Re: [ga] List of Domain Names

[Karl Auerbach <karl@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

On 06/15/2010 06:32 AM, Debbie Garside wrote:

> I wondered if anyone on this list has any opinions on who owns the data
> held by gTLD Zone Managers?
In any normal business the records held by a vendor pertaining to the 
relationship between the vendor and the customer would be private 
business records that are not available to the general public.
In the normal case the data is owned by the vendor or the customer.

There is no real reason why that ought not to be the case for domain 
name registrations.  All the drumming and whining of the trademark and 
law enforcement community is simply a form of political posturing that 
is a mask for those groups' desire to avoid the procedures and costs of 
engaging in the normal process of making an accusation or having 
reasonable grounds for suspicion and using that to initiate a properly 
controlled and limited form of access.
And the idea that a domain name that simply exists can be a form of 
trademark infringement is ludicrous - a domain name that simply exists 
is not in commerce.
That means that for a domain name to offend a trademark that name has to 
be used in some concrete way.  It is the way in which a domain name is 
used, not the mere existence of a domain name, that triggers a trademark 
violation.
In that regard, simply allowing even more people to plow through name 
registration data is simply a greater violation of privacy rather than 
an enhancement in trademark protection - except to those who believe 
that trademarks are the highest and mightiest value on the internet.
Let's not exacerbate the privacy catastrophe that has been created by 
ICANN's submission to the trademark industry.
        --karl--