Re: [wg-b] Common Ground

[Harald Tveit Alvestrand <Harald@alvestrand.no>]

At 01:11 10.02.00 -0500, Milton Mueller wrote:

>I agree with some of the principles and disagree with others. But I think it
>inappropriate to spend much time discussing them in this WG, which is
>devoted to famous marks. In general, your principles seem to imply that
>ICANN should develop a fixed categorization scheme for new TLDs. It also
>seems to imply that strict central regulation should be imposed on the
>registration within TLDs to ensure they registrations conform to the
>categorization scheme. I find it necessary to note that similar ideas have
>been advanced in WG-C by one or two people, but they have received very
>little support within the group, and there was virtually no support for
>those ideas in the public comments.

Milton,
I don't read the comments or the position papers the same way you do.
There have been numerous remarks in favour of "chartered" TLDs.

>I would encourage you to review the record of WG-C, its position papers and
>public comments, and to submit these comments to the WG on new TLDs if you
>care to pursue it.

The reason this issue is relevant to WG-B may be that one cannot say much 
about how famous marks matter without knowing what the rules in the gTLD to 
which they apply are; the logical consequence of that may be that WG-B 
should concentrate on defining the rules for famous marks *only* in *open* 
TLDs, where there is no restriction on who can register or what they can 
register, in effect saying that "the gTLD stands for nothing", and say that 
"the conclusions from this group on this matter should not be taken to 
apply to gTLDs that are not open, such as chartered TLDs".

It seems clear to me that if WG-C has consensus on anything, it is that at 
least one of the gTLDs in the "first rollout" will be an open, 
unconstrained gTLD.

OTOH, if the DNSO (B and C together) could achieve consensus about some 
means of "chartering" TLDs, like the principles suggested by Phil, I'd be 
happier, because I think that's what's best for the Net user.

I just doubt that we can do it.

                     Harald

--
Harald Tveit Alvestrand, EDB Maxware, Norway
Harald.Alvestrand@edb.maxware.no