[gnso-rpm-wg] Inferences (was Re: Mp3, Attendance, AC recording & AC Chat Review of all Rights Protection Mechanisms (RPMs) PDP Working Group)

Beckham, Brian brian.beckham at wipo.int
Thu Jul 13 14:57:25 UTC 2017


Dear Working Group members:



I would like to recall some points made in an email I sent to the list on 13-April:  the number of sunrise registrations per new gTLD launch was an average of 130 (I believe the high-water-mark was 950).  This alone seems to mitigate against further investigation for evidence of abusive use of Sunrises.



Are there some speculators that have obtained trademark registrations for dictionary words that then used them for purposes of getting names in Sunrises?  Of course.  In fact, here’s one example:

http://domainincite.com/16492-how-one-guy-games-new-gtld-sunrise-periods.



All this said, it is still difficult to see how obtaining a list of marks in the TMCH would allow anyone to assess the extent of any abuse beyond what we already know.



To answer Paul Keating’s question:



- as to Sunrises:  “no”, the numbers simply do not bear this out



- as to Claims/abandonment:  there is simply no way to know the reasons for past abandonment



Additionally, I have found several external sources (links have been provided to this list) pointing to 65% or so as a “normal” abandonment rate.



Also, Jeff Neumann has advanced on several occasions that a large portion of the abandoned registration attempts were not actual registration attempts, but registries, registrars, and registrants pinging the TMCH in an attempt to find commercially-valuable information.  Perhaps such practices should be examined in more detail.


Regards,

Brian


From: gnso-rpm-wg-bounces at icann.org [mailto:gnso-rpm-wg-bounces at icann.org] On Behalf Of Jeff Neuman
Sent: Thursday, July 13, 2017 4:42 PM
To: Volker Greimann; gnso-rpm-wg at icann.org
Subject: Re: [gnso-rpm-wg] Inferences (was Re: Mp3, Attendance, AC recording & AC Chat Review of all Rights Protection Mechanisms (RPMs) PDP Working Group)

Volker,

Since we do not know what has caused the abandonment of applications (for lack of getting any reliable data from Registrars or Registries), I don’t believe we should come to the conclusion that the rate of abandonment is a problem.  And if it is not a problem, then there is no reason to reduce the level.

For whatever reason, many have come to the conclusion that the rate of abandonment is a problem.  I know personally I am not there yet.  Given the incredibly high abandonment rate we saw in .biz in 2001 from the trademark claims service (as reported publicly in the Summit Strategies report), and given the fact that I have my own theories on why the rate is so high (which I cannot prove either), I am not convinced that this high rate was unexpected.

This is the point I was trying to make yesterday on the call.    If we cannot show why the abandonment rate if too high (or why it was a problem), then why are we trying to find a solution by trying to lower it.

Jeffrey J. Neuman
Senior Vice President |Valideus USA | Com Laude USA
1751 Pinnacle Drive, Suite 600
Mclean, VA 22102, United States
E: jeff.neuman at valideus.com<mailto:jeff.neuman at valideus.com> or jeff.neuman at comlaude.com<mailto:jeff.neuman at comlaude.com>
T: +1.703.635.7514
M: +1.202.549.5079
@Jintlaw


From: gnso-rpm-wg-bounces at icann.org<mailto:gnso-rpm-wg-bounces at icann.org> [mailto:gnso-rpm-wg-bounces at icann.org] On Behalf Of Volker Greimann
Sent: Thursday, July 13, 2017 10:34 AM
To: gnso-rpm-wg at icann.org<mailto:gnso-rpm-wg at icann.org>
Subject: Re: [gnso-rpm-wg] Inferences (was Re: Mp3, Attendance, AC recording & AC Chat Review of all Rights Protection Mechanisms (RPMs) PDP Working Group)


I still feel that the best way to remove abandonment would be to remove the notices from the registration path and place them in the post-registration notice path. Extending the notice period for trademark holders might help be a good compromise.

Best,

Volker

Am 13.07.2017 um 16:25 schrieb Jon Nevett:
Georges:  Denying that there were abuses of the TMCH won't help either.  There have been plenty presented to date (see below).  Let's try to solve the problems and not deny that they exist.  Obviously, there is some abandonment based on the notices -- let's work to minimize the rate of abandonment by legitimate registrants without unduly hurting the protections afforded to legitimate rights holders.  Jon

https://www.thedomains.com/2017/02/01/the-trademark-clearinghouse-worked-so-well-one-company-got-24-new-gtld-using-the-famous-trademark-the/

https://www.thedomains.com/2014/03/22/tmch-has-plenty-of-trademarks-of-generic-words/


On Jul 13, 2017, at 9:37 AM, Nahitchevansky, Georges <ghn at kilpatricktownsend.com<mailto:ghn at kilpatricktownsend.com>> wrote:

I think the basis problem has been and remains that the basis for all this hunting around and data requests is an unfounded claim that there  is an abundance of “abusive and overreaching tmch registrations.” The evidence of such alleged widespread abuse has not been presented, because it doesn’t exist.  What all this sound and fury about data etc. reminds me of is Donald Trump claiming with basically no evidence that there was widespread voter fraud to explain why he do not get the majority of the popular vote in the US and then setting up a special commission to investigate the matter in the hope of cobbling together some sort of proof.  In the end it’s a waste of everybody’s time and money.



