Re: [ga] How should the taxonomy question be resolved?

[Jeff Williams <jwkckid1@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Danny and all former DNSO GA members or other interested
stakeholders/users,

I agree with Susan and Davids rational and/or argument here.  No
"Taxonomy" that ICANN could adopt would avoid a strong
potential for restraint of trade law suits as Karl has already
indicated in an earlier post of a different thread also clearly
predicted.  As ICANN has not endeared itself to the stakeholder/user
community and cannot define what the "Internet Community" is
adequately, has also earned the ire of many european and asian
countries in this particular regard, it would be foolish in the extreme
for ICANN to adopt any Taxonomy for the addition of new TLD's.


Danny Younger wrote:

> >From "Next Steps for TLDs" by David R. Johnson and
> Susan P. Crawford
>
> How should the taxonomy question be resolved?
>
> Quickly, through deciding to let the market decide
> which potential registrants will find value in
> particular strings.
>
> If the GNSO were to recommend adoption of a taxonomy,
> it would have to recommend a particular taxonomy --
> and ICANN would then have to ban all other strings or
> develop rules regarding which strings are "confusingly
> similar." If it chose a list of permissible TLD
> strings, ICANN would then have to choose among
> competing applicants, based on criteria that would
> take it into subjective assessments of how
> "representative" a particular TLD registry operator
> might be of some group ICANN had determined should be
> the beneficiary of its artificial semantics. No one is
> smart enough to foresee all the different ways in
> which a TLD might be used or valuably named, and it is
> not clear that the GNSO has any particular
> institutional competence to make recommendations in
> favor of reserving particular TLD strings.
>
> Close analysis suggests that a large number of
> intractable problems will be posed if the Board goes
> down the "taxonomic" path of creating specific
> entitlements to TLD strings, overseeing the governance
> of "sponsors," and making centralized decisions
> regarding permissible "communities" and markets ahead
> of time. Because no sound technology-based rationale
> could be advanced to support imposing a taxonomy, the
> imposition of such a rule would arguably violate the
> antitrust laws. Such a decision would also conflict
> with obligations in ICANN?s MOU and Bylaws requiring
> it to promote competition to the maximum extent
> feasible.
>
> The posing of the "taxonomy" question itself could
> lead to endless delay. But the GNSO should be smart
> enough to see that the entire inquiry is a waste of
> time. The GNSO could promptly advise ICANN to proceed
> with a new TLD rollout plan that establishes minimum
> qualifications but leaves the marketing questions up
> to those with the highest stake in getting them right
> -- the registries themselves. If all qualified
> applicants were allowed to enter the market (on some
> reasonable pacing schedule), no registry would expect
> to be protected from competition and all applicants
> would likely be able to find a non-conflicting string
> that would allow them to serve their customers.
>
> http://www.icannwatch.org/article.pl?sid=03/02/16/2048243&mode=flat
>
>

Regards,
--
Jeffrey A. Williams
Spokesman for INEGroup LLA. - (Over 134k members/stakeholders strong!)
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