The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), in collaboration with the Caribbean Telecommunications Union (CTU) will be hosting the LAC+i Roadshow event on Friday April 25 2014 from 8:30 to 4pm at the Hilton Hotel, Port of Spain.

At this event, various sessions about ICANN policy issues related to domain names and IP addressing, including

• generic Top Level Domains (gTLDs),
• country code Top Level Domains (ccTLDs),
• transition to IPv6
• Security, Stability and Resiliency of the Domain Name System
• Internet Governance in the Caribbean

and more.

This event is free to attend.  If you have an interest in these topics and want to learn more and ask questions, please attend!

You can read the agenda at
https://docs.google.com/file/d/0BzqpE890O2UoRnh5TkRYOC05LWZZbHM2Z1ZuaUtUWnVjX1JR/edit

About the LAC+i Roadshow

The LAC-i-Roadshow is one of the projects of the Latin American and Caribbean (LAC) Strategy, a strategy that was developed by the different stakeholder groups represented at ICANN from the LAC region. It is designed to raise awareness across the region on key topics related to the DNS critical infrastructure such as the transition to IPv6, SSR (Security, Stability and Resiliency) and the impact of the new gTLD program.

Text of ICANN announcement : Administrator of Domain Name System Launches Global Multistakeholder Accountability Process | ICANN.

(Update 14/3/2014 8:57pm) ICANN Board Chair, Steve Crocker reacts to US Government plan to relinquish key Internet stewardship

ICANN has launched a process to transistion the role of the US Government relating to the Internet’s unique ICANN’s announcement comes on the heels of an historic announcement today by the U.S. Government stating that it is ready to transfer its stewardship of the important Internet technical functions to the global Internet community. The U.S. Government’s current responsibilities to be transitioned include the procedural role of administering changes to the Domain Name System’s (DNS) to the authoritative root zone file – the database containing the lists of names and addresses of all top-level domains – as well as serving as the historic steward of the unique identifiers registries for Domain names, IP addresses, and protocol parameters.

In doing so, the U.S. recognized ICANN’s maturation in becoming an effective multistakeholder organization and requested that ICANN convene the global community to develop the transition process from of the U.S. stewardship to a global community consensus-driven mechanism.

“We are inviting governments, the private sector, civil society, and other Internet organizations from the whole world to join us in developing this transition process,” said Fadi Chehadé, ICANN’s President and CEO. “All stakeholders deserve a voice in the management and governance of this global resource as equal partners.”

Independent of the U.S. transition, the roles of the Internet technical organizations, including ICANN’s role as administrator of the Internet’s unique identifier system, remain unchanged. The Internet’s Unique Identifier functions are not apparent to most Internet users, but they play a critical role in maintaining a single, global, unified and interoperable Internet.

“Even though ICANN will continue to perform these vital technical functions, the U.S. has long envisioned the day when stewardship over them would be transitioned to the global community,” said Dr. Stephen D. Crocker, ICANN’s Board Chair. “In other words, we have all long known the destination. Now it is up to our global stakeholder community to determine the best route to get us there.”

“The global multistakeholder process is defined by inclusion, and it will take some time to make sure that we obtain all of the necessary inputs,” said Chehadé. “By the time the current contract with the U.S. Government expires in September 2015, we will have a defined and clear process for global multistakeholder stewardship of ICANN’s performance of these technical functions.”

The first community-wide dialogue about the development of the transitional process will begin March 23-27 during ICANN’s 49th Public Meeting, in Singapore. All global stakeholders are welcome to participate in person or remotely.identifiers system.

From the ICANN blog :

“As previously reported, ICANN continues making headway in improving WHOIS. One aspect of this effort focuses on bringing visibility into how these improvements might be impacting overall accuracy rates. To do this, a new program is in development in which ICANN will conduct periodic WHOIS accuracy studies, publish the findings, and forward for follow-up WHOIS records that have been flagged as inaccurate to some degree.

This begs the question— what is an inaccurate WHOIS record?“

Read the blog post at

A Model for Exploring WHOIS Accuracy.

(Video of Roberto Gaetano, Chair of the At-Large Board Candidate Evaluation Committee explaining the search for an ICANN Board member appointed by the ICANN At-Large Community : http://youtu.be/t-sMZDB20KA)

ICANN’s At-Large Community is beginning a search for an appointee to the ICANN Board of Directors. ALAC is looking for someone with a broad international perspective and a background in Internet users’ interests, consumer policy and/or civil society worldwide.

A so-called Expressions of Interest will remain open for those interested in the position through December 26, 2013. This is the first step in a process through which ICANN’s independent user community will appoint a voting member of the Board.

