WS #159 Domain names: digital inclusion and innovation

Summary

This discussion focused on digital inclusion and innovation in the domain name system, particularly regarding new generic top-level domains (gTLDs). Participants explored challenges and opportunities in making the internet more accessible and diverse globally.

Key points included the importance of linguistic diversity in domain names, with speakers emphasizing the need for internationalized domain names to better serve non-English speaking communities. The discussion highlighted the challenges faced by underserved regions, particularly Africa, in participating in the domain name market due to cost barriers and limited awareness.

Speakers debated the definition of success for new gTLDs, with some arguing that traditional metrics like registration numbers may not fully capture their impact. The concept of “lowercase innovation” was introduced, suggesting that seemingly small changes can lead to significant improvements in accessibility and usability.

The Applicant Support Program was discussed as a mechanism to increase diversity in gTLD applications, though some participants noted that more comprehensive, long-term support may be necessary for true success. The discussion also touched on the need for realistic expectations, acknowledging that not all new gTLDs will succeed in the market.

Participants shared experiences from previous gTLD rounds, highlighting the time and investment required to establish successful domains. The importance of community involvement and tailored business models for different regions was emphasized.

Overall, the discussion underscored the complex balance between fostering innovation, ensuring inclusivity, and maintaining the stability and security of the domain name system. Participants agreed on the need for continued efforts to make the internet more representative of global linguistic and cultural diversity.

Keypoints

Major discussion points:

– The importance of linguistic diversity and inclusion in the domain name system

– Challenges and opportunities for new generic top-level domains (gTLDs), especially in underserved regions

– The need for realistic expectations about the success rate of new gTLDs

– ICANN’s Applicant Support Program and efforts to increase participation from underserved regions

– Different perspectives on how to measure success for new gTLDs

The overall purpose of the discussion was to explore ways to foster innovation and digital inclusion through the domain name system, particularly as ICANN prepares for the next round of new gTLD applications. Participants shared experiences from previous rounds and discussed strategies to increase participation from underserved regions.

The tone of the discussion was generally constructive and collaborative, with participants offering different perspectives on challenges and potential solutions. There was a sense of cautious optimism about the potential for new gTLDs to promote inclusion, balanced with realistic acknowledgments of the difficulties involved. The tone became more solution-oriented towards the end as participants discussed concrete ways to improve the application process and support for new gTLDs.

Speakers

– Adam Peake: Moderator

– Jennifer Chung: Works for .Asia corporation, manager of .Kids top level domain name, former member of IGF multi-stakeholder advisory group, leader of IGF Support Association

– Lucky Masilela: CEO of Zakaar (manager of .za domain), leader of Registry Africa group (manages .Africa and city domain names)

– Kristy Buckley: Leading ICANN’s Applicant Support Program

– Sajid Rahman: ICANN board member, background in international banking and venture capital

– Rebecca McGilley: ICANN board member

– Maarten Botterman: ICANN board member

– Ram Mohan: Chief Strategy Officer for Identity Digital, former ICANN board member, current chair of ICANN’s Security Stability Advisory Committee

Additional speakers:

– Paulus Nirenda: From Malawi (audience member)

– Nick Wenban-Smith: Employed by Nominet (audience member)

Digital Inclusion and Innovation in the Domain Name System: A Comprehensive Discussion

This summary provides an in-depth analysis of a discussion on digital inclusion and innovation in the domain name system, with a particular focus on new generic top-level domains (gTLDs). Adam Peake introduced the panel of experts from various sectors of the internet governance ecosystem, including domain registry operators, ICANN board members, and industry leaders.

Key Themes and Discussion Points

1. Linguistic Diversity and Inclusion

A central theme of the discussion was the critical importance of linguistic diversity in the domain name system. Ram Mohan, Chief Strategy Officer for Identity Digital, emphasised that linguistic diversity should be “a core outreach goal” and “a significant metric” for measuring success in the next round of gTLDs. This sentiment was echoed by Jennifer Chung, representing DotAsia and managing the .Kids domain, and Sajid Rahman, who highlighted the opportunity for new gTLDs to serve underrepresented languages and scripts.

The speakers agreed that promoting internationalized domain names (IDNs) is crucial for better serving non-English speaking communities and making the internet more representative of global linguistic diversity. This approach was seen as essential for driving adoption of new gTLDs and fostering true digital inclusion.

2. Challenges and Opportunities in Underserved Regions

The discussion highlighted significant challenges faced by underserved regions, particularly Africa, in participating in the domain name market. Lucky Masilela, CEO of Zakaar and manager of the .za domain, pointed out the limited success of African gTLDs due to market conditions, noting that there are only 3.5 million domain name registrations for a continent of 1.4 billion people.

High costs and the need for long-term investment were identified as major barriers, even in developed markets. Nick Wendman-Smith from Nominet emphasised the complexity and resource-intensive nature of launching and sustaining a new gTLD, citing the Welsh community’s experience as an example.

Despite these challenges, speakers saw opportunities for innovation. Lucky Masilela shared the example of M-Pesa in Africa, demonstrating how mobile technology addressed financial inclusion needs in underserved markets. He also suggested a business model involving cities or municipalities as applicants for new gTLDs, which could potentially address some of the challenges faced in the African market.

3. Defining and Measuring Success for New gTLDs

A significant point of discussion was how to define and measure the success of new gTLDs. Ram Mohan argued against using the number of domain registrations as the sole metric, introducing the concept of “lowercase innovation” through memorable domain names. He suggested that the impact of new gTLDs might only be visible years after their introduction.

Jennifer Chung supported this view, stating that success can mean different things for different regions and communities. However, Lucky Masilela emphasised the importance of sustainable business models over time, suggesting that registration numbers remain important for achieving scale and enabling innovation, especially in price-sensitive markets.

4. Realistic Expectations and Market Forces

Several speakers, including Ram Mohan and Sajid Rahman, stressed the importance of having realistic expectations about the success rates of new gTLDs. Ram Mohan argued that allowing some gTLDs to fail is a natural part of market forces and should be expected. He suggested that ICANN should include an estimation of the number of TLDs that will not succeed as part of its planning for the next round.

5. Improving the Next Round of New gTLDs

The discussion yielded several suggestions for improving the next round of new gTLD applications:

a) Enhanced Applicant Support: Christy Buckley emphasised the need for an improved Applicant Support Program targeting underserved regions. She explained that the program offers a 75-85% discount on evaluation fees and extended support for the first three years of operation. Rebecca McGilley added that there should be a balance between providing support and encouraging eventual independence for new gTLDs.

b) Registry Service Provider (RSP) Pre-evaluation: Rebecca McGilley explained the RSP pre-evaluation process and its potential to reduce costs for applicants.

c) Focus on Linguistic Diversity: Sajid Rahman and others stressed the importance of promoting IDNs and linguistic diversity in the next round.

d) Leveraging Lessons Learned: Jennifer Chung highlighted the value of applying insights from previous rounds to improve the process.

e) Realistic Planning: Ram Mohan advocated for incorporating realistic expectations about success rates and market demand into the planning process.

Unresolved Issues and Future Considerations

Despite the productive discussion, several issues remained unresolved:

1. How to precisely define and measure success for new gTLDs, especially those serving niche communities.

2. Striking the right balance between providing support for new gTLDs and encouraging their eventual independence.

3. Addressing the high costs and long-term investment required for new gTLDs, even in developed markets.

The conversation also generated important follow-up questions, such as how to increase the amount of African content on the internet (currently less than 15%) and how to develop more price-sensitive domain name offerings for the African market.

Conclusion

The discussion underscored the complex balance between fostering innovation, ensuring inclusivity, and maintaining the stability and security of the domain name system. While there was general agreement on the importance of linguistic diversity and support for underserved regions, differences in perspective emerged regarding the definition of success and approaches to market challenges.

As ICANN prepares for the next round of new gTLD applications, the insights from this discussion highlight the need for a multifaceted approach that considers diverse stakeholder perspectives, regional differences, and the long-term sustainability of new gTLDs. The conversation demonstrated a cautious optimism about the potential for new gTLDs to promote inclusion, balanced with a realistic acknowledgment of the challenges involved in expanding the global domain name space.

The panel concluded by mentioning an upcoming workshop on multilingualism, IDNs, and universal acceptance, highlighting the ongoing efforts to address these critical issues in the domain name system.

