[At-Large] ALAC statement on Domain Tasting

[Izumi AIZU]

Dear Alan, I have read the draft statement, and am quite happy
with the current wording.

best,

izumi

2007/11/27, Alan Greenberg <alan.greenberg at mcgill.ca>:
> Earlier this year, the ALAC requested that ICANN develop an Issues
> Report on Domain Tasting. Although the ICANN Bylaws allow an Advisory
> Committee to request such reports, this was the first (and so far
> only) time that a committee had actually done so.
>
> The Issues report
> (http://gnso.icann.org/issues/domain-tasting/gnso-domain-tasting-report-14jun07.pdf)
> was issued in June and sent to the GNSO for further action. The
> ALAC's request for the Issues Report is at the end of the report. The
> GNSO charted an ad hoc group to further investigate and propose Terms
> of Reference for a possible Policy Development Process (PDP). That
> group's report can be found at
> http://www.gnso.icann.org/drafts/gnso-domain-tasting-adhoc-outcomes-report-final.pdf.
>
> At the LA ICANN meeting, the GNSO decided that domain tasting merited
> further action, and voted to initiate a PDP. Constituency input has
> been solicited and is due by December 5th. Although not a GNSO
> constituency, input from the ALAC has been requested as well (a
> first, I believe).
>
> The statements will be combined by ICANN staff, and the result will
> go back to the GNSO. To the extent that more work may need to be done
> at that time, working groups will likely be formed.
>
> The ALAC meeting on Nov. 20th accepted that we should contribute a
> statement to the process, but that it did not need to be exhaustive
> (for reasons of both time and that our actions had initiated the activity).
>
> I propose the following statement.  Comments and suggestions welcome.
>
> =======================
>
> ALAC "Constituency" statement regarding the PDP on Domain Tasting
>
> The ALAC is pleased to have been asked to submit a statement
> regarding the newly launched GNSO Policy Development Process (PDP) on
> Domain Tasting.
>
> Domain tasting is the use of legitimate ICANN-approved processes to
> register a domain, test if there is any substantial traffic (perhaps
> because it was recently in use by someone else or is similar to
> another regularly used domain), and if not, cancel the registration
> at no net cost to the registrant.
>
> The issue of domain tasting has been regularly been discussed since
> the phenomena began in 2005 - and with good reason. In January 2005,
> before the practice was common, for .com and .net, there were about
> 1.7 million domains registered and 0.7 million domains deleted for a
> net increase of 1.0 million domains. By the end of the month, there
> were just over 40 million total domains registered.
>
> Two years later, at the end of January 2007, the total number of
> domains had increased by 78% to 72 million domains. However, in
> January 2007, there were 51 million domains registered and 48 million
> domains deleted. That is, there was a net increase of 3 million
> names, but most of the rest were just being "tasted".
>
> In the period since January 2007, the practice has grown even more.
> Although the practice is relatively widely used, the majority of
> tasting was being done by just three registrars, all of which have
> the same address, telephone number and formation date.
>
> The ALAC initiated the formal investigation of domain tasting by
> requesting that ICANN develop an Issues Report. This was done with
> the support of several GNSO constituencies. Ultimately, the Issues
> Report was delivered to the GNSO and at the ICANN meeting in Los
> Angeles, the GNSO decided to undertake a PDP with the intent of
> further understanding the effects of domain tasting and if
> appropriate, recommend measures to impede domain tasting.
>
> The ALAC is not only pleased that the GNSO has taken this action, but
> is particularly pleased that the action was taken with a 72% vote
> where only >33% was required to initiate a PDP. This indicated wide
> GNSO constituency support for the action. Although each constituency
> may have different reasons for supporting the process, it is
> nonetheless encouraging that the end target is the same.
>
> The GNSO has chosen to solicit constituency statements and most
> likely will create one or more working groups to further investigate
> domain tasting.
>
>  From the ALAC's perspective, our main concerns were raised in the
> request for the Issues Report and with the possible exception of the
> reference to Facilitation of Criminal Activity, the positions remain
> valid. The ALAC advocates any and all actions that will reduce or
> eliminate domain tasting. It will support the PDP in whatever ways
> are most productive to better understand the impacts of domain
> tasting and to ultimately meet this end.
>
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>
>


-- 
                        >> Izumi Aizu <<

           Institute for HyperNetwork Society, Oita
           Kumon Center, Tama University, Tokyo
                                  Japan
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