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[RRE]Public's Right to .us Domain
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Date: Fri, 18 Sep 1998 18:57:35 -0700 (PDT)
From: Audrie Krause ACTION ALERT: Support the Public's Right to the .us Domain * PLEASE CIRCULATE THIS ACTION ALERT UNTIL OCTOBER 5, 1998 * Dear Friends, The National Telecommunications and Information Administration
(NTIA) of the Department of Commerce has asked for public comments
regarding the .us Internet domain and how it should be used. Because
this issue has important implications for noncommercial use of the
Internet, the NTIA needs to hear from you. WHY THE .US DOMAIN ISSUE IS IMPORTANT Right now, there are very few Internet addresses ending in .us, as
opposed to the more popular .com and .org top-level domains. The
NTIA wants to change this, but NetAction, along with the Domain Name
Rights Coalition (DNRC), is concerned about how the NTIA will
structure the governance of the .us domain space. Specifically, we
want to ensure that the proposed new .us governing body will uphold
the rights of noncommercial speech on the Internet, and to prevent
the .us domain from being restricted geographically by linking all
.us domain addresses to postal addresses. NetAction believes that the .us domain should not be dominated by
corporate interests at the expense of private individuals, community
groups, and political organizations. If you believe as we do, you
can help preserve our rights to the .us domain by submitting
comments on the issue to NTIA before the October 5, 1998, deadline.
Our colleagues in the DNRC, who are following this issue closely,
believe that the NTIA will be more responsive to concerns about
noncommercial speech aspects of .us domain governance if they hear
from numerous individuals and organizations before the comment
period ends on October 5th. For that reason, we are urging you to
submit comments, rather than inviting you to co-sign NetAction's
comments. HOW YOU CAN HELP ENSURE NONCOMMERCIAL ACCESS TO THE .US DOMAIN Comments are being accepted by email, and to make participation easy
we are circulating the draft of NetAction's comments. (See below.)
You are welcome to use our comments as a sample in drafting your
own, or simply substitute your organization's name and submit the
comments we have drafted on behalf of your organization. The e-mail address to send comments to is: Karen Rose
Office of International Affairs, NTIA
Room 4701, U.S. Department of Commerce
14th and Constitution Avenue N.W. Washington,
D.C. 20230 WHERE TO FIND MORE INFORMATION ABOUT THE .US DOMAIN ISSUE The full text of the request for comments can be found at:
The questions to which NetAction's comments respond are as follows: 3. Specifically, should special-purpose second-level domains be
created under .us? What are the benefits and costs of creating
particular special-purpose domains (e.g., industry-specific,
credentialing, zoning)? How should such domains be created and
administered? Are there reasons to map names and other addressing
and identification systems (e.g., postal addresses, telephone
numbers, longitude and latitude, uniform resource numbers or others)
into .us? 5. How should conflicting proposals and claims to manage or use .us
subdomains be resolved? Who should have responsibility for
coordinating policy for .us over the long term? What public
oversight, if any, should be provided? 6. What rules and procedures should be used to minimize conflicts
between trademarks and domain names under .us? Should this problem
be treated differently at international, national, state, and local
levels? Should special privileges be accorded to famous trademarks,
such as a right to register directly under .us or a procedure to
pre-empt the use of the trademark in a range of subdomains? WHERE TO GET ANSWERS TO QUESTIONS ABOUT THIS ALERT NetAction thanks Mitch Stoltz for researching and drafting this
alert and our comments. Please direct questions and/or comments
about the .us domain issue to Mitch at: DRAFT OF NETACTION'S COMMENTS The following is a draft
of the comments NetAction will submit to the NTIA. Use this as a
sample or simply substitute your organization's name (or your name
if you submit comments as an individual) and send the comments by
email to: Karen Rose
Office of International Affairs, NTIA
Room 4701, U.S. Department of Commerce
14th and Constitution Avenue N.W.
