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Username: IATA.travel Team
Date/Time: Fri, November 3, 2000 at 9:47 PM GMT
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Subject: IATA Reply to IPC preliminary evaluation of new TLD applications

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      IATA RESPONSE TO IPC EVALUATION CHART


In its “IPC Evaluation Chart for Proposed TLD(s),” the Intellectual Property Constituency (“IPC”) accorded IATA’s application for the “.travel” TLD the highest ratings possible for the categories of: 1) “consider[ation of] intellectual property protections for third party interests” (Category C) and 2) incorporat[ion of] policies that are likely to discourage abusive registration practices” (Category E).  These ratings properly reflect § E of IATA’s application, which describes the numerous ways in which IATA shall ensure that the intellectual property and other rights of third parties are appropriately protected in the issuance of “.travel” domain names.  As detailed in § E5, IATA intends to implement a multi-tiered approach to provide, in a practical manner, the highest level of protection of intellectual property rights and to encourage full compliance with anti-cybersquatting legislation.  This approach includes careful review of the applications, geographic name restrictions, a screening process, holding of registrations in abeyance for 10 days or longer to accommodate legitimate challenges, application of the ICANN UDRP, availability of IATA alternative dispute resolution procedures, a requirement that the domain name be actually used, and ongoing monitoring by IATA.  In addition, the proposed registry operator for the “.travel” TLD has proposed to offer an Intellectual Property Notification Service to enable interested parties to monitor domain registrations.

However, IATA respectfully submits that other aspects of the IPC Chart do not, for some reason, accurately reflect the true nature of IATA’s proposal.  For Category A (whether the proposals “have a well thought-out plan for allocation of names during the startup phase”) IATA’s proposal received an “Unsatisfactory” rating (as did a majority of the proposals).  This rating may have reflected a misunderstanding on the part of the IPC evaluators.  There is, in fact, a “sunrise provision” in our proposal.  Section E15 states that, although “IATA believes that the practice of offering pre-registrations to particular applicants to be a discriminatory practice . . . IATA will use a phased approach to limit the initial sign-on rush by only allowing those who qualify for top level domain names to proceed in the approval process.” .  The proposal also states in § E12 that “IATA believes that by limiting the applicant process to only those qualified for a top level domain name in the first few months, IATA will be able to provide the most expansive benefits to the common Internet user, without overwhelming the registry, registrar and accrediting process.” Further, IATA emphasizes in § E14 that the “rush for registration in the startup phase” for ‘.travel’ will be “limited by the type of TLD assignment available during that period.”

For Category B (whether the proposal “provide[s] for a reasonably accessible and efficient mechanism for resolving domain name disputes”),  IATA received a “Satisfactory” rating.  We respectfully submit that the rating should be “Good” because IATA’s proposal embraces the ICANN UDRP (see §§ E1, E6) and offers alternative specific accessible and efficient mechanisms for the resolution of domain name disputes.    See §§ E1, E5 and §E6.

Finally, we would like to clear up any confusion which may have resulted in IPC concluding that IATA provided insufficient information for Category D, which relates to the manner which the “.travel” TLD will provide an effective and properly balanced WHOIS service.   Section E5.6 of our proposal contains our commitment to provide WHOIS information to the public, and we can assure IPC and the public that the amount of information provided shall be more than adequate to assist trademark owners to obtain the necessary information regarding registrants in order to take the necessary actions to protect their trademark and other intellectual property rights.  We regret any contrary construction placed on our proposal by IPC.

     
 

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