Slashdot Mirror
Domain: icann.org
Stories and comments across the archive that link to icann.org.
Comments · 772
-
ProblemsTher will be some problems... If you look in the release,
4. How will offensive names be prevented?
This will obviously not work.Offensive names will be subject to an objection-based process based on public morality and order. This process will be conducted by an international arbitration body utilizing criteria drawing on provisions in a number of international treaties. ICANN will not be the decision maker on these objections.
One innocent word in a language can be an offensive word in another. For exemple, the french word for "seal" is phoque, which is pronounced exactly like you think it is.
And even in the same language, various countries will give totally different meanings to a given word. Think of "lift" -vs- "elevator", "boot" -vs- "trunk" or "crisps" -vs- "chips"...
And it can be even worse; for example, in France, gosses means "children", whereas in Québec, it means "testicles".
-
In case anyone wants any facts
-
Re:SweetI'm actually attending the ICANN meeting this week in Paris. If you care to share your comments please, here's a couple of ways
1. IRC backchannel - irc://chat.icann.org#icann-general-discussion
2. Twitter feed - http://twitter.com/netfreedom
3. At Large (user) advisory committee - http://atlarge-lists.icann.org/mailman/listinfo/alac_atlarge-lists.icann.org
-
Public comment opens today, closes tomorrow.
ICAAN released a final draft for public comment today, June 22, 2008.
Public comment closes June 23, 2008.
-
Re:Everything old is new again.
Nine years ago, there were only five other registrars available and the whole system was highly experimental. Transferring to one of the new "testbed" registrars was not widely considered to be the safer option. Nobody accused Network Solutions of not being a real registrar, because a few months before they had been the only registrar.
-
Re:IE6
isn't that one old l.root server was lost ?
http://blog.icann.org/?p=309 -
Re:Make sure you are up to date!
The file doesn't change all that often, so checking it once a month should keep you up to date. If you needed a more immediate update schedule, I'd subscribe to the ICANN newsletter at:
http://www.icann.org/newsletter/ -
Re:Good Samaritans?
From the link in the FA:
http://blog.icann.org/?p=227
It is expected that the old address will continue to work for at least six months after the transition, but will ultimately be retired from service.
1st November 2007 -> 1st May 2008 is 6 months. So they left it a few days over 6 months
Tim. -
Re:More feel-good decisions, less real actionAsking ICANN to police the legality of online vendors
There's no policing in my statement. You placed it there. I am asking that ICANN actually enforce the registrar policies that they state on their own website for registrars seeking accredited status. If you read that, you'll see it has nothing to do with legality or lack thereof. Indeed, it has nothing to do with vendors, either. It is all about the registrars, which is where my beef stands with ICANN. There are plenty of registrars that have attained the accredited status (allowing them to sell in the most popular TLDs), and yet act in blatant violation of the agreement that ICANN claims they are bound to.
In other words: get a clue, ICANN is neither empowered nor equipped to act in any sort of law enforcement capacity
In other words: read my post.
I never asked for them to act in any sort of law enforcement capacity. If you read my posts, you'll see me state several times that I know they are not able to do such a thing. I am just asking that they actually enforce the rules that they state - really the EULA or AUP that they have established for the registrars that they give the accredited status to. -
Re:More feel-good decisions, less real actionTrying to hold ICANN accountable for the registrars, who have to police who they sell to is ridiculous.
Its not a question of ICANN being held responsible for the actions of their customers (the registrars). Its a question of ICANN actually holding registrars to the terms of registrar obligations in the registrar accreditation agreement. In particular, ICANN requires that the registrars maintain valid contact data for their customers, which they seldom do when selling to spammers.
I'm not asking for ICANN to "police" anyone. I'm just asking for them to actually require accredited registrars to meet the registrar obligations that they put forth. Obviously ICANN is not into law enforcement. However, ICANN does have the ability to restrict who can and cannot sell domains within the -
Re:More feel-good decisions, less real actionTrying to hold ICANN accountable for the registrars, who have to police who they sell to is ridiculous.
Its not a question of ICANN being held responsible for the actions of their customers (the registrars). Its a question of ICANN actually holding registrars to the terms of registrar obligations in the registrar accreditation agreement. In particular, ICANN requires that the registrars maintain valid contact data for their customers, which they seldom do when selling to spammers.
I'm not asking for ICANN to "police" anyone. I'm just asking for them to actually require accredited registrars to meet the registrar obligations that they put forth. Obviously ICANN is not into law enforcement. However, ICANN does have the ability to restrict who can and cannot sell domains within the -
Re:This could create a worse problemWell to become a accredited registrar you have to pay the following:
http://www.icann.org/registrars/accreditation-financials.htm- US$2,500 non-refundable application fee, to be submitted with application.
- US$4,000 yearly accreditation fee due upon approval and each year thereafter.