From: gnso-rpm-wg-bounces at icann.org<mailto:gnso-rpm-wg-bounces at icann.org> [mailto:gnso-rpm-wg-bounces at icann.org] On Behalf Of Paul Keating
Sent: Thursday, July 13, 2017 9:23 AM
To: Kurt Pritz
Cc: gnso-rpm-wg at icann.org<mailto:gnso-rpm-wg at icann.org>
Subject: Re: [gnso-rpm-wg] Inferences (was Re: Mp3, Attendance, AC recording & AC Chat Review of all Rights Protection Mechanisms (RPMs) PDP Working Group)

Well i want to do a short review here.

The issue.  Is the tmch function resulting in overkill - in other words is it overly protecting mark holders at the expense of the public.

1st many were asking for a list of marks registered with the tmch.  The point here was to understand what type of marks were actually being registered and under what conditions.

This was met with loud objections by a few members who asserted confidentiality.   I seem to recall that the tmch agreement itself contradicted any assertion of confidentiality.  I suggested the list be made known without indication of registrant identification.  I also suggested the list be provided to a 3rd party under confidentiality so they could report to the group.  There was no vote or attempt to measure consensus.

2nd we then considered the post-notice abandonment rate.  This was a 2nd best data source trying to figure out the same original issue.

Now it turns out that the data set was not stellar.  People are not asserting this should be abandoned.  This argument is being made by the same small group that objected to release of the marks registered with TMCH.

Now the suggestion is to abandon any investigation into what is in TMCH or the statistical abandonment rate and instead look at the language of the notice itself.  This does not solve the problem.  It is simply unacceptable to allow abusive and overreaching tmch registrations just because the notice can be watered down or improved.

The problem remains.  In order to measure the success or appropriateness of the TMCH (which this group is required to do) we must have access to the underlying data.

I remain willing to work with people to provide reasonable protection for confidentiality.  I reiterate my suggestions that the data be anonymized or provided to a neutral expert to review, categorize and report on.

If this is not acceptable, then the only alternative is for someone to essentially reverse engineer the list by trial and error.  This can certainly be done on an automated basis.  However, neither side would win by this.   It would be a silly waste of time and resources.  It would also result in publication of the results.  It seems neither side would want such a result.  I am sure we can find a compromise.

Anyone  willing to work on this with me?

Sent from my iPad

On 13 Jul 2017, at 12:22, Kurt Pritz <kurt at kjpritz.com<mailto:kurt at kjpritz.com>> wrote:
I agree with Susan.

I think the Analysis Group was at least negligent in their duties when they reported the 93% abandonment rate. It was misleading despite the disclaimers attached. Whenever any number is reported, it tends to gain traction and, as a result, we find ourselves struggling to attach some type of meaning to it. The Analysis report has led to false conclusions and a waste of time.

We are best off never mentioning the number again. We should agree that we have no understanding, information or data on the issue of how abandonment rate was effected by claims notices.

George has identified a couple ways to approximate the effect. If additional data gathering is undertaken along the lines that George or anyone else suggests, that work would be to get an understanding of abandonment rates and not to test the reported number by Analysis.

Susan’s last and penultimate paragraphs below put it best. In addition to identifying data be collected in the next round, we could look at the language and display of the current notices to ensure that the notices are designed to achieve the goal of the claims notice program: to properly inform without intimidating.

Kurt
________________
Kurt Pritz
kurt at kjpritz.com<mailto:kurt at kjpritz.com>
+1.310.400.4184
Skype: kjpritz





On Jul 13, 2017, at 10:28 AM, Susan Payne <susan.payne at valideus.com<mailto:susan.payne at valideus.com>> wrote:

Correct, the data for two registrars was excluded because of concerns about mining, but Analysis Group clearly were not confident that fully addressed the concern:
Page 7:
"However, due to limitations of the data (discussed in more detail below), our analyses of the data require an assumption that each download is associated with a registration attempt (and was not downloaded by a registrar for a purpose unrelated to domain name registrations). If this assumption is incorrect, then our results will exaggerate the size of any observable registration-deterrent Claims Service effect."

Page 16:
"These results should not be relied upon to make policy recommendations. We find that the vast majority of registration attempts are not completed after receiving a Claims Service notification (94% abandonment rate). This abandonment rate seems quite high, however there are several caveats to this result, which include our inability to determine the abandonment rate that would occur if no Claims Service notifications were sent and limitations of our data set, which require us to assume that every registrar download from the TMDB represents a registration attempt.54 We therefore cannot determine whether Claims Service notifications are the direct cause for the abandonment rate that we observe."

