Definition of Sponsorship Proposals

["Jason Hendeles" <jason@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

In November 2000, ICM Registry was one of 37 registry applicants that was
“not selected” by ICANN as part of the original proof of concept.

ICM Registry proposed to operate an adult-content top-level domain, and over
the past three years, the company has engaged in significant outreach within
the adult-content community to support a sponsored adult-content top-level
domain.

ICM Registry has securred letters of support from some of the major content
and service providers in the adult-content industry from around the globe,
including the US, Canada, England, Spain, and Australia.

However, ICM Registry’s outreach and consensus-building has not just been
limited to adult-content providers but has also included leading
age-verification providers, free-speech organizations,and child advocacy
groups.

After three years of consensus-building, ICM Registry has discovered that a
sponsored adult-content TLD is likely the best way forward. Specifically, a
sponsoring entity would be responsible for developing policies and
best-practices standards for the adult-content TLD.

When ICANN began to discuss moving forward with an expanded proof of concept
for sponsored TLDs, there were representations made that any new round of
applications would be open and there would be no preferential treatment
given to previous non-selected applicants.

Unfortunately, in the latest draft RFP for sponsored TLDs, it appears ICANN
has moved the goal posts and is now proposing to allow only those
non-selected sponsored applicants from 2000 to submit a new bid.

ICM Registry’s original proposal in 2000 was not sponsored because the
sponsoring framework was in the process of formation during the application
timeline. At the time, this fact was immaterial in terms of our technical
and financial merit, the criteria by which ICANN was evaluating proposals.
However, what this now means is that, under the proposed RFP, our company
would be prohibited from submitting an enhanced proposal.

Providing a preferential right to non-selected sponsored applicants from
2000 would set an unfair precedent especially when you consider that all of
the 2000 applications have undergone material modifications both in terms of
their ownership and structure of their applications.  ICM Registry strongly
believes that all interested parties should be permitted to submit a
sponsored application to ICANN’s expanded sponsored TLD proof of concept.


Jason Hendeles
ICM Registry, Inc.