Summary and Analysis of Comments

[Craig Schwartz <craig.schwartz@xxxxxxxxx>]

Summary and analysis of public comments for:
AGP Limits Policy Draft Implementation Plan

1 December 2008


BACKGROUND

The public comment period was created to solicit feedback from the Internet 
community on the draft AGP Limits Policy Implementation Plan.

On 26 June 2008, the ICANN Board resolved to adopt the GNSO recommendation on 
domain tasting and directed staff to implement the policy following appropriate 
comment and notice periods on the implementation documents. Following 
implementation of the Policy, Operators will be prohibited from making refunds 
of registration fees to Registrars for AGP deletes that exceed the threshold 
limits set by the Policy unless an exemption has been granted by an Operator. 
The limits defined by the Policy are (i) 10% of that Registrar's net new 
registrations (calculated as the total number of net adds of one-year through 
ten-year registrations as defined in Operator Agreements) in that month, or 
(ii) fifty (50) domain names, whichever is greater. The draft implementation 
plan details how this Policy will be implemented.


SUMMARY AND ANALYSIS

The public comment period was open from 20 October through 20 November 2008.  
14 comments were received including six (one was a duplicate) from 
corporations, four from associations, two from GNSO constituencies, and two 
from individuals. Of the 14 comments, seven were supportive (M, JC, CD, PC, YW, 
NL, and EE), one was supportive but with reservations (SM), one stated it was 
premature to implement the Policy (CW), one did not voice support or opposition 
and had questions or proposed edits to the plan (BS), one was a duplicate (NL), 
one did not provide comments to the plan (MR) and two were spam (GI and MB). 
The public comments for this forum are archived at 
http://forum.icann.org/lists/agp-limits-policy/.

The relevant comments below are listed in the order they were received.

Mike (Premier Website Solutions): Mike stated, "This is one policy change I 
really look forward to seeing implemented. I think the proposed limit on 
refunds is quite acceptable." Furthermore, he stated that "Far too many good 
domain names out there never get the chance to be used for a good purpose 
because they become nothing but pages of advertising, and the domain tasting is 
what helps those people decide which ones to use for advertising." Finally, 
"The grace period was a nice addition for those legitimate registration errors, 
but was introduced with too much freedom. Adding limits will definitely reduce 
the problems."

Jim Crowne (AIPLA): AIPLA's submission stated "while AIPLA would prefer to see 
the complete elimination of the AGP, AIPLA supports the AGP Limits Policy as a 
first step. Prohibiting gTLD Operators ("registries") from offering to 
registrars a refund of registration fees for domain names deleted 2 during the 
AGP that exceed 10% of that registrar's net new registrations (or 50 domain 
names, whichever is greater) will likely put a significant dent in unscrupulous 
industrial domain name monetization. The policy of eliminating refunds of the 
domain name registration fees, which are currently about $6.42, should 
eliminate the ability of domainers to engage in free high volume automated 
domain name tasting. This, AIPLA believes, will help to reduce the risks 
trademark owners currently face through typosquatting and other products of 
domain tasting."
Further, AIPLA supports comments submitted by the IPC (detailed below) about 
the need for stricter guidelines for registrars who claim extraordinary 
circumstances as a means to avoid the AGP limits. AIPLA also supports public 
disclosure of exemption requests so that registry operators are not placed in a 
position to abuse this exception and dilute the efficacy of the limits.


Clarke Walton (RC): The RC statement is that it is premature to implement the 
AGP Limits Policy. They stated, "The 20-cent Transaction Fee Policy might cause 
very few instances of registrars exceeding the 10% threshold deletion rate.  
Should this occur, the proposed AGP Limits Policy may need to be modified; or 
the community may find that implementing the AGP Limits Policy is not necessary 
at all." Furthermore, "Because the full impact of the 20-cent Transaction Fee 
Policy is not yet known, the RC believes that more information should be 
gathered by ICANN and studied by the community before implementing the proposed 
AGP Limits Policy." Lastly, the RC members are "concerned about financial 
liability for registrations obtained through fraudulent means" and expressed 
the Policy permit exemptions in cases of fraudulent registrations.



Steve Metalitz (IPC): The IPC cautiously supports the implementation of the 
Policy and does so with reservations. The IPC stated the plan should be revised 
to provide more clarity around some of the ambiguous language including 
references to "extraordinary circumstances" and "reoccur regularly."  The IPC 
stated that, "At a minimum, the implementation notes should set a threshold by 
clearly stating that any circumstance which occurs more than once in any 
12-month period will not be deemed an "extraordinary circumstance" under the 
policy." Lastly, the IPC believes that information collected by the registries 
should be made publicly available to "discourage gaming of the AGP Limits 
Policy."



