ICANN has slammed the American Association of National Advertisers for not understanding the new generic Top Level Domains process, saying the "assertions in your letter are either incorrect or problematic in several respects. Perhaps the most severe mischaracterisations concern the ICANN process."
The letter from Rod Beckstrom, ICANN CEO and President, to the ANA's Robert Liodice, also CEO and President, is one of the most scathing letters the organisation has sent, repudiating assertions of what ICANN has, or has not done.
The ANA originally wrote to ICANN earlier this month seething about the new gTLD process. But the organisation appears to have been asleep at the wheel as the process developing new gTLDs has been ongoing since around 2005 and the application guidebook was approved in June. Trademark holders/brand owners have been prolific in their views on the introduction of new gTLDs, driving changes to the applicant guidebook. While ICANN note that the ANA have previously participated in the consultation process back in 2008, one has to ask why the ANA has only seriously woken up to the process now.
Back to the ICANN response. Beckstrom's letter, repudiating the assertion there has been a lack of public comment, says that "multiple public meetings and at least 45 lengthy public comment periods were conducted and thousands of comments, representing a broad range of interests, were received" while all public comments, including those from the ANA, were considered in the decision-making process.
One has to wonder if anyone at the ANA involved in writing the letter had actually read the applicant guidebook with its incorrect assertions.
"Your letter also claims that the program represents 'unrestricted expansion' or allows 'virtually any word or phrase.' These statements demonstrate a lack of understanding of Program details. More research on your part would have revealed: (i) restrictions on delegation rates; (ii) string requirements and limitations; (iii) required applicant background, financial and technical qualifications; (iv) objection processes for infringing and other inappropriately applied-for strings; and (v) standing registry operator obligations in the registry agreement."
Another assertion refuted regards quotes from economic studies that claim more gTLDs will lead to security lapses and financial burdens.
ICANN demolishes this assertion saying "your quotations from the economic studies are highly selective and lead to an unsupported conclusion that more domain names will lead to cyber security lapses or consumer privacy violations. Your claim of 'enormous financial burdens' and other broad statements are offered without supporting data or rationale. I invite you to review the entire set of economic studies, which explored the current marketplace, and applied expert analysis to an examination of the potential risks and benefits as far as possible (noting that the benefits of innovation are difficult to predict)."
The ANA also wrongly claims companies will have no choice but to apply for a gTLD. Something categorically denied by ICANN.
One point the ANA did get right was that the economic "studies recommended the implementation of additional protections against trademark abuse and malicious conduct." But as ICANN note, the organisation "formed teams of internationally recognised experts to adopt both these recommendations and incorporate many significant new safeguards into the program." Some of the changes introduced into the guidebook were the establishment of a Trademark Clearinghouse and the implementation of a Uniform Rapid Suspension system.
In 2008 when the ANA wrote to ICANN commenting on the new gTLD process, they suggested five specific proposals. One proposal concerned trademark protection, and ICANN say that as a result of theirs and other suggestions the IRT was introduced. Similarly with the other suggestions from the ANA transparency, registration information, application fees, general process issues and generic terms for TLDs such as bank and insurance, changes were made that reflected comments, largely satisfying the concerns of the ANA back then.
In conclusion, ICANN say they "will vigorously defend the multi-stakeholder model and the hard-fought consensus of its global stakeholder participants, its duty to act in accordance with established bottom-up processes, and its responsibility to the broad public interest of the global Internet community, rather than to the specific interests of any particular group."
"As you may be aware, ICANN's activities extend beyond this program. It works for the benefit of the public interest, including your organisation, in ways large and small."
All in all this belated outburst by the ANA being critical of the new gTLD process when their original concerns were largely addressed with changes made to the application process must be deeply embarrassing to the organisation. And ANA members should be very concerned about how the organisation represents them.
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