<Ben_Edelman> UDRP Policy?

<Lawrence_Lessig> UDRP -- no; competition among dispute policies -- yes

<Karl_Auerbach> That particular decision and several others trouble me. But, in general, I believe the UDRP process makes sense and needs improvement. One improvement would involve ICANN making some clear policy statements that would be binding. Another would be establishing an administrative review process.

<Lyman_Chapin> The specific case clearly flies in the face of common sense, and also the way in which trademark law is applied in "the real world." The UDRP is inconsistently applied. ICANN has no authority to make or enforce trademark law.

<Karl_Auerbach> 2. The UDRP should only remedy actual actions that constitute infringement or defamation in the jurisdiction in which the act occurs.

<Karl_Auerbach> 3. The maximum remedy should be that the complained-of action should cease, not that the name be expropriated.

<Karl_Auerbach> see http://www.cavebear.com/ialc/platform.htm#dnspol-udrp

<Ben_Edelman> Does this really matter? Perhaps ICANN itself will soon be obsolete?

<Barbara_Simons> Search engines are

<Emerson_Tiller> domain names facilitate the communication of ideas and the ability to self-identify. They are very important because PEOPLE THINK THEY ARE IMPORTANT. That's enough.

<Lyman_Chapin> I agree. The association with trademarks and other commercial semantics "overloads" domain names and makes them artificially important. Better tools for identifying information on the web would drive much of the domain name dispute off the table.

<Karl_Auerbach> I personally hope that DNS names will cease being search keys in the mind of the public.

<Karl_Auerbach> But that's not going to happen soon.

<Karl_Auerbach> But what most people don't realize is that DNS queries are frequently intercepted and interpreted in the context of the user's geographic location and even their personal identity.

<Barbara_Simons> Suppose you drove a Ford with Firestone tires and you wanted to create a web site in the hope of finding others who had been in similar situations. How would you identify your domain if you couldn't use "Firestone" in the domain name?

<Barbara_Simons> However, I also agree that domain names were invented at a time when the commercial demands on the Internet were not understood. If they were, I suspect that the current system wouldn't have been chosen.

<Karl_Auerbach> Answer to Barbara: Firestone will have to engage in a marketing campaign to put forward whatever net identity it may have. But it should not have the right to pre-empt the name from other's who use the name "Firestone", such as a person I work with.

<Barbara_Simons> I agree, Karl.

<Karl_Auerbach> There can be many parallal naming systems on the net - just as there can be many phone kinds of phone directories.

<Barbara_Simons> My point was that that person should be able to have Does_Firestone_Make_Dangerous_Tires as a domain name. (I should add that I am assuming that this happened prior to the revelations about Firestone.

<Ben_Edelman> Has ICANN appropriately interpreted its mission to date?

<Lawrence_Lessig> There is no line; there is a bias. The aim should be to make decisions that leave as much to a competitive process of policy making -- not centralized -- as possible.

<Harris_Miller> ICANN's activities have been consistent with its mission. Decisions are rarely purely technical in the naming and numbering world, but ICANN should not go beyond naming and numbering issues to other policy issues such as Internet privacy, Internet taxation, consumer protection, etc.

<Barbara_Simons> ICANN has been engaging in policy decisions that it should not be making, in particular relating to trademark.

<Emerson_Tiller> TECHNOLOGY CHOICES ARE POLICY CHOICES. Let's call it what it is. If we don't, we'll rob ourselves of transparency, broad participation, and processes that attach naturally to policy decision making.

<Barbara_Simons> I also agree that we should have a large number of new TLDs. This would help defuse some of the IP related controversies.

<Karl_Auerbach> Answer to Emerson: Yes, technical choices are policy choices, that's why I draw the line based on the immediacy of the cause to the effect

<Barbara_Simons> I also agree with Larry that it's difficult to draw a clean line. My choice would be to minimize ICANN's involvement with policy. It should focus as much as possible on technical questions.

<Karl_Auerbach> Comment to Barbara: Much of the light shining on ICANN has been on the matter of domain names, but the larger, and far more technical issue is the allocation of IP addresses.

<Barbara_Simons> I know.

<Karl_Auerbach> No

<Karl_Auerbach> And the UDRP was created by a process that was itself unacceptable.

<Karl_Auerbach> Let's not forget that the Department of Commerce (repeat "Commerce") has indicated that it will retain ultimate control of the DNS and IP address space.

<Ben_Edelman> Plans as an ICANN Board Member? Intended achievements?

<Lawrence_Lessig> preserving and expanding the at-large board membership; building an at large forum for more sustained and meaningful input from the at large community

<Karl_Auerbach> I'd be happy if "the Internet Community" (you and me) can say that our views have been heard and considered and that we know how decisions were made.

<Karl_Auerbach> "Consensus" is a weapon in the hands of a chairman with an agenda.

<Emerson_Tiller> By ICANN standards, a dungeon would be "open".

<Lyman_Chapin> ICANN viewed by all of its constituencies - business, government, and individual - as the legitimate body for the discussion and resolution of issues concerning domain names, IP numbers, and the operation of the root server system.

<Karl_Auerbach> See http://www.cavebear.com/ialc/platform.htm#open-trans for my notes on "open, transparent, and accountable" processes.

<Karl_Auerbach> How can the electors in future ICANN elections know whether to send a board member back or send him/her unless the electors can see how that person voted?