Adam Peake: you you you you you you . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . to bring new geographies online, to bring new brands from the Global South online, to bring more content, access to more content and available connectivity. I don’t think you really need to hear too much from me. I will run through our speakers and try to do this in a way that will also introduce what they’re going to talk about. I will begin with Sajid from across the table. Sajid is an ICANN board member, a member of the ICANN community, a background as an international banker, leader in the financial sector, venture capital firms, but also a business strategist who’s very active in the Global South, bringing development to what we were thinking of as underserved regions. And so he will give us a perspective as an ICANN board member and also member of the community about the discussions we’re having around the enhancing what’s available to you is top level domain names and the new GTLD programs. Lucky Masarela is the CEO of Zakaar, which is the manager of the largest CCTLD in Africa, South Africa’s .za domain name. And also he’s the leader of the Registry Africa group, which are the managers of the .Africa top level domain name and city names for Cape Town, .Durban, Joburg, which are also managed by Zakaar. So bringing a perspective of someone who’s been bringing in new communities into the domain name space. Jennifer Chung on my right, works for one of the leaders of the .Asia corporation and manager of the .Kids top level domain name. Many of you will know Jennifer also as a member or former member of the IGFs multi-stakeholder advisory group and also leader. of the IGF Support Association, so a great supporter of the IGF. Coming soon, we hope, will be Ram Mohan, who’s the Chief Strategy Officer for a company called Identity Digital, which is running the largest number of new top TLDs, around 500. He’s also a former ICANN board member and the current chair of ICANN’s Security Stability Advisory Committee. So he will join us when he’s finished with another session in another room. We have quite a packed schedule. And last but not least is my colleague, Christy Buckley, who is leading our Applicant Support Program. Christy is online and will give a perspective from how the staff is organizing this particular activity and what we’re hoping for and what we’re achieving at the moment with the work that the new GTLD program and the Applicant Support Program are working on. So with that, I would like to begin turning over to Jen, Jennifer and Lucky. Lucky, I hope your microphone will be working. To give us a perspective as two people representing organizations that introduce top level domain names in an earlier round when we introduced new TLDs to the internet. Lucky for .Africa, Jen .Kids and also the earlier experience with .Asia. So I think Jennifer, if you would like to begin and here’s a microphone.

Jennifer Chung: Thanks Adam for that really lovely introduction. So I’ll talk a little bit about the experience .Asia had. I always like to say .Asia is one of the middle children, not a legacy TLD, but definitely not part of the new round. It was quite interesting for DotAsia because it was really in response to DotEU, which is obviously with the CCs, but it was an initiative to support the Asia-wide collaboration and upholding the ethos really of the Asia-Pacific community. Then there was quite a lot of will, geopolitical will and community will to actually have this namespace. It actually pioneered quite a lot of different things. Our sunset, our sunrise policies were now used in a lot of different ways when you look at the different registry policies that you see right now. It was also one of the very first top-level domains that offered IDN registrations after of course the CCTLD fast-track that was passed through back in 2009. We started offering internationalized domain names in our namespace starting from 2011. Now, moving back a little bit and talking about the new GTLD part, we also do manage.Kids, which is a kids-friendly for kids by kids namespace, and that came in the 2012 round. I’m sure Christy will be really happy to talk to you a little bit more about the applicant support program. But one of the very interesting things about.Kids was, in the last round, it was the only recipient for the applicant support program. So we are happy to share lessons we’ve learned, happy to share the feedback, and of course, we’re looking forward to learning more about the applicant support program coming up. I think I’ll stop here because I could talk at length, but I’d love for Adam to moderate.

Adam Peake: Thank you, Jen. I think the link between.Asia is one of, as you said, not quite a legacy, but an in-betweener, that is important in the lessons of.Kids. I wonder, Lucky, hoping that your microphone will work. if you could give us an introduction to the work you’ve been doing with .Africa and perhaps some of the city names. But also, what motivated you to apply for a GTLD in the 2012 round? How’s it being used? And, yeah, any words of wisdom about, you know, what you’re thinking for the next round as well, and applicant support? And over to you, and fingers crossed this works. Jen has very kindly offered to continue a little bit and perhaps touch on the questions I was asking Lucky, and I will just pop to the desk and see what we can find over there. So Jennifer, thank you very much for your help.

Jennifer Chung: Thank you, Adam. Like I said, I’m happy to talk more about, you know, what we were thinking behind some of the reasons. Well, not really for .Asia, because I think all of us already know the reasons why .Asia was applied for, but I will talk a little bit about .Kids. I think it was really, at the time, a response to the children’s rights and children’s welfare community concerns over the over-commercialisation of .Kids, wanting this namespace to become exemplary, you know, GTLD with children’s rights and interests at heart. So, something central to the .Kids namespace is that there was a best practices and guiding principles that were actually crafted and created by child-led organisations, children’s rights and welfare organisations, to make sure that this is something that they can definitely back behind. They actually form part of the advisory committee. that we all often consult with when we come across interesting cases of, you know, possible abuse. There’s very, very strong, strict policies on many of the categories that go beyond, above and beyond many of the different registry operator policies right now. So happy to talk about that. And another important thing I wanted to bring up is there’s always this notion when you start applying for a new GTLD, you think that it will be used for something, you envision different uses for it. But when we actually look at the real use cases, we’ve always been surprised because we’re like, oh, okay, it’s been used for not only educators and children who actually want to, you know, express themselves online as well. We also saw some interesting clothing brands that use interesting .kids names, such as copycat.kids to launch their products, to look at their markets. We looked at futureleaders.kids as well. And they actually provide high-quality educational materials for children to look at, like tutorial modules as well. And also artclubs.asia is an interesting example that actually spans both, I guess, the child community or youth or child community and also the use of Asia as, I guess, the name and the identity that they have online. One thing also that I’ve looked at when we were going through this whole idea of, you know, how can we foster innovation? How can we use this opportunity, having a GTLD, having a new GTLD? How can we use this to further innovation, both in terms of our business models, because there’s a lot of different use cases, as well as pushing forward the innovation in policymaking? And I think three of the things I want to highlight is having. and active suspension quite early on in the domain name life cycle to send the signal to market to kind of you know serve as a warning for people who might look at registration for nefarious purposes to you know kind of back off and understand that the same space is being organized being governed by policies that are quite you know open for innovation but definitely guarding against abuse. Having stable pricing policies is always a very good use case for innovation because a lot of small and medium businesses a lot of individual entrepreneurs really want to know that they’re able to use this namespace to grow their business which they might be starting startups or something like that to be able to fit that into a startup budget. And then finally I guess this is back to this ICANN world as well to foster innovation and inclusion to you know I think it’s happening now as well to stop kind of over requiring RSPs or registry service evaluation process for every single thing. So I think for a lot of registry operators when we’re looking at our business model looking at business use cases, we really want to have predictability to be able to look at how we can grow innovation, how we can introduce this to new markets, how we can have new markets interested to apply for this upcoming new round as well so hopefully that gives us a little bit more introduction of what we’re thinking.

Adam Peake: Thank you very much. Thank you Jen, that was brilliant. And I’m going to try Lucky again. How are you doing Lucky? I’m hoping your microphone is unmuted and please see if you’re able to speak to us.

Lucky Masilela: Good afternoon. Yes, I hope I’m clear. Yes. You can hear me well.

Adam Peake: I don’t hear you but I see your microphone seems to be working there.

Christy Buckley: I can hear Lucky. online. This is Christy.

Lucky Masilela: Oh, perfect.

Adam Peake: Christy, I see you were trying to say something and we can’t hear you either.

Lucky Masilela: Oh, okay. You can’t hear me there?

