[gnso-igo-ingo] Qualification Criteria - Report

[Kiran Malancharuvil <kmalancharuvil@xxxxxxxxx>]

Dear Thomas and all:

After some discussion amongst the Qualification Criteria group members that 
have proposed criteria for prioritization and short-listing, we present the 
following prioritized criteria for further discussion amongst the group 
members.  There remain some significantly diverging views amongst the group 
members.  To avoid misrepresentation, the author of each viewpoint is stated, 
along with commentary.

Claudia MacMaster Tamarit (ISO):


  1.
 Existence of national laws or treaties that prohibit the unauthorized use of 
the words/designations in question;
  2.
Status of the international organization as a non-profit institution;
  3.
Membership (number of member countries in the international organization, 
including percentage of governmental/public members) to be weighed as a part of 
a multi-factored analysis where numbers may be considered flexible benchmarks, 
e.g., over 50 countries or representational 25% of the world's population, 
etc.);
  4.
Organizational mandate for international public service (e.g., Statutes, 
Bylaws, Treaty, etc.);
  5.
Work/serve on international level: Number of countries in which the 
international organization has operations or provides services and/or products; 
Nature and extent of collaborations with governments and other international 
organizations (again, to be weighed in a multi-factored analysis);
  6.
Engage individuals globally: Nature and impact of work, services and/or 
products on an international level in regards to communities, industries, etc.

**NOTE: The group agreed to strike the previously proposed criteria “Internet 
presence (e.g., at least 1 domain name)” from the prioritized short-list.

IOC Commentary on ISO Proposed Criteria

We continue to believe that the following criteria is over-inclusive, and some 
criterion run the risk of being arbitrary and subjective.  This is particularly 
true with (2)-(6).  While these criteria are useful as justification for 
protection, the IOC proposes that they should be used as secondary 
considerations.  For example, an organization must first demonstrate that they 
are the subject of special protection which prohibits the unauthorized use of 
the words in question and then demonstrate that they are an international 
not-for-profit organization which serves the international public good.

With regard to criteria (1) above, national laws should refer to special sui 
generis legislation and not to multi-national trademark protection (although an 
organization with sui generis legislation can also have multi-national 
trademark protection). As previously discussed in this Working Group, the 
Reserved Names Working Group already addressed special protection for trademark 
holders in general, but did not address the specific cases of those 
organizations protected by treaty and/or sui generis legislation.


IOC:


1.      National laws and/or treaties that prohibit the unauthorized use of the 
words/designations in question

2.      Not-for-profit status


Claudia MacMaster Tamarit (ISO) Commentary on IOC Proposed Criteria (Note: If 
we misrepresented anything you said, please correct, subtract or add any 
commentary)

The group should not implement protections that are discriminatory to some 
organizations over others.

Multi-national trademark protection is sufficient to satisfy the “protection by 
national law” criterion.  Restricting qualification to those organizations that 
are the exclusive subject of National Law or Treaty is discriminatory.


We hope this is helpful to the group in furthering our discussion about 
Qualification Criteria.

We look forward to tomorrow’s call.

Thank you,

Jim Bikoff, David Heasley and Kiran Malancharuvil

Kiran J. Malancharuvil
Silverberg, Goldman & Bikoff, L.L.P.
Georgetown Place
1101 30th Street NW, Suite 120
Washington, DC 20007
(202) 944-3307 – office
(619) 972-7810 – mobile
kmalancharuvil@xxxxxxxxx<mailto:kmalancharuvil@xxxxxxxxx>

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