Opposing recs. 6 and 20 in GNSO New gTLD Committee Final Report

[David Lindbergh <dave.lindbergh@xxxxxxxxx>]

Name: David Lindbergh
Email: dave.lindbergh@xxxxxxxxx
Subject:
Opposing recs. 6 and 20 in GNSO New gTLD Committee Final Report

Comments:
I'm writing to oppose recommendations 6 and 20 in the GNSO New gTLD Committee 
Final Report.

The proper venue to resolve non-technical disputes over the morality and 
content of domain names is the courts.

ICANN has no business acting as "Internet police", protector of morals, or 
defender of the state - if these functions are necessary, they should be done by courts 
of law within each jurisdiction.

Regarding recommendation 6, any standards of "morality and public order" ICANN may 
enforce are bound to be either so liberal, given the diversity of world cultures, as to be 
meaningless, or so narrow, again given the diverse views on these subjects, as to be unacceptable 
to large segments of the world population.  This is a "tar baby" -  ICANN ought to stick 
to its technical mission, and stay out of political fights that can only distract from that mission.

Regarding recommendation 20, there is no such thing as a well-defined "community".  Every one of us 
is at once a member of many overlapping communities, and for each such community we may agree or disagree 
with the majority on any given issue.  "Communities", as such, have no rights and no existence - 
they are only convenient names for groups of people with coincident interests, but it is the individuals 
themselves who have rights and whose views must be taken into account - as individuals, not as members of 
some "community".

The concept of "community" is too easily hijacked by self-interested and self-appointed "community leaders" who do not 
necessarily represent the people they claim to speak for.  No special privileges or powers should accorded to such "communities", 
"leaders", "organizations" or "institutions" beyond those explicitly delegated to them by individual citizens.

This recommendation is daft - I can't imagine what you were thinking.

--Dave Lindbergh, Hooke Laboratories, Inc. (USA)  dave.lindbergh@xxxxxxxxx