لكن الأهم من ذلك تقديم التهاني إلى كل من شارك في هذا الإنجاز من الدول الثلاث وساهم في ظهور هذه الأسماء على الإنترنت: (.السعودية) و(.امارات) و(.مصر). ‏

Instead I have decided to post the letter below. Samira is a real person She is a little girl from a village in a developing country. She has one thing in common with many others – she has no access to the Internet (they do have radio). But while her Internet problems start at a different place than IDNs, I am confident that IDNs at some point soon will make it easier for her to learn about the Internet and also make it easier for her to use it. Samira will have to wait for the postal delivery of this letter – but then there is nothing like getting that kind of mail too

Other than that I just like to say that I hope the Fast Track launch goes smoothly, and that it will work favorable for all participants. But most of all I hope that we with this launch will treat IDNs carefully and with the respect it deserves, and that we will continue to work together across time-zones and cultures, because afterall, what is the Internet if it does not work well for many years and users to come.

————————————-
Dear Samira,
Tomorrow is BIG BIG day for many people around the world and I decided to share it with you.

I know you have not seen the Internet yet, but as you grow up and you do, maybe you will recall this letter and an exciting time. What is the Internet? Well, it’s like this big box of information, pictures, games – you can read and also write about anything you like. it could be about peasants, your favorite food, toy, and you know what? You can even listen to the radio on the Internet. Only your imagination sets a limit for the Internet. Have you ever looked under water? It’s like an entire new world down there, so different than on land. The Internet is kind of like that – a different world – only bigger and it has information about under-water and land in it….anything you can imagine

And every page on this Internet has an address. You know, just like you know how to explain where you live. It is made that way so that I can tell you an address and you can then go to that address and read my letter to you, or look at a picture I placed there for you to see. All these addresses have only been able to be written in the Roman alphabet….yes sounds a little weird, but that is just all those letters you see me write here.

Guess what happens tomorrow? Countries around the world – your country too – will be able to get a new address on the Internet. The most exciting thing is that this new address can be in almost any letters you like. So you can use your own language for an address for you. Then your friends and family can use that address and see what you are putting on the Internet. So it will be easier for you and everyone you know to remember that address. I think you will be excited when you see how it works.

I know that even though you already know more than one language, you are soon going to begin learning English. English is the language I used to write this letter to you. Languages are so exciting and they change all the time. Sometimes it can be hard to keep up with, but I will tell you more about it in my next letter. Learning another language is amazing and it will help you communicate with people around the world. I have made so many friends around the world who all have helped make the Internet change the way I tried to describe to you. They have all taught me something important about life that I will never forget. But it would not have worked if we did not speak a little bit of the same language. So I really hope that you will be enjoying learning a new language.

You know how you can write your language both by using the Roman alphabet, and also the Arabic one? Well, this Internet change is almost the same thing – now these addresses can be in either alphabet too! And the coolest thing about it is that there is only one to decide which alphabet to use, and that it YOU! It is your choice for you and you alone!

But please keep that in mind when you start using the Internet. Let me know when that is and I will help you get your own address to a place on the Internet, in your language. But remember that I am not able to read or write your language (although I wish) so it may be a little bit difficult for me in the beginning and I will need your help.

With the very best wishes to you and many many others in the next generation of Internet users. I know I am together with many people around the world when I say that I can’t wait to see what you will use it for and how you will change it over time too….

ICANN’s staff is currently producing implementation plans for both the IDN ccTLD Fast Track Process and the New gTLD Process. What guides that process for the topic of variants, is three things:

1. Following the direction of policy advice already provided
2. Taking broader community needs into consideration, and
3. Ensuring the continued stability of the DNS and the namespace in general

In the course of doing this for the issue of variant TLDs there were two different proposals.

1. Reserve desired variants & block all other variants; and
2. Delegate desired variants & block all other variants

Following public comment periods on both proposed implementation methods (none were agreeable across the community), it was decided during the Sydney meeting this June that ICANN staff would seek implementation assistance from the community. This is usually the case on policies that have technical implications and hence are difficult to implement.

As a result a small team has been asked to volunteer their time (you can read more about that team and another issue the team is looking at in the post Solving the remaining IDN issues).

