[gnso-pro-wg] Some Concerns

["Michael D. Palage" <Michael@xxxxxxxxxx>]

Hello All:

Having been a participant within the ICANN process since the beginning I
would like to express some concerns of where I think the Working Group
and its work product is going.  

First, in reviewing the survey in detail after our call, I have to agree
with many of the points raised by Jeff Neuman. Although I appreciate the
tight time lines we are facing, the strength of our Working Groups end
product will likely be determined by the weakest link in the our process
chain. While I have the highest respect for many of the participants
within this working group, I do not believe any are qualified to
construct surveys and ensure that the proper universe of participants
are sampled.

Therefore, the likely out come of our survey will be MarkMontior tapping
their existing corporate client list and getting upward of a hundred
responses similar to their Whois statement. Given, the pending INTA
annual meeting in Chicago at the end of the month, INTA might be able to
account for a larger turnout. There might be a handful of registration
authorities that submit the survey (approximately 30) or there may be
none as sort of a silent protest to the lack of objectivity of the
survey. Finally there will be a smattering of individual registrants,
and possibly a statement by ALAC,

The results of this survey will likely be skewed toward the trademark
respondents favoring a uniform Sunrise Protection mechanism, eerily
reminiscent of the original proposed title of this Working Group, the
Sunrise Working Group. These results will then be quickly compiled into
a final report that will be sent to the GNSO council. Given the current
makeup of the GNSO council, the IPC, BC and ISPs are likely to vote in
favor of this recommendation, whereas the Registrars, Registries, and
NCUC will likely oppose. Given the current weighted voting structure,
the report will die.

In response to this vote, there will be another up cry about the flaws
of weighted voting, and those new members that invested the time and
resource in participating in this Working Group will potentially walk
away feeling that they wasted their time and they are unlikely to
participate in the ICANN process again.

Now I hope that I am wrong, but I unfortunately feel that this will be
the end result.

Getting back to the exchange between Mike R and Jeff, about what the
scope of the working group is really about, I believe the following
statistics are worth noting:

"Most of the 9,567 UDRP and UDRP-based disputes concern international
domains, with .com representing some 79% of names involved, followed by
.net
(11%), .org (6%), .info (2%), and .biz, .travel, .aero and .edu (jointly
2%)."

Source: WIPO Press Release 464, Geneva, October 16, 2006
http://www.wipo.int/edocs/prdocs/en/2006/wipo_pr_2006_464.html


The primary problem confronting trademark owners is not abusive
registrations in newer TLDs, but continued abuse in the legacy TLDs.
Coupled with the current abuses surrounding the Add Grace Period (aka
domain name tasting) I am reminded of an analogy by Bruce Tonkin talking
about the tavern owner concerned about the bartender giving away free
draft beers, while people walked out the back door with kegs of beer.

Will try to make some constructive edits to the survey tomorrow morning,
but I wanted to clear the air on my concern about where I believe we are
potentially headed.

Best regards,

Michael D. Palage