New TLDs

Nominations For Board of Public Interest Registry (Operator of .ORG) Close Nov 24

Would you be interested in helping guide the future of the Public Interest Registry (PIR), the non-profit operator of the .ORG domain? If so, the Internet Society is seeking nominations for three positions on the PIR Board of Directors. The nominations deadline is Monday, November 24, 2014. More information, qualification requirements and the submission form can be found here. more

VeriSign Supports New gTLDs with Appropriate Safeguards

The introduction of new Internet domains to the global marketplace has the potential to dramatically grow the domain name marketplace, increasing the value of domain names, driving new demand for registry services and opening new markets for registrars and registries alike. Because VeriSign operates .com -- the legacy generic top-level domain (gTLD) -- many in the Internet community have assumed that we would oppose the introduction of new gTLDs. The truth is quite the opposite. more

What ICANN Should Do Now to Help Future Applicants of New gTLDs

During ICANN71, the Brand Registry Group (BRG) openly asked potential future applicants what ICANN can do to help prepare them for the next gTLD round. The answer was very clear - commit to opening the next round and provide as much information as possible early on. However, in recent correspondence to the BRG from ICANN Chair, Maarten Botterman, he emphasized that "significant work lies ahead of us: the 2012 Applicant Guidebook must be updated with more than 100 outputs... more

Trademark Owners Should Consider .mp Domain Name Registration

Saipan DataCom, Inc.’s upcoming late March 2009 open launch of chi.mp (“Content Hub & Identity Management Platform) has implications for trademark holders that seem to have gone unnoticed to date. Chi.mp is a free platform that enables social network users to create social hubs on their own stand-alone hosted Web sites... As an attorney representing both trademark owners and domain name registries, I see chi.mp as a unique situation. more

Policy Advisory Boards - A Cornerstone PICS (Public Interest Commitment Specification)

Six months following the April 11th issuance of the Beijing Communique by ICANN's Governmental Advisory Committee (GAC), ICANN continues to wrestle with whether to accept the bulk of the GAC's proposed safeguards for new gTLDs as set forth in Annex 1 of that document. On October 1st ICANN Board Chairman Stephen Crocket sent a letter to GAC Chair Heather Dryden summarizing the results of the September 28th meeting of the New gTLD Program Committee (NGPC) that considered the remaining and still undecided advice received from the GAC. more

Mubarak, Ben Ali, Kaddafi, ICANN: What They Have in Common Is Scary. Will They Share the Same Fate?

Will current failed ICANN direction on the New generic Top-Level Domains (gTLDs) doom its Regime to follow the fate of Mubarak, Ben Ali, and soon Kaddafi's? The whirlwinds of change we all have witnessed that started blowing in Tunisia, moved to Egypt and is now engulfing Libya, Yemen, Jordan and soon many others, have signaled a revolutionary way of thinking not just at local or regional levels but I believe on global levels too. more

Big Brands Trying to Corner Generic Domain Namespaces?

Trying to make sense of the nearly 2000 new TLD applications is not something that anyone can do quickly. Sure, you can look at the list and see who has applied for what, but it's only when you actually read the "public" part of their submission that you can get an insight into their plans. Let's call a spade a spade. If a big brand wants to get its own TLD then it's pretty much their own business how they use it, as long as they don't do any "harm" to the rest of the internet ecosystem... more

ICANN: Our Top 3 Policy Priorities for 2015

2014 was a big year for us and for our clients. The new gTLD program forced us to rethink, reprioritize and implement new and different strategies to protect our brands online. The uncertainty largely behind us, and with more information at our fingertips about just how well (or not) brands are faring in the new environment, it's time to look forward to what we can do in 2015 to fix what's broken, throw away what's useless, fight for what's important... more

A Look at DNS Trends and What the Future May Hold

We used to think of computer networks as being constructed using two fundamental common infrastructure components: names and addresses. Every connected device had a stable protocol address to allow all other devices to initiate a communication transaction with this device by addressing a data packet to this protocol address. And every device was also associated with a name, allowing human users and human use applications to use a more convenient alias for these protocol addresses. more

ICANN Senate Hearing: The Battle Between Intellectual Property and Multistakeholderism

The US Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation Hearing on ICANN's Expansion of Top Level Domain Names on December 8, 2001 was all about strategy. The strategy was simple: while the world has its attention turned to the debate on the copyright legislative proposals of the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) and the PROTECT IP Act, let's have another ICANN hearing and try to re-open trademark protection for new gTLDs. more

Are Domain Names Recession-Proof? Probably Not, Next Question?

I didn't see the Fortune article Are domain names recession proof until the weekend, and being the author of the now infamous Domain aftermarket overdue for an asset repricing last year I feel somewhat obligated to comment on it. So, how will domain names fare in a recession? The Fortune article was upbeat... more

ICANN Should be Reformed Before “Privatization”, Says New Study

The Technology Policy Institute (TPI), an IT and communications policy think tank, has just released a paper proposing that "ICANN's governance structure should be dramatically reformed to make it more accountable before the current tie with the U.S. Department of Commerce is allowed to expire." The paper titled "ICANN At a Crossroads: a Proposal for Better Governance and Performance" is written by Thomas M. Lenard, President and Senior Fellow at TPI, along with Lawrence J. White, Professor of Economics at the NYU Stern School of Business. The 52-page study also asserts that ICANN must have a clear focus on encouraging competition with minimal role as a regulator with respect to the creation of new generic Top-Level Domains (gTLDs). more

US Senate Committee Holds Hearing on ICANN’s New TLD Expansion

As previously noted, the U.S. Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation today held a full committee hearing on ICANN's expansion of top level domains (TLDs). The hearing was held to examine the merits and implications of the program and ICANN's efforts to address concerns raised. ICANN will begin accepting applications for new TLDs on January 12, 2012. more

A Gap in the New gTLD Applicant Guidebook?

I strongly believe there is a serious "breach" in the Applicant Guidebook: I checked the scoring, I checked the possible objections, I am aware of the Governmental Advisory Committee (GAC) early warning but I really could not find how ICANN is going to avoid Community applications to be submitted as Standard ones. The role of ICANN is to offer a solution to launching new generic Top-Level Domains, it is no party in saying whether a new gTLD is a Community or not. more

Interview: Antony Van Couvering on the New TLD Opportunity

I recently caught up with a former colleague Antony Van Couvering. Many here on CircleID probably know him, he's been active in the domain name business since the late 1990's. With the new Top-Level Domain (TLD) issue so white hot and with Antony's firm right in the mix, I thought it was time to get his take via an interview. If anyone has questions (or challenges perhaps?) to anything below, I'm happy to forward to Antony for a response. more