Community discussion on this topic is very important as we strive to reach a conclusion that works for all involved. Variant TLD management is especially important to make the introduction of IDNs work well for the end-users. The IDN Tables that hold and define the character variants are the most important piece of the management of variants, as these tables are developed to reduce the potential for confusion to end users by the introduction of IDNs.

In the most recent paper [pdf] published on this topic, a variant is defined as follows:

“Variant characters are two or more characters that are similar in appearance and result in two domain names to be visually confusing.

As such the resulting “variant strings” that are obtained by replacing the original characters with the variant characters, are visually indistinctible and, if used for separate purposes, could create user confusion. In some cases this could result in visually similar strings having the same meaning.

As such, the term “variant” designates orthographic equivalence on the character level, such as that between “æ” and “ae” in “encyclopædia” and “encyclopaedia”, but not in the broader sense that pertains to the variant spelling of words, as “encyclopaedia” vs. “encyclopedia” or “color” vs. “colour”. The IDN Tables that define variant characters are useful because they enable TLD registries to develop registration policies that will reduce the potential for confusion that could result from typographic similarities in domain names.

Recent discussions have suggested that the definition might be better if more technical stringent (for example by following the definition in the JET Guidelines: “One conceptual character can be identified with several different Code Points in character sets for computer use”) and then add various examples of variants, where some are confusingly similar visually and others are not.

The same paper proposed the following way of managing IDN TLD variants:

“ICANN understands the need expressed in the community for enabling allocation of variant strings, in particular for locations where some users will key in one string and other users will key in the variant string when accessing for example a website. ICANN urges the community to continue to discuss and develop a technical solution that will enable the allocation of variant strings in the root zone in a stable manner. Until then IDN ccTLD Fast Track requesters will need to select one string per script or language only or alternatively wait until a technical solution has been found.

“In order to reserve the possibility of allocating variant strings to the appropriate entities, ICANN will ensure that all variant strings are reserved or blocked for allocation for now. Blocked strings will be considered as “existing strings” when incoming requests are checked for conflicts with existing TLDs. Therefore, any later request for the same string will be denied.”

The reservation of desired variants was thought to be the safest way of securing adequate variant management until a solution has been found on how to manage them at the top level. The community response to the temporary solution was mixed. There is a concern in certain regions that a blocking of variants will disfranchise certain user communities. However, at the same time the response received stated that solving this problem should not in any way slow down the Fast Track introduction.

While we continue work on the subject with the industry experts, one thing seem to be clear: variant TLDs will be identified using of the IDN Tables that are required in either a Fast Track request or an IDN gTLD application.

This means that for the sake of the end-users, the usability of IDNs globally, and therefore the adoption of IDNs across applications on the Internet, we better get these tables right!

I have previously blogged about what could be the worst case scenario. We really want to avoid this. We are in the last step of making IDN TLDs a reality for users globally which will be an amazing step for all involved.

With Sydney opening on Monday 22 June, we strived to have this information up before this morning, Monday 1 June.

As such, it is probably as comprehensive a set of documents as ICANN has published for any meeting – addressing hard issues on IDNs, an important report on intellectual property issues as related to domain names, another huge piece of comment and analysis related to new TLDs, new financial analysis, more on community travel (which is coming), and other areas. I’m also pretty confident that this is the earliest (relative to an ICANN meeting) that this kind of material has been available.

So what was included?

IDNs: We posted the third revision to the Fast Track Implementation Plan. This was accompanied by explanatory memos that discuss: the form of agreement we will have with IDN TLD operators, financial contributions to ICANN, and the use of variant tables. The bottom line – we plan to launch this process right after the meeting in Seoul.

New gTLDs: We posted the Analysis of public comment, as we did before the Mexico City meeting. This document is intended to demonstrate ICANN’s careful consideration of all the comment. We decided to not publish a new version of the Guidebook since the overarching issues are not yet resolved.

Instead, we have identified several areas where the Guidebook can be amended and published excerpts – just those sections that are changing. We also published explanatory memos: discussing whether Chinese, Japanese, and Korean TLDs should be allowed to register one or two-character names since complete words in those languages are generally that short; describing all the research that has been done regarding morality & public order issues; describing a process for contractual compliance in community-based TLDs; and advocating a requirement that registries maintain thick Whois databases.

IRT and Trademark Protection: The Implementation Recommendation Team was created by a resolution of the Board to develop solutions to trademark protection issues. The IRT made its final report, it was posted yesterday. The report represents a ton of work by the 18 members of the team for which we are very grateful.

