Kent Crispin wrote:
>If the RCs can ignore the hearings at will, then the hearings in
>general are useless, and they might as well be stricken from the
>document.
I don't think they can ignore the hearings at will, but they need to be
able to exercise their professional judgment about what is a real concern
and what is not.
>The strength of the "dissenting opinion" language in the B/M/W draft
>is that it guarantees a voice to dissent from the very beginning --
>no hearings are even needed.
I'm intrigued by the dissenting opinion concept, and it appears that both
the BMW draft and the Paris Draft have tried to address a real problem
with two different approaches. I favor the Paris Draft approach primarily
because it gives the DNSO a time and place to try to work out differences
or problems *before* the proposal goes to the ICANN Board. I think the
value of a "dissenting opinion" comes if those problems are still
unresolved after the hearing process is complete. Perhaps there's a need
for both concepts.
>> If that's unclear,
>> then perhaps we can add language giving the committee discretion to open
>> and close discussions.
>
>Obviously, giving the committee discretion in this matter negates the
>value of the hearing panels to begin with.
I disagree here. Not every problem will require the same amount of time
to address. It seems perfectly reasonable to allow the Research Committee
discretion to give one problem three hours, another one hour, and another
15 minutes. Some problems may take an entire day. The Committee should
have some discretion to set limits that are fair and proportionate to the
problem being addressed.
-- Bret