- Variable fee (quarterly) billed once you begin registering domain names or the first full quarter following your accreditation approval, whichever occurs first. This fee represents a portion of ICANN's operating costs and, because it is divided among all registrars, the amount varies from quarter to quarter. Recently this fee has ranged from US$1,200 to S$2,000 per quarter.
- Transaction-based gTLD fee (quarterly). This fee is a flat fee (currently $0.20) charged for each new registration, renewal or transfer. This fee can be billed by the registrar separately on its invoice to the registrant, but is paid by the registrar to ICANN.
So yeah you pay $4000 per year, and then $4800-8000 a year in operating fees, then $0.20 per domain name, or $200,000 for 1 Million domain names.
Oh and also you need to prove $70,000 in assets and have $500,000 in insurance. -
Re:put it everywhereIf I were Paraguayan right now I would be spamming every forum I knew of(...) We are
As the sibling post noticed, that's why you are hearing from us right now. We also digged it, ICANNed it, and sent it to many other news sites.
Of course we also told the local radios, TV and newspapers. Even though Internet is almost always still viewed here as a secondary issue with regards to national politics, this time everybody just couldn't hold the rage this stupid move generated. We even made it to the cover of the most important national newspaper on saturday. Obviously they (the ruling party) are desperate because they certainly CAN lose the power after 60 years, and they're gonna try just anything.
Actually, the reaction was so strong (and certainly unexpected by the Telco) that the "mischief" lasted less than 24 hours: they fixed it quietly the next morning.
This week is the last one before the most crucial elections in this country modern history. Let's just hope this helps to oust those bastards once and for all. -
Re:I'd rather not buy from the likes of GoDaddy orDisclaimer: I worked for LCN until recently.
I buy from LCN.com. Not as cheap as godaddy but they work well and don't do anything scummy with your domain (like trying to stop you from transferring). I guess you gets what you pays for.
I'm not sure how godaddy can justify doing this. The icann policy only lets them deny a transfer under the following circumstances (listed under point 3):1. Evidence of fraud
2. UDRP action
3. Court order by a court of competent jurisdiction
4. Reasonable dispute over the identity of the Registered Name Holder or Administrative Contact
5. No payment for previous registration period (including credit card charge-backs) if the domain name is past its expiration date or for previous or current registration periods if the domain name has not yet expired. In all such cases, however, the domain name must be put into "Registrar Hold" status by the Registrar of Record prior to the denial of transfer.
6. Express written objection to the transfer from the Transfer Contact. (e.g. - email, fax, paper document or other processes by which the Transfer Contact has expressly and voluntarily objected through opt-in means)
7. A domain name was already in "lock status" provided that the Registrar provides a readily accessible and reasonable means for the Registered Name Holder to remove the lock status.
8. A domain name is in the first 60 days of an initial registration period.
9. A domain name is within 60 days (or a lesser period to be determined) after being transferred (apart from being transferred back to the original Registrar in cases where both Registrars so agree and/or where a decision in the dispute resolution process so directs). -
7% is .com only, .net is 10%Both the article and the summary oversimplify the percentage increase. The summary says: VeriSign is jacking up prices for the
Commencing on 1 January 2007, the Service Fee charged during a calendar year for each annual increment of a new and renewal domain name registration and for transferring a domain name registration from one ICANN-accredited registrar to another, shall not exceed the highest Service Fee charged during the preceding calendar year multiplied by 1.10. -
Read the Contract
The contract is on the ICANN site. People should read it before making statements that aren't true. Verisign can not raise the fee every year, only four of the six years in a contract period. Look at the payments they need to make to ICANN: $1.5 million rising to $3 million a quarter over the contract. Look at the SLAs for
http://www.icann.org/tlds/agreements/net/
http://www.icann.org/tlds/agreements/com/ -
Read the Contract
The contract is on the ICANN site. People should read it before making statements that aren't true. Verisign can not raise the fee every year, only four of the six years in a contract period. Look at the payments they need to make to ICANN: $1.5 million rising to $3 million a quarter over the contract. Look at the SLAs for
http://www.icann.org/tlds/agreements/net/
http://www.icann.org/tlds/agreements/com/ -
Itojun
Yeah, we always fall back on the government to help us out when us nerds aren't satisfied with how capitalism is driving the technological trends that need to happen.
But let's not forget those that went before us. Jun-ichiro Hagino, better known as Itojun, was one of the first researchers that was pushing for IPv6 since as long as I can remember (at least 2001). On top of that he was developing specifications for it and working through the BSD code to make it one of the first operating systems fully capable of being IPv6 compliant--starting a trend that needs to happen in more operating systems sooner. He even started documenting draft APIs to get developers thinking about how this would work inside software.
And then he died in a car accident at age 37. It's funny how you don't appreciate their work until they're dead. Almost like a painter or author.
Although many still carry on his work, the saddest part is that all his efforts to bring awareness to everyone about IPv6 may fall into the responsibilities of the government or, worse, capitalism. -
ICANN?
The domain name market is a pile of sewage, and anyone who bothers to look knows who's sitting on the toilet.
