The Steering Committee is responsible for reporting on the activities of the secretariat and working groups, for examining and approving details of projects to be handled by working groups, and for discussing any problems.

The Steering Committee meets each month in the JPNIC secretariat conference room. Please refer to the following URL for a detailed schedule:

http://www.nic.ad.jp/jp/info/schedule/schedule.html

It is also possible to observe discussions on the public agenda. Please contact the JPNIC secretariat (secretariat@nic.ad.jp) for details.

Below is a summary of a number of discussions and resolutions made at the 23rd, 24th, 25th, and 26th Steering Committee Meetings.

Regarding Organization for the New Financial Year

As of the new financial year, a number of changes have been made to the structure of JPNIC's working group. The previously existing 'Information Service Working Group', 'Statistics Working Group', 'Publicity Working Group', and 'History Working Group', which were all involved in the collection and provision of information, have been combined to form the 'Information Service Working Group'.

Also, the 'International Liaison Working Group' and 'Plan Working Group' have been combined to form the 'Planning & International Liaison Working Group', as international coordination is essential when examining future JPNIC operations.

Please refer to Section 9.2, 'List of Working Groups', for details regarding the purpose and structure of working groups.

EDU-TALK SUMMER FORUM '99

The JPNIC Education Working Group is responsible for contributing to the spread and development of the Internet by providing the knowledge and technical information required for Internet operation and management to as many people as possible.

In particular, introduction of the Internet to schools is progressing rapidly following the introduction of ED.JP domain names. Following a discussion by the Steering Committee, the Education Working Group Started to prepare to hold an off-line meeting on the subject of 'School Internet Connections of Schools', with the aim of achieving a healthy network society.

Please refer to Section 3.4.1 for details of EDU-TALK SUMMER FORUM '99.

Postponement of DNS Zone Transfer Cancellation and the Revision of Exceptional Measures

When the cancellation of DNS zone transfer was announced, zone transfer was to be approved as an exceptional measure in cases where use was approved by JPNIC. However, following a survey and discussion by the Databases Management Working Group, it was proposed that the date for cancellation of zone transfer be postponed, and also that zone transfer would only be conducted to official secondary servers in view of security issues and the load imposed on DNS servers by zone transfer.

This proposal was approved by the Steering Committee, and it was decided to cancel DNS zone transfer as of May 11, 1999. Please refer to Section 3.3 for items relating to the cancellation of DNS zone transfer.

iDNS

There has been considerable international discussion, particularly in Asia, regarding DNS servers which allow the use of multiple languages (iDNS). The Steering Committee has been actively discussing the role that JPNIC should play in an international alliance regarding iDNS, with a task force of interested parties being formed to follow trends associated with iDNS and provide support as necessary.

The status of iDNS will continue to be reported to the Steering Committee.