Blacknight Comments on DAG4

["Michele Neylon :: Blacknight" <michele@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Blacknight welcome the opportunity to be able to submit comments on what is the 
fourth iteration of the "draft application guidebook"

We have taken the opportunity to submit comments on previous drafts of this 
document, and while we are happy to see that some of the areas we touched on 
have been addressed to a greater or lesser extent, that we find ourselves 
commenting on the fourth version of this document is discouraging. While we 
recognise that the launch of new TLDs cannot be entered into haphazardly we 
would also urge ICANN to move forward with the program in a timely fashion.

We recognise that the new TLD program is complex, however ICANN has been able 
to overcome obstacles and successfully handle the launch of IDNs. We would 
therefore urge ICANN to give due consideration to launching the less 
contentious cultural linguistic and city TLDs. By their very nature many of 
these projects will help developing countries and also are less likely to be 
problematic with respect to rights holders. For example CoInternet were able to 
launch a string that is only one character shorter than .com and that could 
have been heavily abused. However the registry operator actively engaged with 
rights holders and designed policies that effectively removed any "harm" from 
the equation. Unlike the new TLD project which has been going on for several 
years CoInternet did all this in a relatively short timeframe. If the DAG4 
logic had been applied to .co it is doubtful that it would have ever launched.

With respect to more specific areas of concern within the document.

We would like to voice our support for the comments submitted by Volker 
Greimann, on behalf of Key Systems, in relation to what we believe is a massive 
"red herring", that of "vertical integration" and "cross ownership". (see: 
http://forum.icann.org/lists/4gtld-guide/msg00048.html)

For the record, and to avoid any level of doubt, we cannot support either the 
proposal in DAG4 or the board motion from Nairobi. 

We find that a policy would have a negative impact both on our own business and 
that of any new TLD applicant that might wish to leverage our accrued 
expertise, both technical and otherwise,  within the domain name industry.


As Volker, and others, have pointed out, and I quote:

"With a strong and flexible set of rules and a strong and empowered enforcement 
scheme, the provision of registry services by registrars as well as 
cross-ownership of registries and registrars would pose no greater risk of 
harmful action or abuse than any other setup."

In the same vein we would be supportive of Stephane Van Gelder's comments on 
the same topic http://forum.icann.org/lists/4gtld-guide/msg00009.html

To misappropriate Rumsfield's quote:
"There are known knowns. These are things we know that we know. There are known 
unknowns. That is to say, there are things that we know we don't know. But 
there are also unknown unknowns. There are things we don't know we don't know."

While that quote may seem like an odd reference it is quite pertinent. ICANN 
needs to recognise that it cannot focus the community's time and energy on the 
"unknown". There is no way that any policy can be drafted to deal with usage 
scenarios that nobody has even thought of yet. If and when issues arise let us 
all address them when they arise.

It would be unreasonable to expect any group of people to draft policies today 
that would remain unaltered for eternity, so it would be beneficial for all 
parties if these limitations were recognised. 

We also would be supportive of comments submitted by Wendy Seltzer that touch 
on areas that we had indicated to be of concern in previous versions of this 
document. 

With respect to "morality and public order", we do not feel that this is within 
the remit of ICANN. National governments and their subjects grapple with such 
issues on a daily basis and expecting ICANN to "legislate" in this area is both 
unreasonable and impractical. Dr. Konstantinos Komaitis' comments on this area 
are very clearly articulated and would broadly reflect our views (see: 
http://forum.icann.org/lists/4gtld-guide/msg00055.html)

Regards

Michele


Mr Michele Neylon
Blacknight Solutions
ICANN Accredited Registrar
http://www.blacknight.com/
http://blog.blacknight.com/
http://blacknight.mobi/
http://michele.me/
Intl. +353 (0) 59  9183072
Twitter: http://twitter.com/mneylon
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Road,Graiguecullen,Carlow,Ireland  Company No.: 370845