ICANN’s Sydney, Australia meeting kicked off to an official start on Monday, June 22. However, smaller pre-meeting sessions of its Generic Names Supporting Organization (GNSO) policy-making body, as well as other parts of the multifaceted organization, began early on Saturday — and ICA was in place then and speaking out on behalf of its members.
The trademark protection “solutions” fashioned by the ad hoc Implementation Recommendation Team (IRT), a group supported by ICANN staff and funding and whose membership and agenda was controlled by the Intellectual Property Constituency (IPC), became an immediate focus of debate. The ICA found that its strong objections to the process by which the IRT was constituted and operated, as well as its Report, are shared by many members of the At Large Advisory Constituency (ALAC), Non-Commercial Users Constituency (NCUC), as well as registrars and many other individuals attending the meeting. The ICA heard from many of these parties that they also believe that the IRT recommendations lack proper balance, and that many – such as the proposed Global Protected Marks List (GPML) — are outside the scope of ICANN’s limited technical coordination powers and their adoption would constitute an unauthorized assertion of treaty organization or legislative powers. There was also discussion within the GNSO meeting as to whether it should assert its supposedly primary policymaking role rather than countenance the possibility of any of the major policy changes sought by the IRT being implemented absent GNSO review.
ICA Counsel Philip Corwin spoke out at the meeting against the IRT Report, focusing in particular on the proposed Uniform Rapid Suspension (URS) policy that would essentially replace the UDRP at all new gTLDs. Corwin was interviewed by Dyn Inc. for its Sydney ICANN Vlog and that video can be viewed at http://www.circleid.com/posts/20090617_latest_updates_from_the_icann_meetings_in_sydney/ or http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G-2MiyC2vUI. Corwin continues to assert that the URS would deprive domain registrants of essential due process rights, lacks a meaningful appeals process, and has no effective sanctions against complainant abuse — and that it should be rejected in favor of an open, inclusive, and transparent UDRP reform process that would set a revised and balanced policy in place at all gTLDs, both new and incumbent. Strong dissent to the IRT recommendations is expected at the meeting’s public forums later this week. Speaking at a Business Constituency luncheon attended by the ICA today, ICANN Chairman Peter Dengate Thrush thanked the IRT for its work but noted that it was now up to them to “sell your work product to the community”, which we took to mean that ICANN adoption is by no means a foregone conclusion. ICA concerns that the adoption of the unbalanced URS policy for new gTLDs could quickly lead to their application to .com and other incumbent gTLDs were confirmed today when that very position was advocated this morning at a meeting of the Registration Abuse Policy Working Group in which we are participating.
The issue of geo-names at new gTLDs is also very much in play. Right now the Draft Applicant Guidebook proposes to give national governments limited rights to control the use of exact matches to country names only at the second level of new gTLDs. To simplify, the proposed rules would not permit the use of France (noun) at a proposed generic gTLD like .food absent the endorsement of non-objection of the French government, but would allow the unfettered registration of French (adjective) or SouthernFrance (incorporating the country name). ICANN’s Governmental Advisory Committee (GAC) is pushing for much broader control of the use of country, region and city names at the second level but there is considerable pushback in evidence at the meeting, with many attendees sharing the ICA view that ICANN has already conceded too much in this area.
Meanwhile, at a Monday morning session on new gTLDs it was announced that ICANN intends to set up a “geographically distinct” entity with dedicated staff to process the 500 gTLD applications it expects to receive in the first round, and that the applications will not be processed simultaneously but in distinct, sequential batches – but there was no indication of whether the entity will be located in the U.S., or what system ICANN will employ to prioritize the processing order. ICANN is now estimating that the average time from receipt of application to approval will be 7.5 months – if no objections are raised or complications arise. It is still targeting the first quarter of 2010 for the opening of the application window.
ICA will issue periodic updates on the Sydney meeting to keep our members and other interested parties fully informed.