ICANN stands for I CAN SHIT.
When ICANN speaks have a plunger handy.
Of course this is going on. But insiders looking at queries is such a small problem anyway, it sounds more like ICANN just trying to come off as a good samaritan. Insider DNS info? Querie spying? These are the least of our worries.
Although one of many scams, the practice of registering expired domains is probably the worse. But this is at least done by "crooks". What I find most disgusting is the redemption policy which allows the registrars to do this exact same practice, but "legally". Not to mention throwing up ad pages immediately after your domain expires to make money AND measure traffic. -
Re:What needs to change
As to the original topic, won't this recent change in ICANN policy largely eliminate the problems with drop catching
I don't think the policy has actually changed. The change appears to be proposed, but the registrars (who make money off drop tasting) must approve the change. Don't hold your breath.
The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers is looking to effectively end domain tasting with a proposal to start charging the annual ICANN fee on registrar domain registrations.
Domain tasting is the use of the Add Grace Period to test the profitability of a domain name registration. The AGP is a five-day period following the initial registration of a domain name when the registration may be deleted and a credit can be issued to a registrar.
"Domain tasting has been an issue for the Internet community and ICANN is offering this proposal as a way to stop tasting," said Dr Paul Twomey, ICANN's President and CEO. "Charging the ICANN fee as soon as a domain name is registered would close the loophole used by tasters to test a domain name's profitability for free."
AGP was originally introduced by registries so registrars could avoid costs if a domain name was mistyped or misspelled during the registration process. It is part of the
Tasting has been a serious challenge for the Internet community and has grown exponentially since 2004. In January 2007 the top 10 domain tasters accounted for 95% of all deleted
The proposal will be part of the ICANN budget process for the fiscal year starting 1 July 2008. The early draft version of that budget will be released for and discussed at ICANN's New Delhi meeting later this month. After public discussions of this proposal and other budget issues, the proposed budget will be released for addition discussions by 17 May 2008 and be voted on at the board meeting to be held during the ICANN meeting in Paris in June. ICANN accredited registrars representing two-thirds of fees collected will be asked to approve the proposal.
http://www.icann.org/announcements/announcement-29jan08.htm -
Re:Bad idea
>>Imagine being able to "taste" a house and only pay for it when people wanted to rent/buy it, how stupid is that?
Domain kiting is even worse -- imagine the government says that you can move into a house free of charge for a week without a deposit or fee. Then you get evicted, but you move back in -- you can permanently live in the house without ever paying rent.
IMO, domain tasting was the stupidest fucking idea ICANN ever came up with. Or, sorry, SUPPORTING THE IDEA OF DOMAIN TESTING. Which should have been painfully obvious to anyone with half a brain that it was a terrible idea, as the entire point of it was for people who were speculating on domains, not actually using them.
Let's see:
http://www.icann.org/announcements/announcement-2-10aug07.htm
http://www.icann.org/announcements/announcement-29jan08.htm
Yep, about 10.5 years for them to come to this conclusion. Lord, I love committees. -
Re:Bad idea
>>Imagine being able to "taste" a house and only pay for it when people wanted to rent/buy it, how stupid is that?
Domain kiting is even worse -- imagine the government says that you can move into a house free of charge for a week without a deposit or fee. Then you get evicted, but you move back in -- you can permanently live in the house without ever paying rent.
IMO, domain tasting was the stupidest fucking idea ICANN ever came up with. Or, sorry, SUPPORTING THE IDEA OF DOMAIN TESTING. Which should have been painfully obvious to anyone with half a brain that it was a terrible idea, as the entire point of it was for people who were speculating on domains, not actually using them.
Let's see:
http://www.icann.org/announcements/announcement-2-10aug07.htm
http://www.icann.org/announcements/announcement-29jan08.htm
Yep, about 10.5 years for them to come to this conclusion. Lord, I love committees. -
Re:The real problem is phony "registrars"
Does that provision really already exist?
Yes. Paragraph 3.7.9 of the registrar agreement: "Registrar shall abide by any ICANN adopted specifications or policies prohibiting or restricting warehousing of or speculation in domain names by registrars."
-
The real problem is phony "registrars"
Most of the "ICANN accredited registrars" are fronts for domain tasting. There are only a few real registrars; the rest are dummies for picking up dropped domains. Enom has a huge number of dummy fronts - "Enom1, Inc" through "Enom469, Inc".
One step needed is for ICANN to enforce the provision of the registrar agreement which allows ICANN to prohibit registrars from owning or speculating in domains. And the provision which requires that a registrar have assurance of payment before activating a domain. With that, the end of the "grace period", and Google refusing to monetize domains for the first five days, we should see this problem decrease. The
We're working on this from the browser end. The general idea of our SiteTruth system is to filter out the bottom-feeders. It's the next step after ad-blocking - make the link pages, directory pages, typosquatters, and similar junk far less visible.
