According to ICANN's website, after years of discussion and thought, new generic top-level domains are being expanded. Class 46 readers and all IP/IT law practitioners may be especially interested in documents related to problems of protecting the rights of third persons in the process of registration of new gTLDs. ICANN has already published a short memorandum regarding this issue, PDF file 76K.

ICANN is implementing an objection-based process pursuant to which rights holders can assert that proposed gTLD strings would infringe their legal rights. This process should discourage entities from applying for gTLD strings that obviously would violate intellectual property rights of others. To that end, the dispute resolution panels presiding over these matters will be provided specific criteria that are being developed with intellectual property experts, to consider when determining whether a TLD infringes the rights of others. One consideration in this analysis, however, is that it is not unusual for more than one entity to have a trademark in the same word or phrase either for different products or services or registered in different jurisdictions. Accordingly, the process is being developed with that understanding.