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<div>Zahid — in case you have an opportunity in this session with the Board, please ask about their reaction to the perplexing results on String Similarity:</div>
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<div>The results of ICANN's String confusion panel were that <span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: medium; ">
singular and plurals of the same string were not placed in the same contention sets. Concerns include:</span></div>
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<div><font class="Apple-style-span" face="Calibri,sans-serif">1. Consumer confusion. Particularly when they hear a TLD in conversation or in the media, then can't remember if it was singular or plural. </font></div>
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<div style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; ">2. Defensive registrations in 25 additional TLDs</div>
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<div><font class="Apple-style-span" face="Calibri,sans-serif">3. Terrible Precedent: applicants in future rounds could propose plurals of established TLDs (.nets, .books, .apps )</font></div>
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<div><font class="Apple-style-span" face="Calibri,sans-serif">4. Reflects poorly on the gTLD expansion</font></div>
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<div><font class="Apple-style-span" face="Calibri,sans-serif">Background: After several months of careful study, ICANN's experts published their contention sets on 28-Feb. (<a href="http://www.icann.org/en/news/announcements/announcement-26feb13-en.htm" style="color: blue; text-decoration: underline; ">link</a>)
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<div>They "identified" 230 "exact match contention sets" where multiple applicants sought the exact same string.</div>
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<div>And they found just 2 "non-exact match contention sets" (unicom and unicorm; hoteis and hotels )</div>
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<div>Unbelievably, they did not consider the singular and plural versions of key words to be confusingly similar. </div>
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<div>This means we will get new TLDs for both the singular and plural versions of keywords such as:</div>
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<div>ACCOUNTANT<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre; "> </span>ACCOUNTANTS</div>
<div>AUTO <span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre; "> </span>AUTOS</div>
<div>CAR<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre; "> </span>CARS</div>
<div>CAREER<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre; "> </span>CAREERS</div>
<div>COUPON<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre; "> </span>COUPONS</div>
<div>CRUISE<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre; "> </span>CRUISES</div>
<div>DEAL<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre; "> </span>DEALS</div>
<div>FAN<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre; "> </span>FANS</div>
<div>GAME<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre; "> </span>GAMES</div>
<div>GIFT<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre; "> </span>GIFTS</div>
<div>HOME<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre; "> </span>HOMES</div>
<div>HOTEL<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre; "> </span>HOTELS</div>
<div>HOTEL<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre; "> </span><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre; "></span>HOTELES</div>
<div>KID<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre; "> </span>KIDS</div>
<div>LOAN<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre; "> </span>LOANS</div>
<div>MARKET<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre; "> </span>MARKETS</div>
<div>NEW<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre; "> </span>NEWS</div>
<div>PET<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre; "> </span>PETS</div>
<div>PHOTO<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre; "> </span>PHOTOS</div>
<div>REVIEW<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre; "> </span>REVIEWS</div>
<div>SPORT<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre; "> </span>SPORTS</div>
<div>TOUR<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre; "> </span>TOURS</div>
<div>WEB<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre; "> </span>WEBS</div>
<div>WORK<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre; "> </span>WORKS</div>
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