comments of dotEUS Association

[dotEUS Association <info@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

The Basque Language and Culture Community [ BLCC ], which is distributed all
over the world, is actively and deeply committed to the development and
evolution of its language and culture. Because of that, the PuntuEus [
dotEus in Euskara ] Association, which represents the [ BLCC ], will apply
for .EUS TLD.

 We could not attend the meeting in Cartagena, moreover, we could not afford
it [ .EUS is a social non-for-profit project and our resources are limited:
time, people, money... ]. But as applicants, we take advantage of this
opportunity you give us to express our worries about the issues raised in
the Proposed Final Version of the AGB.

 As the GAC proposed in its letter of September 23rd, we also consider that
there are "a number of relatively straightforward, non-sensitive and
uncontroversial gTLD proposals – including community-based initiatives –
which are being unduly delayed as a result of wider operational and policy
development issues that do not directly concern or involve them"

 It is known that clTLDs have nothing to do with overarching issues, either
trademark protection or malicious conduct.

 Furthermore, as the last version of the AGB mentions, “we propose dedicated
registration and use policies for registrants” as we understand this is the
only way to achieve our objective: foster the Basque Language and Culture on
the Internet.

 Taking into account the complexity of opening a 'global' window, we do
think that a fast-track window is the only way to keep our socially
beneficial, non-for-profit and volunteer-based project alive.

 This idea was proposed as a solution in the Step By Step document, which we
signed. As signatories, we do believe that “opening a fast-track window: 1)
will create an environment of trust within the process of implementing a
predictable cycle of new TLD application cycles; 2)will enable applicants to
become operational with minimal risk to the integrity of the broader
application process; and 3) will spread the load of evaluating a large
number of applicants in a bigger window. This is beneficial for ICANN’s
operational stability”.

 Finally, we would like to underline that .EUS TLD and, in general, all
clTLDs seek to respond to a very specific need: strengthen small cultural
and linguistic communities. Our communities are waiting. We told them, more
than once, that ICANN was going to open 'the window' in few months. But they
still continue waiting.

 To conclude, we hope we will be able to apply for .EUS in 2011. No more
delays, please.

 Thank you.