Re: [wg-c] Eureka?

[Kent Crispin <kent@songbird.com>]

On Fri, Aug 06, 1999 at 09:41:10PM -0400, Jonathan Weinberg wrote:
[...]

> I think we must be talking past one another.  I agree that allowing a set
> of TLD operators free choice of names can disrupt a centrally planned name
> space.

Oh.  OK.

[...]

> Indeed, I think the sort of ad hoc approval that would
> result from the "series of working groups" approach you've advocated in
> other posts would give us neither the benefits of planning nor those of
> market processes.

Hmm.  I think they would give us the benefits of both, which I will 
explain in a moment.

But I think the real issue is not the WG process I propose -- that is
just a particular planning process, notable for its democratic
character.  The real issue is whether names are chosen independent of
registry operators.   My goal, from a public policy perspective, is 
to totally divorce TLD names from registry operators.

If we make that separation, then I claim that the planning process I
propose gives essentially all the good features of selecting the 
best names that you claim for market processes, while maintaining 
hooks for planning purposes.

In your scheme, a clever person has an idea for a TLD, convinces some
others (venture capitalists or other investors) that it is a good
idea and capitalizes a registry, and convinces ICANN to accredit it. 
He presents the name to ICANN for approval (presumably just
verification that it meets some set of "black letter" rules, but it
could be any criteria, really), and then goes into business. 

In my scheme, some clever person gets an idea for a TLD, convinces 
some others that it is a good idea, and they form a WG, draft a 
charter, and get it approved.  ICANN farms it out to some already 
existing registry operator, or puts out bid for a new RO -- most 
likely the former, because the incremental cost of adding a TLD to 
an already existing registry is tiny.

In both cases good ideas get into the root; in both cases the TLD 
gets registrations depending on its merits.  In the proprietary TLD 
model the individual is motivated by the profit motive, and may try 
to market the TLD.  In the other case the motives are different, and 
the TLD will probably not get marketed.  In my model, however, the 
barrier to getting a TLD in the root is much much less -- getting a 
WG to approve a new TLD costs a whole lot less than starting a new 
registry.  We can expect far more creativity and innovation in my 
model, because these barriers are potentially so much smaller -- 
once we get to a point where people are comfortable with adding many 
TLDs.  But we have to get through that barrier in any scheme...

>  For central decisionmaking
> to make sense, one's got to believe that the structure the planners will
> come up with will be better than the one that would grow organically out of
> market processes.

Hmm.  Talking past one another again.  Once again, you are assuming a
single central planning model, and that is not what I am proposing. 
What I am proposing is *compatible* with central planning, because
rules can be applied to WGs.  But it also allows for what you term
organic growth, as I described above. 

[...]

> I base this position on my observations and experience — like you, I've
> been involved in this process for a while.  (No, I haven't been involved as
> long as you have.  You've been involved since God was knee-high to a
> grasshopper.  I've only been involved for two years.  But it's enough.)
> When I was working for the government, I talked to TM folk (and to others
> as well) about DNS issues.  I don't want to knock the TM community.  I like
> and respect a number of TM lawyers.  (And in general I'm not a big fan of
> saying critical things about other people.)  But I think it's the case that
> an awful lot of the TM community are, well, single-minded about their
> concerns.

OK.  So you believe they are unreasonable.

> I'm not sure I understand your position that adding a lot of new gTLDs is
> "forcing" TM folk to do anything.  Adding new gTLDs quickly doesn't "force"
> opponents to "allow" that rollout any more than adding them slowly "forces"
> advocates of the opposite position to "allow" that.  I do think that an
> approach under which ICANN plans out a several-year phased rollout, and
> places the burden on opponents, if evidence comes in demonstrating that
> additional new gTLDs are a bad idea, to bring that evidence to ICANN's
> attention and call for a halt or a slowdown, is the approach best
> calculated to reach good results.

At that level of generality, I can agree.  But the devil is in the 
details. 

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