THESE ARE SOME MATERIALS THAT COMPLEMENTS AND SUPPORT THE SUBMISSION

1) Council of Europe publication made in 2012 about the first gTLD´s round

Applications to ICANN for Community-based New Generic Top Level Domains (gTLDs): Opportunities and challenges from a human rights perspective

by Eve Salomon Lawyer and International Media consultant and Kinanya Pijl PhD researcher in law European University Institute Florence, Italy 

LINKS :

https://rm.coe.int/CoERMPublicCommonSearchServices/DisplayDCTMContent?documentId=09000016806be175

https://www.coe.int/en/web/freedom-expression/news/-/asset_publisher/thFVuWFiT2Lk/content/icann-webinar-community-consensus-on-the-need-for-change-regarding-community-based-new-generic-top-level-domains-gtlds-

Original Public Comment: Final Proceeding for Proposed Language for the Draft Next Round Applicant Guidebook (AGB) Submission

Performing the function of the vendor in charge of the CPE in the new gTLD´s programme is a very delicate task, that requires a lot of knowledge and expertise in many different fields. So it is important to keep in account a lot of factors and to rely on various competent bodies external to ICANN. In the attached submission are mentioned 7 criteria that could improve the mandate of the Vendor, trying to remediate to some of the errors that emerged from the gTLD´s round 2012 that could, unfortunately, happen again this time.

1)    The vendor has to duty to approach relevant existing bodies among international organizations that have the authority to confirm or not the representativeness of the applicants in CPE, because no vendor in the world could have 360 degrees expertise on all kind of communities that exist in the world;

2)    The vendor has the obligation not only to apply, but also to interpret the norms of the guidebook;

3)     The vendor has to install a dialogue with the applicant and not only proceed by “tabula”;

4)     The abusive objections are not penalized and remains possible in the current procedure, but could be very damaging for community applicants and, more in general, for ICANN impartiality and credibility;

5) The timeline of the CPE is also very important for community applicants. But in this new version of the Guide for the Vendor, this problem is substantially ignored and neglected. At page 7 it is written: “Evaluation Panel Activities ICANN anticipates that the CPE process will take approximately 90-180 days from the time that the CPE panel begins its evaluation until the publication of evaluation determination, depending on the complexity of the evaluation”;

6)    The public general interest has to be the main guidance criteria for the whole exercise of the evaluation of Community application. In case of doubts, because ICANN recognized the COMMUNITY applications as a special category necessitating of a special treatment.