RIAA, music industry unsatisfied with Draft gTLD guidelines

[Michael Haffely]

In a letter to ICANN<http://forum.icann.org/lists/5gtld-guide/pdfZuXmEV9jtt.pdf>(
http://forum.icann.org/lists/5gtld-guide/pdfZuXmEV9jtt.pdf)  Victoria
Scheckler, Deputy General Council of the Recording Industry of America
writes:

*"Under the current proposed standard, we fear that we will have no
realistic ability to object if a pirate chooses to hijack a music themed
gTLD to enable wide scale copyright infringement of our works."*

It appears that some of the Commercial contingent are upset with the Draft
Guidelines and are falling back on FUD tactics with the implied hint that
Piracy and other nefarious things will be perpetuated under the new gTLD
DAG.  I've seen some real "Movie Plot" scenarios thrown about on the
internet with regards to security and piracy -- this one is a whole new
level of silly.  Hijacking a whole TLD?

Pinning your argument on nebulous and heretofore unseen problems like gTLD
hijacking for the benefit of Piracy, in my opinion this removes the
legitimacy of the underpinnings and logic for the position the RIAA is
attempting to make.

I take umbrage as a non-commercial user at the threats hinted at if they
don't get their way, it's great that they have all sorts of lawyers and
groups to represent their interests, but they need to realize that they are
not the only users/concern for policymakers.  Content Providers need to
understand that the internet is for everyone, and compromise is oftentimes
needed in an imperfect world.

Ars Technica<http://arstechnica.com/web/news/2011/01/big-content-to-icann-make-it-easier-for-us-to-challenge-domain-suffixes.ars>also
has a summary of this as they see it. (
http://arstechnica.com/web/news/2011/01/big-content-to-icann-make-it-easier-for-us-to-challenge-domain-suffixes.ars
)

Just my .02

-Mike
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