Registration Policy

1 Definition

In this policy:

ASCII means the American Standard Code for Information Interchange. ASCII is an encoding scheme based on the ordering of the English alphabet. ASCII is set of common numerical Code Points for computers and other devices that work with text.

Allocation means the method by which a domain name is created and assigned to an Applicant; Allocated shall have a corresponding meaning.

Applicant means a natural or legal person, company or organisation in whose name an Application is submitted.

Application means the complete and technically correct request for a domain name, which complies with the Published Policies.

Claims Notice means a notice provided to an Applicant indicating that the applied for Label is a Trademark Match to a Trademark Record in the Trademark Clearinghouse.

Claims Services means the services that collectively provide:

  • Applicants with a Claims Notice; and
  • Trademark Holders, with a corresponding Trademark Record, with notice that a Label that is a Trademark Match to the Trademark Record is Allocated.

Code Point means an assigned code that uniquely identifies a character or glyph in certain languages and scripts. These Code Points are unique numbers for each character, or an aspect of a character such as an accent mark. The Code Points used by the Service are described further in the Unicode standard―please refer to the definition of Unicode for further information.

Customer Registration Agreement means an agreement between a Registrar and a customer.

Diacritic means a mark that is placed over, under, or through a letter in some languages to show that the letter should be pronounced in a particular way.

ICANN means the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, its successors and assigns.

Label means a string of characters used to form part of a domain name.

Premium Domain Name means any domain name so designated by us.

Published Policies collectively means:

  • those specifications and policies established and published from time to time by us or any of our designated representatives; and
  • any ICANN Temporary Specifications or Policies and Consensus Policies or any Rights Protection Mechanisms and associated rules, policies, requirements and procedures (as defined in our agreement with ICANN).

Registrant means a natural or legal person, company or organisation in whose name a domain name is Allocated in the TLD.

Registrar means an entity that is authorised to offer domain name registration services in relation to the TLD.

Registry means the systems used to record, store and maintain details of domain names in the TLD.

Service means the services that we provide in relation to the TLD.

SMD File means the Signed Mark Data file provided by the TMCH Sunrise and Claims Operator to a holder of a Validated Mark which is encoded with certain information.

TLD means Top Level Domain and for the purpose of this policy shall mean .film.

TMCH Sunrise and Claims Operator means the providers appointed by ICANN to serve as the Trademark Clearinghouse by accepting, authenticating, validating and facilitating the transmission of information related to certain trademarks.

Trademark Clearinghouse Guidelines means the guidelines which can be found at the following link www.trademark-clearinghouse.com (as may be updated from time to time) which provide an overview of the requirements for the inclusion of trademarks in the Trademark Clearinghouse and the issuance of a SMD File.

Trademark Clearinghouse means the central repository for information to be authenticated, stored, and disseminated, pertaining to the rights of Trademark Holders.

Trademark Holder means holders of marks that have been verified by the TMCH Sunrise and Claims Operator as meeting the requirements specified in the Trademark Clearinghouse Guidelines.

Trademark Match means that a Label is a match to a trademark, as described in the Trademark Clearinghouse Guidelines.

Trademark Record means a complete and correct set of information concerning a trademark or other mark submitted to the Trademark Clearinghouse.

Unicode means the single scheme that provides a unique number for each character or glyph across a variety of languages and scripts. The Unicode standard contains tables that list the Code Points for each character identified. The Unicode standard and tables are available at the following link http://www.unicode.org.

Validated Mark means a mark that has been verified by the TMCH Sunrise and Claims Operation as meeting the requirements specified in the Trademark Clearinghouse Guidelines including those relating to proof of use.

We, us and our means Motion Picture Domain Registry Pty Ltd ACN 156 336 042 or our designated representatives.

You and your means the person or entity accessing the Service.

Zone File means the file containing information about domain names that are active in the TLD and as further described in section 4.6.

