RE: [wg-c] Eureka?

["Roeland M.J. Meyer" <rmeyer@mhsc.com>]

I once listened to my partner and CTO, a Ph.D in CS, wrt advertising. He
was so concerned that we don't flood the servers with new customer that
he strongly held the view that we should only advertise minimally, in a
targeted fashion. Counter to my own better experience, we acted on his
opinion. The response rate was, predictably, zero. The lesson learned,
Engineering staff have no clue and optimistically over-estimate, market
responses. That is not the first, or only, time I have run that
particular experiment.

I submit, if we open up the root to thousands of TLDs, with no
restrictions whatsoever, that we will be lucky to even get ONE
additional TLD registry out of it, not counting CORE. I submit that
additional TLDs, from NSI, is not what we want. What we want is new TLD
registries, in competition with NSI. I would dearly love to see at least
three new TLD registries, as well as a root registry to manage them.
Initially, I would restrict each registry to a single TLD, until they
have met existance proofs of continued business operations (one year of
profitability, or non-negative cash-flow).

This argument, wrt new gTLDs, is somewhat of a red-herring. The direct
issue is new registries. Only then, do we address the quantity of gTLDs.

--------------------
Roeland M.J. Meyer, CEO
Morgan Hill Software Company, Inc.
http://www.mhsc.com/
mailto://rmeyer@mhsc.com
--------------------


> -----Original Message-----
> From: owner-wg-c@dnso.org [mailto:owner-wg-c@dnso.org]On Behalf Of
> Milton Mueller
> Sent: Thursday, August 05, 1999 8:21 AM
> To: wg-c@dnso.org
> Subject: Re: [wg-c] Eureka?
>
>
> Kent:
> Here's a scenario. Tell me if it addresses your concerns.
>
> On 1 Jan 2000, ICANN issues its long-awaited new gTLD
> decision. The rulemaking
> contains the following items:
>
> 1) ICANN announces that it will accept applications to run
> TLDs from up to 10 new
> qualified registries. It announces that 5 of them will be
> shared and 5 will be
> exclusive. It issues an RFP with basic, minimal guidelines
> for each model. The
> guidelines include whatever TM protection criteria the DNSO
> can agree upon.
> Applications can be submitted any time after 1 March, 2000.
>
> 2) ICANN announces that it is prepared to add up to 300 new
> TLDs to the root over the
> next 3 years, based on applications from registries. In cases
> of conflicting
> applications for the same name ICANN will decide who, if
> anyone, gets it. In the first
> year, each shared registry will be allowed to run 3 gTLDs and
> each exclusive will be
> allowed to run 1 gTLD. The next year, 10 new registry
> proposals will be entertained,
> and existing registries will be allowed to submit proposals
> to add TLDs to their
> repertoire. The maximum new gTLDs in the second year will be
> 100. A third iteration
> planned for the third year could take the number up to 300.
>
> 3) ICANN's decision contains an escape clause that allows it
> to put the brakes on the
> expansion of the name space, but only if certain clearly
> defined criteria are met. In
> other words, the presumption is that the expansion will go
> forward unless serious
> problems are *proven* to arise.
>
> Assume the "worst" from a TM/IP point of view: in the first
> year, there are actually
> 10 viable proposals for registries, which means that a
> maximum of 20 new gTLDs would
> be *authorized* in the first year. Authorization is not the
> same thing as operation.
> If they get the go-ahead from ICANN in April, the registries
> will come on line in
> staggered intervals from May to October. Even by April, the
> Internet should have
> several months of experience with whatever form of DRP it has adopted.
>
> The advantage of a broad authorization of a significant
> number of new TLDs is that it
> creates a competitive marketplace and makes ample room for
> all of the various parties,
> both new and old, who want to get in to the market, with less
> arbitrary
> discrimination. These are vital consumer and supplier
> benefits. They are are equal in
> status to the claims of trademark owners. But if in fact
> serious TM problems occur,
> ICANN could cut short the experiment and amend its plan.
>
> It is also quite possible under this scenario that ICANN does
> *not* receive qualified
> applications from 10 new registries, or that applications
> trickle in rather slowly.
> Several people have raised serious questions about whether
> the business case exists
> for more than three or four new registries. There is
> uncertainty about this. In my
> opinion, ICANN owes it to the markeplace to err on the large
> side. That is, it is
> better to be prepared to authorize 10 and then learn that
> only 5 are ready, than it is
> to arbitrarily cut off 5 or 6 viable businesses.
>
>
> Kent Crispin wrote:
>
> > That sounds to me like advocacy of a "lots of TLDs in a
> short to medium
> > term" approach.  That is the position that is being argued against;
> > the phrase "100 immediately" is just a tag phrase labeling the
> > position you advocate.  It is not a strawman.
> >
> > More disturbing, however, is your implicit assumption that
> nothing can
> > go wrong, and that we really should press on regardless of
> what we may
> > find from our first experience.  The subtext of your
> position is "add
> > TLDs and damn the consequences".
>
> --
> m i l t o n   m u e l l e r // m u e l l e r @ s y r . e d u
> syracuse university          http://istweb.syr.edu/~mueller/
>
>