.eus Pre-Register Domain - .eus Domain Information

The .eus TLD applicaton is submitted by Puntueus Fundazioa in name and on behalf of the Basque linguistic and cultural community.

The goals of the .eus TLD are to:

(a) facilitate digital communications from, to and within the Basque linguistic and cultural community;

(b) provide a platform for the development in the digital space of the Basque linguistic and cultural community.

(c) strengthen the image of the Basque linguistic and cultural community in the on-line world;

This is to be achieved by:

(i) actively designing and developing the .eus TLD name space with a focus on the needs of the Basque linguistic and cultural community, involving cultural, welfare, business and public stakeholders;

(ii) allowing registrations of second-level domains in the Basque linguistic and cultural TLD by individuals and organizations with a bona fide nexus to the Basque linguistic and cultural community; the basic criterion to ellucidate this bona fide nexus will be set by the requirement to use the domain names registered for the purpose of online communications in Basque and/or related to the Basque culture;

(iii) operating the .eus TLD under the stewardship of the Basque linguistic and cultural community: As will be elaborated and detailed under 20 b), Puntueus Elkartea (association) has established the PuntueEeus Fundazioa (foundation) as the future .eus Registry, which has the explicit support of the local public authorities, its most relevant cultural and professional Institutions, the private sector stakeholders.

The .eus TLD will contribute to increase the linguistic and cultural diversity of the DNS, which is one of the main objectives of the gTLD process.

The above-mentioned general goals of the .eus TLD are further developed as follows:

- Meeting point of a lively cultural community: the .eus TLD will serve approximately seven million people all around the globe who constitute a community with a rich cultural activity and unique characteristics.Basque language has a remarkable amount of publications and translations and that has shown a great dynamism on the Internet. As an example, Basque ranks as the 47th language in entries on the wikipedia.

- Contribute to the normalization of Basque language: the .eus TLD will be a powerful tool to make Basque more visible and to improve its normalization. In the future, presence on the Internet will be as critical for small languages as having access to media, education or publishing have been in the past.

- Improving language transmission between generations: The influence of the Internet is specially important for the youth. The .eus TLD will undoubtably help in the reenhancement trend of the prestige of the Basque among its own speakers, especially among the younger users of the language. Because prestige is an essential factor for ensuring that older generations transmit their language to new generations, it can be said that the .eus TLD will contribute to improve intergenerational language transmission.

- Increasing benefits for Basque cultural industry: Basque language has had over the centuries a widespread usage in each of its different cultural manifestations. Todayʹs cultural industries, i.e., literature, music, movies, cartoons, comic, etc. use address their communications to the Basque linguistic and cultural community regularly in Basque. The .eus TLD will contribute to highlight the public relevance of these creations both inwards and outwards, increasing their beneficial effects towards both the community and the cultural industries, and offering a vehicle to foster the evolution of Basque cultural industries. The .eus TLD will also serve as a recognizable item and a tool to smooth the cultural industriesʹ transition to the digital-based era.

- Increasing audience for websites in Basque: Internet search enginesʹ usage of the .eus TLD will serve as a tool to offer more accurate results in regards to content in Basque or related to Basque culture. This will help websites in Basque hitsʹ increase, improving their advertising revenues and, therefore, fostering lawful commercial visibility of the contents in Basque. Contents aggregators in Basque suffer from low visualization in search engines, who do usually give higher ranking to websites in foreign languages, even for domestic content. Furthermore, there are not news search engines for pieces of news in Basque. The .eus TLD could be used both to improve search results in Basque and to develop new specific search engines).

- Improving consumer choice by facilitating online marketing: The .eus TLD will help long tail companiesʹ strategies to focus the marketing of their products in Basque or designed for the Basque cultural community. Logically, the companies' adoption of the .eus TLD to address the Basque market will be key to measure how the .eus TLD has increased consumers' choice. In addition, it will be easy to measure whether the .eus TLD has contributed to make available more products in Basque, specially IT and Internet solutions like, for example, news aggregators, directories, blogging platforms, etc.

- Promoting the language in the diaspora: the .eus TLD will contribute to make the huge Basque diaspora more visible and to improve the relations between its nods and different generations. Basque emigrants social centers websites could adopt the .eus TLD to highlight that they are part of a large community. Furthermore, these groups of emigrants will have an important asset at their availability in order to promote the transmission of the language to the younger generations, most of whom have never been in the original territory of the language and who do use the Internet as their main source of entertainment and information. An efficient way to measure the .eus TLD performance will be to determine how many of the hundreds of Basque emigrants centers have adopted the new gTLD. At this moment, organizations which, among others, agglutinate all Basque Cultural Clubs from Venezuela, Argentina (FEVA), Uruguay (FIVU), Mexico and US (NABO) have already joined Puntueus Fundazioa. The .eus TLD will also encourage IT companies to launch products specifically designed for the diaspora community.

- A new type of linguistic gTLD: the .eus TLD is gTLD which has a relevant part of the members of its community beyond Basque's original and historical area of influence. This will be very useful for academics and ICANN to study whether this kind of linguistic and cultural gTLDs effectively contribute to the preservation of a culture among emigrants.

- The previous experience of a linguistic and cultural TLD, .CAT, offered the possibility to evaluate the beneficiary ripple effects of such a TLD. and its significant contribution to the profile of the catalan speaking community on the Internet. the .eus TLD's cooperation with Fundació puntCAT throughout ECLID - European Cultural and Linguistic Internet Domains - the working group which both entities are founding members of, will contribute to the benefit of the linguistic and cultural TLDs' knowledge, and to the development of a network of multistakeholder non-for-profit organizations committed to the aim of developing the advancement of the Internet in their respective cultural areas of influence.

