The second meeting of the "Japan ICANN Forum" was held on Friday, June 30, 2000, at Josui Kaikan in Kanda, Tokyo. The purpose of the forum, of which JPNIC is the secretariat, is to publicize the importance of ICANN (The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers). The meeting consisted mainly of presentations by individuals who are working on the front lines. Activity reports from the At Large Committee included the most recent figures of ICANN At Large Member registration around the world, which revealed the rapid growth of Japanese membership.

The second speech was "ICANN - A Model for 21st Century International Organizations," made by Mikiyuki Kato of the Fujitsu Corporation. Mr. Kato introduced ICANN by focusing on the uniqueness of its activities, and emphasized that it would be a model for new international organizations of the 21st century. To achieve success as a 21st Century model, he urged the importance of participation, being active in discussions, and of promotion of ICANN.

The final speaker was Shigeki Goto of Waseda University, discussing the topic of "Multilingual Domain Names." Multilingual domain names enable Internet users to use various non-alphanumeric character sets, such as Japanese, Korean and Chinese, for domain names. He outlined some points of how we can resolve some problems including a standardization issue.

After the speeches, a "Current At Large Membership registration, and calls for promotion and registration" session, and an "At Large Committee activity report," were presented. It was reported that the number of registrants in Japan currently exceeds 4,000; that it is the third largest group, after the United States and Germany; that the deadline for registration for obtaining voting rights would be in July; and that other countries have also started campaigns. Continuous advertisement of the importance of participating in ICANN activities was requested,without being satisfied with the status quo.

Several topics were raised during the Q & A session that followed, including news of a campaign in the US that has the cooperation of The New York Times; of a major newspaper advertising campaign that is underway in Germany; and reports that U.S. The member of memberships is twice as large as that of Japan. It was confirmed that positive efforts would continue towards the promotion of ICANN.

The next meeting is planned to take place in September. In addition to regular speeches, there are plans to introduce the ICANN trustee candidates, prior to the election in October by At-Large members.