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[comments-wgb] Report of Working Group B



In the Sunrise Plus Twenty proposal trademark owners will have first crack at domains related to their registered trademarks.
 
So what if Kodak goes out and registers kodak.firm, kodak.rec, kodak.arts, etc...
 
What is the point of the new gTLD if they are just duplicates of the .COM domain?
 
If my business is located at 123 Main Street in Toronto then I could, if I wanted, go out and buy the property at 123 Main Street in Montreal just so customers could find my business a little easier.  This obviously would get a little expensive to do across N.America or the world.
 
But the cost of internet domains are inexpensive enough that a corporation could acquire hundreds or thousands of domains related to their names, products or services.  But what does this leave for the little guy?
 
I think that customers are smart enough to locate Kodak at kodak.com    Leave the new domains to the little guys and for businesses that may not have even existed a few years ago (and thus didn't have a crack at a .com domain).
 
If a business goes out and registers kodak.firm and then proceeds to sell film or related equipment then any court should have no trouble resolving this.   Obviously this business is attempting to benefits off of Kodak.com's name and reputation.
 
If a business goes out and registers kodak.firm because it happens to be a restaurant on the corner of Kodak Avenue then I don't see the problem.
 
Customers will continue to look for multinationals at the .COM domain.  That is why these things sell for up to several million each.
 
Don't underestimate the general public.  They can figure these things out.
 
The more gTLDs that you create then the less relative value that these domains will have.
 
What ever you do, DO NOT open up one new gTLD as a test.  As such, it will have a very high relative value and may taint the entire process by suggesting that a wide expansion will have similar problems.