ICANN

Court of Appeals Avoids “Doomsday Effect” in Iran ccTLD Decision

Earlier today the U.S. Court of Appeals for the DC Circuit issued its decision in Weinstein vs. Iran, a case in which families of terror victims sought to have ICANN turn over control of Iran's .IR ccTLD to plaintiffs. In a unanimous decision the three judge panel stated, "On ICANN's motion, the district court quashed the writs, finding the data unattachable under District of Columbia (D.C.) law. We affirm the district court but on alternative grounds." more

Challenges for .brands - From Strategy to Implementation Planning

While your strategy and objectives speak more broadly to why you're launching a .brand TLD, your implementation plan covers the all-important 'how'. Once you complete your strategy workshop session to agree upon objectives and approach, how do you actually launch a .brand TLD? You need an implementation plan to guide you from strategy to launch, and beyond. At its core, the implementation plan is a checklist; just like a pilot landing a plane, you need to run through your checklist to ensure you don't miss any crucial elements. more

Accountability Group Charter Sets the Bar Too Low

In mid-August ICANN staff attempted to impose their own proposal for the process that will determine what overall new ICANN accountability measures should accompany the proposed IANA functions transition -- and thereby replace the restraining and corrective oversight role that the U.S. has played through periodic reevaluation of ICANN performance in conjunction with re-awarding of the IANA contract. In united reaction against that attempt, the ICANN community sent an unprecedented joint letter to CEO Fadi Chehade and the ICANN Board... more

Why Has ICANN Cut Subsequent TLD Round Preparations From Its Budget?

As we approach another ICANN meeting and another opportunity for our community to come together to discuss, collaborate and work, there is naturally a flurry of activity as stakeholders push for a spot on the agenda for their key areas of interest. And in the midst of current discussions, particularly around important topics like GDPR, it's easy for other vital conversations to be missed. more

Domain Names in 9 Indian Scripts to Be Added to the Root Servers by June

Internet root servers will soon allow domain name registrations in nine Indian scripts, according to Universal Acceptance Steering Group (UASG). more

WLS & Recourse to the DOC

ICANN's recently posted "Seventh Status Report" states: "ICANN's Board of Directors voted 14-1 to take no action in response to the request, on the grounds that the decision to allow the Wait-Listing Service to be offered was not a threat to competition...".

Several firms that currently offer competing services have signaled (pdf) that they are not in agreement with this assessment. more

UDRP and Article 92(b) of EUROPEAN COUNCIL REGULATION (EC) No 40/94

It has been over a year since I posted "The Non-Parity of the UDRP", how little did I know then compared to now! Since that posting, the corporations and their lawyers have given me a crash course in the law and I have learned much. There are many tricks that corporations will play on a domain name registrant in order to silence criticism of the corporation and to violate the registrants right of freedom of expression without frontiers. The UDRP Administrative Proceedings is one such trick... more

Civil Society Cautions Against ICANN Giving Governments Veto Over Geographic Domain Names

A group of twenty-four civil society organizations and individuals today submitted a joint statement regarding a proposal from an ICANN Governmental Advisory Committee (GAC) sub-group on the use of "geographic names" in top-level domains. The joint civil society statement cautioned against the adoption of the GAC proposal that would give governments veto power on domains that use "geographic names." more

Failure in ICANN’s Governance Framework

The legitimacy of the ICANN multistakeholder model and its governance framework are facing an existential threat requiring immediate attention. The recently announced results of the ICANN Nominating Committee highlight how the ICANN Board is captured by "affiliated" directors, which threatens its independence and ability to act for the public interest. more

ICANN Maps Whois Models for GDPR

Earlier today ICANN held a webinar to provide an update on their data privacy activities in relation to whois and GDPR. Rather than simply talking about the various "models" they produced both a visual mapping as well as a matrix. While some attendees may not agree with how all the models are classified it is still a helpful way of showing the deviations from the current fully public whois model for gTLD domain name registrations. more

NETmundial and the IGF: Putting Your Money Where Your Mouth Is

The Internet is not new. It has existed, in one form or another, since the 1960s. Since that time, it has been primarily the domain of the engineers and the other technology-minded individuals that built it. The organizations that were put in place to govern it predate the huge growth in end users the Internet experienced in the 2000s... They are able, in structure and capacity, to deal with technological issues. The issues facing the Internet in 2014, however, are very different from those in 1998. more

Name Collision Mitigation Requires Qualitative Analysis (Part 3 of 4)

As discussed in the several studies on name collisions published to date, determining which queries are at risk, and thus how to mitigate the risk, requires qualitative analysis. Blocking a second level domain (SLD) simply on the basis that it was queried for in a past sample set runs a significant risk of false positives. SLDs that could have been delegated safely may be excluded on quantitative evidence alone, limiting the value of the new gTLD until the status of the SLD can be proven otherwise. more

3rd Digital Marketing & gTLD Strategy Congress

Momentum has released the following announcement regarding its upcoming 3rd Digital Marketing & gTLD Strategy Congress (March 3-4, 2014, The Dream Downtown, New York). more

Preserving ICANN’s Independence Through Bold Action – Not Inaction

This week, the ICANN Board will vote on whether to approve the transfer of control of the .ORG domain to a private equity firm called Ethos Capital. This is a weighty decision for ICANN, since in order to approve the sale, it will have to convince itself that this is the right choice in the face of tremendous and widespread opposition, including from those who will be most affected by the sale. more

Threat of Tiered Pricing Continues in New gTLD Guidebook Version 2

The draft New gTLD Applicant Guidebook (version 2) has been released along with an analysis of the comments to the prior version. The documents are voluminous. I glanced at the revised draft Base Agreement, and it's clearly unacceptable as there continue to be no price caps in place to protect domain name registrants... more