Some of our team members participated in meetings and workshops during ICANN 47.One of the meetings was the 2013 Africa DNS Forum, attended by our CEO Neil Dundas. On the agenda of the meeting were: the trends, opportunities and challenges of the DNS industry, development of policies regarding registrar accreditation, billing for registries, among other things. Calvin Browne, one of our Directors, attended the apc.org Internet Governance Training Workshop. The meeting tackled issues to do with Internet governance, country participation and development.
 

On 14 July we attended the roundtable discussion on HIV work and IT hosted by dotHIV. dotHIV is a new group gTLD applicant working to establish dotHIV domain names in order to raise awareness and funds to fight the epidemic. It has been noted that KwaZulu-Natal has the highest HIV prevalence in South Africa. The meeting was an opportunity for parties to discuss the HIV statistics in our country, the challenges, opportunities for ICT in HIV work and the role that DNS development can play within it. In this discussion was the WhizzKids United organisation representative, Stefan Kunze, who explained that WhizzKids United uses soccer to teach 12-16 year old boys and girls the skills needed to prevent HIV infection. They draw on facets of the game and translate them into life skills. The Blue Roof Wellness Centre represented by Tessa Beaunior is a project of the Keep a Child Alive Foundation. The centre provides free and effective HIV medication, treatment and food to more than 200 families affected and infected by HIV in the area of Wentworth, Durban. Octavia Kumalo, our Marketing and PR Manager, was there as well to provide facts and statistics with regard to Internet usage in Africa. She also spoke about the role and development of Internet infrastructure in Africa and how ICT can help fight the HIV pandemic.
 

ICANN CEO and President, Fadi Chehade, opened the ceremony and addressed the conference. He urged delegates to unite and embody Madiba’s spirit in the information age. He also spoke about the Country Code Name supporting organisation’s 10th year anniversary which gave us some insight into the organisation, and had us dancing to their live band afterwards at the cocktail party. Some of the speakers at the Welcoming Ceremony included Lukonga Lidunda, Hamadoun Toure and Dr Elham Ibrahim who reminded us of the commemoration of the 50th anniversary of the African Union, the Organisation of African Unity. ICANN was commended for its achievements in raising Africa’s profile thus far. ICANN has a 5-year strategic planning process which includes areas for consideration such as role clarity, internationalisation and regional development. Lastly, there was the signing of new Registry and Registrar Agreements.

The following night was even more exciting, with the Gala Dinner theme being ‘A journey through South Africa’. It started at 19:00 with Zulu dancers at the entrance, Indian and Pantsula dancers as we proceeded to the venue, and lastly fire breathers at the entrance to the venue. We were treated to a performance by the dolphins who put on an evening performance especially for us. We were then escorted to the undersea venue for our authentically South African dishes. Finally, saving the best for last, we were entertained by Zahara and her dancers, and then local DJ Matthew Suttner (SLY).

The meeting was held on 15 July at the ICC. The objective of the Africa strategy is to build capacity in order to make Africa an ideal market. One of the issues discussed in the meeting was the action plan which includes multi-stakeholder projects in collaboration with governments, businesses, engineers, registrars, etc. The 3-year strategic plan is fundamentally about capacity development in Africa. There are already some special priority projects and incubator programmes aimed at the youth. These are aimed at interesting the youth in the technology sector and about finding investors in the sector. The strategy is in line with the Ministers’ declaration. The African Ministers in charge of ICT compiled a 12 question communiqué which discusses the need for ICANN’s presence in Africa and Africa’s authentic participation in ICANN. They are calling for partnership within and outside Africa for the strategy to have reach. The focus will be on individuals and registrars on the ground.

He set out the time frames when delegation can be anticipated since dotAfrica has passed initial evaluation. The timeline content includes delegation testing, contract negotiation with ICANN, etc.  No delays are expected. Sunrise and Landrush registration phases should start as early as March 2014, if all goes well. This means we have more than 6 months to prepare policy framework and our launch/communication strategy.

There is a dire need to mitigate risk by creating awareness and greater engagement with the African Governments/Community. RNL policy must be published for public comment. The committee discussed questions raised with regard to the RNL policy. It was agreed that the national RNL should not to exceed 100 names.
 

With regard to Trademarks Clearing House “TCH” vs Mark Validation System “MVS”, Neil Dundas noted that these issues are being dealt with through the Geo TLD group.
 

Issues such as location and the organizational governance model were raised and discussed.
There are ongoing Steering Committee discussions about where the foundation will run its operations.
 

TMCH provides trademark verification to support trademark protection in the launch of the new gTLDs. It was explained that the verification process is a‘4-eyes’ process which consists of 2 verifications per TM record plus the proof of usage. Accuracy and completeness of information and compliance with the requirement would be verified. However, in the event that the TM or proof of use is incorrect, a process called‘re-correction’ would kick in. Certain reasons would permit the occurrence of the re-correction process. Common errors in the process were noted: for example, name of trademark, registration date, name of holder address, etc.
TMCH now includes: weekly notifications, newsletters, monthly webinars, and a full blown API test environment. TMCH animations are now available in more than 10 languages. In the near future one can expect to find the ‘proof of use’ uploaded as a separate document, an SMD file, implementation of the 50 abused labels, transfer of TM records, and updates on the clearing house guidelines which will be soon found in different languages.
 

The Sunrise services allow trademark holders an opportunity to register domain names corresponding to their marks, either defensively or with a view to exploiting a valuable new Web address before new names are made available to the public. New gTLD registries are required to offer a Sunrise period of at least 30 days.
The trademarks claims period follows Sunrise and runs for at least 90 days after the opening of general registration. During the trademark claims period, anyone attempting to register a domain name matching a mark that is recorded in the TMCH will receive a notification displaying the relevant mark information. If the notified party goes ahead and registers the domain name, the TMCH will send a notice to the one or more trademark holders with matching records in the clearinghouse, informing them that someone has registered the domain name.
 

The meeting discussion included issues such as the Internet challenges in Africa and how we can overcome them. Africa reaches the Web very differently from the rest of the world. For instance, credit cards are very scarce in Africa compared to other parts of the world. It is clear that Africa still needs infrastructural development and financial investments. Another interesting discussion was the existence of opportunity for the youth in Africa to register domain names. Our own Octavia Kumalo who was there representing us and the Foundation for Internet Development, answered this worrying issue, by affirming that opportunity and space for competition does exist since Africa has only 6 ICANN-accredited registrars. There need to be more DNS training programmes and financial education to make it easier for youth start-ups.

Africa has about 40-60 tech hubs which give visibility to innovation in Africa. The hubs are a reaction to the lack of support from governments and other organisations. They are a way for Africans to help themselves. According to Andile of the discussion panel, at least 60% of Africa is made up of youth who possess the majority of mobile phones. Therefore products and services should be addressing the youth specifically.  

Closing remarks:

 

In hosting the ICANN 47 meetings we had the opportunity to host her Excellency Dr Elham Mahmoud Ahmed Ibrahim. She is the Egyptian Commissioner for Infrastructure and Energy. She has a PhD in Electronics and Communications from the University of Cairo, an MSc in Electronic Engineering, and a BSc in Communication Engineering from Asuit University. Her career spans over 33 years in various positions such as General Manager for Training and Promotion in the New and Renewable Energy Authority (NREA), Director of the Photovoltaic Research and Testing Department in Cairo, Associate Professor in Saudi Arabia and Director of the Specifications Department at the NREA in Cairo.

For more ICANN47 photos click here: ICANN47