- Reinvest all the benefits in the community: Puntueus Fundazioa is a non for profit collective. According to the provisions of Puntueus Fundazioa's bylaws, that state that contributing to normalization of the language on the Information Technologies field is one of the objectives of the Puntueus Fundazioa, all the benefits from the registration of domains will feed a program to offer economic support to projects that promote Basque in information industry or on the Internet. Consequently, part of the benefits that online content and product in Basque already generate will return to the linguistic community who principally created, purchase and use them

(b) How do you expect that your proposed gTLD will benefit registrants, Internet users, and others?
The key benefits to all stakeholders of the the .eus TLD are derived from the intrinsic link of the TLD string to the Basque linguistic and cultural community, from the specifically dedicated policy to ensure full respect to the linguistic and cultural objectives of the TLD, from the ability to design and develop the name space from inception and from the clear accountability to the Basque linguistic and cultural community, being Puntueus Fundazioa a non for profit entity composed of a wide array of Institutions from the Civil Society. 
The specificity to Basque linguistic and cultural community of the TLD string and the TLD policy enable registrants to communicate in a way that demonstrates their commitment to the Basque linguistic and cultural community. A potential registrant interested in a given domain under the .eus TLD is more likely to be able to register it because the potential of contention from other parts of the world is reduced.  
The ability to design and develop a planned portion of the name space creates a web of predictable and memorable names that will facilitate access to key resources for users. Predictability relates both the choice of the name and the content the user may expect from a name corresponding to a certain pattern. 
The launch process and the community nexus compliance program are designed to achieve a high degree of relevance of the .eus domain names for the Basque linguistic and cultural community. The focus on language and cultural manifestations facilitates clear and easy communications from, to and within the Basque linguistic and cultural community. Along with a policy providing strong intellectual property support, this benefits local and international trademark holders as well as local and international Internet users. 
Answers to enumerated question points:
b) i.What is the goal of your proposed gTLD in terms of areas of specialty, service levels, or reputation?
The goal of the .eus TLD in terms of specialty is the focus on the needs of the Basque linguistic and cultural community. Service levels will match or exceed the high end of currently existing TLDs. The .eus Registry will vigorously build and defend the reputation of the .eus TLD as an orderly and progressive TLD for the Basque linguistic and cultural community.
The precedent experience of .cat's reputation as how a success can be measured with criteria based on the highest service levels to its community and an untarnished reputation as a conflicts-free space to the day, helps understand the benefits a linguistic and cultural TLD can bring to both its own community and the gTLD space as a whole. 
b) ii.What do you anticipate your proposed gTLD will add to the current space, in terms of competition, differentiation, or innovation?
The .eus TLD fills a large gap in terms of consumer choice. From a competition standpoint, it creates a level playing field with respect to the market power of large unspecific TLDs. 
It is naturally differentiated both by its scope, by its governance model and by its intrinsic meaning, from other TLDs. A linguistic and cultural TLD is by definition one of the most suitable tools to widen and raise the profile of the cultural diversity and variety on the Internet.  
Innovation is greatly enhanced by the proactive structured development of the name space. The development process involves an open procedure with calls for proposals for purpose-built localized services based on designated portions of the .eus name space. This approach helps use innovative potential worldwide for the benefit of the Basque linguistic and cultural community and for the advancement of the global Internet.
b) iii.What goals does your proposed gTLD have in terms of user experience?
Compared to most existing TLDs, the .eus TLD user experience will greatly enhance predictability and memorability of domain names. The community-based focus, the orderly development process and strong intellectual property support ensure that users will generally find the services they are looking for under the names they intuitively tend to use for them. 
User experience is improved by the singular specificities of a linguistic and cultural TLD, that will provide to the linguistic and cultural community and to those willing to address online communications specifically targeted to this community the means to identify such communications under a TLD explicitly designed to this purpose. 
Users will have greater comfort on the context of naming variants: in key portions of the .eus name space, alternative names and variants (redirected to the canonical forms) will systematically be activated. Users in the Basque linguistic and cultural community will get increasingly used to the predictability of .eus domain names. As a result, they also avoid stumbling upon typo-squatting, robotized pay-per-click traps or domain-for-sale pages.
b) iv.Provide a complete description of the applicant's intended registration policies in support of the goals listed above.
Registrations under the .eus TLD are restricted to bona-fide members of the Basque linguistic and cultural community, and subject to the further requirement that the registrant's actions in the .eus community, as well as the registrant's use of the registered domain name, must be:
(i) generally accepted as legitimate; and
(ii) beneficial to the cause and the values of the Basque linguistic and cultural community; and
(iii) commensurate with the role and importance of the registered  domain name; and
(iv)  in good faith at the time of registration and thereafter.
The registration policies are differentiated between Pre-launch phase, Launch phase and General Availability. 
1. Pre-launch phase
During Pre-launch, projects and content provision commitments are actively sought and negotiated, especially for key public-interest portions of the name space. All potential registrants and mandate holders are subject to screening and thorough pre-validation.  For more details on the pioneer and the name space program, please see response to Q18 c) below
             
