[gnso-rpm-wg] FOR REVIEW & DISCUSSION: Draft collated proposal for Sunrise-related data collection

[George Kirikos]

Hello,

Without responding to every point:

On Wed, Aug 9, 2017 at 8:50 AM, Kurt Pritz <kurt at kjpritz.com> wrote:
> Third, after-the-fact remedies are always significantly more expensive than
> before-the-fact. Even with loser-pays UDRP, invoking the UDRP or URS remedy
> takes several lawyer and management hours. Preventative costs are always
> 10-100x less that curative costs.

The key difference is that curative rights would apply to a much
smaller subset domain names, namely *only* the actual abusive
registrations. So, even if the curative costs are higher for some
names, on balance the total costs are actually *lower* with the
elimination of sunrise.

Most companies are *already* making this decision calculus, i.e. there
are 40,000+ TMCH marks, yet only 130 or so sunrise registrations on
average per TLD. So, more than 99% of TMCH registrants (and an even
higher percentage of the millions of TM holders worldwide) are doing
the math and finding that, for them, it's rational to wait for
landrush or focus only on post-registration abuse, because one's
overall costs of fighting cybersquatting are lower than if one
registered in sunrise for every possible TLD. If "sunrise" is seen as
an "insurance policy", most TM holders do the math and find that the
"premiums" (costs of registering in each sunrise, instead of waiting
for landrush or not registering at all) are too high, relative to the
actual risks.

Are there some TM holders who use the sunrise that are either (1) very
paranoid about the risks (doing the math incorrectly), or (2) doing
the math correctly and buying the insurance properly? (e.g. the most
famous brands where possible damage might actually be high if they
instead waited to register in landrush)?

For group (1), we're doing them a service by eliminating the sunrise.
They'll be better off, by not having bought the overpriced insurance
policy. The "racket" of scaremongering that tricks them into usnig the
sunrise periods is eliminated.

For group (2), these are the largest companies who can *most afford*
to deal with that damage (through the courts, UDRP/URS, etc.). They
can deal effectively with whatever rules are on the table, and don't
need "cheap insurance policies."

If there was accurate/verified WHOIS and other accountability measures
(loser pays for UDRP, etc.) to deter the professional cybersquatters,
that helps group (2) and markholders in general far more than sunrise
periods do. When Verizon and Microsoft sued in real court:

http://www.loffs.org/verizon-vs-ireit/
http://www.loffs.org/verizon-v-navcatsys-et-al/
http://domainnamewire.com/2008/12/24/verizon-wins-33-million-in-cybersquatting-case/
http://www.loffs.org/microsoft-cases/

those actions did far more to reduce cybersquatting than anything
ICANN has done, as it held the bad actors directly accountable and
sent a strong message to others.

Sincerely,

George Kirikos
416-588-0269
http://www.leap.com/