It's not even clear that advertisers benefit from all those junk pages. If you advertise with Google ads, and get clicks from junk pages, do they really result in sales? Or is this just a way to take money from the real advertiser and divert it to some bottom-feeder?
-
ICANN may already be onto it
ICANN PDF on Domain Tasting/Reserving I found at http://www.icann.org/announcements/announcement-07jan08.htm/ addresses some of the issues. From TFA "Making changes to the grace period, such as eliminating the add grace period entirely; 2) making the ICANN transaction fee apply to deletes within the add grace period"
-
ICANN SSAC looking for input on front running
Just found this in the ICANN Front-running paper. Note the contact email at the end...
For each instance of suspected domain name front running, the type of information that would be most useful in studying the case includes but is not limited to:Method used to check domain name availability (e.g., web browser, application).
Local access ISP.
Provider or operator of the availability checking service.
Dates and times when domain name availability checks were performed.
Copy of the information returned (e.g., WHOIS query response) in the response to the availability check.
Whether the domain name was reported as previously registered or never before registered in the response returned from the availability check.
Copy of the information returned (e.g., WHOIS query response) indicating the name had been registered.
Copies of any correspondence sent to or received from the registrant perceived to be a front runner.
Correspondence with the registrar or availability checking service.
Any information indicating a potential relationship between the availability checking service and the registrant that grabbed the name.
Please submit incidents to the SSAC Fellow at SSAC-DNFR@ICANN.org.
-
ICANN SSAC looking for input on front running
Just found this in the ICANN Front-running paper. Note the contact email at the end...
For each instance of suspected domain name front running, the type of information that would be most useful in studying the case includes but is not limited to:Method used to check domain name availability (e.g., web browser, application).
Local access ISP.
Provider or operator of the availability checking service.
Dates and times when domain name availability checks were performed.
Copy of the information returned (e.g., WHOIS query response) in the response to the availability check.
Whether the domain name was reported as previously registered or never before registered in the response returned from the availability check.
Copy of the information returned (e.g., WHOIS query response) indicating the name had been registered.
Copies of any correspondence sent to or received from the registrant perceived to be a front runner.
Correspondence with the registrar or availability checking service.
Any information indicating a potential relationship between the availability checking service and the registrant that grabbed the name.
Please submit incidents to the SSAC Fellow at SSAC-DNFR@ICANN.org.
-
Re:PR response from NSI
Looks like this has NSI's attention, or at least that of its employees. Here's a recent post from Domain State. I"ve included additional commentary to aid the reader.
Hi my name is Shashi Bellamkonda and I work for Network Solutions.I have know way of confirming your name is really Shashi Bellamkonda, or if you really work for Network Solutions, but for the sake of discussion I'll give you the benefit ofthe doubt.
Wanted to give you our side of the story.Which, as I understand, has been vetted though management, checked by legal, and cleared with PR. Please, proceed
Network Solutions is not front running. " Front Runners" are people who register domain names known to have been searched, for the purpose of monetizing them and then selling them at inflated prices either directly to the customer who searched for the domain or through aftermarket channels.Your "definition" differs from ICANN's defintition of front-running. Just an FYI, as per their whitepaper, your organization is front running
We have started protecting all domain name searches at Network Solutions by holding the searched domains for our customers for a short period of time before releasing them."short time" == 4 days. "All domain searches" == Just
This gives our customers the opportunity to register names later without fear that the name will be registered by a "Front Runner.""'cause we'll be the ones holding it for ransom."
We are not monetizing these domains,"You know, other than the much higher-than-everyone else rate we charge for domain name..."
nor do we intend to keep them after the holding period.unless you're stupid enough to search for them again
We did this because we heard customers complain that queried domain names are being snatched up by other people as soon as they searched."We figured we should be the ones making money off of searched domain names!"
thank you very much for your time today, mr.Bellamkonda, and I'm sure we're looking forward to hearing how this project works out for your company
-
Make yourself heard
Coincidentally, icann has just released a report on domain tasting, and is asking for the public to comment. Be sure to log your comment here:
-
Yes, another confirmation.
Just looked up Network-solutions-antitrust-violation-demo.com. and Network Solutions registered it.
Time for ICANN to issue a policy under the registrar agreement to enforce section 3.7.9: "Registrar shall abide by any ICANN adopted specifications or policies prohibiting or restricting warehousing of or speculation in domain names by registrars."
-
Re:Ask nicely
But now we have a situation where by posing as a registrar, they can speculate at pennies per year per domain -- which makes it economic for them to sit on vast farms of domains.
You might be interested to know that registrars pay USD6.42 for a
Setting up a registrar requires a significant up-front security (either actual cash or letter of credit) equal to the number of anticipated monthly registrations x the number of years x the USD registration fee. In addition, you must pay ICANN about $10,000/year for accreditation, and demonstrate at least USD70,000 in working capital. It is not a trivial undertaking.
