Dear all, As Tan Tin Wee informed, there have been some debates on idn tld issues. Among all those issues, I think the following thing might be the key issue although it didn't get majority support in priority straw poll. However, that issue has always been the main focus of the existing gTLD registries even in former DNSO discussion on new gTLD policies. As I confirmed the transcript of 23 January conference, maybe half of talks seemed to refer to this issue - "confusingly similar" test in new idn tld. Today, I made just one comment on this, but still I cannot find my posting in that archive. I am not sure why, but maybe I could be in a status of observer. Here again, I post my comment. regards, Chun -- ------------------------------------------------------------ Chun Eung Hwi General Secretary, PeaceNet | fax: (+82) 2-2649-2624 Seoul Yangchun P.O.Box 81 | pcs: (+82) 19-259-2667 Seoul, 158-600, Korea | eMail: [log in to unmask] ------------------------------------------------------------ Dear all, I couldn't catch up the recent debates, but I want to make quick comment on one issue of "limit confusion caused by variants", which I could read from conference call 23 January overview - 2.2 as follows; 2.2 Agreement to limit confusion and collisions due to variants. Agreement that this may be a stability and security issue and part of the reserved name process. Agreement that variants of an IDN gTLD string be treated in analogy with current practice for IDN SLD labels, i.e. variants are not available for registration by others. Agreement that this approach implies certain "ex ante rights" with similarities to the "confusingly similar" test foreseen in the New gTLD recommendations. Agreement that such "rights" must not be confounded with IPR rights as such. Some support for enabling a choice for an IDN gTLD strings with variants to only block variants or to use variants as aliasing. What I want to clarify here is the fact that variants come from the same language or the same language family. Therefore, the confusion or collision happen in the same language or within the same language family as well. We cannot use the term of variant in case when some translated or transliterated or phonetically same or similar words (language script labels) are to be taken into account. And obviously, in different languages or in different language families, there is no longer confusion or collision even when those in respective language are similar or the same in graphics, semantics and sound because different language scripts must be distinctive itself. So, in this case, "confusingly similar" test cannot be applied. Accordingly, across different language script labels, there should not be any "ex ante rights" of the existing TLD label, and so any reserved name policy would not necessarily be designed. regards, Chun