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Advisory
13 November
2000
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(13 November 2000) In a 10
November 2000 Advisory, ICANN reported that Economic Solutions,
Inc. (ESI) had filed suit in United States District Court in
St. Louis, Missouri, and sought a temporary restraining order
from that court to prohibit ICANN from establishing a ".biz"
or ".ebiz" top-level domain (TLD) or any other TLD
that is similar to the country code for Belize, ".bz."
On 13 November, the court
denied ESI's request for a temporary restraining order. The
court determined that ESI had not demonstrated that ICANN was
subject to being sued in Missouri. The court also determined
that ESI had failed to back up its claims on the merits:
Neither has plaintiff [ESI] demonstrated
a likelihood of success on the merits of the Lanham Act and unfair
competition claims, given the uncertain status of the claimed
property rights in the ".bz" domain designation, the
prospective and uncertain nature of possible establishment or
use of assertedly competing TLDs, and questions concerning whether
defendant's [ICANN's] role in the feared events could render
it, as opposed to others actually employing the ".biz"
or ".ebiz" designations, liable for false designation
or unfair competition. As to plaintiff's tortuous interference
claim, at this time defendant's proffered grounds for declining
to take the administrative actions sought by plaintiff do not
suggest a likelihood of success on the merits of plaintiff's
claim. Furthermore, the tortuous interference claim and the allegations
underlying it are unrelated to the substance of the TRO plaintiff
seeks.
ICANN applauds this decision preserving
the integrity of the ongoing consensus-based process for moving
toward the establishment of new TLDs.
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