Not-for-Profit Organizations Constituency

The Not-for- Profit Operational Concerns Constituency (NPOC) is a new constituency within the Generic Names Supporting Organization's under the Non-Commercial Stake Holders Group (NCSG) representing the interest of domain name registrants who belong to non profit or non-government organizations. NPOC participates within the ICANN community's discussions on policy issues about the internet and Domain Name System (DNS) that has a significant impact on its operations in delivering services that are beneficial to communities. It was approved by the ICANN Board on June 24, 2011. Amber Sterling serves as Chairman of NPOC.

Background

The ICANN Board made recommendations on how to improve the operations and structure of the GNSO. One of its recommendations is the development of new GNSO constituencies in accordance with Article X, Section 5(4) of the ICANN Bylaws. Since there is no specific guidelines stipulated in the ICANN Bylaws on how the community could file a petition for a new constituency, the ICANN Staff helped the ICANN community in formulating procedures in accordance with principles of the Bylaws as directed by the ICANN Board. On October 2008, two procedures were formulated and adopted by the internet community such as the submission of Notice of Intent (NOIF) to Form a New GNSO Constituency and a formal Petition/Charter. NPOC submitted submitted its NOIF on June 15, 2010 followed by its Petition?Charter on November 2, 2010 which was revised on December 7, 2010. A public comment regarding NPOC's intention to become part of the new GNSO Constituency was conducted by the staff on December 1, 2010 until January 30, 2011. The Charter of NPOC was approved by ICANN on June 24, 2011 and became an official GNSO constituency.

Members

The current members of NPOC include:

• ALSAC / St. Jude Children's Research Hospital - United States
• American Council on Education (ACE) - United States
• American Red Cross (ARC) - United States
• Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC) - United States
• Australian Red Cross Society - Australia
• Bangladesh NGOs Network for Radio Communication (BNNRC) - Bangladesh
• Centre for Science and Media Studies - India
• Church of God in Christ, Inc. - United States
• Corporacion Makia Asesoria Internacional - Colombia
• Fundacion Chasquinet - Ecuador
• Fundacion Omar Dengo - Costa Rica
• Goodwill Industries International - United States
• Human Rights Campaign - United States
• IICD - The Netherlands
• International Baccalaureate Organization - Switzerland
• International Federation of the Red Cross and Red Crescent Socieites (IRC) - Switzerland
• March of Dimes - United States
• St. John Ambulance - United Kingdom
• The Association of NGOs (TANGO) - The Gambia
• Water Environment Research Foundation (WERF) - United States
• World Wildlife Fund (WWF) - United States
• YMCA of The Gambia - The Gambia
• YMCA of the USA - United States

Comments on ICANN Issues

Since its establishment, NPOC had been active in sharing comments and recommendations on different ICANN issues particularly regarding the new gTLD program set to start on January 12, 2012. The organization submitted its comments during the drafting of the Applicant Guidebook and its most recent comments were submitted on May 15, 2011 by Amber Sterling, chairman of the constituency. Its comments include the following:

• The constituency asked the ICANN Board to provide price options for non-profit organizations for new gTLD applications based on criteria.

Not-for-Profit Organizations Constituency

Generic Names Supporting Organization. Develops and recommends to the Board substantive policies relating to generic top-level domains and other responsibilities set forth in the Bylaws (ICANN Bylaws).