From: Sally Khudairi (sk@zotgroup.com)
Date: Wed Nov 01 2000 - 18:44:23 PPET
IW News
Say Sayonara to Dyson; Cerf May Be Next ICANN Chairman
By Kathleen Murphy
Speculation is brewing over who will be the next chairman of
the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, with
WorldCom's ( http://www.worldcom.com ) Vint Cerf leading
most lists.
ICANN ( http://www.icann.org ) chairwoman Esther Dyson and
four other directors will step down at the nonprofit group's
next meeting, Nov. 13 through 16, in Marina del Rey, Calif.
At that meeting, ICANN is scheduled to consider the addition
of several new top-level domains from among 47 proposals.
But the actual selection of new TLDs may not come until
Nov. 20.
Cerf, senior vice president of Internet architecture and
technology at WorldCom, is known as a father of the Internet,
for co=designing the TCP/IP protocols and the architecture of
the Internet. Cerf, the first U.S. citizen elected to ICANN's
board, once supposedly voted to move the A root to Geneva in
a plan executed in 1997 by Net pioneer Jon Postel but
thwarted by federal marshals. He served as founding president
of the Internet Society from 1992 to 1995 and in 1999 served
a term as chairman of the board.
Jeff Field, founder of NameSecure
( http://www.namesecure.com ), said Cerf is a likely
candidate for ICANN's chairmanship because he's "highly
respected, understands the DNS," and is familiar with the
history and politics of ICANN, which was established by the
Clinton administration in 1998 to manage the Internet's name
and address system.
Hal Lubsen, president of Domain Bank
( http://www.domainbank.com ), said it will be important to
have a chairman who knows the ropes and added, "It's time
for new blood" on the ICANN board.
Dyson's tenure as ICANN's leader was marked by intense
controversy and political heat. She drew vocal opposition for
the way she ran the ICANN board and won't be missed by some
of the at-large membership and registrars who attacked her.
Dyson also drew criticism from academic and civil liberties
groups that say ICANN favors huge corporations and trademark
holders over average Net users.
Besides Dyson, the other departing directors include
Geraldine Capdeboscq, George Conrades, Greg Crew, and Eugenio
Triana. ICANN also said this week that four of its original
nine directors, selected in an undisclosed process, would
serve extended terms until November 2002. Those board members
with extended terms include Frank Fitzsimmons, Hans
Kraaijenbrink, Jun Murai, and Linda Wilson, who will be the
only female member of the board after the changing of the
guard.
Many have raised objections to keeping the original four
appointed members, part of a plan adopted by the ICANN board
at its March and July 2000 meetings in Cairo, Egypt, and
Yokohama, Japan. Various proposals are circulating for naming
their replacements, including holding new elections for the
at-large membership and filling the seats with runners-up
from the October election of at-large directors.
"They're board squatters," said Barbara Simons, past
president of the Association for Computing Machinery
( http://www.acm.org ) who was a candidate for the North
American at-large seat. "They've never been elected by
anybody."
At the conclusion of ICANN's annual meeting on Nov. 16, the
five newly elected at-large directors will also join the
board. They are Cisco technologist Karl Auerbach, Brazilian
Internet executive Ivan Moura Campos, Fujitsu engineer
Masanobu Katoh, German hacker-group member Andy
Mueller-Maguhn, and Nii Quaynor, who runs an ISP in Ghana.
Nine other directors have been selected by ICANN supporting
organizations.
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