Thank you very much for your letter to Esther Dyson. Your questions were
direct and on-point, and should have
received a comparable answer. They didn't.
Back in the 1970's I worked briefly at Citizens Communcation Center in
Washington DC, where I had the privilege of working with a lot of the
different media and telecommunications projects that arose under the Nader
umbrella. I have to say that I have not personally encountered a civil
rights issue with such emotional wallop as the issue of domain name dispute
resolution since that era. I am at times tempted to think that the Bill of
Rights is being nullified.
While NSI may be non-governmental, it does in fact make the equivalent of
judicial trademark decisions. It does so by placing a name on hold once a
trademark holder makes any kind of a complaint. While NSI protests that
placing the name on hold is not 'taking it away' it is indeed taking
property from the owner -- and doing so without due process. It is a tilt
that dares an individual to either litigate the matter or file a trademark
abuse complaint. It empowers large corporations essentially to blackmail
and browbeat domain name owners from exercising what should be protected
speech under the first amendment.
However, NSI is angelic compared to the iron-fisted approach proposed in
the WIPO draft. If I am correct that NSI is a de facto state actor, then
ICANN is embarking on the same course at an international level.
I was very sorry that Esther Dyson chose to tell you that ICANN gives
adequate notice and ensures participation. This is not what happened in my
experience. I was not permitted to post comments opposed to the WIPO
draft, and was in fact told that many of them were deleted. While I was
assured that the board received them prior to the meeting, they never were
posted. As a result, I never saw the other comments, or my own.
In addition, participation is effectively being squelched by the board.
There is no recognized Individual Domain Name Owners Constituency, in spite
of the fact that individuals make up the preponderance of domain name
owners. Without such representation, ICANN is essentially a business
organization which has acquired governmental powers without any of the
restraints that protect individuals from government abuses.
I hope you will become an active watchdog over NSI and ICANN.
Yours truly,
Dennis Schaefer
Marblehead, MA
d3nnis@mciworld.com
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