Re: [ssac-gnso-irdwg] Draft matrix

[Dave Piscitello <dave.piscitello@xxxxxxxxx>]

On 4/1/10 11:44 AM  Apr 1, 2010, "Metalitz, Steven" <met@xxxxxxx> wrote:

> I am sorry that I had to miss the last call.  I have two questions about the
> matrix.  
>  
> (1)  As I have mentioned before, references to "English" are inappropriate if
> what we really mean is US ASCII-7.  Even now, in the pre-IDN world, a very
> high proportion of registrants (perhaps a majority?) do not "speak English"
> and yet supply Whois data in ASCII.  For the same reason, the references to
> "translation" should probably be changed to "transliteration."

Agree.
 
> (2)  I am afraid I do not understand Model 2.  To whom is the registrar in
> this model providing the "point of contact for translation" -- to registrants
> (so that their data can be transliterated into ASCII?)? or to Whois users?

I understood this entry to mean "anyone who asks". My simplistic model is
that a registrar must be able to assist with inquiries regarding a domain
registration. It follows that, if the registrar chooses to support
submission of registration data using character sets other than ASCII7, it
must be able to assist requests to contact the registrant in any language or
script it supports. Now, the question that is not addressed here is what
obligation registrars other than the sponsoring registrar have w/r/t POC for
transliteration. The implication from the table is that all registrars other
than the sponsoring registrar would have no obligation beyond the languages
each supports other than to provider referral to the sponsoring registrar.

This is a consequence of localization, and in at least some respects, it
reflects the brick-and-mortar world, no? (OTOH, at least one search engine
provides an approximation of universal web page translation, so perhaps it
is not that much of a stretch to imagine this could be done for WHOIS?)