Re: [wg-c] Eureka?

[Kent Crispin <kent@songbird.com>]

On Sat, Aug 07, 1999 at 10:47:50AM -0700, Christopher Ambler wrote:
> > I don't want to debate what the word "threat" means, but these
> > statements from you meet my definition of the word... 
> 
> Those aren't threats, those are statements that if a company is
> harmed, the company is not afraid to take action to protect
> itself. That's very different from "suing one's way into the
> root."

All:  

As I said, I don't want to debate the meaning of the word "threat".  
The interesting point for our purposes is the legal basis for Chris'
statements.

As Tony has reminded us, ICANN is legally a private entity that will,
if things go as planned, be in control of what is indisputably a
monopoly -- the "legacy root" has around 99% of the market share for
root nameserver services on the Internet.

If ICANN grants a single franchise for a TLD registry, Chris claims
that he can sue ICANN for restraint of trade.  As I recall the
PGMedia case mooted the issue because NSI was working as a government
contractor.  But the issue of whether ICANN would be vulnerable to
such a claim is, to my limited legal knowledge, still open -- ICANN
will be a private entity, not a gov contractor.

If Chris's legal theory holds water, then as soon as ICANN puts a new
gTLD in the root, Chris will sue, and get .web in the root.

At that point a precedent will be set.  Any company capable of
meeting the objective standards for a registry will be able to demand
entry on the same basis.  That is, any company with network
infrastructure equal to or greater than IODesign can claim to be a
TLD registry.  There are tens of thousands of such companies,
probably hundreds of thousands.

I believe it likely that there would not be a great demand for the
average user to register in the .ibm TLD, but that is not the reason
IBM would want .ibm -- IBM would essentially have a private TLD, for
its own business use.  The prestige of having your own TLD would be
far greater than having your own zone in .com. 

This would move all the current conflicts in .com to the root zone, 
in spades.

-- 
Kent Crispin                               "Do good, and you'll be
kent@songbird.com                           lonesome." -- Mark Twain