Dear All, We deeply appreciate the discussion of this past week and look forward to the discussion this week. It looks like good progress has been made on the issues of default and communications with Providers. Tx you! There are, however, a few additional issues that need to be addressed, some gaps in this important Reveal text. The purpose of this email is to highlight the gaps and some solutions to them. 1) The tough questions. We are deeply concerned about the most difficult questions that will pass through this Reveal process - the ones in which copyright and trademark allegations are being used to stifle criticism and speech. The ones in which hard standards are being taken against political corruption, in favor of persecuted and minority political, religious, ethic and sexual expression, and in which news ideas, concepts and concerns are being shared that threatened the establishment, the incumbents, the powerful. These cases to not happen everyday, but when they do, these cases work with vital freedom of expression, free speech & competition issues. Revealing the identity of such speakers could not only suppress the speech to which they are entitled, but expose protected addresses and locations of political, religious, ethnic and sexual minorities to harassment or worse. Several in our WG have used the Church of Scientology example because anyone who posts their materials (however small the snippet) faces criticism as a "copyright infringer" and the wrath of a well-funded entity. Many large business seek to squelch young competitors with "trademark infringement" allegations even in the countries where competition allows the direct naming and critiquing of your competitor's products and services. Wendy Seltzer set up the "Chilling Effects" database years ago expressly for these letters and this concern... What we gather from Providers is that these Reveal Requests are difficult and expensive to process -- that there is significant cost in time and money to evaluate these questions closely. What we expect is that even the best corporate counsel does not necessarily have a specialty in areas of international Freedom of Expression rights, Free Speech evaluations and international competition laws (and that's fair!) So these cases take a lot of time to research (and $$$). Yet, these are the questions in which minority speech, political expression, and controversial ideas -- protected classes worldwide -- rests. We respectfully request that it is not fair to ask Providers to incur the costs of a Freedom of Expression investigation - but neither is it fair to allow the rights of minority speakers, "fringe groups" and other protected groups and individuals to go under-assessed or under-evaluated. So for these tough and questions, and to make Providers' lives easier and cheaper, we propose a safety valve: the creation of a group of Freedom of Expression/Free Speech/Competition Attorneys (at least 1 from each Region) to sit on a "Complex Case Advisory Group." Solely at the Provider's discretion, a matter could be sent to this group for rapid review -- and a response shared for the Provider's consideration. Nothing binding. An outsourcing of the most difficult (and expensive) problems for evaluation and input. We are certain ICANN has the funds for this and should be willing to support this advisory-only group. This would be an addition to Section III, Service Provider Action on Request. 2) Appeals What's good for the goose is good for the gander. Both groups should be allowed to file appeals - both the Requestor whose request is turned down and the Customer whose Reveal is granted over his/her/its objections. In order to stop the floodgates of too many appeals, we propose a "loser pays" system with a clear and specified deference (by the decision-maker) to the Provider. We also propose that the body to which this goes to be a neutral one with - with clear history and expertise in Freedom of Expression, Intellectual Property and Competition Law. Of course, this proceeding should, of course, be completely online. (Additions to III.F) 3) Sanctions We would like to see more discussion of this - what might be done to prevent the frivolous or unfounded Requestors from continuing abusive patterns within and across Providers. Frivolous requests are an undue cost to the Provider and ones that put Customer into real frenzies of work and response. While we continue to think hard about this matter, we propose at this time a small addition to Section I(B) that would expressly allow Providers to share among themselves information about Requestors they feel are/have misused the system (such as vi: Nothing shall prevent providers from sharing data...). We look forward to the discussions this week. As the draft before us took many weeks in its formation, we appreciate the time and opportunity to evaluate it now -- with the full WG! Best, Kathy