Another idea (Re: [wg-b] An idea?)

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

It seems to me that the summary of WG-B's report so far should be:

"WG-B has been unable to reach even rough consensus on any proposal."
I like Michael's last scheme much better than Sunrise+20, but that
doesn't say all that much.

But since we're into idea generation again, let's try another one: instead
of making an arbiter friendly version, let's make a registry friendly version.

PROPOSAL:

In the land rush period, which is defined as the first 48 hours (hey, this 
is the Internet!) after the opening of a new TLD, the following rules apply:

- ALL requests are accepted, including duplicates.
   All registrants have to pay the registry fee for all registrations, whether
   they succeed in the end or not. No refunds.
   (what the registry charges is their business model, and not ICANN's concern)

- At the end of the 48 hours, the registry will put all the names for which
   no conflict was found into the DNS, and make the TLD active.

- The registry will email all registrants of conflicted domains with the
   information about who attempted to register that domain name, and ask them
   to confirm that they uphold their registration requests.

- 48 hours later, it is assigned to the confirmed registration with the
   earliest initial timestamp.

Advantages:

- Cheap to play for a registrant. The top loss is a normal registration fee.

- Allows silly conflicts like 2 branches of the same company registering
   a domain to be detected and resolved easily

- Allows anyone to easily withdraw in the face of massive opposing force
   without losing any more money

- Allows direct contact between potentially conflicting registrants, making
   it possible to work out private settlements without involving the registry

- Normal rules, including UDRP, apply within 96 hours of registry opening

- Puts a ton of extra registration fees into the pockets of the registry :-)

Disadvantages:

- Requires massive tweaks to registry software

- Involves the registry directly with customers

- Will cause massive nail-chewing in the first 96 hours after a TLD
   opens, while all registrants wait to see if they "got it"

- Depends on the quality of the email infrastructure for notifications

I'm still trying to figure out suggestions for a "registrant-friendly" 
sunrise proposal.......

         Harald (who is not, and does not intend to become, a registry)

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