This Senate Bill is far from law and it appears that there is strong opposition against it. That's the good news. What is more worrying is whether and how ICANN will be involved in this. If the trademark community and WIPO convince ICANN to proceed with a similar to this Bill policy, then things can turn awfully wrong. What we know so far is that free speech or freedom of expression are not as much a priority as the protection of trademarks (we saw it happening and we continue to see it happening in the context of the UDRP). We need to keep our eyes open and watch carefully how ICANN will be responding to this.

KK


On 20/11/2010 05:18, "Alex Gakuru" <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

they approved it yesterday,

"The US Senate Judiciary Committee has approved a controversial bill <http://techdailydose.nationaljournal.com/2010/11/senate-judiciary-backs-online.php> that would give the authorities dramatic new copyright enforcement powers allowing it to take down entire domains "dedicated to online piracy" rather than just targeting files that actually infringe copyright law." http://www.thewhir.com/web-hosting-news/111910_Judiciary_Committee_Approves_Online_Copyright_Enforcement_Bill

see also;

"CADNA now encourages the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), the global organization that sets policy for the Internet's naming and addressing system, to supplement the Senate's work by including in its policies provisions that will similarly prevent infringement and counterfeiting outside of the U.S.'s jurisdictional reach."

http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/cadna-commends-chairman-leahy-and-the-senate-judiciary-committee-for-passing-the-combating-online-infringements-and-counterfeits-act-out-of-committee-109242769.html

On Wed, Oct 6, 2010 at 5:50 PM, Milton L Mueller <[log in to unmask]> wrote:


> -----Original Message-----
>
> because of  ICANN's Culture of Secrecy, nothing has been said. We also
> do not know why [ICANN] did it - maybe it just did not fit into anyone's
> schedule.  So a discussion that brings out these issues and explores the
> reasons why it might have made sense for them to have made the decision
> they did, might also be useful.
>

I think Avri's comment above indicates why we SHOULD make a statement on this as NCSG or NCUC.
First, it encourages and promotes support within the broader ICANN community. Second, if indeed ICANN's staff and Board refused to attend this thing for the wrong reasons, we push it in the right direction.

This has been an interesting discussion regarding the status of NCSG as a "creature" of ICANN or as an independent civil society organization that can take positions. Obviously it kind of straddles the fence.