2. Launch phase
During the Launch phase, all registrations are thoroughly pre-validated; Launch phase pre-validation depends on priority status but will always involve community nexus. For further details about the community nexus, please see response to Q20 e) below. The Launch phase includes 3 categories for registrants with prior rights, and a fourth one, which is in fact, a Landrush, running in parallel in time, but being the lowest in priority. The categories are the following according to hierarchy:  
- Entities which have a specific vocation in promoting Basque language and/or culture, including Basque Public Authorities.
- Trademark and other distinctive signs rights holders. This includes trademarks validated by the Trademark Clearinghouse and designations of origin.
- Entities with previous online communications in Basque. Applicants will be requested to provide the URL where their significant content in Basque may be found and checked. (This category is restricted to legal entities, and does not allow "fantasy names")
- No prior rights. Eligible registrants not able to claim any of the priorities listed above will be able to apply during the whole duration of the Launch phase, as a preparation for an orderly and transparent Landrush.   
3. Post-launch: General Availability
At General Availability, community nexus is subject to post-validation by way of an extensive compliance program based on the same criteria that form the basis of the TLD: language and culture. The ongoing compliance program will regularly be adapted to current needs based on experience and audit findings. Community nexus validation combined with strong protection of trademarks helps stamp out cybersquatting and abusive registrations.
b) v.Will your proposed gTLD impose any measures for protecting the privacy or confidential information of registrants or users? If so, please describe any such measures.
Puntueus Fundazioa recognizes first-hand that this is a relevant issue and an evolving area of law in which there is no international standard.  The protection of privacy and confidential information of registrants and users will comply with applicable Law, in particular the European Data Protection framework and the Basque and Spanish Personal Data Protection legislation. Within the bounds of applicable regulations, the Registry will implement anti-data mining measures by way of rate limitation, authenticated access or white-listing/black-listing, as well as tools to prevent unauthorized recourse to repetitive automated access.
Puntueus Fundazioa also intends to incorporate contractual language in its Registry Registrar Agreement (RRA) modeled after language which has been included in the template Registry Agreement and which has been successfully utilized by existing ICANN gTLD Registry operators. Specifically, Registry Operator shall notify Registrar of the purposes for which Personal Data submitted to Registry Operation by Registrar is collected, the intended recipients (or categories of recipients) of such Personal Data, and the mechanism for access to and correction of such Personal Data. Registry Operator shall take reasonable steps to protect Personal Data from loss, misuse, unauthorized disclosure, alteration or destruction. Registry Operator shall not use or authorize the use of Personal Data in a way that is incompatible with the notice provided to registrars. Registry Operator may from time to time use the demographic data collected for statistical analysis, provided that this analysis will not disclose individual Personal Data and provided that such use is compatible with the notice provided to registrars regarding the purpose and procedures for such use.
Finally, Puntueus Fundazioa will propose to ICANN, through the Registry Agreement negotiations, a Whois service that allows individual registrants to opt-out from publishing their personal contact data, as other existing gTLD Registries have done. If this option is not available during the contractual negotiations, Puntueus Fundazioa would submit such proposal after delegation, though the New Registry Services procedure. 
b.vi) Describe whether and in what ways outreach and communications will help to achieve your projected benefits.
Use of outreach programs to achieve TLD goals: the .eus TLD has outreach programs adapted to each phase of its introduction. 
The pre-launch negotiations involving calls for projects by innovators and pioneer users. They foster the intuitive usability of the .eus TLD with a focus on the needs of the Basque linguistic and cultural community. Once these domain names are active, they become an outreach mechanism in their own right because they establish the touch-and-feel of the .eus TLD in the minds of the users. 
The launch phase will involve outreach mechanisms that specifically leverage participation by the local public services, locally relevant trademarks and local actors. 
Promotion codes distributed through community-specific channels are a form outreach available at any time. They are also a low-cost method to achieve community nexus and to prevent abusive registrations.

c) What operating rules will you adopt to eliminate or minimize social costs (e.g., time or financial resource costs, as well as various types of consumer vulnerabilities)? What other steps will you take to minimize negative consequences/costs imposed upon consumers?
The Pre-launch, Launch and General Availability phases of the .eus TLD are designed to minimize social costs and negative externalities. 
The community-based approach of the .eus TLD (please see answers to Q20 below for more details), with its rules for Eligibility, Name Selection, Accepted Use and vigorous Enforcement practices (see answer to Q29 below for additional details) ensure that trademark owners and other rights holders will not face the usual costs of monitoring, and defending against abuses. Nor would they feel impelled to defensively register their names, identities, products, services or brands in the .eus TLD  to prevent abuses.
The .eus Registry will furthermore implement vigorous and comprehensive general malicious conduct (see answer to Q28 below for additional details) prevention and mitigation policies to minimize the number, importance and effects of abuses harming the general users.
The different registration phases protect potential registrants and potentially affected parties while maximizing the value of the name space to its registrants and users.
This approach is based on the premise that extensive screening efforts by the Registry in the early stages will create a fair and orderly name space with lower compliance costs in the long term. 
In phases and areas where the first-come-first-served principle tends to yield perverse results, alternative modes are used. These include:
1) A pioneer name program and name space mandate program. These programs adjudicate domain names based on an open and transparent project selection process. This process is highly economical in terms of social costs and yields substantial external benefits. 
The pioneer name and name space mandate programs are part of the .eus TLDoutreach program. It begins before delegation of the TLD. In terms of workload, it mainly affects proposers who themselves are required to demonstrate support for their projects. Support will be required to come from the segment of the community concerned with the respective portion of the name space. Given the  high value of the resulting on-line resources for the community and the public interest, and given the economic benefits that can be derived from their operation,
the administrative effort is largely justified. To further protect affected parties, all adjudications in this phase have a safety-valve clause, allowing for later adjustments based on community input. The principle of the safety-valve is that affected parties can obtain adjustments to a component of a mandate if they propose (and commit to) an improved use of the underlying domain names from a
public interest perspective. 
2) Launch phase: there will be a long, single launch phase (simultaneous sunrise and landrush) based on domain applications. Domain applications are not domain registrations: multiple applications are accepted for any domain name. (By contrast, only a single registration can exist for a given domain.)   

All applications are published on the Whois service. Applicants mark their prior rights, if any, in the application. There are four categories: entities which specific goal is to promote Basque language and culture; trademark-based applications; previous online content in Basque; and  no prior rights.
For a given domain, the highest priority applications will be validated with respect to the claimed priority right. If there is more than one application for the same domain in a given category (or subcategory), a contention resolution process begins. 
The contention resolution process allows agreement between contenders (withdrawal and refund of application), random selection (if all contenders agree), mediation and arbitration and, as a tie-breaker of last resort, auction. In most circumstances, the agreement or auction are the cheapest solution for affected parties and are likely to be selected.  The options available are thus designed to promote
quiet resolution at minimal effort, yet allowing the appropriate differentiated handling of exceptional cases where the quiet mechanisms (withdrawal and auction) could lead to perverse results.This mechanisms have arguably the lowest social costs and the
highest public benefits while protecting individual stakeholders from excessive burdens.