Adam Peake: Right. It seems the audio Zoom isn’t coming into the room. Sajid, I wonder if I could put you on the spot and jump around and give us an introduction and some comments on what you heard from Jen in particular, but also your thoughts on the program, particularly notions around innovation and inclusion. That would be great. And apologies

Sajid Rahman: for the jump. Thanks, Adam. When Adam mentioned to me a few hours back that I need to talk about domain names and inclusion and innovation, I was really scratching my head on how to connect domain name with innovation. I can understand the inclusion bit of it. So, you know, if you look at the whole digital divide inclusion aspects of it, there are three fault lines that we can think of. So the first fault line is along the line of access to internet. How we can ensure that the people across the world, irrespective of where they are based, can access internet uninterruptedly. So that’s the first fault line that needs to be addressed. The second fault line is the fault line of bias. So just to give you an idea, on the first fault line, there are even today, in 2024, around 2 billion people don’t have access to internet. Between north and south, in north, 93% of the people have access to internet. In south, it may go up to 42%. Between capital city, between urban city and rural city, the percentage varies from 92% in urban to anywhere between 20% to 30% in poor, some cases even more. So the percentages varies a lot based on where you are set up. So access to internet is the first fault line that we need to address if we want to improve digital inclusion. The second fault line is around biases. As much as we believe that internet is in a way, is a result of human biases that we live in. So if you look at it, there was a data that the facial recognition that is used, in case of dark skinned color women, 44% of cases, their facial recognition may be faulty, compared to 1% into a white male. So it sort of reflects the people who are developing the internet and working behind it. So the second fault line is the line around biases. The third fault line, I think, is the fault line of innovation. As we go around the world, there is a challenge of innovation and access to innovation, whether it is an innovation around web infrastructure, whether it’s an innovation around artificial intelligence, whether it’s an innovation on the latest that is coming out with quantum computing and everything. So the third fault line, which is a fault line of innovation, that impacts how people are included in the internet of today and will be included in the internet of tomorrow. If we look at all these three fault lines, where ICANN really comes handy, is the first fault line to address, which is access to internet. Now, if you look at the new GTLD programs that we are working on, so the new GTLD programs is an issue of digital identity. We believe that as more and more domain names are allowed, and more and more domain names are allowed, allowed to exist, like .asia or .africa or all the other domain names, there will be more people who will create better identity on the internet. And that will obviously improve the digital inclusion or access to internet for a wider group of people who are entrepreneurs, who are individuals, who wants to create an identity on the internet. So new GTLD really helps in that way. Then there’s this question of internationalized domain names. So non-Latin scripts. So as we improve the international domain names, then we’ll have people who are of different languages and others. They will at least have an identity which is a non-Latin script, but an identity they can relate with. So that is an important part of this whole ICANN initiative. The third one is, of course, universal acceptance. And we can talk about it a lot in different. I was told by Adam not to touch upon that in details, because we apparently have another program to do that. But the point is that that is also a critical part of how ICANN helps into the new GTLD programs. The second thing is, of course, the whole grant, which Martin is here, who has been leading it for a while from the ICANN side. So the grant program is essentially designed for people on the under-resourced areas to help them get into internet, the people who are working on the different parts of the world, ensuring that they have more people in terms of infrastructure, in terms of innovations. The people who are not represented well are somehow financially supported so that they can access the grant program and can get into the internet. So that’s another critical part of it that works out. Do you want me to continue? We have time? OK.

Adam Peake: Thank you very much. I like the three fault lines idea. So thank you. Let’s just see. Christy, would you like to have another go and see if we can hear you in the room? We could see that the microphone was working. And perhaps now the captioning will show that you’re also. coming through. So over to you, Christy, please.

Christy Buckley: Thanks, Adam. Can you hear me OK?

Adam Peake: Yes. Yes.

Christy Buckley: Hooray. OK. It’s great when technology works. So greetings, everyone, and thanks very much, Adam. I wanted to just say hello from Vancouver, Canada, where it’s four in the morning here, so apologies if I’m not entirely awake yet. But it’s wonderful to see everyone online and also in the room. Thanks for joining this session today. I wanted to share a few observations about digital inclusivity and the domain name system and also highlight how ICANN’s Applicant Support Program is intended to foster broader and more diverse participation in technical internet infrastructure. As some of my colleagues have highlighted, we’re already seeing exciting examples of innovation and global participation in GTLBs, or generic top-level domains, and we hope that the next round of GTLBs will open even more doors for both. From the lens of digital inclusion, one thing that I’ve observed is that concepts and definitions and methodologies for assessing digital inclusion do not typically include any mention of technical internet infrastructure like GTLBs, nor the need for universal acceptance of GTLBs with different languages or scripts, and we have another session related to this tomorrow. And so while definitions of digital inclusion vary, the focus generally falls on access, connectivity, skills, and participation. However, when infrastructure is discussed, it usually refers to internet connectivity, devices, or online services. The underlying technical infrastructure of the domain name system, and who has the ability to participate in or shape that infrastructure, often gets overlooked. when talking about digital inclusion. And as I think about this, it actually reminds me of some of the previous work that I did in a previous life in global food systems. So we know that everyone needs to eat food. But when we look at a plate of food, we rarely think about the complex network of local and global systems that brought those ingredients, those foods together on the plate. And the same holds true for the internet. Millions of people use it every day, and yet very few people think about the infrastructure and relying it, the policies governing it, and who has opportunities to participate in managing that infrastructure or in shaping those policies. I know that many in the internet community are eager to see greater participation and accessibility and inclusion in managing internet infrastructure. And one key opportunity that I see to advance this is ICANN’s Applicant Support Program, which Jennifer had spoken about earlier. It’s often described as a sort of scholarship for GTLB applicants, and it aims to make the process more accessible globally. It offers fee reductions and capacity development and access to professional volunteer resources. And in doing so, the program fosters, the intent is to foster more innovation and ensure diverse participation in that technical infrastructure of the internet, which is, again, a critical but often overlooked aspect of digital inclusion. I’ll speak a bit more in detail about the Applicant Support Program, but for now, I just wanted to emphasize that it’s a sort of tangible way to help foster that the future of the internet is inclusive and innovative and globally representative of the next billion users. Thanks.

Adam Peake: And thank you that we finally got to hear you as well as see you. Thank you. Lucky, perhaps I think it’s time to try you again and we’re having some success getting people online and speaking. So again, if we can come back to that original question that Jen started to cover, when you applied for .Africa and also the city names we mentioned, Joburg and Durban, et cetera, what was the motivation and what was your sort of inspiration and hope for those TLDs? Hope in how that they would be used and have those hopes been met and a little bit of also for you, what’s next? So hoping that the audio works, over to you, Lucky, and thank you.

Lucky Masilela: I hope you can hear me now. Am I audible?

Adam Peake: Yes, we can. Yes, you are.

