Encirca and .Pro

[Ben42]

Would like a response from Tom Barrett from Encirca on this.

The resolution from ICANN does not sound anything like their Press release. Was this press release just sent out to inspire more users to use their Proforwarding service to make a quick buck? I feel swindled.

From ICANN's discussion...
http://www.icann.org/minutes/prelim-report-30apr08.htm

Harald Alvestrand asked if there is anything in this that would make the improper registrations goes away, make the operation that was getting around the restriction stop. Kurt Pritz advised that the Terms of Use clause is intended to address this. Staff has met with .PRO on many occasions and insisted that the behavior that enabled registrants to work around the restrictions should cease. Registrants will be required to state annually that they are using the registration for the professional purpose as intended. The registrar is required to play a role in ensuring the intended use.

From Encirca's Press release...
http://www.reuters.com/article/pressRelease/idUS156783+26-Mar-2008+PRN20080326

With these changes, the dot-pro domain works just like the dot-com domain
name. There are no restrictions on what types of names a user may register.
Businesses may register industry keywords, search engine terms, company names, trademarks or personal names. There is also no limit to how many dot-pro domain names an individual or company can register.
There are still some conditions to ensure dot-pro ownership remains more
exclusive compared to dot-com domains. Under the new rules, any person or
business recognized by a government agency or licensing body is eligible for
dot-pro. But there will be no user verification conducted before the dot-pro
names are used. Instead, the dot-pro registry will perform periodic audits of
the registered names to check compliance.

Seems to be a mismatch of statements here.

So, Tom, which is it?

 

[james2002]

It is confusing, really.

 

[akcampbell]

The top extract is Harald Alvestrand's view on loopholes, it didn't stop ICANN approving Registry.pro's proposals. Encirca's press release is basically a summary of Registry.pro's initial announcement. The comments about .pro being just like .com are fine with me provided Tom cuts the price of .pros by 95%!

There was a deathly silence after the publication of ICANN's minutes. Anybody would think most of Encirca's proForwarding customers aren't professionally qualified!!

I don't think people should worry too much about what was said in this meeting. Rule makers don't like loopholes, ICANN did confirm that they wouldn't be policing the news rules and it's not in Encirca or Registry.pro's commercial interests to clamp down.

Hopefully, after the dust settles, Encirca and Registry.pro will come to an agreement on grandfathering in existing registrations and reg fees will be slashed to get people registering.

Deletions have exceeded new registrations by 5 to 1 since the ICANN announcement so Registry.pro have to do something if they are serious about reinvigorating the extension.

 

[Ben42]

Personally I am not regging anymore .pro's until they do something about the price. It's us domainers keeping the fricken thing afloat and I for one will not help anymore.

 

[dotprofan]

It is a bit confusing just based on the minutes. I'd like to hear more clarification as well, but based on everything I've read I'm optimistic that they won't try to cause any problems for Encirca customers.