Civil Society Workshop on
Domain Name Policy and Free Expression:
“Keep the Core Neutral”
Wednesday 27 June 2007 (13:00 - 15:30)
at the ICANN Board Meeting
Caribe Hilton Hotel ~ San Juan, Puerto Rico
Civil society’s “Keep the Core Neutral” workshop will explore freedom of expression issues in the policy development process to introduce new generic top-level domains (gtlds).
As the ICANN community debates policy options to allow new top-level domains, it must consider important issues that impact what ideas may be expressed in a domain name. The workshop aims to provide a public discussion point in the ICANN policy development process for new top-level domains.
The workshop will address new gtld policy issues such as:
- should ICANN remain content neutral in national policy debates when evaluating applications for domains?
- how can ICANN protect freedom of expression rights in domain name policy?
- what is the proper role for governments in approving or rejecting top-level domains?
- what is the appropriate balance between trademarks and free expression rights in domain names?
- who should decide which ideas are too controversial to be allowed in a top-level domain?
- how to balance competing rights to use the same words in domain names?
- should trademark owners be given prior registration privileges before other rights holders?
- should a controversial domain name be rejected or delayed?
Workshop Speakers:
- Joichi Ito, ICANN board member and Creative Commons board member
- Christine Haight Farley, Law professor at American University
- Michael Palage, Attorney and ex-board member of ICANN
- Milton Mueller, Chairman of ICANN’s Non-Commercial Users Constituency, professor at Syracuse University and founding partner of Internet Governance Project
- Wendy Seltzer, Visiting professor at Northeastern University Law School and Fellow at Harvard Law’s Berkman Center for Internet & Society
- Wolfgang Kleinwรคechter, Professor at University of Aarhus
- Ram Mohan, Vice President of Business Operations and Chief Technology Officer at Afilias Limited
- Tan Tin Wee, Professor at National University of Singapore
Moderator:
* Robin Gross, IP Justice Executive Director
“Keep the Core Neutral” workshop is organized by ICANN’s Non-Commercial Users Constituency (NCUC) and the At-Large-Advisory Committee (ALAC)
See also ALAC/NCUC Geo-tlds workshop on 26 June (12:30 - 14:30)
More info:
ICANN San Juan Board Meeting
Non-Commercial User’s Constituency (NCUC)
At-Large-Advisory Committee (ALAC)
IP Justice New gtld info page