c) i. How will multiple applications for a particular domain name be resolved, for example, by auction or on a first-come/first- serve basis?
As described above, during pre-launch and launch phase, the first-com/first-served principle is NOT applied. Auctions are a component of an optimized contention resolution process.
c) ii.Explain any cost benefits for registrants you intend to implement (e.g., advantageous pricing, introductory discounts, bulk registration discounts.
The focus of the .eus TLD is bottom-line cost to registrants and stakeholders, not the direct per-unit cost. The bottom-line cost is greatly reduced thanks by avoiding contention between legitimate community-based applicants and speculators. 
c) iii. Note that the Registry Agreement requires that registrars be offered the option to obtain initial domain name registrations for periods of one to ten years at the discretion of the registrar, but no greater than ten years. Additionally, the Registry Agreement requires advance written notice of price increases. Do you intend to make contractual commitments to registrants regarding the magnitude of price escalation? If so, please describe your plans.
Puntueus Fundazioa is committed to provide domain name registration services in accordance with the requirements, notices and periods set forth in the Registry Agreement. The .eus TLD will be based on predictability regarding pricing. The .eus TLD Registry-Registrar Agreement will not contain specific or non-standard clauses regarding price escalation between the .eus Registry and its registrars.
The .eus TLD business plan is designed to avoid any future necessity to increase registry price in real terms. The fundamental principle is prudence: starting from conservative price levels and gradually lowering them. This method ensures sufficient financial reserves, favors optimal allocation of domain names, helps prevent misuse and supports an orderly registration process.

The .eus TLD will serve the needs of the Basque linguistic and cultural community on the Internet. The community consists of those who use (or commit to use) the Basque language for their online communications, and/or promote the different aspects of Basque culture online, and/or intend to specifically address their online communications and services to that community.. Eus is the contraction of "Euskara", which means "basque language" in Basque. Registrations under the .eus TLD are restricted to bona-fide members of the Basque linguistic and cultural community, and subject to the further requirement that the registrant's actions in the .eus TLD, as well as the registrant's use of the registered domain name, must be: (i) generally accepted as legitimate; and (ii) beneficial to the cause and the values of the Basque linguistic and cultural community; and (iii) commensurate with the role and importance of the registered  domain name; and (iv) in good faith at the time of registration and thereafter. Puntueus FUNDAZIOA    Puntueus Fundazioa (foundation) is the organization applying for the .eus TLD. It was established in March 6th 2012 by Puntueus Elkartea (association). Puntueus Elkartea (the association)  has been since its inception in 2008 raising awareness about the .eus TLD project, and taking care of the outreach efforts that have gathered the endorsement and involvement of more than 50 of the most relevant entities of the Basque linguistic and cultural community, While it has been considered that the foundation legal type is the more adequate to set up the .eus Registry, Puntueus Elkartea will assist and support the foundation to accomplish any social aspects of the initiative, including outreach and awareness. Answers to enumerated question points: a) i. How the community is delineated from Internet users generally. Such descriptions may include, but are not limited to, the following: membership, registration, or licensing processes, operation in a particular industry, use of a language. Being the objective of  the .eus TLD  to serve the Basque linguistic and cultural community, and to contribute to the promotion of the Basque information society sphere, the community is defined by those Internet content creators and end users using online communications in Basque or related to the Basque culture. a) ii. How the community is structured and organized. For a community consisting of an alliance of groups, details about the constituent parts are required. Puntueus Fundazioa has been established for the purpose of creating and managing the .eus TLD. To that purpose, a structure that represents a wide array of Institutions from every area of the Basque society, and gathered the support of the most relevant Institutions related to the Basque cultural, technologic, media  professional and Civil Society sectors has been created. Puntueus Fundazioa, therefore, represents a community established centuries ago, with a longstanding existence and consolidated  cultural heritage, organized throughout the centuries in many different layers of political, administrative, academic, commercial, cultural and social layers, that exceed by far the scope of this question. a) iii. When the community was established, including the date(s) of formal organization, if any, as well as a description of community activities to date. The Basque language, Euskara, has always awakened the interest of the linguists. In addition to being a language of unknown origin, it is comprised of various dialects and multiple variants which have represented a problem for writers. What language should be chosen in order to reach the greatest number of people? Therefore, the "Euskalkis" (Basque dialects) are the variants of Euskara (the Basque language). According to the current classification, there are six dialects: Biscayan, Guipuzcoan, Labortan, Souletin, High Navarran and Low Navarran. In view of this, the need arose to regularise a unified Basque language complement of the dialects. The "Euskara batua" (unified Basque language) arose in the year 1968 (created by the official academy of the Basque Language, Euskaltzaindia, founding member of both the Puntueus Asociación and Fundazioa) and since that time it has tried to be positioned as an element above the Basque dialects, having been converted at the same time into a communication powerful tool of the Basques. With the passing of time, unified Basque language has increasingly acquired more importance in education, the media and the Administration. The dialects are still used among the population. Therefore, unified Basque language and the Basque dialects complement each other. The Basque Country has a strong presence on the Internet, that the  .eus TLD will reinforce and promote. a) iv. The current estimated size of the community, both as to membership and geographic extent.)) In accordance with the data from the Sociolinguistic Survey of the Basque Government carried out in 2001, the Basque language has 800,000 speakers and the current figures of Basque speakers are shown below by territories: In Navarre, 10.3% of the inhabitants are bilingual; 6.6% are passive bilingual and 83.1% are Spanish-speaking monolingual. In Gipuzkoa, 48% of the inhabitants over 15 years of age are bilingual, 9.5% are passive bilingual and 42.6% are Spanish-speaking monolingual. In Alava, 75.5% of the population are monolingual Spanish speakers, 13.4% bilingual and 11.1% are passive bilingual. In Biscay the monolingual Spanish-speaking inhabitants make up 64.9%, the bilingual inhabitants make up 22.4% and 12.6% are passive bilingual. In the northern Basque Country one of every four inhabitants is bilingual, one of every ten is passive bilingual and the remaining two-thirds are French-speaking monolingual. Beyond the speakers, the main geographical core of the Basque language and culture covers almost 3 million people. With reference to other countries, the diaspora is very important for the maintenance and development of the Basque linguistic and cultural community. Currently it is estimated that there is a population of 4.5 million people from Basque descent distributed all over the world. There are nearly 200 Basque Cultural Club distributed throughout the world. The principal objective of these Basque clubs is to maintain the Basque traditions and heritage, including language and culture, and for this reason they organise different activities. Of these 200, 77 are in Argentina, 36 in the United States,10 in Spain, 3 in Brussels and 1 in Shanghai, just to mention some. Therefore, the target community of the .eus TLD is spread throughout the world. Education has been a fundamental pillar in the development of the Basque linguistic and cultural community. The first book in Basque language was published in the year 1545, ʹLinguae Vasconum Primitiaeʹ written by Bernart Etxepare. As for the press, only one newspaper is published entirely in Basque language: Berria. There are 4 or 5 other bilingual newspapers that are published in Basque language and Spanish or French.More than 20 radio stations, small and large, transmit in Basque language, and there is also availabe a mobile application for listening to most of them. The Basque language has also become immersed in information and knowledge. The Wikipedia in Basque language has nearly 125,000 entries. In relative percentages, the Basque language is found in the top positions, since it has more pages per speaker. There is no problem to having our computer completely in Basque language. For the large companies such as Microsoft and Google, the Basque language already exists. Google offers nearly all its services also in Basque language and has a translation service. Microsoft, thanks to the agreements reached with the local governments, publishes version of the operating system in Basque language.