Lucky Masilela: Thank you. Yeah. Look, thanks, Adam. I think one can answer the question in multiple facets, following the topic around digital inclusion and some of the inhibitors. So we broke ranks in 2012 and we applied for .Africa, .CapeTown, .Durban and .CapeTown, those four names. And ideally, we were looking to bring the continent of Africa into the mainstream. We had to make sure that Africa is also participating in this digital world, in the digital space. More than anything else, we had this dream that the African community felt that they had missed out in the previous round. And they wanted to have this domain name, .Africa, being utilized not only as a digital identity, but as an instrument that would be used to unite the continent, as an instrument that will be used to express the cultural. interests, the cultural diversity of the continent. And that is what was underlying some of the important pointers towards the application. And then for us, it was also one of those great honors by the African community to support us and also identify us to be the ones who are leading this campaign of applying for the domain name and now I’m referring to .Africa when I say the domain name, and also to be the administrators of the name. And we had also to do the marketing for us. Really, it gave us a lot of comfort and confidence that was bestowed on us by the continent. Now, the interesting thing was we’re talking about this inclusiveness where we succeeded. We must also try and look where we failed, because it is where we failed where we need to be focusing at to understand how we go further. In that last round of domain names or GTLDs, there were at least 1,900 names. And there were 13 names that were applied for from Africa, the entire continent, continent of 1.3 plus probably 1.4 billion people. Only 13 names were applied for. And of all the 13 names, only five are still active. And I’m referring to .Africa, .CapeTown, .Deben, .Jobec, and .MTN. Now, the dream of inclusiveness begins to falter immediately. The fault lines, because here are 13 names that do not see the end of day. And now we are looking at the next round. The first round on its own had its own challenges. Challenge of pricing, 185,000 per name, per domain name, and it is also restricting. When you think about it on the continent, how do we begin to get the continent of Africa to be included in this space? Now we look at only 13 names, and most of those 13 names, if not all of those 13 names, the applicants of those names were all in the Southern Hemisphere or in Southern Africa. And up until today, those names are still administered by entities that would be based in Southern Africa for the rest of the world, for the rest of the continent. So for us, this is a litmus test of the success of using inclusiveness, digital inclusiveness, by looking at where have we succeeded and where have we failed as a continent, or as an ecosystem in the DNS space, you know, are the domain names beginning to achieve on what is required or what is expected from us? When we look at the GTLD names and look at how they have performed in the last 10 years, we can still see that, in particular, the geographics have not been able to have some stellar performance that is outstanding. DotAfrica on its own today is ranked fourth in the geographic names with 51,000 names. And this is nowhere next to what would be ideal for a continental name. I mean, we should be looking at being closer to DotAsia as an example, who are the leaders in the pack, but all other names. are becoming difficult to achieve. We can only look at the CCTLD and say, our second level domains, our CO2, ZD, or web and net are the stellar performers. And you compare the same number in South Africa across the continent, you realize that again, the biggest challenge when we talk of inclusiveness is that a continent of 1.4 billion people has only shy of 3.5 million registrations. Now, 3.5 million registrations in this continent, it’s very small. It just shows on the degree or the percentage of penetration or the usage. And we need to find out where are these bottlenecks, where are we losing the plot? Why is it that we are not participating? One of the thing is free names, possibility of people not being literate or being a commercially viable space or other things that we still must find. I think the DNS market, the Africa DNS market study must still find out why we are not growing. But one of the things that I was thinking about earlier on today was if we continue having free names, they are not going to be a solution for the continent. If you think of the Gmail as an example, it is offered for free and it has really put a damper on all the other 3TLDs. And it also puts a damper onto any other GTLD that would enter the market. And we need to have a conversation around to what extent will the Gmail continue being provided, especially on the continent, because it is really, it is a weed amount. the critical CCTLDs in the continent. Now, another thing once we move away from that, it’s managing, who manages those country CCTLDs? We still have CCTLDs that are administered outside the continent. Now, that on its own, it limits on this inclusiveness that we want to achieve, that we want to talk to. Now, it also makes it difficult for our own software developers to participate and build and develop their own solutions. Now, this immediately takes me to the next round. Just looking at the next round, if the previous round in 2014 gave the results that we have the numbers that I presented and the demise of 13 to five names, what will the next round bring for Africa as a whole? It seems like we are heading for another similar failure for the continent, but the rest of the world might be fine. If today it is projected that a domain name will be 285,000 per name and discounted at 85%, and you think of the economies on the continent, what is important? Is it a domain name or bread on the table? Or take your kids to school? The priorities shift and such that there is not going to be a single entity or company that will want to pay whether it is 35,000 US dollars or 285. I do not see that happening. And the next round means it will still be excluding a lot of players from the continent. There is a round that has just begun of your registry service providers. It equally, the evaluation process or the mechanism for that requires a. exorbitant amounts of money to the region of $90,000 to be evaluated to be a service provider. That immediately marginalizes all the service providers on the continent. You will find that the service providers that will be participating in the next round are going to be from the Northern Hemisphere. We’ll have nothing coming from the Southern Hemisphere or the third world countries. And that also further stems this approval on exclusivity. And I can go on and talk about solutions. How do we think we should do this? Not necessarily providing the names or this process for free for the continent, but creating enabling mechanisms. And we are discussing in this direction. And I hope, you know, as we look at the challenges and the beauty whilst we’re celebrating Dode Africa, but I thought, let me bring another dimension on some of the challenges that I think need to be addressed as we discuss the digital inclusion. I will take a break and come back here to deal with other issues. Thanks. Thanks, Ed.

Adam Peake: Thanks very much, Laki. And the solutions part, perhaps, Jen, you can also start thinking of ideas from what Laki’s been presenting to us here about what are the solutions. And I will mention that you’re quite right about the challenges, Laki, with the notion of 1.4 billion people and only three, five billion, sorry, million names registered. We have looked at that. We’ve done, ICANN and the community has looked at DNS studies, marketplace studies for Africa, and have tried to respond to that with different ways to encourage. And of course, there’s the Coalition for Digital Africa bringing together not just ICANN, but the TLD, sorry, the Country Code Top-Level Domain Community. and also yourself and other operators, the Smart Africa groups and others who are working more directly in the development processes. And perhaps some of the ICANN board members who are in the room might want to comment at some point on some of the work we’re doing there. But Christy, I wonder if we can come back to you and ask you if you could say a few words, you know, what we’re doing in engagement activities for the next round, and also how the Applicant Support Program is going to address some of the issues that Lucky referenced there. If that’s all right, thank you. Over to you, Christy.

Christy Buckley: Sure. Thanks so much, Adam. And Lucky, thank you so much for sharing your perspective and observations from the last round. And I think my understanding in working very closely with the ICANN community on developing the next round, and in particular the Applicant Support Program, is that there’s a lot of emphasis and attention and desire to make sure that the next round has global, diverse participation. And one of the opportunities for helping to support that is the Applicant Support Program. In fact, the community provided guidance recommendations on outreach and communications for the Applicant Support Program, which asked ICANN to emphasize underserved communities, nonprofits, social enterprises, and community groups. And so far on the Applicant Support Program, which just opened to receive applications last month, outreach and communications for that has really only targeted underserved regions so far, and not at all in more developed economies just yet. The Applicant Support Program is open for 12 months, and the idea behind that is to give applicants a really long runway to learn about the program, to build their understanding about it, and hopefully to apply. And when they do apply, get access to all of the… supports available, which includes not just the fee reductions in the GTLD evaluation fee, but also access to volunteer professional service providers, as well as a capacity development program that ICANN is constructing right now. And so what’s interesting just in the first months, and I can’t provide detailed numbers just yet because I don’t want to take the wind out of our sails on Wednesday when we announce the numbers, but just in the first month we are already seeing interest in the applicant support program from all corners of the world and all regions, including Africa, which is really fantastic because it’s only been open for just a few weeks. But we’re also under sort of no illusion that ICANN and the ICANN community can do this alone, right? So while we’re putting a lot of resources and effort into spreading awareness and understanding about the next round and the opportunities therein, especially to advance digital inclusion, we’re also relying on the ICANN community and the broader internet governance community to spread the word, to raise awareness, to help people understand the relevance of the debate name system and GTLDs to the work that they’re already doing. And that’s where this broader community, including the IGF, comes in. I will note that similar to the 2012 round, but again only DocKids was able to take advantage of it, the fee reduction provided to supported GTLD applicants is really intended to be meaningful and significant. And so this will be a 75 to 85 percent discount on the GTLD evaluation fee. That’s sort of the base fee of evaluating the application, but also on some conditional evaluations. So for example, if you are a supported applicant that applies for a geographic name, that’s a conditional evaluation that would also be receiving the same discount of 75 to 85 percent. If you’re a community priority evaluation applicant, you’re applying for a top-level domain that represents a community, that’s another evaluation fee that again would be receiving that 75 to 85 percent discount. So the idea is to, you know, provide financial support not just in a sort of one-time, you know, discount, but also to think about the whole life cycle and journey of the applicant and how do we support and sustain more diverse entrants to this space over that course of that life cycle. And so ICANN did research to understand, you know, what other sort of similar programs like the Applicant Support Program tend to provide, and it’s usually this beyond the sort of one-time upfront investment you’re providing that long-term capacity development training and support. For supported applicants that become registry operators like DocKids, there would also be a discount in the annual base registry agreement fees. And so that’s something that we’re again trying to help the first few years of a supported applicant becoming that registry operator to kind of help them get up to speed in the market and run their business. We’re providing that discount in the longer term for the first three years post-operation. I know that there’s been some discussion about the fee for the registry service providers, and even I’ve heard some folks in the community talk about the fact that, you know, that was not considered in terms of like how do we provide support for registry service providers. So it just wasn’t a policy recommendation, but it’s something that has gained a lot of interest and discussion since the registry service provider program has launched. And, you know, I think it’s interesting to consider that in terms of the future continuous improvement of future next rounds. How can we further improve the opportunities for diverse participation in all aspects of the next? round, not just on the GTLD side, but also the RSP side. Adam, did I address your question? Is there anything else you want me to speak to?

Adam Peake: I think that’s brilliant. Thank you very much, Christy. And I just wanted to say, I think what’s clear from this is that there’s many thousands of hours of work have gone into looking at reviewing the 2012 process and making improvements for this latest round. And while it sounds when we say the word ICANN has done, it’s important to remember that this is a community of volunteers. The staff guide the process. But these ideas and these improvements, these mechanisms come from our multi-stakeholder community, of course. I was wondering, so we I mentioned perhaps board member might want to respond on an ASP related issue or one of the comments from from from from Lucky. But really, Sajid, if that’s something you want to pick up on or if it’s we’d like to continue on to Jen and the opportunities and challenges.

