At 21:37 14/11/97 +1100, ramin wrote:
>Peter
>with all due respects, i would like to raise two issues:
>
>1) is there a conflict of interest with Philips Fox being involved with
>all
>the Intiaa/IIA affairs?  Their generosity is certainly appreciated but i
>am
>having trouble telling these organisations apart.  Also, wouldnt
>accounting
>audit firms like KPMG, E&Y, PW etc be better placed to audit/vet review
>things than a law firm? i seem to recall that the gTLD process was based
>on
>using an accounting firm, and we have certainly got some knowledgable
>people
>in these firms in Australia.

Dear Ramin

I can't see how there is any conflict of interest for ADNA's solicitors
Phillips Fox in carrying out this task - unless they aspired to become a
DNA themselves under .au, and that remote possibility has never occurred to
me before, but I guess for form's sake I should get an assurance from them
before they commence this process.
The vetting process consists of examining the validity of at most three
legal documents supplied by the applicants, and does not require auditing
the books of the applicants, so the ADNA Board didn't see why a major
accounting firm was required. We understand that Andersen Consulting's fee
was US$1,000 per applicant in the case of the gTLD applications, and if
Phillips Fox can't give us a quote for much less than that, then I agree we
should seek other bids.

>2) are things moving too slowly for a reason? 60 days? why not use a
>rolling
>approval?    are the important issues being addressed?  not sure...
>
The reason for choosing 60 days was to follow the standard process of
public consultation used by Standards Australia, and also (for the same
reason) adopted recently by the Australian Communications Industry Forum in
getting public input to their draft Codes and Standards.

Thank you (sincerely) for your active interest in these matters.

Peter Gerrand
Secretary, ADNA