The .eus TLD applicant, Puntueus Fundazioa, has been established, as described above, by Puntueus Elkartea. This Association, established in 2008, with the sole goal of promoting the .eus TLD application. It received the support from 26.816 individuals, and represents the most meaningful, plural and relevant legal articulation of the Basque linguistic and cultural community. b) i. Relations to any community organizations. These are the members of Puntueus Elkartea and, thus, Puntueus Fundazioa: EUSKALTZAINDIA. The Official Academy of The Basque Language. EUSKAL IDAZLEEN ELKARTEA. The Basque Language Writersʹ Association. EUSKARAREN GIZARTE ERAKUNDEEN KONTSEILUA. Council of Social Organizations in Favor of Basque is comprised by 46 members. EUSKAL KONFEDERAZIOA. The Basque Confederation is the confluence of associations and federations which work in favor of the Basque language in the Northern Basque Country (France). EUSKAL HERRIKO IKASTOLEN KONFEDERAZIOA. The Confederation of Ikastolas (schools that teach in Basque language) of the Basque Country. EUSKAL HERRIKO UNIBERTSITATEA. The University of the Basque Country (public). EUSKAL HERRIKO TELEKOMUNIKAZIO INGENIARIEN ELKARTEA. College of Telecommunications Engineers of the Basque Country. EUSKADIKO INFORMATIKAKO INGENIARIEN ELKARGO OFIZIALA. Official College of Computer Engineers of the Basque Country. EITB. EITB group is the first telecommunications group in the Basque Country. It is formed by five TV stations and five radio stations. CENTER FOR BASQUE STUDIES, UNIVERSITY OF NEVADA, RENO. It is primarily a research center. It has an extensive Basque library collection (approximately 50,000 volumes and 1,500 journal titles) which is electronically cataloged and Internet-accessible. EUSKALTEL FUNDAZIOA. Foundation of Euskaltel, S.A., Global Operator of telecommunication of the Basque Country. IKASTOLEN ELKARTEA-PARTAIDE IEP. Association of Schools that teach in Basque language. INTERNETIKAK. An association to promote the Basque language on the Internet. EUSKAL KANTUZALEEN ELKARTEA. The Association of Basque Music Enthusiasts. EUSKARA KULTUR ELKARGOA. The Basque Cultural Association. Foundation to promote and defend the Basque language and Basque culture. EUSKOKULTUR FUNDAZIOA. Euskokultur Foundation  receives oral and written testimony about the Basque social customs and lifestyle. GEREDIAGA ELKARTEA. The Gerediaga Association has been organizing activities that have characterized it for decades. EKE, EUSKAL KULTUR ERAKUNDEA. The Basque Cultural Institute works in all cultural expressions in the Northern Basque Country (France). TOPAGUNEA. The federation of associations of the Basque language. SOZIOLINGUISTIKA KLUSTERRA. Sociolinguistics Cluster. EUSKAL HERRIKO GAZTERIAREN KONTSEILUA. An institution constituted by youth all over the Basque Country. DEUSTUKO UNIBERTSITATEA. The University of Deusto (private). MONDRAGON UNIBERTSITATEA. Mondragon University (private, member of Mondragon Cooperative). EUSKO-IKASKUNTZA. Basque Studies Society is a private scientific-cultural entity UDAKO EUSKAL UNIBERTSITATEA. Basque Summer University. More than 1,000 members that are organized in departments of different fields of knowledge. SORTZEN-IKASBATUAZ. An association in favor of the New Basque Public School. ESLE. The Association of companies of Open Source Software. 36 companies. ARGIA. The oldest magazine written in the Basque language that still remains active, being published since 1919. In 1997, it launched the online version. ELHUYAR FUNDAZIOA. This foundation that links science and the Basque language. EUSKARAZKO KOMUNIKAZIO TALDEA. The Basque Communication Group was created to promote media in the Basque language. NORTH AMERICAN BASQUE ORGANIZATIONS. NABO is a federation of organizations for the promotion of Basque culture. The first Basque Cultural Club was founded in 1913 in New York. FEDERACIÓN DE ENTIDADES VASCO-ARGENTINAS. Federation of Basque-Argentinian Entities. The largest association of the Basque diaspora. FEDERACIÓN DE INSTITUCIONES VASCAS DE URUGUAY. The Federation of Basque Entities in Uruguay. EUSKAL PEN. The ʺBasque versionʺ of PEN. Member of International PEN, the worldwide association of writers. EUSKAL AKTOREEN BATASUNA. The Basque Actors Union has 420 members. EUSKAL HERRIKO TXISTULARI ELKARTEA. The Association of Txistu Players of the Basque Country. About 2,000 members. GAINDEGIA. Observatory for social and economic development in the Basque Country. EUSKAL ITZULTZAILE, ZUZENTZAILE ETA INTERPRETEEN ELKARTEA. The Association of Translators, Correctors and Interpreters of Basque Language (from and into Basque). EUSKAL HERRIKO GIZA ESKUBIDEEN BEHATOKIA. Basque Observatory of Human Rights. INTERNET&EUSKADI. The association of the Internet users of the Basque Country. ELKAR FUNDAZIOA. Foundation of a publishing house. ZTK ARGITALETXEA. ZTK is a small record company in the Northern Basque Country, focused on productions in Basque language and French documents for the dissemination of the Basque culture. MAIATZ ARGITALETXEA. An association in Baiona (France) that publishes a literary magazine of the same name (in Basque). GOIENA KOMUNIKAZIO ZERBITZUAK. Communications company which works in the Basque language. SUA EDIZIOAK. Sua Edizioak is a publishing house expert in mountains, nature and cartography. ARROSA, EUSKAL HERRIKO IRRATI SAREA. The Network of the Radios in the Basque Country. EMUN. Company which offers LINGUISTIC SERVICES to develop the working world in the Basque language since 1997. This organization began and grew based on cooperative values. EKHE, EUSKAL KOMUNIKABIDEEN HEDAPENERAKO ELKARTEA. Large Communication Group that publishes, newspapers, magazines and other means in Basque, Spanish and/or French. CMN TALDEA / NOTICIAS TALDEA. Large Communication Group that publishes, newspapers, magazines and other means in Basque and/or Spanish. HAMAIKA TELEBISTA. A project to spread the television and media in the Basque language. SUSA-LITERATURA. Literature publisher since 1983. Literature for adults, only in the Basque language. It has published more than 200 books. It has had a website for more than ten years and has extensive content. EUZKO ETXEA SANTIAGO DE CHILE. The most important Basque Cultural Club in Santiago de Chile. CENTRO VASCO DE MEXICO DF. The most important Basque Cultural Club in Mexico DF. CENTROS VASCOS DE VENEZUELA. Federation that gathers all Basque Cultural Clubs of Venezuela. ESKUBIDEAK. The Basque Lawyers Association is a member of the European Democratic Lawyers association. EUSKADIKO GAZTERIAREN KONTSEILUA. The Youth Council of Euskadi is a public organization created by the Government of the Basque Country and is comprised by 55 associations. b) ii. Relations to the community and its constituent parts/groups. Puntueus Fundazioa gathers the most important and relevant institutions and associations of the Basque linguistic and cultural community: the official academy of the basque language, the largest TV and radio group, the only telecommunication operator, the most important institutions of the diaspora and social and cultural associations of many different fields. In numbers: 12 cultural organizations, 10 social organizations, 3 universities, 5 educational institutions, 7 media groups, 6 organizations of the diasora, 7 organization that work in the ICT field and 6 publishing houses. b) iii. Accountability mechanisms of the applicant to the community. The accountability to the community is guaranteed by the widespread and grassroots membership of the Fundazioa, including the most representative cultural, social and academic Institutions of the Basque linguistic and cultural community. The social legitimacy of these Institutions, their own accountability mechanisms, and their inclusion on the Board of Directors guarantees adequate and commensurate accountability mechanisms