Sajid Rahman: But you know, I was previously talking about the three fault lines, right? So the fault lines that is essentially causing a digital divide. And if you look at the first fault line that I talked about, which is how to make people access to Internet, I think it’s very important to create the ability for different people to participate in the system. At the end of the day, if we believe in the hypothesis that competition creates innovation, then the more open we we make it for people to join through different support programs, the better competition we’ll have, the better innovation we’ll have and the whole ecosystem will flourish. So on the application support program, we have done a lot of work. Martin, I know you wanted to say something, but or Becky.

Rebecca McGilley: Thanks. Christie’s talked a lot about the applicant support program, but it is based on longstanding policy and policies. that the community implemented to support diversity and inclusiveness on the internet. And the support, as Christy noted, will be meaningful in terms of both the application fee reduction, also enabling applicants, supported applicants, to participate in auctions in a meaningful way. And unlike the 2012 round, in this round, we will be contemplating support, ongoing support, to enable the domain to get up and running. So deferred, discounted ICANN fees and the like, all that are going to be very important. Ultimately, there needs to be a market that supports a domain. So it’s not intended to be forever. But the goal would be to provide enough support to ensure that the domain is able to operate and able to educate people about its existence and create a market and create interest in it. So it’s a very important aspect of increasing access to the internet locally across the world.

Adam Peake: Thank you, Becky. Thanks, Ajit.

Lucky Masilela: Adam.

Adam Peake: Yes.

Lucky Masilela: If I may come in.

Adam Peake: Please, Lucky.

Lucky Masilela: And thanks for those comments that have been made regarding the solutions. and how this applicant support program is being implemented and rolled out to include people from the underdeveloped world or countries. But one of the things that I want us to think of and consider, think of it very strongly, whilst we’re talking of bringing in other mechanisms, training and other support mechanisms, what if we make this leap of faith and say, based on the evidence that we have, there is empirical evidence that currently the four GTLDs in Africa, dot Africa, dot Cape Town, Durban and Joburg, have not been very successful, but they’ve been successful in the sense that they are still active 10 years later, and they are growing very slowly. Dot Africa has just made the turn the corner, there is growth. What if we use that very lessons that we have in our hands that we have seen and allow those very entities to be the ones working with the local communities, to give training to the local communities, those potential applicants on the continent, to be trained or given support by the guys who are on the ground, the guys that have seen it, the guys that have walked the journey. And I’m referring here to Registry Africa. Registry Africa has been very active in growing these domain names, these geographics, and I believe we have been successful. I believe that the model that is a business model that we have shared at the last Africa Strategy Session in Istanbul, where we believe that if we were to create a model whereby there’s a sponsor or an applicant, and that applicant would be a city or a municipality, a county, or even a community. These will be the entities that apply for a domain name, and that domain name, they will then appoint an operator consisting of a registry and a registry back-end provider, and this could be a local provider, and this could be done as a build, operate, and transfer basis, and they would be building this on behalf of this city or municipality. The interest for the city and the municipality is to provide service to its residents and derive revenue from the utilities or the services that they’re providing to their citizens, and out of that, they grant each citizen, each utility holder a domain name, an email address, and that email address would enhance the delivery of bills and the settlement of bills based on what would be utilized. We believe such a model, when applied or implemented on the continent and underserved or underdeveloped countries, it would attract more players, more participants, and this needs some kind of understanding that we have seen it. We have walked this ground. We think we understand what is the best mechanism of bringing about inclusion, and this is my submission to this audience that consider this business model of an applicant being a city municipality, gaining or getting access to their discount, appointing a registry operator and a back-end provider. to be the ones who are doing the work, and building websites alongside that, providing. And we are looking now at where is the next wave of a domain name. For us, the next wave for domain names, when we talk of inclusivity and innovation, is getting more of our own participating in e-commerce. E-commerce is the next great space for domain names. If we can participate extensively, solid in that space, we would have been able to achieve a lot in this space. Thanks, Adam.

Rebecca McGilley: So, I just want to say something that Lucky mentioned that’s very important. Part of the program for applicant support will be sort of pro bono assistance in terms of, we’re looking for people to help applicants with writing applications, understanding the legal issues, but also the business models. And so, what Lucky was saying about learning the lessons from what .Africa, .CapeTown have done, and how they’ve grown, and the insights that you’re providing, Lucky, are critically important. And I hope we will have a lot of people who will volunteer to be part of the applicant support to get that kind of hands-on, on-the-ground experience with it. But I know that’s something that the applicant support program is putting together as the outreach for the pro bono, for the sort of non-monetary, but very critical support in terms of business models and dealing with the paperwork and the like. So, there’s also a question from Neil in the chat about the prospect of an applicant for the registry service provider pre-evaluation form. The cost for the evaluation of back-end service providers is, like the cost of the GTLD program in general, cost recovery. So, there is a $92,000 projection, but that is based on a certain number of applicants, and the fee itself will go down if we get more applicants for that. The other thing that’s really important to keep in mind is, in the last round, every evaluation, every application included an evaluation of the back-end service provider. And so, there was a cost to the applicant in the form of that evaluation. That won’t be here this time because the registry service providers are being evaluated on a sort of once-and-done process. So, there are savings and benefits that will accrue to supported applicants, and applicants in underserved regions from the program itself. And then, finally, the question of sort of whether there should be applicant support for back-end registries raises really important stability and security issues. Back-end service providers are businesses that are going to be operating multiple top-level domains all around the world, and the very last thing that we should allow to happen is to not thoroughly evaluate the ability of that service provider to provide high-quality service. And that costs money. That evaluation costs money. So, although I think we understand and agree with the desire to have globally located back-end service providers, we have to balance that with the absolutely critical stability and security requirements and take into account the fact that this once-and-done evaluation process will benefit applicants globally who will not have to bear the costs of those as part of the evaluation process.

Adam Peake: Thanks, Becky, and thanks for the – oh, go ahead, Martin, please.

Maarten Botterman: Hi, this is Maarten Botterman. Sorry for – just to add to what Becky said, another big difference between the first round was that there were just a handful of back-end providers. Actually, there’s now a market with choice, including non-profit organizations and CCs, so you have much more offer and much more reasonable pricing as well. Just wanted to add that part. Thank you, Martin. Thank you, Becky,

Adam Peake: for your comments. It’s very helpful, very kind of you. Just wanted to welcome Ram Mohan to the room. I know you’ve been in much demand in other sessions, so Ram, as I mentioned, is the Chief Strategy Officer for Identity Digital and one of the largest operators of the new TLD batch from 2012. And wanted to say we’ve been talking about – Lucky and Jen have been talking about their experience from 2012 and Jen from before with .Asia and how that’s worked, and Lucky’s made some very important points about inclusion and how we can get people applying from the African content, etc. But please make an introduction and give us some ideas. Thank you.

Ram Mohan: Thank you so much. Can you hear me? Okay, great. Thank you so much, and my apologies for joining this session late. I was speaking at another one. So I want to focus my comments on two areas. One is that we look at innovation with a lowercase I rather than innovation with an uppercase I. Let me explain what that means. Often the success of programs is only seen years out. And in the meanwhile, you have many prognosticators who pre-decide and who say that a program has failed or has succeeded based on conventional metrics. Metrics, for example, in the domain name industry, such as how many domains have been registered. And you find especially a prevalent logic inside of the domain name industry that focuses on success almost directly correlated to the number of domains that people have registered. But I’d like to say that that is actually a myth. If you look at my own company and the 300 plus domain names that we have, I can tell you that we have success in all of them. Not in the way of looking at it purely from a commercial, is it a profit-making enterprise, one TLD at a time? One way of looking at innovation for us has been in the existing domain name space prior to the various rounds that ICANN has introduced. The gold standard has been .com in the GTLD space and businesses, organizations applying for a .com, getting a .com domain name. name. We are now in a situation where it’s somewhere in the order of 17 or 18 characters that you have to string together to get an open name that is just easily available in .com without paying any kind of a premium. So just to give you an example, if I say, I want to get roms studio, if I type in romsstudio.com, it’s hard to get. It’s probably gone. Even if I type in roms-studio, even that is hard to get. And what you’ll find is engines that come back and say, how about romsstudioonline.com? How about romsdigitalstudio.com, et cetera, right? The lowercase i innovation that has happened is, with the advent of new TLDs and the availability of them, is that I can go and get rom.studio, or I can get rom.photography, or whatever it is, right? And there is innovation that has come about just by that. Because you’re bringing communities that were otherwise forced to get very long strings that are often not easy to remember, often not easy to relay. Those strings are now no longer as important, because you can get memorable, descriptive strings available directly in the domain space. And I think that is true innovation that is being fostered. So that’s the one thing that I’d like to make a point on. The second is on, we’ve talked here about diversity and inclusion. The thing here is that, if you do not get to linguistic diversity combined with the other kinds of diversity that ICANN is looking for, you’re going to fail. There has to be linguistic diversity as a core outreach goal, as a core model for a definition of success. It’s not the only determinant of success, but it ought to be a significant factor and a significant metric that you measure, because the world that we know is not a world of English and Spanish and Chinese and Arabic. The world that we know is far more multilingual, but we do not have systems at the domain name space or the domain name level that can reflect the actual reality of the people of the world. For that, we need to really have a focus on linguistic diversity. I’m pleased that there is a session tomorrow on universal acceptance and internationalized domain names. It’s not enough to just say, let us get names in your language, let us get names accessible online. We have to also look at, are the various languages and the communities that have those languages, do they have the knowledge, understanding, awareness to be able to participate in what you’re bringing forward? Because when they do that, you will find lowercase innovation coming through.

