ICANN's 'Go/No-Go' Decision Concerning New gTLDs

The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) should institute a variety of changes to its soon-to-be-issued Draft Applicant Guidebook for new generic Top Level Domains (gTLDs), which has sparked fierce and almost universal opposition from the global business community in its currently proposed implementation. The following recommendations should be addressed by ICANN prior to the release of its Draft Applicant Guide Book: * Elimination of the proposed 5% global domain name tax: ICANN's ill-conceived and potentially illegal tax bears no correlation to cost recovery model, is not limited to name registration fees, and contains provisions to prevent double taxation. * Creation of a Rebuttable Reserve Names List and an Expedited Domain Suspension Policy: Narrowly tailored to protect brand holders while respecting fair use rights, these mechanisms would minimize the need for expensive defensive domain name registration. * Creation of a Uniform Proxy Registration Policy: Baseline practices and safeguards should be established for proxy registration to prevent abuse that could harm legitimate users. * Creation of Registrant-Verified TLDs: Verifying the identity of registrants in certain TLDs would ensure accuracy of domain registration data and could minimize the need for defensive registrations.