What many speculators do is "test-drive" domains by taking advantage of the 5-day grace period that Verisign allows before a domain name must be paid for. Even then, a registrar will pay $6.42 to continue to hold onto a domain after the grace period. -
Re:Buy it
The UDRP is much more streamlined and cost-effective than other methods of dispute resolution such as going to court. Complainants often win even weak cases because many respondents do not even try to dispute the claims. Only 14% of UDRP disputes that have been decided were decided in favor of the respondent.
The poster does not even need a lawyer to proceed with a UDRP complaint (it might help, of course). Information about the process is available from ICANN.
-
Re:In a word, no
If the registrar was ICANN certified, the domain registration should have reverted to ICANN or another ICANN provider when the company went bust. If the company was a subsidiary of another, the registration reverts to the parent. You do not lose the registration, you just get moved to a different registrar (though there can be some period of time while it all gets worked out). Sounds to me like you failed to follow the transfer or failed to pay when it came time to renew. Perhaps your spam filter shitcanned their instructions on how to start using the new registrar.
The relevant ICANN policy
j. Ensure that the registrar's obligations to its customers and to the registry administrator will be fulfilled in the event that the registrar goes out of business, including ensuring that SLD holders will continue to have use of their domain names and that operation of the Internet will not be adversely affected.
SLD is second level domain.
Very good find and post here. You should have logged in so people would see it. -
Re:In a word, no
If the registrar was ICANN certified, the domain registration should have reverted to ICANN or another ICANN provider when the company went bust. If the company was a subsidiary of another, the registration reverts to the parent. You do not lose the registration, you just get moved to a different registrar (though there can be some period of time while it all gets worked out). Sounds to me like you failed to follow the transfer or failed to pay when it came time to renew. Perhaps your spam filter shitcanned their instructions on how to start using the new registrar.
The relevant ICANN policy
j. Ensure that the registrar's obligations to its customers and to the registry administrator will be fulfilled in the event that the registrar goes out of business, including ensuring that SLD holders will continue to have use of their domain names and that operation of the Internet will not be adversely affected.
SLD is second level domain.
-
Most of the registrars are now "bad"
If instead ICANN had some cajones, they could take the bad registrars out...
The problme is that most of the registrars, by actual count, are now "bad". See the list of ICANN-approved registrars. There are several hundred, few of which have any real existence. Most are just fronts for some domaining operation. Some are obvious about it: "DropExtra.com, Inc.", "DropFall.com, Inc.", "DropHub.com. Inc", "DropJump.com, Inc.", etc., all of which are fronts for a "wholesale domain registrar". Then there's "Enom1, Inc."., "Enom2, Inc."
-
Re:sed 's/US/UN/g'
Here's the thing you keep missing, though: The "US" is not "in charge."
ICANN, the primary (but not the only) body that regulates the internet structure and growth, Just happens to be based in the United States. Only 4 out of the 15 Directors on the board are American. The US Government does not control ICANN any more than the President controls the Congress.
Putting it in the hands of the UN would likely INCREASE the amount of American political tinkering, and definately increase the political tinkering overall. As it stands the whole operation is run by people who actually know what they're doing... why are you so keen to turn it into what is guaranteed to be a festering do-nothing bureaucracy?
=Smidge= -
Re:The real domain names are...You are getting some wrong info here. I suggest you ask that lawyer to write him a letter, stating the reasons why you got the name in good faith and believe that he is guilty of cybersquatting.
At least talk to him about it and then follow his advice. That part won't cost you thousands.And he very well might leave you alone, since he has made the number one mistake you can make in UDRP matters -- ask for money. Here are the UDRP rules and the policy.
-
Re:The real domain names are...You are getting some wrong info here. I suggest you ask that lawyer to write him a letter, stating the reasons why you got the name in good faith and believe that he is guilty of cybersquatting.
At least talk to him about it and then follow his advice. That part won't cost you thousands.And he very well might leave you alone, since he has made the number one mistake you can make in UDRP matters -- ask for money. Here are the UDRP rules and the policy.
-
Re:Well
Incorrect, at least in the US. Trademarks work more or less like copyright; they are automatic upon use of the mark to trade goods or services (service marks).
No. In fact (with a nod to Strongbad), answer equals very no.
Copyright protection is automatic upon creation under U.S. federal law (although *enforcement* of that protection in court requires registration); trademarks do not work this way. While one may claim a common law trademark and notify others (through the use of a TM or SM) that the user considers the mark a trademark, the enforceability is extremely limited. For federal trademark protection, one must not only apply for registration, but have it granted by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, after a long process and a fair amount of back and forth with the examiner. Registrations will also only be issued to marks that are currently in use in commerce--one may start the registration process before the mark is in use (an "intent to use" application), but it won't be issued unless one gives the examiner proof of use (e.g. labels, packaging). (States may have analogous processes.) Even once a mark is registered, it only gives the holder a right within the particular class of goods or services for which it was issued.
