ICANN

New gTLDs and Their Hidden Costs: Part 2

In my last post I discussed some questions that remain about ICANN's generic Top-level Domain (gTLD) budget. Today I discuss the rights protections mechanisms as they currently appear. An economic study commissioned ICANN to analyze the new gTLD process recently concluded that "the biggest likely costs" of approving new gTLDs are "consumer confusion and trademark protection." more

When Did We Give Away the Internet?

I've been following the recent news on the World Summit on the Information Society, and it's getting really bizarre. The Wired article is one example of out of the out-of-this-world coverage on the World Summit; I heard a similar spin yesterday on a radio show that often shares material with the BBC. What king or dictator or bureaucrat has signed the document giving power over the Internet to one organization or another? Did I miss the ceremony? One laughable aspect of news reportage is that the founders and leaders of ICANN always avowed, with the utmost unction, that they were not trying to make policy decisions and were simply tinkering with technical functions on the Internet.  more

Proposed New IETF Standard Would Create a Nationally Partitioned “Internet”

For those worried about the threat of a state-based takeover of the Internet, there is no need to obsess over the International Telecommunication Regulations (ITRs) exclusively. Three Chinese engineers are proposing a way to alter Internet standards to partition the Internet into autonomously administered national networks, using the domain name system (DNS). The idea was not proposed in the ITU; no, it was sent to a multi-stakeholder institution, the granddaddy of the Internet itself, the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF). more

Rumor: Rod Beckstrom Next ICANN CEO

Sources indicate former director of the US Homeland Security Department's National Cybersecurity Center (NCSC), Rod Beckstrom, will be replacing the current ICANN CEO, Paul Twomey, who announced his resignation earlier this year. Milton Mueller in a blog post on the IGP website writes: "This is still unconfirmed by ICANN but comes from well-informed sources. We also hear that David Eisner, the CEO of the Corporation for National and Community Service under G.W. Bush and former VP at AOL, was also in the running." Beckstrom recently made headlines for his sudden resignation from his post at NCSC, criticizing the lack of funding from the NSA and its move to try to "rule over" the NCSC. more

Holocaust Remembrance Day

Today is Holocaust Remembrance Day. Today we remember that the Nazis rounded up Jews, Roma, political dissidents, and other "undesirables" using the best data and technology of the day and sent them off to concentration camps. We don't normally deal with this type of political reality in ICANN, but now is the time to do so. In 1995, the recently formed European Union passed the EU Data Protection Directive. more

Amazon Gets the Green Light for .Amazon TLD Following Intense Negotiations Involving South America

ICANN has lifted the stop on delegating the .amazon top-level domain, allowing the delegation of the domain to the company Amazon Inc. over the South American region. more

ICANN Sets June Target for New gTLD Program Launch

npt its recent meeting in San Francisco, ICANN approved a new draft timeline for the launch of its new generic top-level domains (gTLDs) program that will let its Board of Directors approve the final Applicant Guidebook in June 2011, enabling companies to apply for gTLDs before the end of the year. more

ICANN and the Data Quality Act: Part IV

This is the fourth part of a multi-part series reported by ICANNfocus. This part focuses on the Information Correction Process. "The Data Quality Act provides affected persons the right "to seek and obtain correction of information maintained and disseminated by the agency that does not comply" with the Data Quality Act and implementing guidelines. ...The Department of Commerce's National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) provides detailed instructions on how to request correction of information not meeting their Data Quality guidelines. NTIA is the operating unit of the Department of Commerce that is responsible for ICANN." more

The Year IPv6 Made it to Major League

May 6th 2007: ARIN board of trustees passes a resolution advising the Internet community that migration to a new version of the internet protocol, IPv6, will be necessary to allow continued growth of the internet. June 29th 2007, Puerto Rico: ICANN Board resolution states that: The Board further resolves to work with the Regional Internet Registries and other stakeholders to promote education and outreach, with the goal of supporting the future growth of the Internet by encouraging the timely deployment of IPv6. Oct 26th 2007 at the RIPE 55 meeting in Amsterdam... Nov 15th 2007: IGF meeting, Rio de Janeiro... This is but a small sample of the fast growing visibility IPv6 acquired this year, 2007. more

Insight: .JOBS and New TLD’s - Are You Paying Attention?

A lot of the people are planning to attend the .nxt conference next month ask me to point out the benefits of new Top-Level Domains (TLDs), and today gave me a fantastic opportunity... If you are thinking of applying for a new TLD and haven't been paying attention to the latest happening with .JOBS, maybe you should be. Though .JOBS has been a bit of a quiet TLD, they've been a favorite of mine because of the specific focus of the extension. more

ICANN’s Proposed Changes to IDN Registration

A month ago, ICANN announced that it had a large set of proposed changes to its "Guidelines for the Implementation of Internationalized Domain Names". The original guidelines are fairly confusing and not widely deployed by the ccTLDs, so one would think that the proposed revisions would be clearer and more useful. No such luck. Instead of describing what the problems with the old guidelines were, the committee that put together the new proposal simply added a whole bunch more rules. more

TLD Operators: Cleaning Up Lame Delegations

ICANN's Security and Stability Advisory Committee (SECSAC) recently released some recommendations regarding the DNS infrastructure, specifying among other things, that sub-zone delegation be kept up-to-date. ...The SECSAC report doesn't mention, but I believe is trying to address, is the alarming fact that nearly 10% of the name servers listed in the root zone are lame, either they aren't authoritative for the zones they are supposed to be, or they are unreachable much of the time.
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5 Reasons Why Closed Generic New gTLDs Should Be Opposed

I'm on the record multiple times over the last few months for my opinions on "closed generics"... Since then I've sent several letters to ICANN (supported by many others) and have been quoted and referenced in several articles on the subject including Politico.com... If you're not a domain "geek" then the danger of this issue might not be that easy to understand, so here are five reasons why "closed generics" are a really bad idea. more

Instead of a New gTLD, Maybe There Ought to be an App for That

The conflicting yet co-existing anxiety and enthusiasm in support of expanded Internet territory -- those new generic Top-Level Domains (gTLDs) we have heard so much about -- may be misplaced. If the economic reports commissioned by ICANN are to be believed (non, nod, wink, wink), top level domains fall flat because they are either too tightly defined (.museum?) or lightly marketed (.aero?). Building a business plan to give a new gTLD the market and marketing reach it will need to succeed is a heavy lift. more

Advocating Ratio Model for Deleting Domains

To date, end-users (of all levels of technical ability) who are trying to find a good domain name to establish an online identity have been endlessly frustrated by the lack of a method to fairly re-allocate "used" domain names. A full resolution to that problem is a separate (and much bigger) discussion... more