ICANN approves .XXX red-light district for the Internet

[johnl at iecc.com (John Levine)]

>>                         ... I expect the board and staff really
>> really would not want to have to answer questions under oath like "who
>> did you talk to at the US Department of Commerce about the .XXX
>> application and what did you say?" and "why did you vote against .XXX
>> when they followed the same rules as the TLDs you voted for?"
>
>The first assumes that a beneficiary should exist that is distinct 
>from the applicant-sponsor.

On the contrary.  Since it is clear that all of the other sTLDs have
failed to attract the predicted support from their nominal
communities, why should a similar lack of support for .XXX make any
difference?

>The second assumes the principle liability that exists is specific to 
>a single application.
>
>While possible, this fails to place a controversy in its complete 
>context, and assumes an implied pattern of conduct by an agency of 
>government at a point in time reflects a continuous primary issue of 
>that agency.

Heck no.  I expect that were a case to bring documents to light, they
would show that what ICANN said to the US government was at odds with
what they were saying in public.  I know none of us would find that at
all surprising, but we're not a judge looking at the contracts.

R's,
John