I will soon be publishing an extensive article on this matter. For now I would point out that, regardless of the timing of the IPC letter, ICANN received a letter from Sen. Jay Rockefeller, then-Chairman of the US Senate Commerce Committee, raising essentially the same concerns in March 2014. Philip S. Corwin, Founding Principal Virtualaw LLC 1155 F Street, NW Suite 1050 Washington, DC 20004 202-559-8597/Direct 202-559-8750/Fax 202-255-6172/cell Twitter: @VlawDC "Luck is the residue of design" -- Branch Rickey From: owner-council@gnso.icann.org [mailto:owner-council@gnso.icann.org] On Behalf Of Amr Elsadr Sent: Monday, April 13, 2015 6:52 AM To: James M. Bladel Cc: Volker Greimann; jrobinson@afilias.info; council@gnso.icann.org Subject: Re: [council] Intellectual Property Constituency Communication to ICANN Regarding dotSUCKS Hi, Apologies for coming back to this thread so late, but just wanted to voice my support of the perspectives offered by Volker and James. As this gTLD has already been delegated, and unless there is any reason to believe the registry is not in compliance with its Registry Agreement, I don’t see why ICANN staff would be required or mandated to freeze the launch of .SUCKS. One part of the blog by Allen Grogen caught my attention, and I probably need to look into this a bit more closely before opining: “…, if Vox Populi is not complying with all applicable laws, it may also be in breach of its registry agreement. ICANN could then act consistently with its public interest goals and consumer and business protections to change these practices through our contractual relationship with the registry.” Personally speaking, although I understand the concerns raised by the IPC, I’m not convinced that there is necessarily any malicious intent on the part of Vox Populi. Like Volker said, I agree that this is an interesting business model. Just not entirely sure its actual objective is to extort trademark holders. If the IPC would like to suggest initiation of a policy process to somehow address this, that would be its prerogative. Additionally, should ICANN compliance staff determine that there indeed is a contractual issue ICANN needs to resolve, I would recommend that a discussion about this be held with the GNSO to clarify the reasoning. Thanks. Amr On Apr 1, 2015, at 6:12 PM, James M. Bladel <jbladel@godaddy.com<mailto:jbladel@godaddy.com>> wrote: Agree with Volker. This TLD has attracted quite a bit of (negative, and perhaps deservedly so) attention recently, but I am confused by this letter. The window to take action was likely prior to delegation. Once the TLD is delegated and the contract is signed, I don’t see ICANN Staff having the authority to do anything to “halt” the launch. Probably why they didn’t…. Thanks— J. From: Volker Greimann <vgreimann@key-Systems.net<mailto:vgreimann@key-Systems.net>> Date: Wednesday, April 1, 2015 at 10:28 To: "jrobinson@afilias.info<mailto:jrobinson@afilias.info>" <jrobinson@afilias.info<mailto:jrobinson@afilias.info>>, GNSO Council List <council@gnso.icann.org<mailto:council@gnso.icann.org>> Subject: Re: [council] FW: Intellectual Property Constituency Communication to ICANN Regarding dotSUCKS Interesting business model, but not really an issue for the GNSO, unless someone is proposing to take this as a basis for new policy development. As an observer with no skin in this game, this looks to be an issue for compliance to determine if the model violates the policies and/or contracts or not and if it does, to take action accordingly. For the interesting question of the different fee structure, there seems to be an explanation already: http://domainincite.com/18282-that-mystery-1-million-sucks-fee-explained-and... Best, VG Am 01.04.2015 um 11:49 schrieb Jonathan Robinson: All. FYI. Jonathan From: Greg Shatan [mailto:gregshatanipc@gmail.com] Sent: 27 March 2015 20:45 To: Jonathan Robinson Subject: Fwd: Intellectual Property Constituency Communication to ICANN Regarding dotSUCKS Dear Jonathan, It was a pleasure working with you in Istanbul. In your role as Chair of the GNSO, I am sending you a copy of the attached letter, just sent to ICANN, expressing the concerns of the Intellectual Property Constituency regarding the .SUCKS registry. Best Regards, Greg Gregory S.Shatan President, Intellectual Property Constituency -- Bei weiteren Fragen stehen wir Ihnen gerne zur Verfügung. Mit freundlichen Grüßen, Volker A. 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