The Basque linguistic and cultural community owns an strong identity based on a very wide historical, linguistic, cultural, social and political background. Euskara is the language of the Basque linguistic and cultural community, the base of its community, and Basque culture, its social expression. Further, Euskara is the only pre-Roman language still alive in the Iberian Peninsula. Many linguists all over the world have struggled to track its real origin but no conclusion has gained a broad consensus so far, and, nowadays, Euskara is still considered an isolated language. Nevertheless, in spite of being a minority language with very specific characteristics, Euskara and its speakers have historically shown an strong commitment to adapt to the times and new challenges. In this sense, in contrast to its status as a minority language, the presence of Euskara obtained a very remarkable position number 38 in the ranking of languages on the Internet in 2003, according to studies carried out by Peter Gerrand. Vid. Gerrand, P. (2007). Estimating linguistic diversity on the Internet: A taxonomy to avoid pitfalls and paradoxes. Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication, 12(4), article 8. The social expression of Euskara, through the Basque culture, has shown traditionally many forms. From the first book in Euskara published in 1545 ( ʹLinguae Vasconum Primitiaeʹ of Bernart Etxepare) to the literature in Euskara, the ʹbertsolaritzaʹ, Basque dances, Basque music or many other social expressions, Euskara has had an extensive way throughout history, so significant as innovative. The Internet allows to create communities with different purposes. Thus, this fact opens the door to that social expression, in our case the Basque culture. However, although the contents on the Internet are becoming increasingly diverse, no doubt, language remains the main tool of communication on the Internet. In this sense, on the Internet, multiculturalism lies at the highest possible level and, in such multicultural melting pot, the Basque linguistic and cultural community should have its own technological shelter. Therefore, .eus is the name that will represent the Basque linguistic and cultural community on the Internet. This symbol will become a tool for the promotion of Basque culture and Euskara, and, in this sense, the .eus TLD will be an effective mechanism for linguistic standardization of Euskara worldwide. The .eus TLD, through the virtual space of the Internet, will assure an efficient promotion of Euskara, guaranteeing simultaneously its international recognition. Similarly, the .eus TLD will reinforce and extend the multicultural nature of the Internet, since allowing linguistic and cultural communities to have their own doTLDmain, puts multiculturalism on the very heart of the Internet. TLD related to language and cultures strengthen and benefit not only those linguistic and cultural communities but also the Internet itself. So that, in a few words: the objective of the .eus TLD is to assign a name, a symbol, to the presence of the Basque Language and Culture on the Internet, creating such a name for the Basque Culture Community on the Internet, in a feedback process that reinforces the Basque linguistic and cultural community. c) i. Intended registrants in the TLD. The intended registrants of the TLD could be differentiated in three main different groups: Individuals and entities with online activity living in those areas where Basque is an autoctonous language; the communities of the diaspora and the societies where they have been formed; and those willing to address and engage in online communications with the Basque linguistic and cultural community. c) ii. Intended end-users of the TLD.  The intended end-users are as varied as the people with a certain interest in the Basque linguistic and cultural community. But for taxonomy purposes, four main  targets could be identified: The general public living in those areas where Basque originated; the communities of the diaspora and the societies where they have been formed; the academic interest in the Basque language and culture; and those willing to be informed about the different aspects related to the Basque language and culture c) iii. Related activities the applicant has carried out or intends to carry out in service of this purpose.  All the activities developed so far by the Puntueus Elkartea have been focused on raising awareness in regard to the development of the .eus TLD space, and in gathering the support of representative Institutions from any sector of the Basque linguistic and cultural community. The explicit and decided support from a very significant part of  the representative entities of the community is proof enough of how these two objectives have been met, as well as of the overwhelming endorsement from the Basque community.  The activities of the Puntueus Fundazioa from the delegation of the TLD onwards will be twofold: To foster the development of the .eus TLD space for the benefit of the Basque linguistic and cultural community, and to promote the development of the Basque linguistic and cultural information society, being both objectives clearly hand in hand with each other.  c) iv. Explanation of how the purpose is of a lasting nature. The purpose of the .eus TLD is indeed of a lasting nature. The name, as referred in 18 and in 20 b) and d), is a long established and widely used contraction of the name of the Basque language and of its linguistic and cultural community, that has had a centuries' longstanding existence and continued presence, and a firm and vibrant community.

