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RE: [registrars] Fw: [council] GAC and country name reservations


People are raising very important concerns about an issue that most directly affects registrars and registries.  We should work on a common position with the gTLD constituency to forward to the NC regarding the need for any policies affecting registration policies to be vetted through our 2 constituencies.  These issues directly affect our contractual obligations and should be treated as potential concensus policies, with all the due process implications of those, rather than changes made via top-down authority.

 -----Original Message-----
From: Antony Van Couvering [mailto:avc@nameengine.com]
Sent: Thursday, September 27, 2001 11:24 AM
To: erica; Registrars@Dnso.Org
Subject: RE: [registrars] Fw: [council] GAC and country name reservations

Erica,
 
The GAC is a standing committee of ICANN whose responsibility is to interpret whether ICANN's actions are consonant with and do not violate national laws.  It has no clear remit to proactively set ICANN rules, and in this case its pronouncements should be ignored if not protested.
 
The GAC recommendation is flawed and dangerous on several fronts.  In New York, at the behest of the International Olympic Committee, we saw several Greek restaurants forced to change their names because of their use of the word "Olympic", even though their use of the name predated the special status given to the IOC and its trademarks by Federal law.  We could easily see a repeat of this kind of absurdity.
 
Here's what the GAC communique says:

"...the GAC recommends that the names of countries and distinct economies, particularly those contained in the ISO 3166-1 standard, as applied by ICANN in identifying ccTLDs, should be reserved by the .info Registry, (or if registered in the Sunrise Period challenged by the Registry and, if successful, then reserved) in Latin characters in their official language(s) and in English and assigned to the corresponding governments and public authorities, at their request, for use. These names in other IDN character sets should be reserved in the same way as soon as they become available.

The GAC also draws the attention of ICANN and the Registries to the fact that a large number of other names, including administrative sub-divisions of countries and distinct economies as recognised in international fora , may give rise to contested registrations. Accordingly the GAC recommends that Registrars and eventual Registrants should be made aware of this."

Perhaps it's just sloppy drafting by the GAC, but on my reading this is not just about country names, but also about any "administrative sub-divisions", which would include states, provinces, municipalities, police units, political parties, art museums, etc., etc.  In some countries (e.g. France) there is practically nothing outside flea markets which are not administrative units of the central government. 
 
What about "China Online" or "Bell Canada" or other names which incorporate country names?  How about "France Telecom", and ICANN-accredited registrar?  The GAC does not address this issue, but this is exactly how the Olympic Diner in New York lost its name.
 
As we all know, exclusion lists in a registry are very difficult to design and manage effectively because a variation ("Surinam" and "Suriname"), a translation ("Germany" and "Deutschland"), or an abbreviation ("United States of America" and "USA") can have equivalent meaning to humans but are meaningless to machines.
 
ICANN has a well-defined mechanism for dealing with "contested registrations", designed in fact by WIPO, which is a member of GAC (why it's a member of GAC is an entirely different question).  As everyone here knows, registrars were advised by ICANN to remain blind to registered names and to *not* exercise any oversight with regard to domain name choices.  I therefore don't understand registrars would need to be aware or implement any restrictions, especially one as open-ended and ill-defined as the GAC's.
 
I should also note that one of the ICANN Board members, Nii Quaynor, who will be helping to host the upcoming ICANN meeting in Accra, uses an email address at "ghana.com".  Will he be stripped of that?
 
Registrars should be aware of the GAC's activist agenda and its strong preference for governmental control of the Internet.  These views are on full display in the "GAC Principles" where ICANN is reduced to a technical co-ordinating body which works at the behest of governmental authorities, and which were invoked, very short-sightedly, by ICANN itself when it redelegated the .AU domain last month.   The independence of ccTLDs has been severly undermined by the GAC, and I would urge registrars to speak out against governmental incursion into the gTLD namespaces, especially when the attempt is as ham-fisted as this one.
 
Antony Van Couvering
NameEngine
-----Original Message-----
From: erica [mailto:erica.roberts@bigpond.com]
Sent: Thursday, September 27, 2001 3:48 AM
To: Registrars@Dnso.Org
Subject: [registrars] Fw: [council] GAC and country name reservations

I draw the attention of Registrars to the recent GAC Communique which recomends that the names of countries and distinct ecnomies should be reserved in any new gTLDs and warns that the registration of such names may be subject to dispute.  This warning picks up issues being canvassed under the WIPO process - partiularly the concern by many governments that they should be recognised a having intellectual propery rights in political/geographical names.
Many governments are signatory to a treaty (or similar agreement) under which they recognise appellation rights in relation to other industries.  While I am not fully across this, I do know that this has significantly impacted on the wine industry - so that only wines made from grapes grown in the French Champaigne area can be called "champaigne", ditto "burgundy" etc.  This had a big impact on the wine industry world wide and established a prededent which gives governments some form of IP rights in place names. 
As I see it,  this is primarily an issue for Registries who are being asked to reserve the relevant names.  However, in the absence of any defined list of relevant names (such as the two letter country codes on the the ISO 3166-1 list) there is scope for confusion and dispute - which has the potential to impact on Registrar business.
The NC is taking this issue under consideration and solicits comment from the Registrar constituency.
 
erica
 
Sent: 24 September 2001 16:56
Subject: [council] GAC and country name reservations

In a communiqué made by the Government Advisory Council at its Montevideo meeting http://www.icann.org/committees/gac/communique-09sep01.htm "the GAC recommends that the names of countries and distinct economies, particularly those contained in the ISO 3166-1 standard, as applied by ICANN in identifying ccTLDs, should be reserved by the .info Registry, (or if registered in the Sunrise Period challenged by the Registry and, if successful, then reserved) in Latin characters in their official language(s) and in English and assigned to the corresponding governments and public authorities, at their request, for use. These names in other IDN character sets should be reserved in the same way as soon as they become available"

In the same communiqué the GAC further "draws the attention of ICANN and the Registries to the fact that a large number of other names, including administrative sub-divisions of countries and distinct economies as recognised in international fora, may give rise to contested registrations. Accordingly the GAC recommends that Registrars and eventual Registrants should be made aware of this".

---------------------------------------

I believe that the NC should issue a statement about this and ask you to consult in your constituencies rapidly. I currently propose that we could consider:

- urging caution on the GAC in taking this step,

- point out that dot info is but the start of a TLD expansion and something much more interesting for countries could be possible

- propose that WIPO is the best place for discussion on geographical names.

 

Comments please.

Philip

NC Chair

 



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