ICANN has received over 300 comments on the draft RFP from individuals and organizations representing intellectual property interests, brand owners, business owners, ICANN supporting organizations, domain name industry players, and government representatives.

The key concerns raised were:

  • Brand protection issues and the impact on brands and trademark owners.
  • Financial considerations, including evaluation fees, ongoing registry fees, and refund procedures.
  • Various issues surrounding the proposed registry agreement, particularly price controls, registry/registrar separation, the management of future agreement amendments, equitable treatment, and others.
  • General comments and concerns related to expanding the top level and its impact on the global marketplace, specific industries and Domain Name System stability.

ICANN will release a comprehensive analysis of the comments in early February 2009. ICANN also announced that it will be holding conferences in different global locations, and will be amending the draft RFP based on the feedback it has received. No date has been given for when the next release of the RFP will be available.