ICANN Responds To gTLD Plan Comments

angry tapir writes "ICANN has delayed its plans to sell new generic top-level domains while responding to public comments about the controversial proposal. The organization has released a 154-page document detailing and analyzing the hundreds of comments (PDF) it has received about its gTLD plan. In response to several concerns brought up by the public and companies in the Internet industry, ICANN has moved out the projected timeline for taking applications for new gTLDs from September to December."

Comments

Existing non-Internet Registrars

[surmak]

We already have too many gTLDs. What is the difference between foo.com and foo.net? Most likely foo.com got there first, and then foo.net was the second comer. The only reason I can see for allowing new top-level domains is to provide a reference to organizations that already exist within another globally unique registry of some sort.

The best example of such a registry I can think of is the callsign of a radio station. These are globally unique (the first letter or two identified the country, and the rest is assigned by the radio regulatory authority of that country (in the US, the FCC). Thus, I could see adding a TLD .radio, which would be limited to callsigns as the second level domain. (e.g. wkrp.radio)

Other such global registries could include UPC or ISBN prefixes. PCI, USB or ethernet manufacturer IDs, or the like are also globally unique ID's and may be worth putting into DNS.

Gated Community TLDs

[RevWaldo]

Just a thought experiment. Suppose you set up a TLD - .bob for instance. Users can set up domains for web sites, e-mail, FTP etc. within .bob just like any other domain, but the rules of using it are different from the rest of the web. Such as -

Web -
- Only other .bob account holders can access .bob sites. No one else can get in, not even google.
- .bob sites cannot be accessed anonymously, but .bob sites must guarantee privacy - your usage can't be shared with anyone else.

E-mail and IM -
- No anonymous addresses or accounts. .bob e-mail addresses or chat names must be linked to an actual person.
- .bob users can only send/receive e-mails or IM to other .bob addresses. Nothing outside .bob is allowed in.
- Spam is not allowed. At all. You spam, you lose your .bob access

Content -
- Your .bob account comes with a license with nearly all known media companies. (www.timewarner.bob, for instance.) For a monthly fee you can access any media they have digitized - books, news, film, music, games, software, etc. It's DRMed out the wazoo, of course. All usage is tracked. Violate the terms of use and you lose your .bob access.

In other words, a fully privatized portion of the internet. A nightmare to some, but to others - "Access to all media? No spam? $39.95 a month? Where do I sign?"

Other TLDs could set up other ecologies. .ftw might only allow services that are fully encrypted and anonymous, for example.

Is there anything that would prevent TLD owners from doing this?

trademark

[Lord Ender]

Even US trademark law does not scale well to the Internet. I can't imagine the disaster GTLDs would be for international trademark disputes. The IP lawyers must be licking their lips at the thought of GTLDs.