Adam Peake: A nice new way to look at this, gen.asia and language and the issues around that. How do you respond to this idea of lowercase innovation based on language and inclusion? Thank you.

Jennifer Chung: Thanks, Adam. I thought we weren’t supposed to talk about it, but I’m happy. As ever, to be able to say more, I think especially coming from Asia-Pacific, language is ultimately so important. Almost none of us in Asia-Pacific has English as our first language. Some of us, it’s our second language, third language, or even fourth language. It’s really important for the community that we’re trying to serve to actually serve their needs, for them to be able to not only know they can navigate the internet in their own language, that they have the know-how to do so. And I’m really happy to hear both from Becky and also Christy at the improvements that have been made towards the Applicant Support Program, because obviously DOT Kids was a beneficiary. Not a single beneficiary of the 2012 round Applicant Support Program, but I mean, we’re happy in that way. But looking at it overall, that is a sign that there’s a lot more things that need to be improved coming to the new round. Where can we really target and provide this benefit? International domain names is one of the priorities that ICANN has said time and time again that they are looking for the new round. Even this morning, we heard from Curtis that this is what ICANN really wants to happen, to be able to serve the underserved or underrepresented regions, to be able to get these people online, being able to use these new domain names in a way not only to benefit the community, but in a way that allows for innovation, allows for market-driven innovation and entrepreneurship. The lowercase i, see, English is not my first language either, that Ram was saying, is so critical. It’s so critical. And I think especially for Asia-Pacific, because linguistic diversity is so broad, more than just that, it is, we’re talking now about digital inclusion and language justice. And I think that’s something that Ram touched on is really near and dear to DotAsia’s heart, of course, DotKids as well. What we’re trying to look, our wishes, if we had three wishes for what DotAsia wants to see for the next round is, of course, more applicants coming in from Asia Pacific region. We are a huge region with most of the world population and growing and more from community applicants because I heard both from Becky and Chrissy that the improvements done for these different evaluation processes, including three reductions, that is very important. But in addition to that, to provide the knowledge and the upskilling that allows them to succeed and sustain their business, that’s the most important part. So more from community, that the community priority evaluation should lean towards supporting those who want to be community and not just kind of looking at it from the lens of, oh, we must weed out these people or these organizations that are trying to game the system. Of course, every single system will have people who are looking to look for the loopholes, but the outset of how we’re trying to organize and design these programs really should be for people who want to use this for the benefit of that community. So hopefully that answers a little bit more. And the final little bit on internationalized domain names, my last wish, perhaps, that it’s now on the equal footing to all the different ASCII domain names, the English language domain names that you see. So that could be not something that’s weird or new, but that becomes something that’s really common and nobody blinks an eye at it.

Adam Peake: Thanks. We switched it on. I put a link into the chat about the workshop tomorrow and the words beginning for that session are that the internet must be multilingual and inclusive is the first sentence of the description there. So we have about 24 minutes left, 20 minutes left, something like that, 20 minutes left. Are there any questions from the audience? You’re here being very attentive and patient at the beginning. So would anybody like to raise a hand and we’ll pass a mic around. Or the same for any question online. If not, I would like to go back to… Could you pass the microphone backwards, please? I would like to go back to Lucky and his comment about solutions. I don’t think we should miss that.

Paulus Nirenda: Thank you very much. Paulus Nirenda from Malawi. I just wanted maybe to raise the issue, one of the issues that Lucky, which is success of the new GTLDs that were put up in the last round, especially those from Africa, Africa.Johannesburg.Cape Town, they haven’t been as successful as expected. And I think that this applies to quite a few other new GTLDs. I don’t know if in the next round there is an evaluation on this and how ICANN wants to move forward with the success of new GTLDs.

Ram Mohan: Thank you. I hope you can hear me. So, I want to say we should expect not all GTLDs will succeed. We should walk away from this idea that just because ICANN introduces a new GTLD program and they have hundreds if not thousands of new GTLDs that come through, that they all must be successful. I think the, at least from ICANN’s point of view, the goal has to be to create a level playing field and to make sure that the ingredients for success are present and accessible to all. Those ingredients include the applicant support, they include the technical knowledge, they include linguistic ability, they include universal acceptance, things like that. The rest of it, where there are market forces that come to bear, I really think we should allow economics and market forces to do what they do well rather than try to engineer some kind of social experiment to arrive at some definition of success.

Sajid Rahman: If I can add a few points, the whole multi-stakeholderism that ICANN is very proud of essentially means that all the different voices get heard and get built into the different activities and policies that we form. As a result of that, this multilingualism, which is an issue, and that’s why you see different activities like UA Days and international domain names and many initiatives including application support programs that have been taken. But I completely agree with Ram that at the end of the day, it needs to make sense for someone to continue a domain name indefinitely. I mean, the application support program can only continue up to a certain extent, it cannot be infinite.

Lucky Masilela: Yeah, if I may come in, I think I’m quite excited. by Ram’s approach to complex issues, he explains them with lower and upper cases, and of course it makes sense the more he pulls context into that. And starting with the second point where he talks to diversity inclusion, and in particular the linguistic diversity, for us, one of the things that we picked up in early days is that this is very critical, the issue of linguistic diversity. And this was supported by the fact that there is less than 15% of African content, I’m talking about history books, our music, etc., that is available on internet. And it makes it difficult for the African child to go into internet and find sufficient information of themselves, something that had been created and generated by themselves, across the multiple languages on the continent. And that, again, for us, becomes an inhibitor to this digital inclusion. And we need to start bridging that gap to this digital inclusion by ensuring that more African languages are translated into, or more internet content is translated into African languages, so that this can be accessible to the larger community. And with that, we will see more people participating, and we’ll see more appreciation for what we are discussing today, the DNS, the domain name, and the inclusiveness. And then those lower cases and innovation, it is well and good, again, there are certain things that are price sensitive. Whilst we say The success of a domain name is not the number of names that you would have sold. It proves slightly different, you know, when you don’t have the numbers to begin to innovate around. We have been able to innovate as an entity around names like your co.za. We’ve been able to build other solutions because we have scale. We don’t need to reach the scale that would be taking away from our creativeness or what you would call the uppercase innovation. It tells us that numbers do matter, especially for certain markets. You need to be price sensitive on the African continent. You cannot charge any fee that is very far from the market conditions. That will make it even more difficult for people to participate. So we need to be grappling. For us, we are grappling with all those things. How sensitive can we be to the pricing? Make sure that it’s correct. And once the numbers are there and the scale is there, then we begin to bring in innovation. We bring more solutions into this thing so that this domain name is not just what it is, blank and boring. But we put color, we put flair into these things. This reminds me of a different solution that was innovated on the continent. I don’t know. Most of you might not or could have heard of it. Banks, for a very long time, have been excluding a lot of the citizens across the continent. And one mobile operator realized that we have a lot of people who are not banked. And we can use our platform, our mobile platform, to make sure that people are not banked. people have access to cash, access to money, or they can use this tool, this mobile phone, to make payments and transact, buy tomatoes, pay for the piki-piki or that taxi in town. And that brought in M-Pesa. And that was the innovation, when people felt marginalized by banking systems, that they couldn’t qualify, they couldn’t fulfill some of these KYC. And then another instrument was developed, which was more accommodating. And I’m seeing that for us again, if we want to have this inclusiveness properly addressed, we have to think with an uppercase innovation and come up with solutions that are going to bring more participants in the third world or those underdeveloped or underserved markets. We have to think outside what we are starting. We are on the right track, but let’s think again, if is this all that we can do? Is this sufficient? Does this provide a foolproof solution for what we want to achieve inclusiveness? History will judge us that we have not done enough. We have failed to think far and fast to ensure that we include those that are marginalized. Thank you.

