[At-Large] New gTLDs

[RJGlass | America@Large]

Vittorio, I kinda agree.  I agree that we need not necessarily judge the
success of a domain, but what we are doing is trying to protect the
stability of the web.  Taking .cat as an example, I agree that this serves
its unique purpose and they should be afforded their own TLD.  However, does
it have to be a globally-resolvable TLD sanctioned by ICANN?  Well, could be
but doesn't need to be.  Newnet (new.net) has proven that it can
successfully offer TLDs that are globally resolvable, but not sanctioned by
ICANN.  If .cat were to go through the same or similar process, it would
still be .cat and it would still work and it would still be a success.
Similarly, I could run my own DNS server from my bedroom and anyone I choose
could have access to my TLD and I could call it whatever I want.

This is actually the heart of my argument, to which I'm glad to have brought
up.  If a TLD is to be ICANN-sanctioned, then we need to put more thought
into this matter, otherwise our policies could be our downfall.  I've always
liked what new.net has implemented, but I can't say their management
policies are any better than ICANNs by any stretch.  Similarly, there is
absolutely nothing standing in the way of an ISP offering .nyc as a TLD,
running their own DNS, and allowing their customers to use it, and setting
their own policies.  However, if they did, every time there was an outage
then their section of the web wouldn't work, but it only wouldn't work for
their DNS rather than the entire Internet.  I think this is where we should
tread carefully because if it were perceived that ICANN were inept (ummm,
from outside the organization) then we would at that point lose the battle.

What battle?  Fulfilling the by-laws of the organization.

Anyone can run a DNS, but when ICANN says so-and-so is a TLD, I take it to
mean that it will be globally resolvable using the root-servers.  Feel free
to edit this statement.

Finally, I don't think anyone, including me is saying that the likes of
.jobs, .aero, .museum, .coop, et al are failures or useless or anything of
the type, any more than .cx would be a failure or useless.  I kind of like
the ideas behind those TLDs, but I do question the scope of our concern.  I
wholeheartedly disagree that ICANN should just open the registry and say
'fight it out' just to add revenues and more choices and disregard
standardization, not to mention confusion for trademark holders.  Rather,
the issue at hand is how it affects the population of Internet users, ie
does it serve a purpose or just confuse the namespace?  Additionally, What
is the purpose of ICANN?

aloha,
Randy Glass
A at L


On 7/6/07, Vittorio Bertola <vb at bertola.eu> wrote:
>
> John L ha scritto:
> >> It is my opinion that we need to dedicate some more thought on this
> matter
> >> BEFORE, rather than AFTER introducing new TLDs.
> >
> > I'm with you.  Of the new gTLDs, the only ones that have succeeded so
> far
> > are .BIZ and .INFO, because they're clones of .COM.  Maybe you could
> call
> > .NAME a success with about 200,000 names.  I think .MOBI is likely to
> > succeed because it's going to be put in front of a whole lot of mobile
> > phone users.  Other than that, they're all gathering dust.  On the other
>
> It depends on how you measure success. .CAT only has 20'000 names, yet
> it is a success. No doubt - just ask anyone in Barcelona. I think that
> we should stop measuring the success of TLDs in terms of sheer number of
> registrations, as there's much more attached to that. If you like, I'd
> propose - in qualitative terms - the product of the number of
> registrations by how much registrants feel attached to or identify with
> the domain: that'd already be better. Given that you can have at least
> several thousands of TLDs, if you only have a few thousands of
> registrants but that TLD really makes a difference to them in emotional
> or symbolic terms, why not?
>
> In any case, I have started to write down what I would like to see as
> principles and values to guide the introduction of new TLDs. If we all
> do the same, we might come up with a common statement. I already
> solicited a statement from the Committee several times, because the
> issue will certainly come up in Board discussion in the next weeks; so I
> would suggest that someone takes the lead on this, and we start up yet
> another consultation and working group.
> --
> vb.                   Vittorio Bertola - vb [a] bertola.eu   <--------
> -------->  finally with a new website at http://bertola.eu/  <--------
>



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