Re: [ga-org] First Ten Policy Questions

[Jonathan Weinberg <weinberg@mail.msen.com>]

	I agree with Harald that keeping .org as an open TLD looks like the best 
approach.  Kicking out existing registrants seems untenable and 
undesirable; and given that, I'm not sure I see much advantage in trying to 
limit future registrations.  I'm told that there was a period of time after 
.com started to fill, but before commercial enterprises started routinely 
duplicating registrations, when many businesses, especially small 
businesses, registered in .org.  So we're stuck with an .org that has 
different sorts of registrants in it, some noncommercial, some not.  If 
there is to be a TLD for the noncommercial community, it seems to me to 
make more sense to start one from scratch, without grandfathered 
registrants (notwithstanding Alexander's point that doing so will require 
waiting for a future round of TLDs).  If ICANN decides to look favorably on 
the creation of a new TLD for this purpose, it wouldn't be difficult to 
devise procedures that would attract proposals and reduce 
application-associated costs.

	On the tilted UDRP, I'm not sure I completely understand what's being 
proposed.  One possibility is to allow a non-profit to use a UDRP-like 
procedure to oust a registrant simply on the ground that it is for-profit 
(like .biz, but in reverse).  This doesn't strike me as a great idea; it's 
just a particular mechanism for enforcing the general registration rule 
that registrants can't be for-profit, and I don't see the advantage in 
trying to do that at this point.  Another possibility might be that the 
UDRP works exactly as it does elsewhere, *except* that for-profits are 
categorically barred from invoking the UDRP against non-profits.  That 
would give some additional protection to the proprietors of 
mcdonaldssucks.org, so long as the site was devoted to bona fide 
(noncommercial) criticism of McDonalds, and didn't simply represent a 
(commercial) attempt to get McDonalds to buy it out.  OTOH, it would 
introduce the mess of *defining* non-profits or noncommercials or whoever 
the favored class is (and it might make it less likely that ICANN would 
create a *real* noncommercial TLD down the road).

	I like the idea of discouraging duplication (in general), but I have one 
cautionary story to tell about .com and .org duplication:  A friend started 
the Women on Waves Foundation, a Netherlands-based nonprofit that offers 
reproductive-rights information and services, and registered 
<womenonwaves.org>.  An unrelated entity then registered <womenonwaves.com> 
-- so as to get people looking for the .org site whose fingers reflexively 
typed ".com" after everything -- and pointed it to pages operated by the 
Operation Rescue organization inveighing against abortion and displaying 
pictures of purported late-term abortions.  The foundation successfully 
UDRP'ed the .com name, so now they have both. How should any nonduplication 
policy affect them?

Jon


Jonathan Weinberg
weinberg@msen.com

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