[ga] New gTLD Evaluation Report - please publish

["Richard Henderson" <richardhenderson@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

In mid-July Miriam Sapiro and Summit Strategies International submitted a report "Evaluation of the New gTLDs: Policy and Legal Issues". This report was part of the New gTLD evaluation process, overseen by Sebastien Bachollet.

Have the ICANN staff and Board published this report anywhere on the ICANN website? Is it in the public domain? For the sake of openness and transparency (and to benefit informed participation by all constituencies) is it going to be published?

According to the presentation given in Kuala Lumpur on 22nd July 2004, the report had already been submitted to ICANN and included (among others) these findings:

http://www.icann.org/presentations/sapiro-forum-kl-22jul04.pdf

The Start-Up periods of registries like .info and .biz were reported as "raising concerns". "The Sunrise period, without screening or verification, led to serious abuses." It added that "the landrush allocation methods enabled gaming of the system".

"Interviews raised questions about enforcement" in implementing registration restrictions in .biz. And data sampling brought to light "questionable registrations" in relation to the restrictions that were supposed to be in place.

"The Registries indicated there had been no major lawsuits" or legal or regulatory problems "that had not been considered at the outset". (I find this statement quite surprising in the context of .biz)

Please could we have access to Miriam Sapiro's report?

Yrs,

Richard Henderson