In regards to expressed concerns about contract for approval of new top-level domains, a letter has been submitted to Peter Zangl, Deputy Director General of Information Society and Media DG for European Commission by Vint Cerf, ICANN's chairman of the board. The letter, starting with the following excerpt, can be found in full on ICANN's website [PDF]:

Dear Mr. Zangl: Thank you for your letter concerning the application submitted by ICM Registry for a new sponsored top-level domain (sTLD) for .xxx. As you know, increasing competition through expansion of the domain name system (DNS) is an important part of ICANN's mission. The White Paper that led to the establishment of ICANN described one of the organization's principal responsibilities as overseeing "policy for determining the circumstances under which new TLDs are added to the root system," including "development of policies for the addition, allocation, and management of gTLDs [generic toplevel domains] and the establishment of domain name registries and domain name registrars..." The importance of competition is reflected in ICANN's Bylaws, which consider "introducing and promoting competition in the registration of domain names where practicable and beneficial in the public interest" to be a core value.

Consistent with Article II, Section I of the Bylaws, ultimate responsibility for promoting competition and overseeing the addition of new TLDs rests with the ICANN Board. In 2000, the Board undertook the first expansion of the DNS since the 1980s (other than with respect to country code top-level domains) when it selected seven proposals for new gTLDs—.aero, .biz, .coop, .info, .museum, .name and .pro - from among more than 40 applications. The success of this expansion led the Board to launch a second round of expansion in 2004, this time dedicated solely to sTLDs. The Request for Proposals (RFP) for the sTLD round was explicit that one of its purposes was "to enhance competition in registry services." ICANN and its supporting organizations are presently considering a third round of expansion of the DNS. The policy development process to create an appropriate framework for such an expansion has been launched and includes a global call for input on questions concerning key aspects of new gTLDs.

Your letter draws certain comparisons between the 2000 gTLD and 2004 sTLD rounds, but it appears that the assumptions upon which they are based reflect inaccurate or incomplete information. It is important to recall that during the 2000 round, the GAC provided only broad feedback on gTLD applications, and did not comment on any specific application. In fact, some GAC members in particular were quite concerned about the notion of commenting on the substance of specific applications. It is equally important to remember that the selection of the seven new gTLDs in 2000 was made without prejudice as to the future status of the remaining proposals, including .XXX.

This letter is available in full on ICANN's website [PDF]

See related topics: DNS, Domain Names, Top-Level Domains