John Demco
FTC Urges ICANN To Change New gTLD Program – In a December 16 letter to ICANN, the U.S. Federal Trade Commission has recommended changes to the new gTLD program including: implementing it as a pilot program to substantially reduce the number of gTLDs introduced in the first application round, and improving the accuracy of Whois data.
Independent Review of .AU Governance Published – An independent review of auDA, the Australian domain name administrator, has been carried out. The review concludes “that the Australian country code domain is well managed and that auDA is widely regarded by local and international stakeholders as a global leader in domain administration.” Among the recommendations are: to develop an Accountability and Transparency Framework similar to ICANN’s, to make some revisions to the membership and board structure, and to more clearly define the relationship between auDA and the Australian government.
Picks To Click
- ICANN CEO Rod Beckstrom defends the new gTLD program in a response to the Washington Post’s “What’s the .rush?” editorial.
- A number of international organizations have requested that ICANN extend the same special exemption rules on new gTLDs agreed to earlier this year for the Red Cross and the International Olympic Committee.
- A CEO Candidate Profile has been published to help in the search for a new ICANN CEO.
- Finland’s .fi domain celebrates its 25th anniversary.
- “Who’s registering .XXX domains”, by John R. Levine, an analysis of the .XXX zone file.
Timeline
- Thu, Jan 12 – Thu, Apr 12: applications for new gTLDs being accepted
- Sun, Jan 15: .com, .net registry fees increase
- Sun, Mar 11 – Fri, Mar 16: ICANN meetings in San Jose, Costa Rica