As an ICANN staff member closely associated with this important and huge amount of work, I would like to thank everyone from staff and the community that worked so hard in making it possible to publish this in time for review and discussion in Sydney.

Mexico City is no exception. Although this time, it is very much easier to get a quick overview of what is out for public comment by looking at the front page of the ICANN website (the third box down on the right).

Just to present you with another avenue to finding out about these public comment periods, there are all listed below with quick explanations of what they are and the dates when they close.

Open comment periods

1. GNSO Constituency Renewals. Closes 25 FEB
As part of the ongoing changes to ICANN’s main policy-making body, the GNSO, all the existing constituencies have put in submissions stating that they have followed the bylaws and so should be reconfirmed as valid constituencies. You are free to comment on these submissions.

2. IPv4 Global Policy. Closes 26 FEB
We are running out of IPv4 address space and so ICANN has been working with the Regional Internet Registries (RIRs) to decide what system we follow as the addresses get more and more scarce. The policy here proposes that each RIR be allocated one “slash-8″ – equating to roughly 16.7 million IP addresses – as soon as they are only five blocks left. If you have a comment on this you can make it between now and 26 February.

3. Single and Two-Character .BIZ Domains. Closes 15 MAR
The company that runs the .biz registry, NeuStar, wants to make single and two-character domains available. Until recently, no registries were allowed to do this because of technical concerns. But those rules have relaxed over the past year or so. To be allowed to create, for example, i.biz, NeuStar has to change its contract with ICANN, and ICANN puts all contract changes out for public comment and review. So if you have an opinion about this, you can make it online.

4. Geographic Regions Working Group Charter. Closes 24 MAR
As an organization hoping to represent global stakeholders, ICANN has followed the common approach of splitting the world up into different regions in order to make things manageable. The problems is: where do you draw the lines? It may seem simple but the closer the issue is looked at, the more complex it becomes. So, in order to review what these regions are and who they include, ICANN has created a Working Group to go through all the issues and make recommendations at the end of it. The first step in that process is to create a charter for the group – outlining the scope and methodology that will be followed. This public comment period opens that charter up to public review.

5. Fast Track Proposed Solutions. Closes 6 APR
The Fast Track is the process by which governments and the managers of different countries’ registries will be able to apply for and receive versions of their country name in different languages scripts at the top-level of the Internet i.e. the part after the dot in a domain name. An example would be “China” in Chinese characters. These “internationalized domain names” or IDNs are being put out on the Internet for the first time as the technical issues that make it possible have only recently been resolved.

It is not a simple process by any means, so ICANN has been producing drafts of an “implementation plan” to make this process a reality. In this iteration, as well as the latest version of the Fast Track Implementation Plan, there will be three papers identifying specific issues that still need to be resolved. You can see all the papers in question and make comments about them now and until 6 April.

6. ALAC Review Final Report. Closes 17 APR
ICANN regularly reviews of its main supporting organizations and advisory committees to make sure they remain relevant and in the correct format. The At Large Advisory Committee or ALAC exists to represent ordinary Internet users and it has been under review for roughly a year and the process is drawing to a close. A final report of the working group created to carry out much of the review has been released for its final piece of public comment before being formally submitted to a Board Committee that then puts it forward to a vote by the whole Board. So if you want your say on how ordinary Internet users should be represented within the ICANN model, this is your last chance. Until the ALAC is reviewed again in a few years.

7. Operating Plan and Budget FY2010. Closes 30 APR
People are constantly asking how much money ICANN has and how it decides where to spend it. What few people recognise however is that those decisions are heavily influenced by the community itself. Every year, ICANN runs through a public strategic planning process that outlines what the organization needs to do in the next year. It then turns that into an Operating Plan and from that devises its budget. The community is invited every year to provide their feedback on the process of where ICANN spends it money. This is a comment period on the first version of the Operating Plan and Budget for ICANN’s 2010 financial year. The comments from this will be used to revise the plan and budget and it will then be put out a second time before being approved by the Board in June.

And that’s it for now. Much of the community will be focussed on the revised Applicant Guidebook for new generic top-level domains that will come out in the next day or so, but please do not forget these other public comment periods.

You can view all open and recently closed public comment periods on one page, as well as an archive of older comment periods: http://www.icann.org/en/public-comment/.