers in
all regions
the ccNSO has taken the first step to launching a Policy Development Process
to set the 
overall policy for IDN ccTLDs.
At this stage, the ccNSO is also discussing whether or not to recommend that
the ICANN
Board consider a fast track/interim approach under which some IDN ccTLDs
could be
delegated while the overall policy is being developed. To help with those
discussions we need 
to find out the level of interest in your territory and that is why I am
writing to you. 

While community feedback has encouraged the ccNSO to explore levels of
interest in a fasttrack/
interim approach to IDN ccTLDs , this is the first of many steps that would
have to be 
carefully and successfully taken towards that end and it is generally
accepted that any
implementation would have to be in compliance with current policies and
procedures. Some 
of these that may be relevant are set out in the Background and References
section below. 

I would be grateful if you would answer the following questions:
1. Do you believe that the local community in your territory has a pressing
need for an 
IDN ccTLD?
2. If so, is there yet agreement in your territory on the scripts and the
string within the 
script(s) for which delegation of an IDN ccTLD would be sought, and could
you
indicate which strings and scripts are of interest?
3. Do you believe the delegation of an IDN ccTLD under a fast track/interim
approach 
would be of interest to your community?

The fast track/interim approach will be discussed by ccTLD managers at the
ICANN meeting
in Los Angeles. So, it would be most helpful if you could respond by 26
October 2007. 

Background and References
In the Domain Name System, a ccTLD string (like .jp, .uk) has been defined
to represent the
name of a country, territory or area of geographical interest, and its
subdivisions as identified 
in ISO 3166-1, and is represented by 2 US-ASCII characters
(
<http://www.iso.org/iso/country_codes/iso_3166_code_lists/english_country_na
mes_and_cod>
http://www.iso.org/iso/country_codes/iso_3166_code_lists/english_country_nam
es_and_cod 
e_elements.htm). This method of identification was adopted for use in the
Internet through
RFC 920, dated October 1984, and reaffirmed through RFC 1591, dated March
1994. All 
ccTLDs in use today are taken directly from the ISO 3166-1 list or from the
list of 
exceptionally reserved code elements defined by the ISO 3166 Maintenance
Agency.
The implementation of IDN ccTLDs introduces the (apparent) use of characters
outside the
US-ASCII character set (for example characters in Cyrillic, Chinese, Arabic,
and other scripts) 
for domain name strings.

In initial discussions by the ccNSO members, other ccTLD managers and
ICANN's
Governmental Advisory Committee (GAC) a number of policy questions were
identified and a
"Questions and Issues Paper" was submitted to the ICANN Board of Directors 
(http://www.icann.org/topics/
<http://www.icann.org/topics/idn/ccnso-gac-issues-report-on-idn-09jul07.pdf>
idn/ccnso-gac-issues-report-on-idn-09jul07.pdf ). It became
clear that the development of the required policy for IDN ccTLDs to resolve
the issues raised 
was likely to take a minimum of 2 years. It also became clear that such a
time frame was a
major concern for a number of ccTLD managers who have expressed there is a
pressing need 
for an IDN ccTLD in their territory. Because of this, the concept of a fast
track/interim 
approach began to be discussed. In those discussions it was thought that it
might be 
possible to find a method to allow the introduction of a limited number of
IDN ccTLDs while
the overall policy was being developed. 

Policies and procedures that may be relevant to the delegation of an IDN
ccTLD under a fast
track/interim approach include:
the IDNA protocol standards (
<http://icann.org/announcements/announcement-2->
http://icann.org/announcements/announcement-2-
11may07.htm);
RFC 3454 (http://www.ietf.org/rfc/rfc3454.txt );
RFC 3490 ( <http://www.ietf.org/rfc/rfc3490>
http://www.ietf.org/rfc/rfc3490);
RFC 3491 ( <http://www.ietf.org/rfc/rfc3491.txt>
http://www.ietf.org/rfc/rfc3491.txt);
RFC 3492 ( http://www.ietf.org/rfc/rfc3492.txt );
RFC 1591 and associated procedures for delegation of a country code top
level domain 
( <http://www.isi.edu/in-notes/rfc1591.txt>
http://www.isi.edu/in-notes/rfc1591.txt)
The GAC principles http://gac.icann.org/web/home/ccTLD_Principles.rtf.
Following consideration of the "Questions and Issues Paper", and statements
of the GAC and
ccTLD managers on a fast track/interim approach the ICANN Board has
requested the ccNSO 
to explore both an interim and an overall approach to IDN ccTLDs associated
with the ISO
3166-1 two-letter codes and to recommend a course of action to the Board
taking the 
technical limitations and requirements into consideration 
http://www.icann.org/minutes/resolutions-29jun07.htm#m .
At its meeting on 2 October 2007, the ccNSO Council launched a Policy
Development Process 
(ccPDP) by requesting a PDP Issues Report and appointing an Issues Manager.
This ccPDP
has been launched to develop an overall approach, which includes finding
solutions for the 
matters raised in the "Questions and Issues Paper". 

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