Forwarded message:
From: Roelof Meijer <Roelof.Meijer@sidn.nl>
Date: Tuesday, 23 October 2018 at 15:45
To: Katrina Sataki <katrina@nic.lv>
Cc: Bart Boswinkel <bart.boswinkel@icann.org>
Subject: ccNSO Emoji Study Group
Dear Katrina, dear ccNSO Council Members,
I would like to bring the following to your attention.
As you know, during the presentation by Peter Koch, I raised the question of the Emoji SG striking a good balance between investigating the potential of using emoji’s at the second level versus the issues of doing that.
Although I received the confirmation that such a balance will be sought, I -having read the “Purpose and Scope of Activities” of the WG- remain a worried about the angle the study group seems to be taking.
I have attached the “Purpose and Scope of Activities” document, in which I marked passages that to me suggests a biased focus. Words as “risks”, “threats” and “issues” are all over the document, while nowhere terms like “value”, “innovation”, “demand”, “user experience” appear.
Emoji’s have become part of our lives. One might say that they help us making digital contact/exchange between people a fuller experience, enabling us to better and faster express and share emotions, and so closing a bit of the gap between online and F2F social contact.
I am definitely not a technical expert on this matter and possibly we will later rightfully conclude that emoji’s are not a viable option in 2nd level domains.
However, we now seem to be starting from the assumption that emojis in domains are (only) bad. Starting from that angle will just lead to its confirmation and not provide a drive to solve seemingly blocking issues.
If we start from the assumption (which we should investigate) that emoji’s in/as 2nd level domains have a huge potential, will create and meet a demand, will innovate our name spaces and will increase the relevance of domain names especially for young people (imagine your own email address with emoji) and thus will provide true value, this will drive and motivate us to address and solve issues. If we succeed, as a bonus, ccTLDs will get an attractive advantage over gTLDs in their local market.
Our industry is very risk averse. You will remember that for years we’ve had similar “risks, threats and issues˜ focused discussions about IDN ccTLDs. Strong demand and a clear view of value to communities motivated us to address and overcome those. As a result, today we have quite a number of successful IDN ccTLDs.
I feel that we would be doing ourselves and our local internet communities a huge disservice if we do not study the potential of emoji’s in domains, and I urge you to assure that we investigate the potential and that we approach issues with the objective to solve them, not just to confirm them.
Best regards,
Roelof Meijer
CEO
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