Page History

PROPOSED AGENDA

1. Roll call/Updates to Statements of Interest
2. Review suggestions and feedback from ICANN59 open community session, on refined questions and data collection for Sunrise and Claims
3. Confirm if further work is required from Sunrise and/or Claims Sub Teams
4. Next steps/next meeting

BACKGROUND DOCUMENTS

1. Sunrise Registrations original and refined charter questions - 12 July 2017
2. Trademark Claims original and refined charter questions - 12 July 2017
3. Data Requirements for Sunrise Registrations questions - 12 July 2017

4. Questions and Comments from AC room chat at the WG F2F meeting at ICANN 59 in Johannesburg

Mp3

AC Recording

AC Chat

Transcript

Attendees

Apologies:  Marie Pattullo, Marina Lewis, Kristine Dorrain, Lillian Fosteris, Matthew Mlsna

Notes/ Action Items

Action Items:

Action Items for WG members:

1. WG to develop a definition for “Standard Pricing”
2. WG to follow up with a revision of the definition for “Premium Pricing”, to reflect higher prices for Premium Names
3. WG to suggest rewording for Q3 (refined) in the Sunrise Registrations document to include the ability of TM owners to challenge the classification of terms as Reserved Names as well as Premium Names, taking into account the fact that Premium Names may also be Reserved Names. Consider also whether use of the word "release" is appropriate in this context
4. WG to consider how best to rephrase TM Claims refined Q1 & 2, to more clearly delineate between the intent and effect of a Claims Notice and a Notice of Registered Name

Action Items for staff/co-chairs:

1. Staff to add “unfairly” to the second bullet of Sunrise Registrations refined question 2, so that it reads “Is there evidence that Registry Sunrise or Premium Name pricing unfairly limits trademark owners’ ability to participate during Sunrise?”
2. Staff to include Maxim’s comment on the scope of the ICANN “picket fence” in the document in reference to Q3 (refined) for Sunrise Registrations
3. Staff to archive the original Charter questions for Sunrise Registrations and use the reworded questions from now on, keeping the new comments from Johannesburg and deleting the older ones that have been resolved (the original questions and older comments will be recorded in an Annex for a comprehensive record)
4. Staff to post INTA survey results to the RPM WG wiki
5. Staff and co-chairs to review the Sunrise data collection questions to determine which would be easier, quicker and more of a priority to collect, to inform the order in which the WG tackles the refined Charter questions

Notes based on the Meeting Agenda:

These high-level notes are designed to help PDP WG members navigate through the content of the call and are not meant as a substitute for the transcript and/or recording. The MP3, transcript, and chat are provided separately and are posted on the wiki here.

1. Roll call/Updates to Statements of Interest

• Maxim Alzoba has added membership of the GNSO New gTLD Subsequent Procedures PDP to his SOI

2. Review suggestions and feedback from ICANN59 open community session, on refined questions and data collection for Sunrise and Claims

Review of Sunrise Registrations Questions:

