Re: [alac] new gTLDs, GNSO call

["Sebastian Ricciardi" <sricciardi@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

I have certain ideas about this, but I'm still reading some papers, and the
WIPO report (BTW, there some points there we should discuss). Please give me
this weekend to keep studying and I will try to give you a constructive
imput on monday/thursday.

Have a nice weekend,

Sebastian


----- Original Message -----
From: "Vittorio Bertola" <vb@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: "Wendy Seltzer" <wendy@xxxxxxxxxxx>
Cc: "Interim ALAC" <alac@xxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Thursday, April 10, 2003 12:59 PM
Subject: Re: [alac] new gTLDs, GNSO call


> On Thu, 10 Apr 2003 05:21:28 -0700, you wrote:
>
> >There are two questions on the table regarding new gTLDs:
> >1. criteria for introduction of 3 sponsored gTLDs, as a continuation
> >of the "proof of concept" stage of TLD additions
>
> A note: the Board's resolution from Amsterdam, as a result of the
> public forum discussion there, does not say "3" (as originally
> proposed) but "a limited number". In fact, I think we should actually
> push for another principle to be applied - all applicants who meet a
> certain threshold, even if 10 or 15, should be approved, or, in Vint
> Cerf's words, "a TLD should be approved if it does no harm to the
> DNS". I think this is possible and was widely supported in Rio during
> the public forum, so it doesn't seem to me such a weird proposal.
>
> >2. whether the namespace should be "structured" for the addition of
> >further new gTLDs going forward
> >
> ><http://www.dnso.org/dnso/notes/20030307.gTLDs-committee.html>
> >
> >In many of the analyses put forward on both of these questions, the
> >prime focus seems to be on exclusion:  do the sponsored gTLDs
> >represent a limited community and adhere to their charters by
> >permitting registrants only from within that community?  Little
> >attention seems to have been given to the other side: are there
> >people or organizations who are left without logical places to
> >register domain names, or who are denied registration in a sponsored
> >TLD whose charter they fit?
>
> This is an important point in my opinion, because the approach in
> which you have to find "the" organization for a community in order for
> this community to start its sponsored TLD is quite wrong. It means
> that only strongly organized communities (example: airline industry
> with SITA) can have a sTLD. And even in that case, it usually means
> that there's a part of the community who's left out of the sTLD,
> especially because there's a strong organization that represents the
> majority of it! (For example, I'm quite sure that there are a number
> of airline-related entities that are not member of SITA, just to make
> an example.) I would have another approach - I would allow less
> strongly organized and defined communities to have their own sTLD, as
> long as there is a real chance for the registrants and the members of
> the community to have a voice in the process. So if the policy-making
> process is open, there's no need to have a strong already existing
> organization to manage the sTLD.
>
> >At-large Internet users are both domain name registrants and users of
> >the domain name system.  As users, they are well served by names that
> >are not confusingly similar, enabling them to differentiate the names
> >they encounter and minimizing typographic or semantic mistakes.  As
> >registrants, the "at large" are perhaps the most likely to be
> >underserved by community-defined, chartered gTLDs.
>
> Agree. Perhaps if you had thousands of small sponsored TLDs, you could
> hope to cover a good fraction of the diversity through their union.
> But not in the present situation.
>
> >A second tension appears between market competition and desire to
> >protect registrants from the consequences of registry failure.  I
> >tend to think that the intermediate choice of a heavily regulated
> >market is worse than alternatives on either end (free market or
> >openly acknowledged planning), because it leads to false assumptions
> >and conclusions about what "the market" will support.   How concerned
> >are we with this type of stability, or are we comfortable letting bad
> >competitors fail?  (Note also that a separation between the technical
> >provider and policy provider could make it easier to move a registry
> >if a component failed.)
>
> I think that perhaps there should be a sort of "warranty fund" to cope
> with failing registries and to cover the expense of moving their
> domains to existing registries, which could manage them without too
> much cost or effort. Also a third party escrow of the registration
> data should be required so that a safe copy always exists. But apart
> from that, I don't think you should require any special warranty.
> --
> vb.                  [Vittorio Bertola - vb [at] bertola.eu.org]<---
> -------------------> http://bertola.eu.org/ <-----------------------
>