2 About this document

This document describes our policy regarding the registration of domain names in the TLD.

Document Identifier: MPDR-POL-003

Publication Date: 22 JANUARY 2019

Status: CURRENT

3 Purpose

The purpose of this policy is to describe:

  • the eligibility requirements for registering a domain name in the TLD and the required criteria for domain name registration;
  • the technical requirements for the composition of a domain name;
  • what domain names may be reserved or restricted by us;
  • our policy on domain name pricing;
  • information about a domain name that is displayed publically in the WHOIS Service; and
  • how the Zone File for the TLD may be accessed.

We have developed this policy with reference to applicable industry standards, ICANN mandated requirements, and to meet our operational requirements for the TLD.

4 Policy statement

4.1 Eligibility

The purpose of this section is to describe the eligibility requirements for registering a domain name in the TLD.

Mission and purpose of the TLD

The mission and purpose of the TLD is to benefit internet users by ensuring increased trust, convenience and utility. The TLD will develop an internet space for the film industry, allowing the general public across the globe to engage directly with content relating to films, actors and actresses, and related organisations and associations, products and services.

We intend to open domain name registrations in the TLD to the global film industry. We seek to develop a TLD alternative targeted specifically at the film industry.

Eligibility requirements

To support the mission and purpose of the TLD, in order to register or renew a domain name the Applicant or Registrant must:

  • be the intended beneficiary of the domain name registration;

At the time of submitting an Application to register or renew a domain name in the TLD, the Applicant or Registrant must warrant that:

  • it will be the intended beneficiary of the domain name registration; and
  • that the domain name and its use will be consistent with:
  • the mission and purpose of the TLD; and
  • applicable laws, government rules or requirements and the Published Policies.

An Applicant or a Registrant:

  • must provide true and accurate details and information about itself at the time of Application for, and registration of, the domain name and make those warrants as described in the Published Policies;
  • must provide to their Registrar updated details and information as soon as practicable when information about the Registrant changes, and in any case no greater than 14 days from such change; and

The Registry Operator reserves the right to review domain name Applications for consistency with the mission and purpose of the TLD and cancel, lock, place on hold, transfer or delete Applications or Registrations which, in the Registry Operator’s sole discretion, appear to have been registered in bad faith.

Continuing eligibility

Where the Registrant no longer meets the eligibility requirements of the TLD, it must contact its Registrar as soon as possible, and in any case no more than 14 calendar days after it becoming ineligible, request that the domain name be cancelled, locked, placed on hold, transferred or deleted.

Transferring a domain name to another person or entity

A domain name may only be transferred to another party that meets the requirements of the Published Policies, and the receiving party must make also warrant that it meets the eligibility requirements and would be entitled to register the domain name if it were applying for it in its own right.

Monitoring and review

During the lifecycle of the domain name we may take certain steps to substantiate whether a Registrant meets the requirements described in our policy.

We may request that the Registrant provide information to demonstrate compliance and maintain its eligibility. In such cases, the Registrant must respond to our request within 14 calendar days. Failure to respond within the specified timeframe may result in suspension or deletion of the domain name in our absolute discretion.

Where we determine that:

  • the Registrant does not meet the eligibility requirements described in this policy; or
  • the domain name is not consistent with the mission and purpose of the TLD;

we may in our absolute discretion cancel, lock, place on hold, transfer or delete the domain name.

Our rights and responsibilities

We reserve the right to deny any request for, or Application for, a domain name, or cancel, lock, place on hold, transfer, delete, or take any other action on any domain name or transaction that we deem necessary, in our sole discretion:

  • to protect the integrity and stability of the Service;
  • to comply with our obligations to ICANN;
  • to comply with any applicable laws, government rules or requirements, requests of law enforcement, or in compliance with any dispute resolution policies or process;
  • to avoid any liability, civil or criminal, on our part, as well as our affiliates, subsidiaries, officers, directors, employees and subcontractors;
  • to ensure compliance with the Published Policies;
  • to stop or prevent any violations of any terms and conditions of the Customer Registration Agreement;
  • for the non-payment to us of any fee; or
  • to correct mistakes made by us, any Registrar or any of our service providers in connection with an Application for a domain name, or a domain name.