Adam Peake: We have over to Jen again, and then I have Nick Wendman-Smith behind me, asking questions. Oh, go to Nick, please.

Nick Wenban-Smith: Oh, thank you, Adam. I think that works, I hope. Very strange with headphones, not headphones. So yeah, so my name is Nick Wendman-Smith. I am employed by a company called Nominet. And from our perspective, from the last round of the new GDG, from our perspective, from the last round of the new GTLDs, I wanted to just share a little bit of a story because although the United Kingdom is, you know, one of the G7, wealthy nations, we had areas of significant deprivation and social challenges and I think that’s the case even in the very wealthiest of countries. So we were very interested to get a better digital presence for the Welsh community, which is a population about five million and includes some of the very poorest parts of the United Kingdom. And I have to tell you that when we approached the Welsh elected officials in terms of the cost of the new GTLD applications, plus of course the technical time and infrastructure and expertise required, and to make it twice as bad they wanted two because they wanted the one in the Welsh version, because part of this is about linguistic diversity, so they need to have two application fees plus two letters of credit for the continuing obligations thing, which is also extremely expensive. Now I want to be positive to say that actually it’s been a very good initiative and over the course of time they’ve now got a lot of very high profile registrations, for example the national sport is rugby and so they use a dot Wales and a dot Cymru domain names for their national sport, for the local government, for the musical and cultural things are all very well represented online and they have now I think between the two 20,000 domains under registration which is sustainable. But I wanted to say that it has been, first of all it required an investor which was prepared to take a lot of risk and over the long time and that investor was nominate in fact, so we paid the application fees and we did all of the things that they needed to do and then it has taken the order of 12 years of continuous investment and over a long long period of time before you see any sort of return. So I suppose what I’m just saying, while the applicant support program is being still refined within ICANN, you just need to understand that even for sophisticated applicants with relatively deep pockets, it was quite a hard piece of work and it required a lot longer. Certainly the business models that we put together, which our finance team signed off on when we paid for the applications, were well far off the mark, is what I would say, and I think just urge everybody to sort of try to, whatever you can do to help people with the applications, it’ll need ten times that what you’re currently, in order to get these things off the ground, because it’s a hugely complex process and a hugely expensive and technically time-consuming one, even for people who are experts in the area. That’s my thoughts on that, I don’t know, it’s already a question, I’m just saying, you need to do more.

Adam Peake: Over to Jen, who’s been doing a lot already. Do more, Jen, thank you.

Jennifer Chung: Okay, actually, I was really happy to go after Nick, because I was going to bring back the example of .Kids, which was the sole recipient of the applicant support programme back in 2012. We didn’t launch until about two years ago, it’s taken a very, very long time, and .Asia is actually the organisation behind all of this. We are supposedly on a cost recovery basis, but really, we have underwritten everything, the know-how on how to create the registry policies, leveraging on our registry back-end providers, of course, to do all of that, and I foresee coming into the new round, I mean, talking again about success, right, looking at, if we’re looking at pure numbers, that’s just one measurement of success. I think success means… means different things to different people. I like how Lucky has mentioned time and time again as well, and it’s really important to stress the African continent really needs to look at this, whether or not this new GTLD program for them coming in the new round, what success will look like for the African region, and I could bring it back to Asia Pacific, what does success might look like for Asia Pacific? Is it more applications with internationalized domain names? Is it more brands coming in? Is it more SMEs? Is it more innovative applications? I think the answer is all of the above, and I think right now as a community as well, we’re trying to refine the ways to be able to get to the success. Not only, of course, ICANN, the organization, but ICANN is also a community who’s trying to look at lessons learned from the previous round to be able to apply them and create solutions that allow for innovation, but not to the point where this new, as a new applicant, you want to be able to eventually independently run your domain, not always have this guard rails around or training wheels, as I like to call them, forever, because that is not really a true sense of success. So being able to give that boost and that help to the underserved regions, to the markets that really need this, but don’t know how, I think that is the balance we really have to strike here.

Adam Peake: Ram, please.

Ram Mohan: Briefly, success for ICANN in this next round perhaps should include some estimation of the number of TLDs that will not succeed, because that is the market reality. And we really, I think, are doing a lot of work to make sure that we’re not just doing this for all of us a disservice by going into this with an idea that 100% success rate or else. And I think that’s unrealistic. That’s not how the marketplace works. We ought to have a recognition of that. We also ought to recognize that in some cases the need may be apparent but the demand may not be evident, right? Just because there is a need for something doesn’t mean that the people who profess to have the need will be willing to go and stand up and, you know, open up their wallets and buy that name, right? So I think some level of realism and some level of, you know, projecting and being quite clear that while the new TLD program will and should work on diversity, applicant support, especially linguistic diversity, which is close to my heart as well, while all of those things are there, if you do all of those things you should still expect some level of failure.

Adam Peake: Final comment and then we’ll probably have to wrap up, I think.

Sajid Rahman: Thank you. I mean, like, you know, wearing my investor hat, we always accept some failures. And I’ve seen companies launching products, which are which do very well till they start charging for it. So, you know, there is always this reality and, you know, there are realities that we need to accept, but we continue to support. I mean, like I said, you know, I can listen to the voices. The whole idea of multistakeholderism is to listen to voices around and, you know, do whatever we can to support.

Adam Peake: Thank you very much, everybody, for your time. this afternoon. We mentioned there is a workshop tomorrow afternoon around the issues of multilingualism, IDNs, universal acceptance, so please look at the schedule for a workshop number 150. Want to thank particularly online Lucky and Christy. Lucky for the challenges you’re facing across the region and also solutions and issues that are very relevant to the whole of WSIS and not just discussions with an ICANN community, so very relevant. To Jen for just being very kind and helpful throughout and providing a lot of useful information, particularly at the beginning while I was running around there. Thank you, incredibly kind. And Sajid for the default nine scenarios and ideas. Ram, I like lowercase innovation and the importance of language, so I think it’s been very helpful and very grateful to all of you for being here and to our speakers. So thank you. The end. Bye. Thank you. Thank you.

Agreement Points

Importance of linguistic diversity in new gTLDs

Ram Mohan

Jennifer Chung

Sajid Rahman

Need for linguistic diversity and local content to drive adoption

Opportunity to serve underrepresented languages and scripts

Focus on linguistic diversity and internationalized domain names

Speakers agreed on the critical importance of linguistic diversity in new gTLDs to foster digital inclusion and better serve diverse communities.

Need for realistic expectations about gTLD success

Ram Mohan

Sajid Rahman

Need to allow for some gTLDs to fail as part of market forces

Realistic expectations about success rates and market demand

Speakers emphasized the importance of accepting that some gTLDs will fail due to market forces and that success should not be expected for all new gTLDs.

Importance of applicant support for underserved regions

Christy Buckley

Jennifer Chung

Rebecca McGilley

Importance of applicant support program for underserved regions

Enhanced applicant support program targeting underserved regions

Need to balance support with eventual independence for new gTLDs

Speakers agreed on the significance of the Applicant Support Program in fostering participation from underserved regions while emphasizing the need for eventual independence.

Similar Viewpoints

Both speakers highlighted the challenges of launching and sustaining new gTLDs, emphasizing the high costs and long-term investment required, even in developed markets.

Lucky Masilela

Nick Wendman-Smith

Limited success of African gTLDs due to market conditions

High costs and long-term investment required even for developed markets

Both speakers argued for a more nuanced understanding of success for new gTLDs, beyond just the number of registrations, considering factors like community needs and regional differences.

Ram Mohan

Jennifer Chung

Success should not be measured solely by number of registrations

Success can mean different things for different regions/communities

Unexpected Consensus

Acceptance of gTLD failures as part of the process

Ram Mohan

Sajid Rahman

Need to allow for some gTLDs to fail as part of market forces

Realistic expectations about success rates and market demand

Despite coming from different perspectives, both speakers unexpectedly agreed on the need to accept that some gTLDs will fail, viewing it as a natural part of market dynamics rather than a policy failure.

