France is adamantly against the plan of the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers to launch .wine and .vin generic top-level domains (gTLD).
France says that if addresses such as .wine are used, trade agreements that involve region-specific products such as champagne will be put at risk.
French minister of digital affairs Axelle Lemaire thinks that allowing the usage of these proposed domains "would threaten France's desire to 'preserve the cultural diversity' built on Bordeaux, Burgundy and Champagne — wines endemic to various French regions."
Lemaire is seeking for geographical protection for the proposed .wine and .vin addresses. Since the term "champagne" can only be legally used for sparkling wine that is produced in the Champagne region of France, then shouldn't the .wine and .vin domains be also restricted in use to authentic wine?
The addition of the domains involved in the issue has been in process since 2010, when Project DotVinum began to push for the creation of the domains. At that time, there was already resistance by several countries in Europe against the movement. In 2012, ICANN began the new gTLD program, wherein a few companies sent in their application for .wine gTLDs. This move drew the attention of countries which wanted to protect the brands of their wines.
In March 2013, the European Federation of Origin Wines sent a letter to ICANN, stating that the new gTLDs could potentially violate the intellectual property rights of the federation's members.
"EFOW has already raised its concerns with relevant EU countries and would like to know whether ICANN intends to modify its' procedures to allow GI right holders to have the same rights and guarantees as the ones given to trade marks owners," said [pdf] Riccardo Ricci Curbastro, president of EFOW, in the letter.
ICANN issued [pdf] a 60-day period a year later, looking to resolve the issue by June 3. However, as delegates were unable to come to an agreement, ICANN has continued the processing of the applications for the .wine and .vin domains.
Amid growing criticism regarding the domains, ICANN gave an assurance in their ongoing 50th annual session that all valid trademarks will be respected, even with the granting of the domains. However, ICANN did not show any restraint in the matter and is looking like it will move forward with the applications without delay.
ICANN's annual session began in June 22 and will last 5 days until June 26 in London.
