As tricky top level domains still remain to be tackled, ICANN treks on

There might not be that many people fully aware of the new and enlarged name space out there on the internet. Have you ever thought about buying a .yoga, .abogado or .wedding top level domain (TLD)? All is available or will soon be. 1,200 names might flood the net in two years from now. Those pushing for a second round of TLD applications could win the day. Will the hundreds of TLDs still be alive when the next round of applicants make their way to the internet? That’s more difficult to foresee.

Tricky TLDs still to tackle as ICANN trekking towards next round

430 new top level domains - from the digital red ribbon site .hiv to the online .poker hall, from .alsace to .gmx - have been delegated by the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN). That is, since it started the new generic top level domain (gTLD) programme in 2012. While no major technical problem arose during what had been fiercely debated for years, not everybody is in for a quick reiteration. Governments tirelessly push for a minimum threshold to protect end users in the multi-TLD world. The industry is divided over how fair round one was, where community applications such as .gay failed to get priority. Yet ICANN’s Generic TLD Division embarked on its review process to prepare for a round two, possibly as early as 2016.

During an ICANN meeting held in Los Angeles in October, ICANN’s Top Level Domain Division president, Akram Attalah, presented the review plans of the mega project that resulted in 1,900 applications for new TLDs. ICANN is doing a baseline study at the beginning of next year, to be reiterated a year later. Both the policy process of the Generic Name Supporting Organisation - the body in charge of reforming and adjusting the application policy and, the root operation - to understand effects with regard to the technical load and performance, are under review.

ICANN has started the review of the gTLD programme, as required by its commitment to do so one year after launch. The idea is to ensure that the organisation is ready for round two in time. End of 2016 could be the earliest date for another edition of the gTLD application. “But we think, it might take longer,” Atallah told the Governmental Advisory Committee in October.

TLD application process needs to be fixed

Governments are not at all convinced by ICANN's timeline. In Los Angeles, they did not only warn about the overloaded work programmes of ICANN’s self-governance bodies. They also mentioned the organisation’s grappling with the transition of the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA) from US government to some still undefined community oversight (see related article); enhancing ICANN's sometimes questioned accountability; as well as reforming core aspects of the domain name management system, such as the Whois query and response protocol.

Julia Wolman, Head of Section at the Danish Ministry of Business and Growth said: “The evaluation of the round that we're still discussing or implementing will take place at the same time as the new policy development will start.“ Her German colleague, Hubert Schoettner from the Ministry of Economics, concurrently expressed his concern over the fact that ICANN has only delegated the less controversial, yet on the “last mile” the more difficult, delegation procedure (auctions or otherwise).

Government representatives by the way also consider that the delegated TLDs have not fully implemented the safeguards they had requested. The most recent Governmental Advisory Committee Communique includes a long list of “Safeguard advice applicable to all new gTLDs in category one (consumer protection, sensitive strings and regulated markets) and in category two (restricted registration policy strings). ICANN is “strongly advised“ to implement the accuracy of domain name owner data collections (Whois data), validation of credentials and also sanctions where new gTLD operators do not comply.

Community TLDs: more competition outside the US

While the ever tighter regulation on domain names is looked at by parts of the industry as a power grab and content regulation, this view is not shared by the ICANN business, academic and technical communities. This said, fairness problems with the new TLD attribution process have been raised by many.

In close to 1,200 new top level domains, only 35 are non-english language names, 34 are geographical locations and, 19 refer to communities. The new TLD programme in essence has a bias towards countries of the Northern hemisphere and those more developed.

With regard to community TLDs, the talk of the day in Los Angeles was the rejection of community status for .gay by the Community Evaluation Panel for what the panel called a lack of nexus to the gay community. The applicant dot.gay, who now faces an auction process with three other applicants that did not ask for a community slot, but have much deeper pockets, will most certainly ask ICANN for reconsideration of that decision. Yet the case has drawn its toll on ICANN, with not only governments, but also non-commercial user and industry representatives complaining about it not being fair.

“ICANN could be accused of having developed its own elite,“ said Werner Staub of the Swiss service provider Axone, and Secretary of the CORE Council of Registrars. In 2007, the original policy, Staub said, wanted community to be interpreted broadly. “What came out in 2012 was nothing of the sort, with the most shocking thing being “this barrage of opposition to ICANN“. A reconsideration of the community application policy is pretty certain after the .gay case, one must reckon.

Will new TLDs succeed?

One question that has not yet been fully answered is, how, if at all, can the new gTLDs become an economic success, given the prolonged processes and the big buck – around at least 500,000 dollars according to experts – to get an application in and going. Even in earlier rounds when there was only a handful of new TLDs on the starting blocks, some failed. That’s the case of the ten-year-old .pro (for professionals) or .name (for personal names).

Economically, warned Elliot Noss, Chief Executive Officer of the Canadian registrar Tucows, a bias towards the US market will remain – despite the ongoing political transiting out of IANA from direct US government control.

How many new TLDs will try to get in next time? Expect hundreds or thousands.