On May 29th ICANN staff issued its Report of Public Comments on the “Draft Report: Rights Protection Mechanisms Review”. Back in May ICA advised ICANN that, “ICA would vigorously oppose any attempt to amend the URS to provide a domain transfer option as such a rapid and circumscribed process could be readily abused to further the scourge of reverse domain …
ICANN Proposes URS for .Cat and .Pro in Steady March Toward .Net and .Com
Just ten days ago we advised the domain investment community that ICANN staff was seeking to act in an unacceptably unaccountable manner that appears to violate ICANN’s own Bylaws by improperly imposing Uniform Rapid Suspension (URS) and other new gTLD program Rights Protection Mechanisms (RPM) implementations on legacy gTLDs. This would have the de facto effect of converting these RPMs …
Act Now — Just Say “No!” to URS at .Travel – Or It Will Travel to .Com
On May 12th ICANN posted the “Proposed Renewal of .TRAVEL Sponsored TLD Registry Agreement” for a period of public comment ending June 21st. You’d expect ICANN staff to be on their best behavior right now, during ongoing community efforts to fashion enhanced and binding accountability measures. But instead this proposed Registry Agreement (RA) contains a provision through which staff …
ICA Counsel Quoted in WSJ Op-Ed on ICANN
ICA Counsel Philip Corwin is quoted in a May 18th Wall Street Journal Op-Ed. The article, “Obama’s Bungled Internet Surrender’, was penned by L. Gordon Crovitz, whose weekly column addresses technology-related policy matters. As the title suggests, Mr. Crovitz is not a fan of the Administration’s plan to relinquish its counterparty role on the IANA functions contract. His Op-Ed states: …
ICA Counsel to Testify before Congress on IANA Transition and ICANN Accountability
ICA Counsel Philip Corwin has been invited to testify on ICA’s behalf before the House Judiciary Committee’s Subcommittee on Courts, Intellectual Property, and the Internet. The Subcommittee is holding a hearing on Wednesday, May 13th on the subject of “Stakeholder Perspectives on ICANN: The .Sucks Domain and Essential Steps to Guarantee Trust and Accountability in the Internet’s Operation”. The hearing …
ICA to ICANN: We’ll “Vigorously Oppose” Changing URS to Facilitate RDNH
On Thursday, April 30th ICA filed a comment letter with ICANN regarding the “Draft Report: Rights Protection Mechanisms Review” published earlier this year. This preliminary report paves the way for a more extensive issues report on the new gTLD RPMs that will be delivered to the GNSO Council this fall. That second report will not only inform the debate on whether …
Senate Judiciary Leaders Ask New IP Czar to Facilitate ICANN-Focused Conversations
Daniel Marti was nominated to become the new White House “IP Czar” in August 2014 to replace Victoria Espinel. His predecessor, in yet another illustration of Washington’s “revolving door” shuffling key individuals between the government and private sector, departed the post a year earlier to become head of BSA/The Software Alliance, the leading trade group for the software industry. …
Second Draft CWG-IANA Stewardship Proposal Out for Public Comment — April 24th Explanatory Webinar Scheduled
Late on the evening on April 22nd the CWG-Stewardship on the IANA Naming Functions issued its second Draft Proposal for a 28-day public comment period that closes on May 20th. Information about the Proposal can be found in a news announcement and at the public comment page. ICANN has scheduled a 90-minute explanatory webinar on the proposal on Friday, April …
$59 Million and Counting: ICANN Board Downgrades Community Say on Use of Last Resort Auction Proceeds
ICANN’s new gTLD program provides for last resort auctions to settle contention sets where the competing applicants are unable to reach agreement by negotiation or private auction, with the proceeds going to a segregated ICANN account. With the recent $25 million bid of Google to secure control of the .App registry the total proceeds of those ICANN auctions has swelled …
.US to Hold Inaugural Town Hall on April 22
Last fall I was appointed to the first Stakeholder Council ever established for .US, the country code top level domain (ccTLD) of the United States. Now I am happy to announce that .US will hold its inaugural Town Hall meeting on April 22nd at 1 pm Eastern time (17:00 UTC). As described by the Stakeholder Council’s Secretariat, the Town Hall …