I had no idea you could buy gTLDs for internal company use. That’s outrageous, and ICANN should have rejected the application. I don’t mind the idea behind gTLDs, but the while thing has been handled pretty poorly.
Especially something as generic as .dev. I could possibly see Google having a legitimate claim to a .google TLD, but not something like .dev that is in no way limited to Google.
There are no gTLDs intended only for internal company use. There are many that are intended for only a single companyto use them, though externally.
For example, the .americanexpress gtld (https://www.nic.americanexpress/) will only provide domains to entities affiliated with american express.
Same with .dodge, and .google, and many many others.
ICANN handled this quite well -- they let others object to applications, let anyone who may have a trademark or reason to claim the word was generic come forwards, left time for comments, etc etc.
If you're objecting to this now, not back when the program was being formed, you clearly handled this poorly by not being involved in something you care about.
If you don't care and weren't involved, you also don't have the full picture and your outrage very well might be misplaced.
> If you're objecting to this now, not back when the program was being formed, you clearly handled this poorly by not being involved in something you care about.
> If you don't care and weren't involved, you also don't have the full picture and your outrage very well might be misplaced.
That's an unhelpful and unreasonable response. You shouldn't blame people for not being attuned to the activities an obscure bureaucracy (the gTLD process), just because they might be affected by it. The gTLD process has a problem, not the people negatively affected by it.
There really ought to be a long post-implementation objection period for gTLDs, and the existing process should be changed to allow for that. The top goal of the DNS system right now should be to not break stuff, and that should override any entity's desire to buy a gTLD for $$$.
You can't un-delegate TLDs once they've been delegated. That breaks the Internet. The creation of a TLD is thus irreversible, and deleting a TLD would cause a lot more harm than it would prevent.
What you can do is transfer the TLD to a different operator, and/or change its registration policies, though all of the existing domains on the TLD need to remain with their existing owners, as domain names are legally treated as property and cannot be confiscated except through due process (like a court seizure following a ruling on illegal activities).
> as domain names are legally treated as property and cannot be confiscated except through due process (like a court seizure following a ruling on illegal activities).
That's just current convention, though. If better governance means being less private-property absolutism, I'm for it. ICANN or whoever could just update the terms of their contract to allow revocation of the TLD (with a refund), if there's too much weeping and gnashing of teeth over it's issuance. People would just need to understand domains on a new TLD aren't going to be as ironclad as ones on more established TLDs.
The article quoted Google's application, which only claims private registration, and then makes wrong assumption's about google's intended use of it. The article's wrong, or used internal to only mean "closed registration".