Re: Conflict of Interests (fwd)

[Leni Mayo <leni@toplevel.net>]

AUNIC is supported by Telstra but Telstra isn't the IANA delegate for
.au and has no say in which names are registered in .au.  Names are very
rarely added to .au in any case.

Names are mostly registered in the SLDs, the largest of which is
.com.au, which accounts for around 85% of the names registered under
.au.  A single for-profit company is responsible for registrations,
charging similar prices to the Internic, under a set of policies which
it inherited and presently administers.

Operations and policy are separated under the gTLD-MOU:
POC+PAB = policy
CORE    = operations

This separation is of key importance.  Overall, (IHMO) the gTLD-MOU
seems to have been carefully structured to help the various players
avoid an appearance of conflict of interest.

The other thing that helps with the gTLD-MOU is that the policy settings
are pretty simple: anyone can register any name, with special
circumstances pertaining to (a relatively short list of) widely-known
trademarks.

Leni.

LEIF O. GAMERTSFELDER wrote:
> 
> Dear All,
> 
> Have there been any court cases where a registry, such as InterNIC, has been
> accused of a conflict of interest with respect to its handling of a
> domain e dispute?
> 
> I am interested in how the MoU addresses conflict of interest issues in
> this context. For example, in Australia I think the local registry is
> controlled to some degree by Telstra. If a domain name dispute arose where
> Telstra's interests or the interests of its major clients were at risk,
> it seems that a conflict of interest arises. This would not occur if an
> independent body administered registrations. Does the MoU address this
> issue or is the only remedy a court action in every case?
> 
> Leif Gamertsfelder