d) i. Relationship to the established name, if any, of the community.     THE BASQUE LANGUAGE "Euskara" means Basque Language in Basque. The origin of the word euskara (pronounced éuskara) possibly comes from the ancient Basque verb *enautsi which means "to say" and which is preserved in some forms of the Biscayan conjugation of the current verb esan (to say) such as, for example dinosta (diñósta; ʺhe/she says it to me"). The verb *enautsi plus the suffix -(k)ara (form of) would lead to the word *enauskara (ʺform of saying ʺ, ʺform of talkingʺ) that subsequently, with the passing of the centuries, would evolve phonetically to the current standard form euskara (*enauskara〉*enuskara〉euskara)      ORIGIN The Basque language, Euskara, cannot be classified, its roots are not known, there are no semantic groups in which to encompass it, and it does not have common traits with any other language. It is the heritage of all the Basques and its most marked cultural identity trait. A treasure. Preserved by the Basque people from generation to generation, today it is experiencing its maximum splendour. The line of work followed by those studying the Basque language has consisted of looking for its affiliation with other languages, among them the African (Berber, Guanche, Somali, Egyptian...), Caucasian (Georgian, Russian...), dead languages, etc. After the comparison of the Basque language with dozens of languages, the results obtained do not prove any reliable relationship, for which reason its origin continues being unknown. According to the linguists, the Basque language is not related to any other current or historical language. From the 16th century, there have been many questions asked about its geographic and genetic origin, and there have also been many answers. The Basque language is the only one in Europe that does not have an Indo-European origin and this has led many scholars and writers to study it and compare it with other languages in search of some affiliation or relationship.   d) ii. Relationship to the identification of community members.  The Basque language has its own ISO 639-1 and ISO 639-2 codes. In the case of two-character codes, the ISO code of the Basque language is EU. In turn, also has two three-character ISO codes: EUS for terminology and BAQ for literature. Moreover, the word ʺBasqueʺ in Basque language responds to the term ʺeuskalʺ. That is, "Basque people" equals to "Euskal jendea" , ʺBasque languageʺ to ʺeuskal hizkuntzaʺ, ʺBasque cultureʺ to ʺeuskal kulturaʺ, ʺBasque sportsʺ to ʺeuskal kirolakʺ, ʺBasque traditionsʺ a ʺeuskal ohiturakʺ,  ʺBasque cuisine" to ʺeuskal sukaldaritzaʺ. Therefore, ʺEuskalʺ is a very common term in any area of the Basque linguistic and cultural community (furthermore, many of the members of the foundation has this string in its name). That is why ʺEUSʺ is an obvious abbreviation, either in the case of the name of the language (Euskara) or in the case of the adjective that precedes the noun (Euskal). Therefore, since it is an obvious and logical abbreviation of Euskara and the adjective ʺeuskalʺ, and based on ISO 639-2 codes, one of which assigned to termilogy, without any doubt., EUS is the string that best represents the Basque linguistic and culture community. d) iii. Any connotations the string may have beyond the community. The word "eus" has no other meaning in Basque. Neither in Spanish, French, English  nor in any other language in the relevant area of the Basque linguistic and cultural community, It may have some meaning in other languages, but completely irrelevant to the community, or the purposes of the TLD.