“The process is different because, by its nature, the At-Large community is looking for new people who are interested in participating in the Internet governance process and are coming from the civil society, the user community and so on,” said Roberto Gaetano, a non-voting former ALAC liaison to the Board. “The qualification is basically to have an ethical attitude. We demand a moral standing and the ability to discuss freely, along with the ability to understand the different cultures”.

The At-Large community consists of over 160 active At-Large organizations (called “At-Large Structures” or “ALSes”), representing the opinions of the global community of Internet users. At-Large allows individual worldwide Internet users to participate in a number of issues, such as:

*   Guidance on how to run Internationalized Domain Names (IDNs).
*   How to introduce new gTLDs (such as .eco, .green and IDN TLDs).
*   How to implement a stable and fair transition from IPv4 to the next Internet addresses generation, IPv6.

Those who wish to be considered for the ALAC Board position must complete an Expression of Interest form at: https://www.bigpulse.com/p26527/register.

Completed application forms must be received by 23:59UTC on 26 December 2013.

If you want to understand more about ICANN At-Large community, please also contact Dev Anand Teelucksingh, vice chair of the Trinidad and Tobago Computer Society (TTCS ; https://www.ttcs.tt/). The Trinidad and Tobago Computer Society is an member of the At-Large Community and Dev Anand is currently serving as a member of the At-Large Advisory Committee (ALAC) and on the ALAC Leadership Team.

Additional links:

• At-Large Board Director 2014 Selection Workspace: https://community.icann.org/x/ng6MAg 
• Watch a video of Tijani Ben Jemaa, Chair of the At-Large Board Member Process Committee speak about the process (in French) http://youtu.be/2fS0zNbR8_Q
• At-Large Board Candidate Evaluation Committee: https://community.icann.org/x/uAafAg

The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers  48th public meeting  begins this Sunday November 17th to Thursday November 21 2013.

The full meeting schedule can be viewed at http://buenosaires48.icann.org/en/schedule-full. Each meeting on http://buenosaires48.icann.org/en/schedule-full  has a link to aseparate meeting page (for example, the ALAC and Regional Leadership Working Session 1 meeting at http://buenosaires48.icann.org/en/schedule/sun-alac-regional) has remote participation details and the agenda that allows anyone with a broadband connection to attend the live sessions and participate.

Note that the times of meetings are listed in the local time in Buenos Aires, Argentina which is UTC/GMT -3 hours. This means that the time in Buenos Aires is 1 hour ahead of the time in Trinidad and Tobago. This means that a time of 4pm local time in Buenos Aires is 3pm in Trinidad and Tobago

The Trinidad and Tobago Computer Society (TTCS) is involved in ICANN At-Large. At-Large is the name for the community of individual Internet users who participate in the policy development work of ICANN. Currently, the vice chair of TTCS, Dev Anand Teelucksingh serves on the At-Large Advisory Committee (ALAC) which provides advice on ICANN activities as it relates to the interests of the individual internet end users. The agendas of all the At-Large meetings can be found at https://community.icann.org/x/nFl-Ag

There are several meetings during the ICANN 48 Buenos Aires meeting with a significant focus on Latin American and the Caribbean.

See http://buenosaires48.icann.org/en/schedule/lac-participant-guide-13nov13-en.pdf

The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers  47th public meeting  begins this Sunday July 14th to Thursday July 18 2013.

The full meeting schedule can be viewed at http://durban47.icann.org/full-schedule

Each meeting on http://durban47.icann.org/full-schedule  has a link to aseparate meeting page (for example, the ALAC and Regional Leadership Working Session 1 meeting at http://durban47.icann.org/node/39587 ) has remote participation details and the agenda that allows anyone with a broadband connection to attend the live sessions and participate.

Note that the times of meetings are listed in the local time in Durban which is UTC/GMT +2 hours. This means that the time in Durban is 6 hours ahead of the time in Trinidad and Tobago. This means that a time of 2pm local time in Durban is 8am in Trinidad and Tobago

The Trinidad and Tobago Computer Society (TTCS) is involved in ICANN At-Large. At-Large is the name for the community of individual Internet users who participate in the policy development work of ICANN. Currently, the vice chair of TTCS, Dev Anand Teelucksingh serves on the At-Large Advisory Committee (ALAC) which provides advice on ICANN activities as it relates to the interests of the individual internet end users. The agendas of all the At-Large meetings can be found at

See also the ICANN meeting guide at http://durban47.icann.org/meetings/durban2013/meeting-guide-03jul13-en.pdf