OPENING
STATEMENTS
QWill brand owners have to make
many defensive applications to
protect their brand?
AIt is going to be interesting to
watch. Marketing departments
are saying of course we are going to
apply for it. What we are picking up
and what some of the registrars are
saying is that some of the marketing departments are quite keen to
get into the game. There will be a
tendency for some of the people in
the company to think this is simply a defensive registration to defend
my brand, but I think a lot of other
people will say this is an opportunity
to promote the brand.
QSo ultimately it will be up to
the company or the applicant
to decide how determined they are to
defend the brand?
AThat’s right. If there’s a company
called XYZ, do you apply for
xyz.com, xyz.info, xyz.net? It is an economic decision. Some companies will
decide they need to defend their brand
anywhere, anyhow, any possible way
and will spend lots of money doing
that. I actually think when we had
seven or 20 generic domain names,
perhaps it was worth doing it, but if
we end up with 2000 I just wonder
how confused the consumer is going
to be. The trade-off will be made by
the company.
QHow will issues of potential
trademark conflicts caused by
transliteration of foreign scripts or
languages under the internationalized
domain name program be resolved?
AAddressing that is just part of the
general process [of dispute reso-lution]. For example, the Greek letters
α “alpha” and “tau” are similar to
[the English characters of the telecommunications company] AT&T. AT&T
will have an opportunity to bring an
objection if it wishes.
These issues are not new just
because they are happening in domain
names. They happen in commerce all
the time. ETIHAD [the name of the
national airline of the United Arab
Emirates] in Arabic means United.
It just means, more than ever, that
you have to have lawyers who speak
the language.
QDoes ICANN plan to deny TLD
applications for extensions that
may be considered objectionable by
some groups, e.g., abortion, pornography, jihad, etc?
AWe very clearly are not going to
be determining what is moral or
against public order. There will be an
international arbitrator on this. People
will be able to go in front of the arbitrator and argue their case, and we will
accept the arbitrator’s decision.
A nasty little goblin
that lives under bridges.
A nasty little goblin
whose primary purpose is making
patent infringement claims.
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