Getting back to the OP question, registering a domain name does not give trademark rights. The converse is *somewhat* true; owning a trademark can give some priority over the owner of a domain name incorporating that mark, under certain circumstances generally involving bad faith (under the Anticybersquatting Consumer Protection Act, 15 USC Section 1125(d), which doesn't actually require a *registered* trademark, or the ICANN UDRP). The alleged trademark holder would have to demonstrate either use of the domain name as a trademark, or some kind of registration. {ProfJonathan} -
Simply having a trademark is insufficientEven if they own a trademark on SimpleDog, that's insufficient grounds for a domain transfer. ICANN has some pretty well-established arbitration rules for these cases. Of particular note are sections 4a and 4b. A valid complaint exists only if:
- (i) your domain name is identical or confusingly similar to a trademark or service mark in which the complainant has rights; and
- (ii) you have no rights or legitimate interests in respect of the domain name; and
- (iii) your domain name has been registered and is being used in bad faith.
- (i) circumstances indicating that you have registered or you have acquired the domain name primarily for the purpose of selling, renting, or otherwise transferring the domain name registration to the complainant who is the owner of the trademark or service mark or to a competitor of that complainant, for valuable consideration in excess of your documented out-of-pocket costs directly related to the domain name; or
- (ii) you have registered the domain name in order to prevent the owner of the trademark or service mark from reflecting the mark in a corresponding domain name, provided that you have engaged in a pattern of such conduct; or
- (iii) you have registered the domain name primarily for the purpose of disrupting the business of a competitor; or
- (iv) by using the domain name, you have intentionally attempted to attract, for commercial gain, Internet users to your web site or other on-line location, by creating a likelihood of confusion with the complainant's mark as to the source, sponsorship, affiliation, or endorsement of your web site or location or of a product or service on your web site or location.
In other words, even if the other site has a trademark on SimpleDog, if you're using it for a legitimate business and your site does not compete with them (does not leech off their fame for commercial gain), you're pretty safe. In fact, if your thesimpledog.com site became famous and you were able to turn it into a multi-million dollar business venture with widespread name recognition, and simpledog.com was still an advertising site which advertised what your business sold, you'd actually have pretty a good chance to get their domain transferred to you. They would be leeching off your fame for commercial gain, and thus satisfy definition 4b(iv) of using the domain in "bad faith".
(Incidentally, section 4b(i) is why you never, ever put a dollar amount on your domain in these cases. Their lawyers will immediately jump on it as evidence that you're using the domain in bad faith.)
-
somewhat similar experience
WARNING: IANAL. And you really should talk to one. Nevertheless...
I had a somewhat similar experience a few years ago. A domain that I registered and was using for personal projects attracted the attention of lawyers from Shieldmark, who asserted that I'd registered it in bad faith, and demanded that I turn over ownership of my domain to their client or face an arbitration proceeding according to the rules of ICANN's UDRP process. In Belgium.
In the interest of fairness, I should say that their client did have registered trademarks on the phrase that made up my domain name. On the other hand, their trademark specifically addressed the realm of agricultural products, and... well, let's just say I'm not in the agriculture business.
I sent them a polite letter back saying that while their client had my sympathies, I had registered the domain in good faith, was actively using it, and that if they initialed a UDRP against me, they'd lose. And that was the last I heard of it.
The situation here is different: this guy apparently has no claim on this domain other than the fact that your domain sounds kinda like one of the many he owns. Given that, I'd first talk to a lawyer, then do what I did: write a polite letter suggesting he pound sand. -
ICANN Board discussion on this
The Board of ICANN discussed this issue about an hour ago in their public Board meeting (it's still going on as I write this here: http://media1.icann.org/ramgen/broadcast/international.rm). The meeting has its own webpage - http://losangeles2007.icann.org/node/75.
-
ICANN Board discussion on this
The Board of ICANN discussed this issue about an hour ago in their public Board meeting (it's still going on as I write this here: http://media1.icann.org/ramgen/broadcast/international.rm). The meeting has its own webpage - http://losangeles2007.icann.org/node/75.
-
Registrar contracts MUST BE enforced for whois
To correctly do whois, there must be some changes to the Whois to work.
For those people who use Fake information, they need to lose their domain names. 3.7.7.2 states that a registrar may cancel a registration when there is intentionally false information given. This is rarely enforced. (see http://www.icann.org/correspondence/touton-letter-to-beckwith-03sep02.htm). In fact, I was told by a person at ICANN (I shall allow her to remain nameless, for now -- but for those who were at the IP meeting on Tuesday, she was sitting next to me) that there is no provision for punishing a registrar, except by terminating them and ICANN does not want to terminate registrars because all of them do not have a good data escrow in place. (think registerfly). I believe this is incorrect. I believe that suspending a registrar's ability to prevent NEW registrations by a registrar would be within the ability of the contract and not harm any domain registrant.
Many registrars give 15 days (the period for mistakenly false information, ie. typo, aged, etc.). What needs to be done is to suspend the domain name, for intentionally false false information, for this 15 day period. And then when they provide updated information, this updated information MUST be proven to be correct (ie. don't change 123 Yellow brick Road to 123 Main Street, Oz, Kansas.) and allow the registrar to charge a reasonable administrative fee.