• Definitions (Reserved Names, Premium Names and Premium Pricing)
  • ACTION ITEM: WG to develop a definition for Standard Pricing
  • General agreement to refine definition of Premium Pricing and to add one for Standard Pricing
• Preamble Question:
  • Meant to serve as clarifying questions asked up front (level-setters)
  • New bullet added from Joburg discussion: "Have abuses of the Sunrise Period been documented by Registries and Registrars" to obtain input from ICANN Contracted Parties (registrants and trademark owners were covered in earlier bullets)
• Question 2:
  • General agreement that the word “unfairly” should to the second bullet of this question so that it reads “Is there evidence that Registry Sunrise or Premium Name pricing unfairly limits trademark owners’ ability to participate during Sunrise?”
  • Use of “unfairly” in Q2 and Q4 is meant to provide useful context to the questions – if not included, the obvious answer is “yes”, which is not helpful for the WG to reach any informed conclusions on how to develop an appropriate policy recommendation. The presence of the word “unfairly” helps distinguish between pricing in itself being a deterrent, and unfair practices being put in place that deter trademark holders from participating in Sunrise.
• Question 3:
  • General discussion as to whether this question was worded correctly in order to address its purpose – e.g. should the wording be changed to reflect more the concern that it may be the pricing of terms as Premium or Reserved Names that needs to be changed, not merely the possibility that such names should be released? Note that in some instances, Premium Names are reserved by registries, and cannot be registered during Sunrise, but are then released at a later time.
  • From AC Chat: on Q3 this should be addressing both the designation as premium (and thus the pricing) and, potentially reserving the name because it is "premium" so that it is not available until after the sunrise.  This latter issue should be picked up in the question 4 on reserved names
  • Question as to whether the WG will make a distinction between Premium Names that are priced similarly for everyone, and those that specifically target trademark owners during Sunrise periods – some registries have reportedly used Premium Pricing to target TM holders during Sunrise, knowing that they may be released with lower prices during General Availability.
  • From AC Chat: We should not forget that there is a thing called Picket Fence - basically it is a set of provisions in RA (Registry Agreements) & RAA (Registrar Accreditation Agreements) that Consensus Policies should not  "prescribe or limit the price of Registry Services;" - so even if out output comes to the state where there is an idea of price regulation it will have no power, even if it comes into Policy state - the same for Registrars : shall not "prescribe or limit the price of Registrar Services;"
• Question 4:
  • Question as to whether use of the word “unfairly” suggest a bias in the question
  • (Same comment applicable to Q2) Use of “unfairly” in questions 2 and 4 is meant to provide useful context to the questions – if not included, the obvious answer is “yes”, which is not helpful for the WG to reach any informed conclusions on how to develop an appropriate policy recommendation. The presence of the word “unfairly” helps distinguish between pricing in itself being a deterrent, and unfair practices being put in place that deter trademark holders from participating in Sunrise.
• Question 8:
  • Suggestion from AC Chat in Johannesburg to add as a consideration when reviewing this topic: “Whether other lawful rights in some jurisdictions like family names or non-registered names used in trademarks were precluded from getting priority (as a result of ALP, QLP or LRP)”
• Question 9:
  • Suggested rewording from Johannesburg inserted to make the question more clearly understandable
  • Suggestion from AC Chat in Johannesburg to add as a consideration for geoTLDs when reviewing this topic: “For geoTLDs, jurisdiction of the mark in question should be added as well”
• Question 11:
  • Suggestion from AC Chat in Johannesburg to add as a consideration when reviewing this topic: “Consider also whether TMCH for IDNs followed the LGR (Label Generation Ruleset) rules, technical standards, etc. (note SSAC belief that this may not have been the case)”
• Question 12:
  • Comment raised that new highlighted text is not helpful, and should be deleted, but keep the rest of redline text (“Should there be a different rule for some registries - Is it appropriate for some (different types of) registries to have different rules?”)
  • However, different view raised in AC Chat: “We heard a lot about specialized gTLDs in the third hour of our F2F. I would not recommend changing that.”

Review of Data Suggestions for Q2:

• INTA Survey posted on CCT-RT wiki, results contain anecdotal evidence from trademark holders
• Additional suggestion in Johannesburg to collect data on the different Sunrise prices – could be collected from the TLD Startup Page

Review of Trademark Claims Questions:

• General Comment: Questions on TM Claims need to cover both the Claims Notices that are sent to domain name applicants as well as the Notice of Registered Name sent to TM owners, as the considerations for each will likely be different - question is how to refine the existing questions to effectively make that distinction (footnote 1 in the document not sufficient)
• Question 1
  • Comment by Rubens/Amadeu highlights some of the data requirements needed to be considered while answering this question
  • On Data Available/Collection Needed for 1b
    • General discussion as to whether the words "dictionary terms" in data column 1b are appropriate: suggested alternatives include (1) something like “terms/acronyms that also have non-trademark significance”; (2) “widely used terms”; (3) “commonly used phrases”; or (4) “terms/acronyms that also have non-trademark significance”
    • Using “dictionary terms” vs. “distinctive trademarks” may be a false dichotomy as some distinctive trademarks are also dictionary terms – limiting consideration to this distinction might provide unusable information
    • Considering the string alone only gives half the anecdotal answer – should also consider both the intent behind the registration attempt as well as the reasoning behind abandonment
    • However, WG members generally understand what type of data is being sought
    • General discussion over data sources: one suggestion was that reporters (and their stories) might be a good source of data
    • Comment from AC Chat: “I think we need to take a step back and be honest with ourselves. We are not going to get data from supposed applicants (other than perhaps from industry insiders) on whether they dropped applications or why. We will not get that data from registrars, registries or the TMCH (as that is confidential customer data – assuming it was even collected). As far as newspaper stories, that is biased as well as they are seeking the controversial.”
    • Comment from AC Chat: “The only way we can get data is in the future if we get registrars to survey consumers as to why they didn’t go through (or did go through) with a registration.”

3. Next steps/next meeting

• TM Claims Question to be finalized during the first 30 minutes of next week's call
• Continue discussion on how to collect data
• Next meeting is on 19 July at 17:00 UTC
• Poll on Open TMCH Questions will remain open until Friday 14 July
• Co-chairs and staff will work out rotational call times to avoid clash with RySG biweekly calls