4.2 Requirements for the composition of a domain name

The purpose of this section is to describe the elements that make up a domain name, how those elements are commonly described, and the technical requirements for those elements.

General information about domain names

In the operation of the TLD we use the word ‘label’ to describe a sequence of characters. A domain name is made up of one or more Labels, separated by a period (‘.’), before the TLD, for example name.film or domain.name.film.

Labels that may be used to make a domain name are subject to composition requirements described in this policy.

Levels of domain names

A domain name is often described in relation to its ‘level’, a:

  • ‘second level’ domain name consists of one Label before the TLD, for example name.film; and a
  • ‘third level’ domain name consists of two Labels before the TLD, for example domain.name.film; and so on.

Composition requirements

We validate all attempts to create domain names against these technical composition requirements prior to allowing a domain name to be created.

Applications for domain names must conform to the following set of requirements. Each Label in the domain name must:

  • have a minimum of 1 to a maximum of 63 characters;
  • only contain letters (a-z, A-Z), digits (0-9) and hyphens (-) or a combination of these;
  • begin with a letter or a digit and end with a letter or a digit;
  • neither begin with, nor end with a hyphen (-);
  • not contain hyphens (-) in the third and fourth positions (e.g. www.ab–cd.tld); and
  • not include a space (e.g. www.ab tld).

Internationalised Domain Names

A domain name consisting of at least one character other than those in basic Latin ASCII characters (upper and lowercase letters A-Z and numbers 0-9) is called an Internationalised Domain Name or ‘IDN’.

Internationalised Domain Names can be represented in two forms; a ‘User Form’, which is how the domain name appears in the chosen script, and a corresponding ‘DNS Form’, which is an ASCII encoded form of the IDN’s User Form that represents how the domain name is represented technically in the DNS.

The ability to register domain names in characters other than ASCII characters is a relatively recent innovation and as such these two forms exist to allow the introduction of Internationalised Domain Names whilst maintaining backwards compatibility with legacy infrastructure and software. This is due to the fact that much of the infrastructure of the Internet assumes domain names consist of only Latin characters.

As a result of needing to use these two forms, some additional steps are required to ensure that Internationalised Domain Names both function correctly in the DNS and that the domain names are meaningful to end users.

An example of an Internationalised Domain Name in the two forms is:

  • User Form: bücher.example
  • DNS Form: xn--bcher-kva.example

Labels that may be used to internationalise domain names have composition requirements in addition to those specified for Latin only domain names. These additional requirements are also explored in this document.

Composition requirements

We validate all attempts to create domain names against these technical composition requirements prior to allowing a domain name to be created.

In the case where only one of the forms (User Form or DNS Form) is requested, then its corresponding form will be determined automatically by the Service; both forms must meet the following composition requirements of this policy.

Each label in the DNS Form of the domain name must:

  • Begin with xn – -;
  • Contain between 5 to 63 characters;
  • Consist only of Latin characters (a-z, A-Z), digits (0-9) and hyphens (-); and
  • Not end with a hyphen (-).

Each label in the User Form of the domain name must:

  • Contain a minimum of one character;
  • Not consist of only Diacritics;
  • Only use the characters described in this policy;
  • Neither begin with, nor end with a hyphen (-);
  • Not contain hyphens (-) in the third and fourth positions;
  • Be the equivalent of a valid DNS Form.

Languages and characters available for domain names

We will only allow Internationalised Domain Names composed of certain characters and Code Points described in the tables at the following link: https://www.iana.org/domains/idn-tables

The request for an Internationalised Domain Name must include a language tag. The language tag is an important part of the process of creating an Internationalised Domain Name and must be present. Only one language tag per domain name is allowed.

