[governance] Letter from U.S. Senator Rockefeller to ICANN on new TLDs

[Adam Peake]

ICANN board's New gTLD Program Committee has been thinking about these issues. See

http://www.icann.org/en/groups/board/documents/resolutions-new-gtld-25jun13-en.htm#2.c

http://domainincite.com/13558-icann-freezes-closed-generic-gtld-bids

Adam


On Jun 30, 2013, at 4:03 PM, parminder wrote:

> 
> 
> 
> 
> On Friday 28 June 2013 08:42 PM, Thomas Lowenhaupt wrote:
>> This letter from Senator Jay Rockefeller, chair of the Commerce Committee to ICANN's Dr. Steven D. Crocker - http://images.politico.com/global/2013/06/26/rockefeller_letter_to_icann.html - might be of interest to the list.
> 
> The senator's letter makes some very important points. Although it comes mostly from trademark owners' point of view while the problems in the new round of gTLDs associated with general community ownership of linguistic terms are underplayed, but that is perhaps expected from a mainstream US politician. 
> 
> GAC in their communiqué at the end of Beijing ICANN meeting proposed two very important things with regard to new gtlds
> (1) "For strings representing generic terms, exclusive registry access should serve a public interest goal" 
> 
> (2) "Strings that are linked to regulated or professional sectors should operate in a way that is consistent with applicable laws (and)... establish a working relationship with the relevant regulatory....bodies "
> 
> I think civil society groups like the IGC should endorse these very important 'advices' which have a far reaching implication vis a vis how domain names allocation system functions.... Purely as a highest-bidder, market based system, or as a public interest oriented governance system.
> 
> 
> These 'advices" represent the abject failure of the ICANN system to meet public interest requirements concerned with its global governance functions..... And I see this failure as kind of systemic. ICANN has somehow organised itself to *not* be able to address real world public interest issues, despite committees over committees over independent experts that it may designate on any issue - as it of course did it on the new gTLDs issue.  
> 
> Now, if you ask anyone on the street what does ICANN do, one is likely to say, if at all recognising the organisation, that it allocates top level domain names like .com..... and to that extent the new round of gTLDs represent ICANN's basic function.... and that it failed so miserably to address and uphold key public interest issues in terms of its basic function says a lot about the ICANN governance paradigm...
> 
> parminder
>> 
>> Best,
>> 
>> Tom Lowenhaupt
> 
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