ICANN Congressional briefing audio available for download

The audio recording of the Congressional briefing titled “The Future of the U.S. Government’s Role in ICANN, Internet Addressing and Internet Governance” is now available for download. The briefing was held in the U.S. Capitol Building on October 1, 2009. Visit the Congressional Internet Caucus Advisory Committee’s podcast page at http://www.netcaucus.org/audio.xml to download the audio MP3 or go to the Agenda page for the event at http://www.netcaucus.org/events/2009/icann/ for more details. You can subscribe to all Congressional Internet Caucus Advisory Committee podcasts in the Apple iTunes Store as well.

The briefing featured experts on the relationship between the U.S. and Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), the non-profit body that manages the Internet’s domain name system, including IP address space allocation. The main topic of discussion was the newly released “Affirmation of Commitments” agreement between ICANN and the U.S. Government. The predecessor to that agreement, the Joint Project Agreement (JPA), would have expired at midnight on September 30, 2009. Our esteemed panel discussed the implications for the new agreement.

Panelists included:

* Steve DelBianco, NetChoice

* John Kneur, Kneur LLC, Former Assistant Secretary for Communications and Information and Administrator of National Telecommunications & Information Administration, U.S. Department of Commerce.

* Brenden Kuerbis, Syracuse University, Internet Governance Project

* Steven Metalitz, Partner, Mitchell Silberberg & Knupp LLP