A domain name may not be registered which contains a different language tag but represents the same DNS Form and User Form as a domain name which has already been registered. By way of example, multiple language tables contain the ü character; however this translates into U+00FC for all language tables.

4.3 Reserved and restricted Domain Names

The purpose of this section is to describe the various types of Labels in the TLD that may be ‘reserved’, meaning that they are unavailable for registration as a domain name, or ‘restricted’ meaning that they may be available for registration as a domain name under certain conditions.

Where a Label is both reserved and restricted then reserved status shall take precedence.

Our use of reserved and restricted Labels

Subject always to ICANN mandated requirements, a reserved or restricted Label may be Allocated or registered to us.

Reserved Labels

The Labels that may be reserved in the TLD fall into the following categories; these are Labels that are reserved:

  • for technical operations;
  • that represent country and territory names;
  • that represent names of intergovernmental organisations;
  • which are certain Labels composed of two letter-letter characters;
  • that represent names of the International Olympic Committee, and those of the International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement; and
  • those that are reserved by us.

Status of reserved Labels in the Service

Unless otherwise Allocated according to this policy, the response to a WHOIS query for a domain name containing a reserved Label includes a message indicating that the domain name is reserved.

Technical operations

The following Label(s) are reserved in all levels of the TLD:

  • EXAMPLE
  • NIC
  • RDDS
  • WWW
  • WHOIS

Country and territory names

The following Label(s) may be reserved in all levels of the TLD:

  • The short form (in English) of all country and territory names (including the European Union) contained on the ISO 3166-1 list (http://www.iso.org/iso/country_codes).
  • Country and territory names described in the United Nations publication:
    Technical reference manual for the standardization of geographical names, part three ‘Names of Countries of the World’ (http://unstats.un.org/unsd/geoinfo/UNGEGN/docs/pubs/UNGEGN%20tech%20ref%20manual_m87_combined.pdf) as published by the Group of Experts on Geographical Names.
  • The list of United Nation member states, in each of the official United Nations languages described in the United Nations publication:
    List of Country Names (http://unstats.un.org/unsd/geoinfo/ungegn/wg1.html) as submitted by the Working Group on Country Names of the United Nations Group of Experts on Geographical Names to the United Nations Conference on the Standardization of Geographical Names.

Two-character Labels

Certain Labels composed of two letter-letter characters may be reserved in all levels of the TLD.

Names of intergovernmental organisations

Names of intergovernmental organisations are reserved at the second level of the TLD.

These Labels can be found at the following link: http://www.icann.org/en/resources/registries/reserved

Names of the International Olympic Committee, and those of the International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement

Names of the International Olympic Committee and those of the International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement are reserved at the second level of the TLD.

These Labels can be found at the following link: http://www.icann.org/en/resources/registries/reserved.

Reserved by us

Labels that are reserved by us are determined at our absolute discretion. Labels may be reserved by us for our exclusive use, at any level of the TLD.

We may release reserved Labels for registration to another person or entity at any time at our sole and absolute discretion.

Restricted Labels

The Labels that are restricted are determined at our absolute discretion, and will not be published.

We may release restricted Labels for registration to another person or entity at any time at our sole and absolute discretion.

Registering a domain name that includes a restricted Label

We will consider proposals to register or renew a domain name that includes a restricted Label. Proposals to register or renew such domain names must be approved by us.

In considering your proposal we may require that you provide additional information including such things as the grounds for which you believe that you should be able to register the Label, and your intended use of the domain name.

Our decision to grant or decline such requests will be at our absolute discretion, and we will not communicate the reason for making such determination.

Status of restricted Labels in the Service

The response to a WHOIS query for a domain name containing a restricted Label will return information if we have allowed the domain name to be registered, or where the domain name is not registered no data will be returned.