e) i. Eligibility: who is eligible to register a second-level name in the gTLD, and how will eligibility be determined. Eligibility requirement policies will be developed according to the definition of the Basque linguistic and cultural community, and a diversity of proceedings will be implemented to ensure accommodation of all its bona fide members Registrations under the .eus TLD are restricted to those fulfilling these two requirements: a) bona-fide membership of the Basque linguistic and cultural community on the Internet. The community, as described above in 20 a),  consists of those who use (or commit to use) the Basque language for their online communications, and/or promote the different aspects of Basque culture online, and/or intend to specifically address their online communications and services to that community. b) subject to the further requirement that the registrant's actions in the Basque linguistic and cultural community, as well as the registrant's use of the registered domain name, must be: (i)   generally accepted as legitimate; and (ii)  beneficial to the cause and the values of the Basque linguistic and cultural community; and (iii) commensurate with the role and importance of the registered  domain name; and (iv)  in good faith at the time of registration and thereafter. These conditions must always be fulfilled. The strength of the validation is kept in line with the importance of the underlying domain name base on the assumption that a typical user would reasonably make. To facilitate validation, registrants are required to state their intended use of the registered domain name. A false statement of intended use is an indication of bad faith and can be the basis for the suspension of the domain name.  The validation may be assisted through pre-identification of potential registrants using existing community channels, through membership of qualified Organizations or the distribution of Promotion Codes to members. After the launch phase, the validation mode goes from pre-validation to post-validation with statistically targeted random validation, backed up by a ongoing enforcement program. The validation and enforcement programs are supported by an integrated issue tracking system. This system allows validating agents and personnel to cooperate and interact with the registrant. The system keeps track of decisions made by the agents and stores supplemental documentary evidence that may be supplied by the registrants.  e) ii. Name selection: what types of second-level names may be registered in the gTLD. The fundamental rule on which name selection is based is part of the policy principles: the domain names may be registered considering the registrant‘s relationship to the Basque linguistic and cultural community, and the use of the domain name must be commensurate to the role and importance of the domain name.    The role and importance of the domain name registrations is based on the meaning an average user would reasonably make of a domain name in the context of the Basque linguistic and cultural community.    e) iii. Content/Use: what restrictions, if any, the Registry operator will impose on how a registrant may use its registered name. Puntueus Fundazioa, as the .eus Registry Operator, will adopt policies to ensure that the use of the domain names are: (i)   generally accepted as legitimate; and (ii)  beneficial to the cause and the values of the Basque linguistic and cultural community; and (iii)  in good faith at the time of registration and thereafter. This will be verified according to:   1) the intended use statement supplied by the domain registrant at the time of registration and/or the explicit agreement to the terms and conditions including the the .eus TLD use policies.   2) an ongoing enforcement program. e) iv. Enforcement: what investigation practices and mechanisms exist to enforce the policies above, what resources are allocated for enforcement, and what appeal mechanisms are available to registrants. The purpose of the enforcement program is to protect the credibility of the .eus TLD for its local and international public. In particular, upholds the community-based purpose of the .eus TLD and helps prevent misuse or malicious behaviour. The enforcement program is based on statistically targeted random investigations and on a complaint follow-up process. The statistical targeting is strongly automated and involves the use of search engines and the analysis of Registry data related to behaviour of registrants.  Depending on the type of misuse to be investigated, web site content or content sent to victims of abuse will reviewed and analyzed by investigators.  Enhanced investigation takes place if the registrant has a bad track record in terms of compliance with the rules of the .eus TLD.  Other violations of public record (such as UDRP or URS cases) will also be taken into account. If content or use of an existing .eus domain name demonstrate that the registrant has shown bad faith by stating a false intended use, the domain name is suspended. If a registrar is complicit with systematic violations of the the .eus TLD policies or causes an unacceptable burden for the validation and enforcement program by negligence, the Registry can restrict that registrar's access to the new registrations, subject its inventory of .eus domain names to enhanced investigation and require it conduct its own post-validation program. An appeals process is available for all administrative measures taken in the framework of the enforcement program. The first instance of the appeals process is managed by the Registry service provider. Puntueus Fundazioa will engage  the relevant ADR providers of its area to establish a second instance appeal process.

Q22 - Protection of Geo Names

1. Reserved List of Geographic Names

In accordance with Specification 5 of the proposed TLD Registry Agreement published as Attachment to Module 5 of the Applicant Guidebook by ICANN, and with Governmental Advisory Committee (GAC) advice on geographic names at the second level, the .eus Registry will put the following names on the reserved list, therefore making them unavailable for registration or any other use:
• the short form (in English) of all country and territory names contained on the ISO 3166-1 list, as updated from time to time, including the European Union, which is exceptionally reserved on the ISO 3166-1 list, and its scope extended in August 1999 to any application needing to represent the name European Union;
• the United Nations Group of Experts on Geographical Names, Technical Reference Manual for the Standardization of Geographical Names, Part III Names of Countries of the World; and
• the list of United Nations member states in 6 official United Nations languages prepared by the Working Group on Country Names of the United Nations Conference on the Standardization of Geographical Names.
Technically, this is achieved by utilizing the advanced domain name rule engine that is part of the CORE Registration System and described in detail in the answer to Question 28. As laid out there, the underlying set of checks can be tuned to block registrations of .eus names based on various syntactic rules, multiple reserved names lists, and patterns. Prior to the launch of the .eus TLD, the rule engine will be configured in accordance with the reserved list mandated by Specification 5, which means that the listed names are not available for registration by registrars.

2. Additional protected names

The .eus Registry intends to translate all the list containing the names in the lists above to Basque (Euskara), besides English and the other five official UN languages, as Basque is the most relevant language for this linguistic and cultural community TLD. Otherwise those names would not be effectively protected in a meaningful way within the .eus TLD.

3. Exceptions

However, the .eus Registry recognizes that there may be cases where a request to register and use a geographic name at the second level should be considered legitimate, valid and useful.

Examples of such cases are:

◦ the local consulate wishing to use that name for itself, with the agreement of its Government;
◦ the countryʹs or territoryʹs relevant authorities wishing to use it, e.g. for touristic or cultural promotion purposes;
◦ other legitimate purposes.
For registration requests from the relevant public authority, the .eus Registry will put in place the procedure agreed between the GAC and Afilias for the .info gTLD, as referenced in the letter written by Mohamed Sharil Tarmizi, GAC Chair, on Sept 9, 2003; see
https://gacweb.icann.org/download/attachments/1540128/dotinfocircular1.pdf.
The current procedure is:
Technically, the registrar needs to use the authorization code supplied by the registrant as the domain authinfo in the EPP 〈domain:create〉 request, which will let the request bypass the rule engineʹs blocking mechanism and permit the registration.

4. Additional monitoring

The .eus Registry does not plan to monitor use of geographic names below the second level (i.e. subdomains used by a .eus TLD  domain name registrant), as those procedures are both difficult and ineffective. Available dispute resolution mechanisms are a more adequate resolution procedure in cases where third or higher level domains unduly use country or territory names.