Claudio DiGangi (INTA Internet Committee): INTA stated it is pleased by the 84% 
decrease in AGP deletes and stated, "This alone is not at all conclusive proof 
of the cessation of domain name tasting." As such, INTA stated ICANN should 
move forward rapidly with the implementation of the Policy because it carries a 
higher financial penalty than the Board approved FY09 budget provision. Similar 
to the IPC's comments, INTA stated that "extraordinary circumstances" and 
"reoccur regularly" should be further clarified, that the plan should limit the 
cumulative number of claims based on extraordinary circumstances and that 
exemption request information should be made publicly available.  INTA further 
stated that if the registrar is relying on information supplied by the 
registrant for the exemption, the registrar should disclose any relationship 
between the registrar and the registrant and that there should be "a 
prohibition against a refund where there is a corporate or other close 
relationship."



Phil Corwin (ICA): The ICA in March 2008 expressed their concerns about a 
one-size-fits-all AGP policy for all registries. As such, they are generally 
supportive of the proposed Policy and have stated they expect it will be 
"highly successful in ending domain tasting." ICA commented that economic 
penalties that have been instituted to eliminate domain tasting will probably 
achieve this goal. ICA expressed that they would "have preferred to leave some 
leeway for registry experimentation" but did not say more about what the 
experimentation might look like and the desired outcomes.



Barbara Steele (VeriSign): VeriSign provided comments and suggested edits to 
clarify elements of the draft plan. The comments do not suggest support or 
opposition to the draft plan. One comment suggested that implementation of the 
plan should not occur for at least 120 days after the final form of the plan 
has been adopted. This time would be necessary to incorporate into current 
operational procedures the additional reporting requirements. Several comments 
addressed language in the reporting requirements section including the 
difficulty in providing exemption request information in a CSV file format and 
a recommendation that registries submit an additional report that would include 
exemption request information. VeriSign requested addition language be 
incorporated to ensure that none of the information submitted in registry 
operator monthly reports is made available to anyone prior to expiration of the 
90-day confidentiality period. VeriSign requested the term "appropriate action 
be taken" be clarified in the compliance section. Lastly, VeriSign stated, "It 
does not seem appropriate or applicable to include the experience of Public 
Interest Registry or NeuStar as factors that may be considered in measuring the 
success of the Policy. It is recommended that fourth paragraph and 
corresponding bullets be deleted."


Yvette Wojciechowski (CADNA):  CADNA's submission contained a brief, partial 
summary of the history of the GNSO's work on domain tasting and included 
specific information from some of the constituency statements that were 
submitted during the policy development process. The submission stated, "While 
CADNA would support a new policy that removes the AGP completely, we also 
support the AGP Limits Policy in its current form. CADNA urges ICANN to 
implement the AGP Limits Policy at the earliest possible time, but in any event 
no later than March 1, 2009, the date proposed in the Draft AGP Limits Policy 
Implementation Notes."

Natasha Lipkina (HP.com): HP.com's comment is that it "seconds attached CADNA's 
comments." Further, it "urges ICANN to implement the AGP Limits Policy at the 
earliest possible time, but in any event no later than March 1, 2009, the date 
proposed in the Draft AGP Limits Policy Implementation Notes."

Elisabeth Escobar (Marriott International, Inc.): Marriott's comment was that 
"it agrees with the comments submitted by the Coalition Against Domain Name 
Abuse in support of the AGP Limits Policy and encourages ICANN to implement the 
Policy as soon as possible."





CONCLUSION



This summary should not be considered a full and complete recitation of every 
comment, concern, or recommendation contained in the public comments.  It is an 
attempt to capture in broad terms the nature and scope of the comments.  In 
several instances substantial written comments were submitted to elaborate on 
and support the positions presented.  This summary has been prepared in an 
effort to highlight key elements of these submissions in an abbreviated format, 
not to replace them.  Every effort has been made to avoid mischaracterizations 
and to present fairly the views provided.  Any failure to do so is 
unintentional.



NEXT STEPS

This summary of public comments will be used to inform ICANN's AGP Limits 
Policy Implementation Plan. It is expected that the final implementation plan 
will be announced to gTLD registries and the community in December 2008 and 
implemented by gTLD registries no later than 15 April 2009.





CONTRIBUTORS are in order of first appearance (with abbreviation) and number of 
postings if more than one:

Mike (M), Premier Website Solutions
Grupo Iwa (GI), Global Domains International (spam)
Mike Rodenbaugh (MR)
Jim Crowne (JC), American Intellectual Property Law Association (AIPLA)
Clarke Walton (CW), Registrar Constituency (RC)
Steven Metalitz (SM), Intellectual Property Constituency (IPC)
Claudio DiGangi (CD), INTA Internet Committee
Phil Corwin (PC), Internet Commerce Association (ICA)
Barbara Steele (BS), VeriSign
Yvette Wojciechowski (YW), Coalition Against Domain Name Abuse (CADNA)
Natasha Lipkina (NL), HP.com (submitted duplicate comments)
Elisabeth Escobar (EE), Marriott International
Maxime Bellet (MB), Velectris (spam)

Craig
___________________
Craig Schwartz
Chief gTLD Registry Liaison
ICANN
1875 I Street, NW, 5th floor
Washington, DC 20006