ICANN has posted a comment about the Board's decision to rule on the .TRAVEL wildcard service, specifically referencing my blog comment from last week. The post admits a mistake in announcing a December 7th comment deadline, but then, in my view, goes a bit too far in the defense of the Board's decision to move forward. If you announce a deadline for public comment -- right down to the precise hour of the last day in which comments will be accepted ("18:00 UTC (10:00 PST) on 7 December 2006") -- I don't think it's reasonable to say that you were "following a well-defined process" when you made a decision two weeks before that deadline. The public has a right to rely on the announcements made by ICANN, rather than having to chase their accuracy through a review of the bylaws, contracts and consensus policies. Kudos for acknowledging the error and pledging to do better, but the defense of the comment period and the promise that ICANN will continue to review comments even after the service has been rejected, goes too far.

Look, the Tralliance wildcard was a bad idea and no period of comment was going to see it resurrected from the RSTEP waste bin. This is just a big process point. On this RSTEP report, I was satisfied with the conclusions. The next time though? It may not be such an easy decision. For the closer calls, and they will come, we all may want to submit something in response. And even though I know the ICANN bylaws and contract provisions and consensus policies as well as anyone, I'm probably going to rely on that ICANN announcement on the ICANN home page for my comment deadline.