[ga] Karl's comments at the 2003 Senate hearings on allocation systems

[Danny Younger <dannyyounger@xxxxxxxxx>]

Excerpt:

"Of the seven TLDs that ICANN has created, most are of
value only to small interests.  There has been no
cognizable benefit to the public.

ICANN's glacial, and extremely expensive, processes
have not only failed to meet even the smallest portion
of the demand for new TLDs, but it appears that even
the opportunity to apply for new TLDs, or to be the
database operator (registry) underlying those TLDs,
has become limited to a very few favored insiders.

ICANN has claimed that the initial seven TLDs were a
test bed.   But it was a test bed lacking even the
most rudimentary elements needed to evaluate success
or failure.  ICANN is in no way more knowledgeable
about the issues of deploying new TLDs than it was in
year 2000.

My conclusion is that ICANN's foray into TLD
allocation has been an nothing less than an
unmitigated disaster.  ICANN's behavior has wasted
millions of dollars and hindered the progress of
innovation on the Internet.

ICANN should immediately drop all of the arcane, and
useless, business regulations and microscopic
distinctions that it has imposed on the allocation of
new top level domains (TLDs) and simply look at the
technical competency of the applicant.

It is my suggestion that ICANN adopt an allocation
system following the suggestions of Professors Mueller
and McKnight (see The Post-COM Internet: A Five-Step
Process for Top Level Domain Additions - online at
URL:
http://dcc.syr.edu/miscarticles/NewTLDs-MM-LM.pdf) and
of Professors Solum and Manheim (see An Economic
Analysis of Domain Name Policy - online at URL:
http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=410640)."

http://www.cavebear.com/rw/senate-july-31-2003.htm


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