By allowing registrars to ignore invalid whois and complaints regarding such leads to the argument that since the all data is not correct, that the Whois should be scrapped. -
Businesses are not entitled to "privacy".
The actual ICANN report, shows they're deadlocked, all right. See this timeline.
Most of the privacy advocates are referring to the European Directive on Privacy. That only applies to individuals not engaged in business. For businesses, the The European Electronic Commerce Directive (2000/31/EC) applies. And it's very clear. Any "natural or legal person providing an information society service" must disclose name, real-world address, and E-mail address. No exceptions.
California has a similar law. It's more narrowly drawn, only applying to sites that take credit cards, but it's a criminal law - six months in jail for not disclosing the "actual name and address" of the business.
WHOIS policy should take that into account. There's a legal obligation to disclose name and address information for businesses. It's not optional.
Our SiteTruth system is based on these laws. If a web site is selling or advertising something, and we can't find a business name and address for it, its rating is toast. We scan each site for human-readable postal addresses (some people would call this "semantic web" technology). We check commercial business databases. We check SSL certificates. We look at Open Directory. If we can't find a business name and address after doing all that, the site's rating is a red "do not enter" sign, and we kick them down to the bottom of search results. Once we have a business name and address, we have something to look up in business databases, corporation records, business license records, credit ratings, criminal records, etc. Plenty of data is available about businesses once you have a name and address. No more "on the Internet, no one knows if you're a dog". We know.
We haven't found WHOIS data very useful in doing this. WHOIS data quality is awful. Many entries are phony. Mailing addresses on the web site itself tend to be more accurate. Using a phony business address is felony fraud in most jurisdictions, so that's relatively rare, and mostly shows up on phishing sites. So we cross-check with anti-phishing databases to kick those sites out.
It's quite possible to use this approach to check WHOIS information in bulk. If ICANN actually cared about WHOIS data quality, they'd check the data against postal databases and business databases. They don't.
-
ICANN needs to put registrars out of speculation
One of the provisions of the ICANN Registrar Agreement is this:
- 3.7.9 Registrar shall abide by any ICANN adopted specifications or policies prohibiting or restricting warehousing of or speculation in domain names by registrars.
So ICANN has the authority to insist that registrars get out of the domain speculation business. They don't have to ask the registrars; they can simply order it.
Currently, most of the "registrars" are fronts for domain speculators. Take a look at the list. There are whole families of phony registrars (Enom1, Inc., Enom2, Inc., Enom3, Inc.,
Most of these "registrars" are so phony they don't even have a business address.
This registrar information is useful for filtering junk sites. If a site is registered with one of the bogus registrars, it's probably desirable to block its e-mail (which is probably spam), and throw it out of search engines.
-
ICANN needs to put registrars out of speculation
One of the provisions of the ICANN Registrar Agreement is this:
- 3.7.9 Registrar shall abide by any ICANN adopted specifications or policies prohibiting or restricting warehousing of or speculation in domain names by registrars.
So ICANN has the authority to insist that registrars get out of the domain speculation business. They don't have to ask the registrars; they can simply order it.
Currently, most of the "registrars" are fronts for domain speculators. Take a look at the list. There are whole families of phony registrars (Enom1, Inc., Enom2, Inc., Enom3, Inc.,
Most of these "registrars" are so phony they don't even have a business address.
This registrar information is useful for filtering junk sites. If a site is registered with one of the bogus registrars, it's probably desirable to block its e-mail (which is probably spam), and throw it out of search engines.
-
Speculative DomainTasters & Targeted TyposquatNot all of the domainer scum are playing the same market. Some are targeting existing names (or potential names of real customers), and they're often malicious - but trademark law provides some tools for dealing with them.
But another kind are the speculative domain tasters, who register large numbers of potentially useful names and return them before the 5-day grace period unless they're going to make more than $6/year in banner ads. ICANN's Soviet-central-planners have decided that the Registry won't charge transaction costs on that, so it doesn't cost anything to search except opportunity cost and credit card balance. It's certainly simple to fix that without compulsory licensing or complex "taxes" based on some perceived "value" of a domain name or some bogus plan for requiring name buyers to provide "actual content" - either don't return the customer's money if they don't like the name, or at least charge some fixed price for the transaction even if you're returning all or half of their fee. There'll still be some market for this kind of fishing, but it's much smaller.
ICANN is currently evaluating the issue, though their is over. (Poll Results!) The article commented that Verisign may be proposing to do this as a way to make money off the speculators if ICANN does get rid of domain tasting.
Individual registrars can already avoid having to deal with domain tasters - they can set their fees at a price that makes it unattractive to use them even though ICANN's making the registry return their part of the fee. That doesn't eliminate the practice unless all the registrars stop doing it, and there are apparently enough registrars that make money off of speculative parasites that they're tolerating the extra transaction load - but Verisign's $6 fee was never particularly cost-based anyway, so the registrars can keep their costs low by automating the process heavily.
