18(c) What operating rules will you adopt to eliminate or minimize social costs?

Prototypical answer:

1. How will multiple applications for a particular domain name be resolved, for example, by auction or on a first-come⁄first-serve basis?

The dotMusic Registry will apply several mechanisms to provide a fair opportunity for potential registrants of the domain space while attempting to minimize related costs to IP holders of related strings.

As discussed in 18b iv, registrations methods will differ during the initial phases of the dotMusic Registry.

Phase 1 (Sunrise): Will be operated for a limited scheduled time period preceding Landrush and General Availability (90 days).

• Sunrise: Sunrise periods have evolved steadily over the past years during the launch of numerous TLDs such as .Info, .Biz, .Mobi, .Tel, .Me, .XXX and others. We intend to leverage what we have learned from these efforts to present a balanced approach that provides efficiencies for intellectual property (IP) holders, as well as a fair opportunity to register strings they believe apply to their IP. The dotMusic Registry will take applications during a time defined Sunrise period for all holders of internationally recognized filed trademarks or possibly holders of existing (legacy) gTLD domain strings that are a perfect match to the applied-for .music string as valid IP holders. These trademarks will be validated by a qualified 3rd party service provider (note: at this time it is unclear if this party must be an ICANN-named service provider related to the Trademark Clearinghouse but we will comply with any finalized requirement in this regard) and legacy gTLD strings must be verified as being held by the applicant prior to defined calendar date. Applicants will have to identify and declare their associative membership in an accredited music association, who will be informed of their declaration and given a defined time schedule. All these validations must be passed before the application is accepted.
• Not knowing exactly how the Trademark Clearinghouse will be implemented, we envision being able to check Sunrise applications periodically against trademarks registered in the Trademark Clearinghouse. If a match is found, and the IP associated with the application is deemed valid, we anticipate being able to contact the party that registered the matching string in the Trademark Clearinghouse and inform them that there is a Sunrise application currently submitted that matches their string. This allows the IP holder to only participate in the Sunrise application process if there is an application against a string they have a recognized trademark against.
• In the event there is more than one valid Sunrise application for a given string, the awarding will be determined by an auction process.

Phase 2: Operated during a scheduled time period preceding General Availability.

• Land Rush: Land Rush is designed to minimize speculation in a secondary domain marketplace and therefore reduce costs for registrants. During this period, non-IP related registration applications are accepted for a defined time period. In the event that there are multiple qualified .music applications for the same domain, the awarding of the string will be determined by an auction process. Community registration restrictions for potential registrants still apply.

Phase 3: General Availability.

After Land Rush is completed, we believe IP related and speculative registrations have been addressed with efforts to minimize the costs to potential registrants and provide a fair opportunity for registration. At this time it is appropriate to open the dotMusic Registry in its regular operating state, accepting live registrations on a first-come, first-serve basis; provided, however, that all prospective registrants must demonstrate their membership in an accredited music association

2. Explain any cost benefits for registrants you intend to implement (e.g., advantageous pricing, introductory discounts, bulk registration discounts).

The focus of the dotMusic Registry is to create a trusted and protected namespace for the .music community. We will constantly analyse pricing in the TLD marketplace in consideration of providing .music registrants advantageous pricing, discounts⁄rebates or bulk registration discounts⁄rebates. We reserve the right to modify our pricing as market conditions dictate.

3. Note that the Registry Agreement requires that registrars be offered the option to obtain initial domain name registrations for periods of one to ten years at the discretion of the registrar, but no greater than ten years. Additionally, the Registry Agreement requires advance written notice of price increases. Do you intend to make contractual commitments to registrants regarding the magnitude of price escalation? If so, please describe your plans.

We do not plan to make specific price escalation contractual commitments to our registrants. We believe that ultimately, our community market and the recognized value of our community compliance monitoring and enforcement will determine the viability of our pricing. Accordingly we intend to maintain the freedom to set pricing first, in accordance with any related ICANN and⁄or Registry Agreement criteria, and second, with the demands of what our community marketplace will bear.

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