Domain Names

Mishandling the Registrar Contract Negotiations

By publishing a draft Registrar Accreditation Agreement (RAA) for public comment before it has been agreed on by both parties, has ICANN dealt the bottom-up multi-stakeholder model a blow? ICANN Staff and the registrars have been negotiating a new version of the RAA for the past 18 months following requests by Law Enforcement Agencies (LEA) such as Interpol for greater consumer protection. With both ICANN and registrars working hard, by early this year agreement had been reached on 11.5 of the 12 LEA "asks". A deal looked close. more

Google: Not All ccTLD’s Are Created Equally in Generic Search Rankings

There is a very interesting video posted on YouTube.com from Matt Cutts of Google who answered the question about how ccTLD's are viewed by Google especially when they are being used as domain hacks. Here is the question: "We have a vanity domain (http://ran.ge) that unfortunately isn't one of the generic TLDs, which means we can't set our geographic target in Webmaster Tools. Is there any way to still target our proper location?" more

Thinking Carefully About New gTLD Objections: Community (3 of 4)

My third installment regarding gTLD objections - and understanding exactly what's required for an objector to prevail - moves to the more complex community-based objections. For those getting their first exposure to this unwieldy beast, pull up a chair and get comfortable. The community objection involves multifaceted elements, each having its own set of defining factors and often using similar terminology in different contexts. As such, it can be very confusing and one can easily lose track of the bigger picture. more

What Did we Learn Today About .XXX From IFFOR Tax Return

The 2011 Tax return for IFFOR has been filed and our friend George Kirikos of Leap.com found it.. IFFOR's tax return is important for two reasons. First IFFOR return shows us how how much money the non-profit, which is suppose to receive $10 for each .XXX registration, actually received from ICM the operator of the .XXX TLD and how IFFOR spent the money. Second the return is important to see how the money ICM the registry operator of the .XXX TLD paid to IFFOR matches up to ICM reported number of .XXX domain name registrations. more

How the Registrar Cash Flow Model Could Collapse with New ICANN gTLDs

New top-level domain applicants are getting plenty of advice nowadays about how to launch their new Registry. In addition to thinking about their branding and distribution, they should also be thinking about their business practices with Registrars. What many of them do not realize is that their cash flow practices, with respect to Registrars, may be a factor of whether ICANN Registrars even support their Registry. more

The Biggest gTLD Problem Has Just Appeared on the Horizon

A letter sent earlier this month by the ICANN Board to the Governmental Advisory Committee (GAC) should cause every new gTLD applicant's ears to prick up. Having been through every one of the applications for 1,396 different Internet extensions, the world's governments not only issued formal warnings for 199 of them, but also asked what mechanisms were in place to make sure that people did what they said they would in their applications. more

Why I’m No Longer So Worried About ICANN

"No, the new gTLD program isn't ready!" ... "Yes, I was wrong on the Trademark Clearinghouse!" Fadi Chehadé showed some strong leadership qualities during last week's ICANN regional registry and registrar meeting in Amsterdam. Honesty and courage... What started out as a speech soon turned into a heart to heart. As he responded to questions, Chehadé made some surprisingly honest comments. more

Opportunity Missed: Hilton Checks-Out of New Domains Boom

American author Mark Twain once wrote: "I was seldom able to see an opportunity until it had ceased to be one." Last month we learned that Hilton Hotels & Resorts joined six other new Top-Level Domain applicants in withdrawing their application and exiting the program. I was disappointed when I first heard the news. My initial thoughts were centred on the enormous potential .hilton offered the company and the innovative business opportunities they were now abandoning. more

Pandora’s Box - New US Cyber Security Bills Create a Worm Hole in the Internet Galaxy

There are two Bills that are floating through the corridors of power on the Hill that could potentially change the course of civil and political rights within the United States and the world. One was introduced through the House of Representatives and the other through the Senate. The two Bills touch on a common thread that are premised on "national security" however there are interesting challenges that will surface should the Bills be passed that affect global public interest that require further examination, introspection and discussion. more

Copyright Infringement and ccTLDs

.tk was once designated as the riskiest ccTLD. .ru is often said to be, after .com, the most used in the content of spam messages. But is there a ccTLD that is a favorite destination for copyright infringement? The question is worth asking in view of the growing trend for .com domain names seizures related to copyright infringement. more

A Serious Bug in the Similarity Check

A week ago, ICANN announced the latest delay in the New gTLD Program: the so-called "contention sets" will only be published March 1, 2013. The original deadline was July 2012, postponed serially in two-month intervals. The gTLD program is lost in confusing similarity. What went wrong? In order to determine which TLD applications are in contention, it is necessary to say which TLD strings are confusingly similar to one another. more

Trademark Clearinghouse Debate is Not About the Trademark Clearinghouse!

A comment period on the "strawman", a proposal to update the Trademark Clearinghouse (TMCH), is currently underway. Originally planned to end on January 11, it has been extended by ICANN to February 5. The comment portal has so far received 89 email contributions. A fair number, but the real story is how many major brands have spoken out on the proposed amendments to the TMCH model. more

Follow a Phishing Case in Real Time: postfinances.com / Swiss Post

It is just another phishing case. Why should I care? I happened to receive my own copy of the phishing email message. Most Internet users will just smile bitterly before deleting it. I checked it to see why it had gone through the spam filters. It had no URL in the text but a reply-to address. So it needed a valid domain name, and had one: postfinances.com. PostFinance (without trailing "s") is the payment system of the Swiss Post. It has millions of users. more

Registering for the Registrar Rodeo: A Note to the New gTLDs

Thank goodness for Monday's new gTLD draw!!! To date the process has been more of an intellectual exercise in marketing, technology, and strategic game thinking - it was getting a little boring. A business needs to see regular 'wins' to keep momentum and stay motivated. The presumptive lineup of new gTLDs has now been established which has given most applicants (save those poor souls looking at 2015 as their launch year) a clear view of the starting gate. more

Mitigating Harm Caused by the ICANN “Draw”

The gTLD Prioritization "Draw" was a mistake. But its negative impact can still be mitigated. The best course of action follows directly from information that can be gleaned from available data. Let us start with the latest piece of intelligence: who "played" in the "Draw"? 1766 of 1917 applications had a lottery ticket. This is much worse than expected. Very few abstained. Even the purely defensive applicants saw no other choice but to "play". more