Amending the list of reserved and restricted Labels

We may at our absolute discretion from time to time, subject always to applicable industry standards, and ICANN mandated requirements:

  • add to, delete from and generally amend or modify the list of Labels which are reserved or restricted and the level at which they are reserved or restricted;
  • allow a domain name containing a reserved or restricted Label to be registered; or
  • delete a domain name containing a Label which is reserved or restricted.

Where we allow a domain name containing a previously reserved or restricted Label to be registered, that domain name may be subject to the Claims Services.

4.4 Domain name pricing

Our pricing and the obligations of the Registrar

All domain names must be purchased and managed using a Registrar; they are the retail channel for the TLD. We have an agreement with all of our Registrars which amongst other things details the fees associated with domain name transactions. While we set the fees for domain name transactions to Registrars, they are free to retail those domain names based on their service offering and delivery models.

It is our intention however that when an end user enters into an agreement with a Registrar, that they are made aware of the fees associated with the domain name including the fees for creation and renewal of the domain name. Also described in our Registrar Code of Practice, Registrars must fully disclose to an Applicant for, or Registrant of a domain name at the time of Application, or creation or renewal, certain information including but not limited to the registration and renewal fee of the domain name.

Pricing of domain names

Creation and renewal

Our agreement with ICANN to operate the TLD includes a number of obligations with regard to the price that we may set for domain name creation and renewals. Subject always to that agreement we may from time to time revise the fees that we charge to Registrars.

All domain names are subject to our policies and may be restricted or reserved as described in this policy.

Premium Domain Names

We may, at our absolute discretion at any time, identify certain desirable domain names as a Premium Domain Name. A Premium Domain Name may have a higher than standard fee for creation and renewal.

Where a Premium Domain Name is not registered, subject always to applicable industry standards, and ICANN mandated requirements, we may:

  • add to, delete from and generally amend or modify the list of Premium Domain Names;
  • modify the pricing of any un-registered Premium Domain Names; or
  • allow a Premium Domain Name to be registered.

Application fees

At certain times domain names will not be issued on a first come, first served basis, such as during the Sunrise Period and the Early Access Period (as they are described in our Launch Policy), and this may also occur when we make a Premium Domain Name available for registration.

During such times:

  • A domain name may be subject to multiple Applications.
  • Where there are multiple Applications, contention between Applications will be resolved as described in the relevant policy, which may include auctions.
  • There may be a fee for Application for the domain name, which is separate to any fee for creation and renewal, or auction fee.

Auction fees

Auctions may occur where there are multiple Applications for a domain name. Where a domain name is subject to an auction, any auction fees charged are for the right to register the domain name and not for the domain name registration itself. The fee for registration will still apply in addition to the auction fee.

4.5 The WHOIS Service

The purpose of this section is to describe the WHOIS Service for the TLD, the information displayed by the WHOIS Service and how to use the WHOIS Service.

The word WHOIS is not an acronym, it is the phrase ‘who is’, which is concatenated into the word WHOIS; it can also be written as WhoIs and Whois, and is also known as Registration Data Directory Services (RDDS).

To operate the TLD we have entered into an agreement with ICANN, which describes the requirements that we have in relation to the provision of the WHOIS Service. Details about ICANN’s requirements with regard to WHOIS and additional information can be found on the ICANN website at the following link http://whois.icann.org/.

WHOIS is a query and response protocol used to lookup data related to domain names. A WHOIS query returns information related to contact details, name servers, and the Registrar of a domain name.

Who collects the information that is shown in the WHOIS Service?

Our agreement with ICANN requires that when a domain name is registered or renewed, we include certain information to be displayed in the WHOIS Service.

During the procedure of making an Application to register or renew a domain name, the requestor is asked to enter into an agreement, acknowledging and authorising the collection and use of the information in the provision of the WHOIS Service.

What information is returned from a WHOIS query?

