Category Archive

On February 2nd ICANN staff announced the release of a Draft Report: Rights Protection Mechanisms Review that is open for public comment until May 1st. This Draft Report is preliminary to an Issues Report requested by the GNSO Council that is due to be delivered by September 30th, and that may set the stage for a Policy Development Process (PDP) …

On February 4th I departed my home in Alexandria, Virginia for the ICANN 52 meeting in Singapore. I arrived at my hotel’s reception desk 28 hours and +13 time zones later. While my 777 was traversing the Arctic Circle, ICA dispatched a letter to ICANN CEO responding to remarks he made during the annual gathering of the top tenth of …

On February 5th, while many (including the author) were on route to ICANN 52 in Singapore, the U.S. Senate passed S.Res. 71, a non-binding, “Sense of the Senate” Resolution declaring February 8th-14th as “Internet Governance Awareness Week”. Those dates overlap the now ongoing ICANN meeting in Singapore, and the congruence is intentional. The text of the Resolution (below) is fairly …

During the recent World Economic Forum meeting in Davos, Switzerland, ICANN CEO engaged in an interview in which he touted the purported benefits of the new gTLD program. Unfortunately, in the course of those remarks he appeared to accuse domain portfolio owners of “hogging names” as well as equate them with “cybersquatters”. Many ICA members felt that these remarks were …

Elections do have consequences. Last year outgoing Senate Commerce Committee Chairman (D-WV) Jay Rockefeller resisted member requests to engage in oversight on the Obama Administration’s March 2014 announcement that it intended to end the U.S. counterparty role on the IANA functions contract and turn the responsibility over to the global multistakeholder community. But incoming Committee Chairman John Thune (R-SD) will …

The ICA, speaking on behalf of domain investors and developers, has joined with other organizations representing civil society, internet domain registries, internet service providers and internet companies to communicate their joint concerns regarding a “trademark package” currently being considered by the Council of the European Union. Adoption of language under consideration could lead to adverse judicial actions brought against domain …

ICA Counsel Philip Corwin has been elected by the members of ICANN’s Business Constituency to be one of the two Councilors representing it on the GNSO Council. The Council is the policymaking body for all gTLD-related issues. It will review and decide whether to endorse the proposals eventually produced by the two cross community working groups currently focused on the …

The Congressional Internet Caucus held its 15th annual State of the Net conference today at The Newseum in Washington, DC. This is traditionally a start the new year networking and information update day for the capital’s technology policy set. Immediately following the lunch break, at a session titled “Internet Functions in Transition: Is the US and the World Ready?”, NTIA …

ICANN staff have requested a six-month delay in the delivery date of a Preliminary Issue Report on the “current state of all rights protection mechanisms (RPMs) implemented for both existing and new gTLDs, including but not limited to the UDRP and the URS”.  The request is contained in a January 5, 2015 e-mail sent by ICANN  Senior Policy Director Mary …

While the debate continues as to whether most new gTLDs are a sound long-term investment for their registry operators, there’s no disputing that the program has been an economic boom for ICANN. The 1,930 first round applications each required an application fee of $185,000, which added up to a tidy $357 million. Even after refunds for withdrawn applications ICANN still …