At 31/05/2009 11:14 PM, Hong Xue wrote:

...

This may be correct with respect to registrants and privacy. I am not an expert in these matters, but it seems to me that from the point of view of not confronting users with domain names that are easily confusingly similar to others, the needs of real end-users and IP holders may well be quite complementary.

Neither IP extremism nor anti-IP extremism is in the interests of users. Theoretically trademark protection is for users first and competition second. Trademark counterfeiting is subject to criminal punishment for it is deceptive to the public as well as infringes the private right of the trademark owner. So the issue is reasonableness.

I'm not sure if Alan is referring to "domain name law" (perhaps existing in some jurisdictions, Canada? ). If we are the same page and discussing confusing similarity in the ambit of trademark law, then I doubt the reasonableness of precluding an applied TLD string for it is doomed "easily confusing" to users--it's not been used (let alone in commerce). Even if such precluding could exist, it should be limited to a small scope and unfortunately there is no globally recognized well-know mark list to define that scope.

Hong

I started out saying I wasn't an expert (which you are! ;-) ), and I certainly was not commenting on the specifics of the IRT recommendations. I was just reminding people that we should look at the merits and not react to who has written the proposal (in line with the theory of your second sentence). Alan