Overall Assessment

Summary

The main areas of agreement included the importance of linguistic diversity in new gTLDs, the need for realistic expectations about gTLD success, and the significance of applicant support for underserved regions. There was also consensus on the challenges of launching and sustaining new gTLDs, and the need for a nuanced understanding of success beyond registration numbers.

Consensus level

Moderate consensus was observed among speakers on key issues. While there were differences in perspectives, particularly regarding the definition of success and the approach to market challenges, there was general agreement on the importance of inclusivity, linguistic diversity, and the need for support in underserved regions. This level of consensus suggests a shared understanding of the complexities involved in expanding the gTLD space and the need for balanced approaches that consider both market realities and inclusivity goals.

Different Viewpoints

Measuring success of new gTLDs

Ram Mohan

Lucky Masilela

Success should not be measured solely by number of registrations

Importance of sustainable business models over time

Ram Mohan argues against using the number of domain registrations as the sole metric for success, emphasizing innovation and community needs. Lucky Masilela, while acknowledging other factors, stresses the importance of registration numbers for achieving scale and enabling innovation, especially in price-sensitive markets.

Expectations for gTLD success rates

Ram Mohan

Kristy Buckley

Need to allow for some gTLDs to fail as part of market forces

Importance of applicant support program for underserved regions

Ram Mohan argues for realistic expectations about gTLD success rates, suggesting that some failure should be expected as part of normal market forces. Christy Buckley, while not directly contradicting this, emphasizes the importance of support programs to foster broader participation and success in underserved regions.

Unexpected Differences

Overall Assessment

summary

The main areas of disagreement revolve around how to measure the success of new gTLDs, the balance between market forces and support for underserved regions, and the expectations for gTLD success rates.

difference_level

The level of disagreement among the speakers is moderate. While there are differing perspectives on certain issues, there is also a significant amount of common ground, particularly in recognizing the importance of linguistic diversity, supporting underserved regions, and acknowledging the complexities of the gTLD market. These differences in perspective contribute to a richer discussion and highlight the multifaceted nature of the challenges and opportunities in expanding the gTLD space. The implications of these disagreements suggest that a balanced approach, taking into account various stakeholder perspectives, will be crucial in shaping the future of the gTLD program.

Partial Agreements

All speakers agree on the importance of considering regional and community-specific factors in defining success for new gTLDs. However, they differ in their emphasis: Lucky Masilela focuses on sustainable business models, Jennifer Chung highlights the need for diverse metrics beyond registration numbers, and Ram Mohan stresses the importance of realistic market expectations.

Lucky Masilela

Jennifer Chung

Ram Mohan

Success can mean different things for different regions/communities

Need for linguistic diversity and local content to drive adoption

Realistic expectations about success rates and market demand

Similar Viewpoints

Both speakers highlighted the challenges of launching and sustaining new gTLDs, emphasizing the high costs and long-term investment required, even in developed markets.

Lucky Masilela

Nick Wenban-Smith

Limited success of African gTLDs due to market conditions

High costs and long-term investment required even for developed markets

Both speakers argued for a more nuanced understanding of success for new gTLDs, beyond just the number of registrations, considering factors like community needs and regional differences.

Ram Mohan

Jennifer Chung

Success should not be measured solely by number of registrations

Success can mean different things for different regions/communities

Key Takeaways

New gTLDs face significant challenges in underserved regions like Africa due to market conditions and high costs

Linguistic diversity and local content are crucial for driving adoption of new gTLDs

Success of new gTLDs should not be measured solely by number of registrations

The next round of new gTLDs should focus on fostering innovation and inclusion, particularly for underserved regions and languages

Realistic expectations are needed about success rates and market demand for new gTLDs

Resolutions and Action Items

Enhance the applicant support program to better target and assist applicants from underserved regions

Focus on promoting internationalized domain names and linguistic diversity in the next round

Provide more comprehensive, long-term support to help new gTLDs become sustainable

Unresolved Issues

How to define and measure success for new gTLDs, especially those serving niche communities

How to balance providing support for new gTLDs with encouraging their eventual independence

How to address the high costs and long-term investment required for new gTLDs, even in developed markets

Suggested Compromises

Accept that some new gTLDs will fail as part of normal market forces, while still providing support to increase chances of success

Consider alternative business models for new gTLDs, such as the city/municipality sponsorship model suggested by Lucky Masilela

Often the success of programs is only seen years out. And in the meanwhile, you have many prognosticators who pre-decide and who say that a program has failed or has succeeded based on conventional metrics. Metrics, for example, in the domain name industry, such as how many domains have been registered.

speaker

Ram Mohan

reason

This comment challenges the conventional way of measuring success in the domain name industry, introducing the concept of ‘lowercase i’ innovation.

impact

It shifted the discussion from focusing solely on registration numbers to considering other forms of innovation and success in the domain space.

There has to be linguistic diversity as a core outreach goal, as a core model for a definition of success. It’s not the only determinant of success, but it ought to be a significant factor and a significant metric that you measure, because the world that we know is not a world of English and Spanish and Chinese and Arabic.

speaker

Ram Mohan

reason

This comment highlights the critical importance of linguistic diversity in achieving true digital inclusion.

impact

It broadened the conversation to include the need for multilingual approaches in domain names and internet governance.

Banks, for a very long time, have been excluding a lot of the citizens across the continent. And one mobile operator realized that we have a lot of people who are not banked. And we can use our platform, our mobile platform, to make sure that people are not banked. people have access to cash, access to money, or they can use this tool, this mobile phone, to make payments and transact, buy tomatoes, pay for the piki-piki or that taxi in town. And that brought in M-Pesa.

speaker

Lucky Masilela

reason

This comment provides a concrete example of innovation that addressed a specific need in underserved markets, relating it back to the domain name discussion.

impact

It encouraged participants to think more broadly about innovation and inclusion, considering solutions that may be outside traditional domain name approaches.

Success for ICANN in this next round perhaps should include some estimation of the number of TLDs that will not succeed, because that is the market reality. And we really, I think, are doing a lot of work to make sure that we’re not just doing this for all of us a disservice by going into this with an idea that 100% success rate or else.

speaker

Ram Mohan

reason

This comment introduces a realistic perspective on success rates, challenging the notion that all new TLDs must succeed.

impact

It prompted a more nuanced discussion about expectations and metrics for success in the next round of TLDs.

Overall Assessment

These key comments shaped the discussion by broadening the perspective on what constitutes success in the domain name industry. They moved the conversation beyond simple metrics like registration numbers to consider linguistic diversity, innovative solutions for underserved markets, and realistic expectations for success rates. This led to a more nuanced and comprehensive dialogue about digital inclusion and the role of new TLDs in fostering innovation and addressing global needs.

How can we address the low number of domain name registrations in Africa (only 3.5 million for a continent of 1.4 billion people)?

speaker

Lucky Masilela

explanation

This highlights a significant gap in digital inclusion and domain name adoption in Africa, which needs to be investigated to improve participation.

How can we create enabling mechanisms for the next round of gTLDs to increase participation from the Global South, particularly Africa?

speaker

Lucky Masilela

explanation

This is crucial for ensuring more diverse and inclusive participation in the next round of gTLD applications.

How can we address the issue of CCTLDs still being administered outside the African continent?

speaker

Lucky Masilela

explanation

This impacts digital sovereignty and local control over internet infrastructure in Africa.

How can we make the Registry Service Provider (RSP) evaluation process more accessible to providers from the Global South?

speaker

Lucky Masilela

explanation

The current high costs ($90,000) for RSP evaluation may marginalize service providers from developing countries.

How can we improve the success rate of new gTLDs, particularly those from Africa?

speaker

Paulus Nirenda

explanation

Understanding the factors behind the limited success of some new gTLDs is important for improving future rounds.

How can we increase the amount of African content (currently less than 15%) available on the internet?

speaker

Lucky Masilela

explanation

This is critical for improving digital inclusion and making the internet more relevant for African users.

How can we develop more price-sensitive domain name offerings for the African market?

speaker

Lucky Masilela

explanation

Affordability is a key factor in increasing domain name adoption in developing markets.

How can we better support applicants throughout the entire lifecycle of launching and operating a new gTLD?

speaker

Nick Wendman-Smith

explanation

Even for well-resourced applicants, the process of launching and sustaining a new gTLD is complex and requires long-term support.

How can we realistically assess and prepare for the potential failure rate of new gTLDs in the next round?

speaker

Ram Mohan

explanation

Understanding that not all new gTLDs will succeed is important for setting realistic expectations and planning appropriate support mechanisms.