To: process.mail@wipo.int
Subject: WIPO RFC3 comments
From: "Christian Mogensen"
Date: Mon, 16 Apr 2001 16:53:32 +0200
Comments by Christian Mogensen, an individual residing in Oslo, Norway.
item 43: INNs
INNs should not be afforded special protections in the TLDs. If the WHO is worried about misleading information being published on the internet, it may be best to create a special gTLD to contain only WHO sanctioned information. e.g.: ibuprofen.who or ibuprofen.drug
Alternatively, if a new gTLD is not desired, and INNs in the current gTLDs are embargoed, then the WHO should be charged with maintaining informational sites at the INN domains. (with power comes responsibility and obligation)
item 49-52: INN Protection.
Only the INN by itself should be protected. INN+"anything else" should not be affected. e.g. amoxicillin-sucks.com should be allowed.
bayer-amoxicillin.com should be allowed.
Misspellings should not be protected.
Item 83: Automatic exclusion of INNs
Translations should be excluded, but not automatically excluded. (i.e. resolve translations of INN names using the UDRP) (of course, if a new INN-specific gTLD were created, then these issues go away, since the WHO can have as many DNS aliases as it likes within its own domain)
Item 112: .int gTLD
Maintain the status quo. Petition ICANN to have the rules governing .int registration harmonized with TRIPS and the Paris Convention.
Item 115: IGO Acronym protection.
Acronyms should not be protected. The UDRP is enough to solve these. who.com is appropriate to (for example) the band "The Who", and also the (fictitious) "Wharton Health Organization". If the WHO feels that either of these uses might be infringeing, then let it use the UDRP. Otherwise the WHO should use and promote who.int as its domain name.
Item 123: exclusion of IGO names
Given that most of these names tend towards 40 characters or more in length, we could probably be safe in giving them this exclusion. However, this is the first step on the slippery slope to giving special interest exclusions for international corporate names, famous names, movie titles.
Just say no.
Item 124: exclusion of IGO Acronyms
No. There are simply too many other, legitimate expansions of an acronym to allow IGOs a blanket exclusion. The UDRP should be sufficient to deal with those cases where a deliberate effort is made to mislead users as to the "officialness" of a site. The tendency towards giving special rights to special groups reduces the public commons, and tends away from maximal free speech rights.
e.g. the gatt.com site that was created by anti-WTO protesters would fall under the UDRP. This would not prevent the (fictitious) Georgia Anti-Tax & Tariff Lobby from registering gatt.org.
(ok, GATT was not a treaty org, but you see what I mean)
Item 130: modify the UDRP to allow IGO names
I disagree; modifying the UDRP is a lesser evil than excluding large chunks of the name-space because of potential conflicts. The objection in 129 seems specious. A judgement by a jury of twelve randomly selected internet users on the question "does site X mislead with respect to the IGO Y?" would be no better or worse than the learned opinion of wise men. Democrats and liberterians would argue that it would be less biased. International law does not, and should not, enter into it.
Item 138: you quote Locke!
Cool!
Item 178: the .name gTLD
Something more person specific would be nice, like .pers instead of .name, since just about everything has a name (companies, cars, pets). But that's a complain for ICANN rather than WIPO, no?
Item 186: Modification to UDRP for personal names
Maintain the status quo. The UDRP is not perfect, but it is the lesser of many evils. If personal names grow to be a problem, then it can be revised later.
Item 265: creation of new law on country names
The reservations mentioned in this paragraph sound like an excellent reason to leave well enough alone.
Item 281: Maintain the status quo on country names
Yes. The UDRP seems to be working fine. The case D2000-0617 (stmoritz.com) would appear to show that the bad-faith clause works as intended. If the city of St Moritz is really desparate for the domain name, they may buy it. This is how property is transferred -- through trade.
Item 285: More protections for country names
Option one is preferable. Introduce no new restrictions on country names or ISO-abbreviations in the gTLDs.
Item 286: Existing ccTLDs
Encourage the creation of .com.us and .org.us to relieve some of the stress on the .com gTLD
Item 322: Modifications w.r.t. Trade Names
I support this item. The vagueness of what is a trade name in general makes any policy on the matter hard to define. Modify the UDRP to solve trade name disputes rather than create a special set of exclusions. By its very nature, trade names will have to be resolved on a case-by-case basis and the UDRP is a good basis for handling these disputes.
--
christian