<Karl_Auerbach> Open and transparent processes are not complicated - either we (the Internet Community) can participate and know what is going on or we can't.

<Karl_Auerbach> ICANN *IS* meeting in secret behind closed doors.

<Karl_Auerbach> Montains of e-mail.

<Karl_Auerbach> One of ICANN's largest expenses has been its legal fees. And a goodly chunk of that has been spent to keep the at-large from having any rights or direct voice in policy making. Should it be a surprise if there isn't a lot of sympathy for ICANN's finances from those of use from the "at large"?

<Ben_Edelman> How to fund ICANN?

<Karl_Auerbach> One of ICANN's largest expenses has been its legal fees. And a goodly chunk of those fees have been spent trying to prevent the at-large from having

<Barbara_Simons> A related question is why ICANN has been so expensive to run. As Karl says, there have been a lot of legal fees. If I am elected to the Board, I'll request to see an analysis of the expenses.

<Barbara_Simons> In addition, ICANN should be audited annually, as are other organizations such as ACM, and that information should be made public.

<Karl_Auerbach> any meaningful rights. Thus it is understandable if some at-large members have less than an overwhelming sympathy for ICANN's financial straits.

<Harris_Miller> I disagree with Professor Lessig re the $50K fee. There's gold in them thar hills for those who are selected to manage gTLDs, and the fee is an investment which many people/organizations are willing to make, even for public interest TLD's.

<Ben_Edelman> ICANN Expenses - see http://www.icann.org/financials

<Lyman_Chapin> Registrars are scattered all over the world; it would be very difficult to collect fees for domain registration from all of these sources sitting in many different legal jurisdictions. I recommend charging a fee to maintain a TLD resource record in the root zone database.

<Karl_Auerbach> The TLD slot application fee should be that set for NSI - $6.

<Emerson_Tiller> AUCTION OFF OF TOP LEVEL DOMAIN NAMES -- They're worth millions.

<Karl_Auerbach> Do we allocate IP address space by auction?

<Harris_Miller> I disagree with Professor Tiller re the auction. Someone who has no connection to the union movement could bid millions of dollars and win based on the price, even though the unions had no input.

<Lyman_Chapin> Domains are valuable when they are used (advertised by the root servers), not when they are registered.

<Karl_Auerbach> To my mind governments ought to be presumed to be representative of their citizens.

<Barbara_Simons> If ICANN is going to charge for TLDs, they should have some kind of sliding scale so that organizations that want to offer free or very low cost dlmain names, eg in economically disadvantaged countries, would be able to do so.

<Ben_Edelman> Foreign government influence over ICANN?

<Lawrence_Lessig> If ICANN goes slowly, keeping itself focused on a narrow task, it is less likely to excite the attention of government. If it doesn't go slowly, then it deserves the attention of government.

<Harris_Miller> Governments generally do not want to interfere with ICANN, and will probably resist from doing so as long as ICANN sticks to its knitting.

<Karl_Auerbach> To Lyman: Yes, *use* of a domain name is critical, particularly with regard to deciding whether some mark (or other name) is being abused.

<Karl_Auerbach> We ought not to engage in hypothetical invention as to whether a domain name holder intends to abuse a name - we need to look to actual conduct, actual use of the domainname.

<Karl_Auerbach> There should be no such thing as cybersquatting - speculation is an honored economic activity. Now, use of a domain name may be actionable, but mere speculation ought to be acceptable.

<Karl_Auerbach> Proof of identity ought to occur as a phase after a connection is established.

<Karl_Auerbach> This is what encryption/authentication is for.

<Karl_Auerbach> When you make a phone call do you assume that the person at the other end is always the person who bought the phone number?

<Lyman_Chapin> ICANN is trying to reconcile its status as a creature of the U.S. Dept. of Commerce with the larger role that has been thrust upon it as an experiment in establishing a legitimate governing organization for the Internet community. Maintaining this tenuous position requires support from many sources, including governments; and ICANN would suffer if it lost support from any of these sources.

<Karl_Auerbach> MacDonalds-sucks.com is a perfectly legit nominative use of the term "MacDonalds" - it clearly identifies who sucks.

<Karl_Auerbach> Agreed!!!!!!!!!!

<Lyman_Chapin> Every time ICANN agrees to do the specific bidding of an agency of the United States, it loses credibility with the rest of the world and with the Internet community.

<Karl_Auerbach> (By-the-way, the net is more than the world-wide-web.)

<Emerson_Tiller> The UDRP needs reformed, not dropped. If we don't have international body resolving these rights, we'll get inconsistent laws across national jurisdictions.

<Karl_Auerbach> Should we create Internet law based on the expectations of the naive or should we educate the users?

<Ben_Edelman> Support adoption by ICAN of TLDs used in alternative roots?

<Karl_Auerbach> I already have cavebear.web - but then again, I don't use the Dept of Commerce root system

<Lawrence_Lessig> The presumption is yes.

<Harris_Miller> I agree with Lyman.

<Karl_Auerbach> See http://www.cavebear.com/ialc/platform.htm#dnspol-tldpol

<Emerson_Tiller> Yes, grandfathering would be a good idea. But ICANN should have procedures to examine this closely.

<Karl_Auerbach> ICANN - the velvateen organization.