[council] RE: [Correspondence] Letter from Steve Crocker to James Bladel, Chair, GNSO Council

["WUKnoben" <wolf-ulrich.knoben@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

Microsoft Word - 2016-08-05-Steve-Crocker-to-James-Bladel.docxHi James:

We’ve shared Steve Crocker’s related letter within our constituency. Following 
a discussion I’d like to communicate our preliminary thoughts:

General observation

The recent round of gTLDs resulted in a new "gaming" move for domainers. They 
discontinued the practice of avidly buying all attractive names that became 
available for resale purposes, and invested instead in registry concessions, 
now a new secondary market is developing with gTLDs themselves (not the names).



The dominant registrars have cherry picked which new gTLDs to include in their 
storefronts, thus becoming arbiters of the fate of newly launched gTLDs, since 
exclusion from their registration sites is a tough disadvantage to overcome. 
IOW registrars are designated the EXCLUSIVE sales channels for all new gTLDs, 
but they are under no obligation to carry any of them in their domain name 
portfolios.



A subsequent round might, given these developments, simply augment these 
distortions, so "proceed with caution" would appear advisable.



Further comments

1.    Both the letter from the Board and the letter from the GNSO Council seem 
to start with the assumption that there will necessarily be a subsequent round 
of the new gTLD program. The ISPCP constituency hopes that a full discussion 
about whether or not to have a further round is had by the community long 
before work is done on building a new application process. It seems essential 
that the marketplace and technical reviews are complete and considered by the 
community. These need to be part of the foundation of any discussion of whether 
or not to proceed with subsequent rounds of new gTLD applications.

2.    In the event that a new gTLD application window is opened, no particular 
type of gTLD should be allowed to determine the timing of the window. In 
particular, all strings should have equal status as far as the timing of a 
subsequent window. For example, a set of strings for a particular use or 
function, should not be allowed to proceed early.

3.    In the event that a new gTLD application window is opened, the policy 
work in support of the new round should be complete prior to the application 
process being developed. The ISPCP constituency finds the idea of iterative 
development of application process to be impossible in the context of such a 
complex procedure. An iterative approach fails to take into account the 
interconnectedness of the application process – the development of a policy on 
geographic names, for example, might have implications on what strings are 
available and even the prohibition of certain names. The possibility of policy 
development in one area having a knock-on effect in another area is something 
we witnessed in the 2012 round. It would likely be a feature of subsequent 
rounds and makes the iterative development of an application process unlikely 
to succeed.

4.    The Board question about timing raises questions beyond policy and the 
development of an application process. The ISPCP constituency is extremely 
concerned that not enough attention has been paid to technical aspects of the 
deployment of new strings in the root zone. In particular, universal acceptance 
and technical outreach are areas where the ICANN community needs a new, 
comprehensive plan. That effort, to ensure that the technical aspects of new 
gTLDs is addressed, will need to be done before a new application process can 
commence – thus affecting the schedule of that process.

5.    Another technical aspect that must be addressed prior to a new round 
beginning is the relationship between the Internet’s underlying architecture 
and the new gTLD program. Specifically, ICANN must improve its relationship 
with the IETF to identify meaningful ways to cooperate in the reservation of 
certain strings in the root. This relationship must also provide some reliable, 
predictable, scalable and usable mechanism for reserving strings for special 
use or because those strings, if allowed in the root, would affect the security 
and stability of the DNS and tools built upon the DNS.

Procedurally, the ISPCP reserves the right to send our comment directly to the 
board.


We’re looking forward to further discussion within the community.

Best regards

Wolf-Ulrich


 

From: owner-council@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:owner-council@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx] On 
Behalf Of James M. Bladel
Sent: Wednesday, August 10, 2016 7:13 PM
To: GNSO Council List
Subject: [council] FW: [Correspondence] Letter from Steve Crocker to James 
Bladel, Chair, GNSO Council

 

Councilors -

 

Attached, please find a letter form Steve Crocker/ICANN Board to the Council, 
regarding the work on subsequent rounds of New gTLDs.   (Per Wendy’s note, the 
letter has not yet been posted on the ICANN Correspondence page, but expected 
soon). 

 

Note that the letter contains a specific request to the GNSO:

 

‘For example, assuming all other review activities are completed, it would be 
helpful to understand whether the GNSO believes that the entirety of the 
current Subsequent Procedures PDP must be completed prior to advancing a new 
application process under the current policy recommendations. The Board is 
cognizant that it may be difficult to provide a firm answer at this stage of 
the process as the reviews are still underway and the PDP is in its initial 
stages of work, but if any consideration has been given in relation to whether 
a future application process could proceed while policy work continues and be 
iteratively applied to the process for allocating new gTLDs, or that a set of 
critical issues could be identified to be addressed prior to a new application 
process, the Board would welcome that input.

 The Board would also welcome any elaboration on the expected time frame 
outlined in the PDP Work Plan, as well as any additional points the GNSO might 
wish to clarify for the Board in its efforts to support the various areas of 
work underway in the multistakeholder community’.

I propose that we add this question/topic, and the letter itself, to our 1 SEP 
meeting agenda as a discussion item, and that we examine ideas on how to 
proceed on responding to this question. If this is amenable, I would also ask 
Staff to draft a brief note to Steve, acknowledging the receipt of this letter 
and noting that it would be discussed during our next meeting.

 

Thoughts on this approach?

 

Thank you,

 

J.

 

 

 

 

From: Wendy Profit <wendy.profit@xxxxxxxxx>
Date: Friday, August 5, 2016 at 14:19 
To: James Bladel <jbladel@xxxxxxxxxxx>, Glen de Saint Géry 
<gnso-secretariat@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>, Marika Konings <marika.konings@xxxxxxxxx>
Cc: Steve Crocker <steve.crocker@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>, Icann-board ICANN 
<icann-board@xxxxxxxxx>, board-support <board-support@xxxxxxxxx>, Akram Atallah 
<akram.atallah@xxxxxxxxx>, Erika Randall <erika.randall@xxxxxxxxx>, Daniel 
Halloran <daniel.halloran@xxxxxxxxx>, Eleeza Agopian 
<eleeza.agopian@xxxxxxxxx>, Jamie Hedlund <jamie.hedlund@xxxxxxxxx>, Karen 
Lentz <karen.lentz@xxxxxxxxx>, Cyrus Namazi <cyrus.namazi@xxxxxxxxx>, Cristina 
Flores <cristina.flores@xxxxxxxxx>
Subject: [Correspondence] Letter from Steve Crocker to James Bladel, Chair, 
GNSO Council

 

Dear James Bladel,

 

Please find the attached letter from Steve Crocker, Chair, ICANN Board of 
Directors regarding subsequent New gTLD rounds.

 

The letter will be posted shortly to the ICANN Correspondence and New gTLD 
Correspondence pages:

 

https://www.icann.org/resources/pages/correspondence

https://newgtlds.icann.org/en/program-status/correspondence

 

With warm regards,

 

Wendy Profit

ICANN Board Operations Specialist

 

 


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