22 Describe proposed measures for protection of geographic names at the second and other levels in the applied-for gTLD

Prototypical answer:

The ZACR is cognizant of the GAC advice in their management of second level domain name registrations and confirms it will comply with Specification 5 of the Registry Agreement.

Specification 5 of the New gTLD Registry Agreement initially reserves at the 2nd and all other levels within the TLD:
• Country and territory names contained on the ISO 3166-1 list
• UN Group of Experts on Geographical Names, Technical Reference Manual for the Standardisation of Geographical Names, Part II Names of Countries of the World, and
• The list of UN member states in 6 official UN languages prepared by the Working Group on Country Names of the UN Conference on the Standardization of Geographical Names

In accordance with the provisos contained in Specification 5, such names may be released if the Registry Operator reaches agreement with the applicable government and⁄or the Registry Operator proposes release of the reserved name(s) subject to review by GAC and approved by ICANN.

The Registry will work cooperatively with ICANN to ensure that the 2nd and subsequent levels of the proposed TLD comply with expressed public policies and goals and in particular the following:

1. It is worth to be noted and as documented by ICANN that rights of governments or public authorities in relation to the rights of the sovereign state or territory which they represent cannot be limited or made conditional by any procedures that ICANN introduces to new gTLDs. The ZACR will follow the GAC public process relating to geographic names.

2. The ZACR will use the existing recognised international lists as prescribed by ICANN. The lists will be reserved at the second level at no cost for the governments of the dotJoburg TLD. It will be the prerogative of the relevant governments to adopt procedures that allow for applicants to register names from any of the lists.

3. Before starting the registration operations, the ZACR will adopt the initial registration policy for the dotJoburg TLD in consultation with the ZA Domain Name Authority (ZADNA) and other interested parties. The ZACR will implement in the registration policy the public policy rules pursuant to the agreement between the ZADNA and the ZACR taking into account the exception lists and the GAC process as prescribed in the principles regarding new gTLDs.

Similar gTLD applications: (2)