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One of the key features of the soon-to-launch iPhone is its advanced web browser capabilities. "The iPhone is the first smart phone we've tested with a real, computer-grade Web browser, a version of Apple's Safari," say the Wall Street Journal. To make the user's browsing experience even more efficient, the phone even comes with a top-level domain (TLD) button labeled ".com". Rather interesting given that today there are over two hundred TLDs in existence including .mobi... more
The bitter partisan divide that characterizes so many of official Washington's current policy discussions was conspicuous in its absence at the July 8th hearing held on "Internet Governance Progress After ICANN 53" by the House Energy and Commerce Committee's Subcommittee on Communications and Technology. In opening remarks that asked "What is the multi-stakeholder community, anyway?", Subcommittee Chairman Greg Waldren went on to declare that he and his colleagues "sought to strike the right balance between supporting the multi-stakeholder model of Internet governance, while still protecting the invaluable tool of communications and commerce the Internet has become". more
This is a preliminary input for the current policy-development process on "new registry services" that was prepared by ALAC members; Jonathan Weinberg has provided input and comments in response to earlier drafts. The ALAC is currently soliciting comments on this text. Comments can be submitted either to CircleID (see comment section), or to the ALAC's public comment address at [email protected]. ..."In the present document, we will focus on substantive criteria to be used by ICANN in evaluating requests to review proposed changes to the architecture or operation of a gTLD registry. We are, however, not stating any opinion about the kinds of requests that ICANN currently has the authority (or obligation) to consider." more
In an article published over two years ago, I cited a disturbing trend of third parties seeking to obtain national trademark registrations in an apparent attempt to game ICANN's new gTLD process. While many of these applications have withered and died on the vine some have sneaked through. However, it appears that the United States Trademark Trial and Appeal Board (TTAB) has issued a very well-reasoned and articulate opinion... more
The Canadian Internet Registration Authority (CIRA) has issued a public letter to ICANN calling on the organization to follow accountable, transparent, and fair processes. Until the concerns are addressed, CIRA says it is suspending its voluntary contributions to ICANN... more
As the world grows more connected and more complicated, we all need ways of defining, identifying and keeping track of things and cross-referencing them with their owners. The simplest way to do that is with registries -- everything from the Domesday Book, a medieval registry of land, property and people; to current-day auto registries on the one hand and the worldwide Domain Name System on the other...But now, companies and organizations have to keep track of ever more things and people, not just inside their walls but across extended organizational boundaries. Call this new wrinkle an "external registry". Finally, they may want to interact with things and people, rather than just look them up, via an "active registry". more
I just wanted to call people's attention to this International Chamber of Commerce (ICC) paper on Internet governance. I don't endorse it; haven't actually read it yet, but their say will play a big role and should be widely known: "Coming barely a month after the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) in Geneva, and prepared by ICC's Commmission on E-Business, IT and Telecoms, the paper divides the issue of Internet governance into three main components - technical engineering, coordination of the names and numbers system and public policy matters." more
Planning for a short trip to Hong Kong tomorrow reminded me of Jonathan Shea, something I wanted to blog about but was waiting for the hype around the new generic Top-Level Domains (TLDs) to cool down. Jonathan Shea is an old friend who is in-charge of ".hk". I had the pleasure to catch up with him in Paris ICANN meeting. Before Jonathan, let me talk about something related that happened in Paris. At the Cross Constituency Meeting, there was a presentation by the Anti-Phishing Working Group (APWG). In summary, they were proposing working with registries to take down domain names that are suspected to be involved in phishing. more
Heads of 20 or more gTLD registries will meet privately this month to discuss various topics including the possibility of a reduction in their ICANN fees. more
AFRINIC-The Regional Internet Registry for Africa has finally successfully conducted its 2025 Board of Directors Elections! The elections were held from September 10 to 12, 2025. This fresh leadership marks the beginning of a new era after years of turbulence and uncertainty for the organization. more
It highly concerns me when domain registries controlling a certain Top-Level Domain (TLD) raise the wholesale prices they charge to registrars (domain retailers) without consultation to domain registrants (domain buyers). When this happens, all the registrars will need to pay more to the registry for every domain which they register or renew for a customer. They will in turn raise their prices to cover the additional cost to them. Transferring the domains to a different registrar will not help, as all the registrars for that TLD will be forced to raise prices as they all have to pay more to the registry. Don't think it hasn't happened before? more
When Bill Clinton addresses the 40th ICANN meeting in San Francisco in March 2010 he described Internet Governance as a process of "stumbling forward". Stumbling is good, he said, as long as it goes forward. Five ICANN meetings later - in the meantime ICANN adopted the new gTLD program, got nearly 2000 applications for Top Level Domains (TLDs) and has a new CEO - the "stumbling forward" goes into the next round. more
ICANN has embarked on the IDN boat at the same time it wants to introduce DNSSEC and new gTLDs. This promises lots of fun. Or grey hair, depending how you look at it. First is the issue of country code IDNs. The ISO-3166 table, based on two letter codes, is a western convention. Some cultures do not use abbreviations or acronyms. Some do not use a character-based alphabet, but a syllabic one. Hence, the next logical step would be to represent the full country name in local script, rather than a transliteration of the ISO string... Imagine the case of India, where there are 1.652 languages, of which 24 are spoken by more than one million people... more
When last we wrote, trademark lawyers had written an outraged letter to ICANN about the $2500 price to preregister trademark.sucks names, and ICANN, reliably panicking in the face of legal threats, wrote to the US Federal Trade Commission and Canadian Office of Consumer Affairs saying please tell us that's illegal so we can shut down this registry with whom we just signed a long-term contract. (The mysterious $1 surcharge turned out to be a weak attempt by ICANN to collect debts that affiliates of registry owner Momentous defaulted on long ago.) more
As faithful CircleID readers will know, iREIT (Internet REIT, Inc.), a Texas domain name portfolio investment corporation, has been sued by Verizon and by Vulcan Golf for cybersquatting. It appears iREIT is taking steps to clean up its portfolio by deleting obvious typos of famous trademarks... more
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