[nc-transfer] Re: FW: WLS Posting (from: mcade@att.com)

[Elisabeth Porteneuve <Elisabeth.Porteneuve@cetp.ipsl.fr>]

While the focus on the NC Transfer call is on the WLS, I believe that
several other aspects of today gTLD space have problems.

As an end user I ask Thomas Roesseler and Alexander Svensson, 
the GA Chair and Alternate, to kindly channel my individual view.

Thanks, and good luck for the call.
Elisabeth Porteneuve
(posting as individual)
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The RFC1591 issued in 1994 uses such sentences as:

   * "The designated manager is the trustee of the top-level domain for 
      both the nation, in the case of a country code, and the global 
      Internet community.";
   * "It is appropriate to be concerned about "responsibilities" and 
      "service" to the community.";
   * "The designated manager must be equitable to all groups in the domain 
      that request domain names."

ICANN and many of his important groups and committees has been repeating 
since years that domain's name registration shall be a public service. 
It is in ccTLD Best Practices. There are services in the world, on 
much wider scale than Internet domain names, which have the label 
of public service and have no problems.
Domain names registrations in gTLD space have problems.

Let me consider an end user perspective - my perspective.

A.  When I buy a service or a product on the Net (French people have 
twenty years of experience of buying services on Minitel), I want and I 
demand the following conditions granted:

    The service provider is dully identified. On the first page of his 
    website there is a mandatory identification with name, address, country, 
    registration number at the Company House or Trading Registry and VAT 
    number (whatever appropriate in the corresponding country), the 
    telephone number, email address and hours of business. The full terms 
    and conditions under which services are sold, including the appropriate 
    references for arbitration, should any conflicts for those services 
    arise.

Rationale:

1. The above information are insurance of legal frame, therefore a 
guarantee that I can trace problems which may arise (and more serious is 
information and services, less problems will happen). At this stage I 
can provide information about myself and buy services or products, there 
is reciprocity between both parties: I know who is trader, he knows who 
I am.

2. As an educated consumer, I take care to whom I send money. I do not 
want to buy services in any laundry's money casino or fiscal paradise 
(maybe for terrorists or corrupted governments or those who exploit 
children at work). In a case of gTLD Registries and Registrars or
their agents operating registration of domain names where 
extraterritorial rules apply, an additional information should be part 
to the full identification, such as the explicit ICANN contract 
number (URLs) referring to that Registry or Accredited Registrar
or agent.


B.  At this stage we arrive to the domain name registration per se.

As an end user I hold a couple of domain names in gTLD space, and I want 
to have means to respect two basic rules, to be sure that I may continue 
to hold those domain names in good faith (I may even have sympathy 
for a bill introduced in the US House of Representatives to 
criminalise using false data in domain name applications 
http://www.newsbytes.com/news/02/176371.html):

 1. periodically pay on time for domain name renewal
 2. keep information regarding myself accurate

This is very similar to the telephone service I have: once I got the 
telephone number, I renew it for years, sometime lifetime. I do not rent 
my telephone number and pay in advance for 1 or 2 or 10 years. I rent it 
and the only thing I need is to have a reliable mechanism for automated 
payment of my bills (which amount may vary, depending on phone calls 
I make each month). It is related to the correct information about me.

I do not want to pay in advance for domain names to a gTLD 
Registry/Registrar, which can get cash for 10 years, far beyond the 
contract they have with ICANN, and might go bankrupt or make 
impossible a divestment to a successor.

I would like to have a right to a unique NIC-handle of myself, 
a person, or of my company, for my domain names in gTLD space, across 
Registries/Registrars, and to be able to update that NIC-handle when I 
move or change my phone number. Such a NIC-handle could naturally
address the issue of authority required for transfers, and give
power of decision to the Registrant.

I tend to believe that the Registrant's interests call for separation 
of activities of gTLD Registries/Registrars, maintainers of objects 
related to domain names in whois database, from the activities 
of NIC-handle-Offices (to be created), which should be maintainers 
of objects related to persons or organizations and companies.

Additionnaly such a NIC-handle-Offices could serve as Voting Registries
to allow for public representation in ICANN process.
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