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Re: [wg-c] voting on TLDs
"Milton Mueller" <mueller@syr.edu> wrote (03/13/00 12:04PM )
>----- Original Message -----
>From: "Kevin J. Connolly"
>
>> Nope. The #1 reason why the GTLD-MOU tanked was opposition from the
>> trademark community.
>
>Nope. The #1 reason was the US government's lack of...er....comfort at the
>role of the ITU. ICANN was created primarily to avoid having to put these
>matters in the hands of intergovernmental organizations such as ITU.
As you have done before, you simply make it up as you go.
I was present in the room when Becky Burr and Ira Magaziner
originally floated, and then refined, the NewCo proposal. The administration's "discomfort" at the role of the ITU is a fiction,
created by the organizations that were fronting for the
trademark community when the GTLD-MoU underwent its hatchet
job. The relationship between the ITU and the GTLD-MOU was
handled as a diplomatic manner, and, in the best traditions of
international relations, a means was found to accommodated all
parties. Then the trademark community emerged with an
agenda which was shamelessly devoted to the destruction of the
GTLD-MoU and the prevention of new GTLDs ever being added
to the root. To continue to foist the "ITU-Discomfort" scenario is to continue to legitimate the greed of the trademark community.
>
>The #2 reason was the refusal of the USG to allow a government contractor
>such as IANA to grab control of valuable taxpayer-funded assets without any
>formal authorization.
>
Oh my numen! This is about the most horrendous thing I've ever
heard said of Jon Postel (=IANA). There are many reasons for
the motto, de mortuis nil nisi bonum. Not the least of these is that
those who attack the dead cannot be perceived other than as
cowards. The only grab of public assets which has taken place
is the grab of the databases by NSI, which, rather than allow a
public asset to be held in trust for the public has decided instead
to break the asset beyond repair. (Has anyone tried to do useful
work with the whois databases lately?)
>The trademark theory is an odd one, given the participation of WIPO and INTA
>in the gTLD-MoU, and the fact that gTLD-MoU gave them more power and more
>representation than they have under ICANN.
How fascinating. Where, in the CORE-POC paradigm, did the
trademark community have a seat at the table? Where, in that
process, was the ability to prevent the growth of the TLD
namespace forever by imposing operationally-impossible
constraints?
>
>Trademark interests are one of many stakeholders in the name space. They
>have gotten almost everything they wanted out of ICANN and it's time for
>some other groups to have their needs considered.
Actually, they have that: there have been no new GTLDs added.
There will be no significant growth in the TLD namespace for the foreseeable future. This is not at odds with their objectives, given
the repeated failure of the ICANN process to address the concerns
of the trademark community about cybersquatting, free-riding,
and other predation.
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