I believe this is a fruitless exercise.  Analysis Group are meant to be professionals at this, were paid a tidy sum by ICANN to carry out this review, presumably had the benefit of being an independent third party which ought to have removed some of the confidentiality concerns that we have faced, and should have had the support of whatever ICANN contractual provisions there are requiring co-operation in economic studies.  They still produced a report which repeatedly cites the paucity of data, the resulting reliance on assumptions, and that their “results” were consequently inadequate and should not be relied upon to make policy.

We are wasting our time with this.  What would not be a waste of time would be to identify the data that we wish we had and make recommendations such that any future review would not be similarly hampered.

Susan Payne
Head of Legal Policy | Valideus Ltd

E: susan.payne at valideus.com<mailto:susan.payne at valideus.com>
D: +44 20 7421 8255
T: +44 20 7421 8299
M: +44 7971 661175


-----Original Message-----
From: gnso-rpm-wg-bounces at icann.org<mailto:gnso-rpm-wg-bounces at icann.org> [mailto:gnso-rpm-wg-bounces at icann.org] On Behalf Of George Kirikos
Sent: 12 July 2017 21:30
To: gnso-rpm-wg at icann.org<mailto:gnso-rpm-wg at icann.org>
Subject: Re: [gnso-rpm-wg] Inferences (was Re: Mp3, Attendance, AC recording & AC Chat Review of all Rights Protection Mechanisms (RPMs) PDP Working Group)

Hi again,

Just to followup on my prior email, The Analysis Group *already* adjusted the stats to attempt to take into account the "mining" theory that Jeff spoke about. i.e. the 93.7% abandonment figure that we've been talking about is a figure obtained *after* making the adjustments! Without the adjustment (which eliminated 62.2% of the observations), the abandonment rate would have been 99%! See:

https://community.icann.org/download/attachments/64066042/Analysis%20Group%20Revised%20TMCH%20Report%20-%20March%202017.pdf?version=1&modificationDate=1490349029000&api=v2

(a) page 17 (footnote 55)

""As discussed in Section IV, there are two registrars that averaged downloads of more than 20 trademark strings per download, which is large compared to the average of fewer than five trademark strings in the downloads of other registrars. We also exclude downloads made by ICANN’s monitoring system. The exclusion of the two registrars does not significantly impact our results. Inclusion of the two registrars shows that 99% of registrations are abandoned and 0.5% of completed registrations are disputed."

(b) page 18, note [2]

"[2] A bulk download is defined as a download from the TMCH of multiple strings by the same registrar with exactly the same time stamp. Downloads by two registrars are excluded from this analysis because of a potentially high prevalence of bulk downloads (98.7% and 81.9% of downloads, respectively) by each of these two registrars. The average size of the “bulk downloads” by these two registrars (approximately 23 and 35 strings, respectively) is much larger than the average “bulk download” size of other registrars (other registrars in the Claims Service data download 5 strings or less on average).
This exclusion results in an exclusion of 62.2% of the observations in the original Claims Service data received from IBM after excluding downloads by ICANN's monitoring system."

Sincerely,

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



On Wed, Jul 12, 2017 at 4:10 PM, George Kirikos <icann at leap.com<mailto:icann at leap.com>> wrote:
> Hi folks,
>
> Just following up on some statements from today's transcript:
>
> On Wed, Jul 12, 2017 at 3:51 PM, Terri Agnew <terri.agnew at icann.org<mailto:terri.agnew at icann.org>> wrote:
>> Adobe Connect chat transcript for 12 July 2017:
> ...
>>   Jeff Neuman:My belief is that we have a huge rate of people
>> abandoning is because (i) registrars were mining the system, (ii)
>> registrants were mining the system to see what was valuable, and to a
>> lesser extent as a result of the claim (either legitimiate or not)
>>
>>   Jeff Neuman:But I cant prove any of those theories
>>
>>   Kathy Kleiman:@Jeff: we have gathered evidence already from
>> registries; there is probably more
>>
>>   Jeff Neuman:There just is no way to do so on a backwards basis
>
> If one had access to the raw data (and presumably The Analysis Group
> would have had it, to generate their reports), one could filter such
> "mining" by examining abandonment rates by (1) registrar and (2) by
> time relative to the launch date.
>
> i.e. presumably those were "mining" the system were not spreading out
> their queries across all registrars equally. It would be easy to
> identify the outliers. Furthermore, registrants would be also focused
> on a few registrars that permit those bulk lookups, and they wouldn't
> spread their queries over time equally --- they'd be focused at the
> launch (i.e. the beginning, first few days, etc.) of a TLD.
>
> Of course, if need be, one could anonymize the data by registrar (i.e.
> Registrar 1, Registrar 2, etc.), if there are any concerns about
> revealing their individual abandonment rates.
>
> Registry operators and registrars both have technology to block WHOIS
> access to those who are "mining" that data. One can use similar
> detection techniques in this instance.
>
> Sincerely,
>
> George Kirikos
> 416-588-0269
> http://www.leap.com/
> _______________________________________________
> gnso-rpm-wg mailing list
> gnso-rpm-wg at icann.org<mailto:gnso-rpm-wg at icann.org>
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