GNSO working group

Thu Jun 18 21:34:32 CEST 2009

OMG!   I'm shocked 'criticism as abuse' got so far into a proposal.   
It has to be knocked out as it does contradict well-established law  
and violate free expression rights.

And I also agree that the careless cease and desist and takedown  
notices sent by trademark holders using the whois data is another  
abuse.  The Chilling Effects website is a complete catalogue of this  
type of abuse.  I also thought that abuse needed to be added to this  
list.

It will be difficult for any single person to take on the IPC and BC  
and their dozens of (paid lobbyist) participants in this working  
group to get these points across with no other support.  We need to  
populate this working group with more participants and we need to  
work with the registries and the registrars to bring this proposal  
back in line with the law.

Do we have any volunteers to join this group and help Edward fight  
for non-commercial interests in this policy's development?

Thanks!
Robin

On Jun 18, 2009, at 12:20 PM, Milton L Mueller wrote:

> Wow. I just noticed that the list of abuses contains “gripe/ 
> commentary” sites. In other words, this is an attempt to define  
> free expression and commentary using trademarked names as an abuse  
> – it is just an attempt to stifle criticism.
>
> Edward, that has to go. First, it does not represent well- 
> established positions of this constituency; second it is literally  
> ILLEGAL under U.S.law – it is well settled case law now that the  
> use of trademarked names in grip domains is legal and protected by  
> the First Amendment.
>
> From: Non-Commercial User Constituency [mailto:NCUC- 
> DISCUSS at LISTSERV.SYR.EDU] On Behalf Of Edward Nunes
> Sent: Tuesday, June 16, 2009 8:16 PM
> To: NCUC-DISCUSS at LISTSERV.SYR.EDU
> Subject: Re: [NCUC-DISCUSS] GNSO working group
>
> Hey all,
> I just wanted to update you all on what's been happening with the  
> Registration Abuse Policy Working Group.
> Since I joined the GNSO Registration Abuse Policies Working Group  
> the discussion within the group has focused on the definition of  
> registration abuse. During the April 27th meeting we decided on a  
> working definition of abuse:
>
> Abuse is an action that:
> 1. Causes actual and substantial harm, or is a material predicate  
> of such harm, and
> 2. Is illegal or illegitimate, or is otherwise considered contrary  
> to the intention and design of a stated legitimate purpose, if such  
> purpose is disclosed.
> Notes:
> * This is a working definition as per group consensus on April 27,  
> 2009 and may be re-visited should the WG find it inadequate after  
> examining some specific examples.
> * The party or parties harmed, and the substance or severity of the  
> abuse, should be identified and discussed in relation to a specific  
> proposed abuse.
> * The term "harm" is not intended to shield a party from fair  
> market competition.
> * The above definition of abuse is indebted to the definition of  
> "misuse" in the document "Working Definitions for Key Terms that  
> May be Used in Future WHOIS Studies" prepared by the GNSO Drafting  
> Team [18 February 2009, at http://gnso.icann.org/issues/whois/whois- 
> working-definitions-study-terms-18feb09.pdf].
> While this is the definition we are sticking with for now, there  
> has been numerous issued raised about this definition both in and  
> outside the working group. Issues raised included:
> ·      The use of “stated” and “disclosed in clause 2 is redundant.
> ·      The use of “illegal” and “illegitimate” in clause 2 is  
> redundant.
> ·      There should be an intent requirement for violators, so as  
> to limit abuse to malicious abusers.
> ·      “Illegal” is too vague of a term, as the law varies among  
> the jurisdictions of the world.
> ·      “Harm” is too broad of a term.
> ·      The section “material predicate of such harm” creates an  
> overly broad definition of abuse.
> ·      “Illegitimate” is too vague of a term.
> ·      “Illegal” is a legal conclusion derived from a court  
> proceeding.
> o     There has been some preliminary talk about the process to  
> determine if whether something constitutes registration abuse, but  
> no decisions have been made on this subject.
> While we are sticking with this definition for now, we understand  
> there are issues with it and expect to revisit it at a later time.
> In the May 11th meeting we focused on defining “registration”, and  
> how this definition will effect the scope of the working group. It  
> appears that there is no easily borrowed definition of  
> “registration” from ICANN, and there is debate about whether  
> registration abuse can only occur at the exact moment in time the  
> registration is created, or whether it can refer to an abuse at any  
> time regarding registration.
> This debate on the definition of "registration" in registration  
> abuse continued into the June 1st meeting.  As RAP-WG member George  
> Kirikos put it, the problem was a definitional one as to whether  
> registration refers to a) the act of registering, or b) an entry in  
> a register.
> This definitional issue was important because, for example, if  
> registration were taken to mean an entry in a register a person who  
> registered a domain name could be found guilty of registration  
> abuse for causing consumer confusion with a site that was  
> registered after it.  While there was much debate we determined  
> that registration abuse refers to abuse at the time of registration  
> because abuse after registration would be abuse of domain use, not  
> abuse of domain registration.
>
> At our most recent meeting we started gearing up for compiling more  
> information on types of registration abuse, a major part of the RAP- 
> WG charter.  A preliminary list of abuses is available at http:// 
> tinyurl.com/l8kzsb.  We began discussing the abuses on this list,  
> but there is still much more work to be done.  This topic will be  
> continued to worked on in the coming weeks/months.
>
> And that's the word from the RAP-WG.
>
> Sincerely,
> Ed Nunes

IP JUSTICE
Robin Gross, Executive Director
1192 Haight Street, San Francisco, CA  94117  USA
p: +1-415-553-6261    f: +1-415-462-6451
w: http://www.ipjustice.org     e: robin at ipjustice.org

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