Washington, D.C. 20230
Email: usdomain@ntia.doc.gov Comments on the Enhancement of the .us Domain Space, in response to
the Request for Public Comment (Docket No. 980212036-8172-03). Dear Ms. Rose, The .us top level domain (TLD) provides the United States with a
golden opportunity to alleviate overcrowding in the .com and .org
domains, to experiment with new forms of Internet governance, and to
present an example to the world of how the American values of free
speech and open communication go hand-in-hand with the Internet.
NTIA has taken the first crucial step by recognizing the value of
the .us domain in promoting these goals. However, we feel that
certain issues involving policy guidance of this domain, and the
potential conflict of commercial speech versus other types of
speech, need to be addressed more strongly by NTIA. In response to question (5) of NTIA's ".us Request for Comments," we
believe that the policy issues surrounding the .us domain should be
handled by a U.S. Internet Council, a forum where the U.S. Internet
community can negotiate policy for the .us domain under the
jurisdiction of U.S. law. The existence of such a body would not
conflict with the current trend of internationalizing Internet
governance. On the contrary, it would ensure that the U.S.-specific
TLD, .us, is maintained according to U.S. law and U.S. values of
free speech, without the need for accountability to foreign
governments. This domain could then serve as an example to the world
of fair, democratic Internet governance. The existence of the Internet Council would facilitate the
separation of policy and technical administration of domain names.
This is clearly a necessity, since the policy-making body must be
held open to participation by and be accountable to the U.S.
Internet user community and the U.S. Government and legal system,
while the technical overseers of the domain name system should be
free of these responsibilities. We believe that the .us domain should be organized initially into a
small number of second-level domains (SLD's) based on the type of
content to be organized under each. (Question 3) SLD's can be
created for commercial content, personal content such as individual
home pages, and for political speech. The current geographical
system, which assigns SLD's to states and localities, does not make
sense to a modern, mobile, location-independent Internet company or
organization, and it violates the Internet's "location-independent"
philosophy. Mapping addresses in .us to postal addresses or phone
numbers does not make sense for the same reasons -- there is no
value to associating an Internet address with a specific locality. Finally, we believe that noncommercial and commercial speech should
be given equal protection in the .us domain, as addressed in
question (6), and that trademark owners not be given any special
precedence in obtaining a domain name. Law and court cases have
established that simply registering a domain name does not
constitute use of a trademark. Thus, companies should not be able to
pre-empt the registration of a domain name similar to their
corporate trademarks, especially not in the personal and political
SLD's we propose. Since the Internet was first created as a tool
for communication and collaboration, not for buying and selling,
any policy which protects the right of commerce over freedom of
expression violates the spirit under which the Internet has
achieved its phenomenal success. The first-come, first-served
system of assigning domain names which exists currently has been
an important factor in this success by allowing a very fast
turnaround for domain name registrations. To replace this system
with something resembling the lengthy registration, review, public
notice, and opposition process which registered trademarks require
would be unmeasurably damaging to the Internet's viability as a
medium of speech. In order to maintain the values which are key to the Internet's
growth, and to set an example to the world Internet community, we
ask that NTIA make a high priority of the following policy
recommendations put forth by the Domain Name Rights Coalition: a) That the protection of free speech be a primary policy goal for
those overseeing the .us domain. b) That "No Internet policy will prevent individuals or businesses
from using their full imagination and creativity to create and label
products, services and content for the Internet, just as they do in
traditional channels of communication and commerce." c) That policies for the .us domain "will affirmatively and
expressly set out protections for free speech and open
communication, as well as protections for intellectual property
rights in the digital environment." d) That these policies "will protect and promote the development of
new Internet products and services by entrepreneurs and small
businesses, as well as the ongoing marketing and sale of products
and services by long-established companies." (Source: The proposed expansion of domain names under the .us TLD cannot
help but alleviate overcrowding on the generic TLD's like .com and
.org. However, we have an opportunity to achieve other goals with this
transformation: a strengthened protection of the rights of free speech
and entrepreneurship which our country stands for. Sincerely, Audrie Krause
Executive Director
audrie@netaction.org NetAction
601 Van Ness Ave., #631
San Francisco, CA 94102
http://www.netaction.org
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