[wg-b] .UNION Top-level domain name

["Michael D. Palage" <mpalage@infonetworks.com>]

Speaking in an individual capacity again. Good question.

I believe it would be prudent for all parties involved to guarantee that a
proposed .UNION top-level domain should be free of any type of right of
first refusal by the trademark interests. Although the easy way to handle
this situation would be to define .UNION as a chartered non-commercial
top-level domain, I do not believe that would solve the problem since the
.UNION web sites may want to sell goods and services to its members, etc. I
believe the registrar proposal could be revised to include language along
the lines that the sunrise period should not be available in charted
non-commercial domains and other narrowly defined charted top-level domains
of a primarily non-commercial focus. I would envision this later category
having to seek a waiver of the sunrise period on a case by case basis.
IMPORTANT. This is only my personal opinion subject to further refinement
based on public feedback. Moreover, I will have to check with the registrar
constituency to see if they support this amendment.

Perhaps the trademark community could comment on this issue, but I do not
believe that they would have a big concern with .UNION as long as
registrants were properly screened and they did not try to sell the domain
name back to them at inflated prices or sell counterfeit goods on their
site, but maybe I am wrong. If the trademark community could offer some
insight on this proposed chartered top-level it would be much appreciated.


-----Original Message-----
From:	James Love [mailto:love@cptech.org]
Sent:	Saturday, March 25, 2000 8:15 AM
To:	Michael D. Palage
Cc:	Judith Oppenheimer; Mikki Barry; wg-b@dnso.org
Subject:	RE: [wg-b] WG-B Deadline

On Fri, 24 Mar 2000, Michael D. Palage wrote:
> I know the Non-Commercial Constituency has fought a hard valid fight
against
> the creation of a Universally Famous Trademark list. I have had this
> discussion with Michael Froomkin, Kathy Kleiman, Mikki Barry, Milton
Muller
> and others and I genuinely share many of your concerns. However, based
upon
> what I saw in Cairo, the adoption of the guidelines by the WIPO standing
> committee last November, and the general global push for enhanced
protection
> for famous trademark,  I believe it is no longer a question of whether
WIPO
> will create the list, BUT at who's request, when and with what safeguards
in
> connection with the domain name system.

    Michael.  Next friday the AFL-CIO, the Teamsters, CWA, AFSCME, and
several other unions will meet in Washington, DC to discuss the .union
TLD.

    Are you proposing that .union cannot be used with a famous
trademark?    Could ibm block the use of ibm.union, or nike block the
use of nike.union.

   As indicated in my previous missive to this list, and as raised in
Cario in countless discussions, including the meetings of working groups
B and C, this is an area were groups other than the trademark owner have
a legitimate interest in using a famous name with a TLD.

    Jamie

=============================================
James Love, Consumer Project on Technology
P.O. Box 19367        | http://www.cptech.org
Washington, DC 20036  | love@cptech.org
Voice 202/387-8030    | Fax 202/234-5176
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