Comments on "value" of a name, and on providing "real content". Until strong AI shows up, there'll be no easily automated way to distinguish between real human-provided content and bogus astroturf, and certainly not without burning huge quantities of CPU and database storage, and if strong AI ever does show up, it'll be no more interested in reading those web pages than real humans are. The speculative domain tasters are often going to generate lots of astroturf for their pages to try to attract traffic from search engines as well. Also, what's the "value" of a name? Certainly nothing objectively quantifiable. For domainers, it's the amount of money they think they can make from owning the name, but for real companies in real business, it's tied into the whole advertising and branding space. DotCom Boom companies were often somewhere in between real companies and bogus ones (was DogFoodOnline.Com a good idea or a silly way to extract money from overexcited VCs? Only your sock puppet knows for sure...) -
Speculative DomainTasters & Targeted TyposquatNot all of the domainer scum are playing the same market. Some are targeting existing names (or potential names of real customers), and they're often malicious - but trademark law provides some tools for dealing with them.
But another kind are the speculative domain tasters, who register large numbers of potentially useful names and return them before the 5-day grace period unless they're going to make more than $6/year in banner ads. ICANN's Soviet-central-planners have decided that the Registry won't charge transaction costs on that, so it doesn't cost anything to search except opportunity cost and credit card balance. It's certainly simple to fix that without compulsory licensing or complex "taxes" based on some perceived "value" of a domain name or some bogus plan for requiring name buyers to provide "actual content" - either don't return the customer's money if they don't like the name, or at least charge some fixed price for the transaction even if you're returning all or half of their fee. There'll still be some market for this kind of fishing, but it's much smaller.
ICANN is currently evaluating the issue, though their is over. (Poll Results!) The article commented that Verisign may be proposing to do this as a way to make money off the speculators if ICANN does get rid of domain tasting.
Individual registrars can already avoid having to deal with domain tasters - they can set their fees at a price that makes it unattractive to use them even though ICANN's making the registry return their part of the fee. That doesn't eliminate the practice unless all the registrars stop doing it, and there are apparently enough registrars that make money off of speculative parasites that they're tolerating the extra transaction load - but Verisign's $6 fee was never particularly cost-based anyway, so the registrars can keep their costs low by automating the process heavily.
Comments on "value" of a name, and on providing "real content". Until strong AI shows up, there'll be no easily automated way to distinguish between real human-provided content and bogus astroturf, and certainly not without burning huge quantities of CPU and database storage, and if strong AI ever does show up, it'll be no more interested in reading those web pages than real humans are. The speculative domain tasters are often going to generate lots of astroturf for their pages to try to attract traffic from search engines as well. Also, what's the "value" of a name? Certainly nothing objectively quantifiable. For domainers, it's the amount of money they think they can make from owning the name, but for real companies in real business, it's tied into the whole advertising and branding space. DotCom Boom companies were often somewhere in between real companies and bogus ones (was DogFoodOnline.Com a good idea or a silly way to extract money from overexcited VCs? Only your sock puppet knows for sure...) -
Re:Not actually squatting
They're putting it to good use, right?
It's not about "good use", it's about copyright and "bad faith".
a. Applicable Disputes. You are required to submit to a mandatory administrative proceeding in the event that a third party (a "complainant") asserts to the applicable Provider, in compliance with the Rules of Procedure, that
(i) your domain name is identical or confusingly similar to a trademark or service mark in which the complainant has rights; and
(ii) you have no rights or legitimate interests in respect of the domain name; and
(iii) your domain name has been registered and is being used in bad faith.
In this case, it'd probably have to resort the part (iii), which usually is about one competitor registering another competitor's site. IE. Coca-Cola registering Pepsi.com and redirecting it to Coke.com. However, IANAL, and but they can probably convince some judge of part (iii) and (iv) below.
b. Evidence of Registration and Use in Bad Faith. For the purposes of Paragraph 4(a)(iii), the following circumstances, in particular but without limitation, if found by the Panel to be present, shall be evidence of the registration and use of a domain name in bad faith:
(i) circumstances indicating that you have registered or you have acquired the domain name primarily for the purpose of selling, renting, or otherwise transferring the domain name registration to the complainant who is the owner of the trademark or service mark or to a competitor of that complainant, for valuable consideration in excess of your documented out-of-pocket costs directly related to the domain name; or
(ii) you have registered the domain name in order to prevent the owner of the trademark or service mark from reflecting the mark in a corresponding domain name, provided that you have engaged in a pattern of such conduct; or
(iii) you have registered the domain name primarily for the purpose of disrupting the business of a competitor; or
(iv) by using the domain name, you have intentionally attempted to attract, for commercial gain, Internet users to your web site or other on-line location, by creating a likelihood of confusion with the complainant's mark as to the source, sponsorship, affiliation, or endorsement of your web site or location or of a product or service on your web site or location.