When a user queries the WHOIS Service and where information exists, a response will be returned containing details relating to the domain name, Registrar, and name server data, described in detail in Appendix A of this policy.

WHOIS data accuracy

Registrant responsibilities

It is the Registrant’s responsibility to ensure that any information provided when registering or renewing a domain name is complete and accurate. Additionally the Registrant is required to update their information with the Registrar if a change has occurred to the information provided.

What we may do to promote accuracy

We or the Registrar may attempt to verify the information provided. An Application to register a domain name may be rejected where incomplete information is provided, or where verification fails.

During the term of registration of the domain name we, ICANN or the Registrar, may:

  • perform audits of the information that has been provided; or
  • attempt to contact the nominated entities associated with the domain name, requesting the review of the information that has been provided—and if required request that the Registrant contact the Registrar to make adjustments.

What happens if WHOIS data is inaccurate?

Where it is determined that information provided in relation to a domain name is false, incorrect or out-dated; we, ICANN or the Registrar may suspend or cancel the domain name.

Preventing misuse of WHOIS data

The use of the WHOIS Service provided by us is subject to our Acceptable Use Policy which can be found at the following link: http://nic.film/. We also impose limits on the number of queries a user may make to the WHOIS Service.

No user of the WHOIS Service is permitted to utilise automated and/or electronic processes that send high volume to the WHOIS Service.

WHOIS query limits

To ensure that privacy concerns are addressed we have imposed limits on the number of queries that may be made. For general use of the WHOIS Service the following limits will apply, up to:

  • twenty queries per hour from the same IP address; and
  • two-hundred queries per day from the same IP address.

Please note however that we may amend these limits at any time.

WHOIS restrictions

Where the WHOIS query limits have been exceeded the IP address will be barred from the ability to make additional queries for a period of 24 hours.

WHOIS query exemptions

We may consider exemptions to the WHOIS query limits described in this section for law enforcement, government agencies, regulatory bodies, subject always to the Published Policies.

4.6 Zone File Access

The purpose of this section is to describe how access to the Zone File may be granted.

ICANN requires that we in our management of the TLD follow the stated requirements to allow any user access to the TLD’s Zone File. Details about ICANN’s requirements for Zone File access can be found on the ICANN web site at the following link: http://www.icann.org/en/resources/compliance/registries/zfa

Submitting a request for Zone File access

All requests to access the Zone File for the TLD must be submitted through the Centralized Zone Data Service found at the following link: https://czds.icann.org/en

Credentialing requirements and agreement

Access to Zone File data for the TLD may be available to users subject to verification of the users’ credentials and agreement by the user that the data will only be used for lawful purposes.

In order to grant access to the zone file for the TLD, we will request, through the Centralized Zone Data Service, each user to provide the reason for which it seeks access and information sufficient to correctly identify and locate the user.

A user will be required to enter into an agreement that will govern the access to our zone file data and its use. The agreement will be standardized, facilitated and administered by the Centralized Zone Data Access provider.

A user’s access to the Zone File data is always subject to the requirements of ICANN.

Grant and revocation of access

On approval, we or ICANN will grant the user a non-exclusive, non-transferable, limited right to access our Zone File data. The method of access will be defined by us and this method will be communicated to you at the time of application.

The Centralized Zone Data Access provider may reject the request for access of any user that does not satisfy the credentialing requirements. In addition, we may reject the request for access;

  • of any user that does not provide correct or legitimate credentials; or
  • where we reasonably believe that the user will use the data in a manner that contravenes the Published Policies.

On approval, we or ICANN will grant the user a non-exclusive, non-transferable, limited right to access our Zone File data. Such access will be facilitated by the Centralized Zone Data Service.

We may, at any time, revoke access of any user where we have evidence to support that the user’s use of the data contravenes the Published Policies, or where we are instructed to do so by ICANN.

Use of data by the user

We will permit the user to use the Zone File data for lawful purposes, provided that:

  • the user takes all reasonable steps to protect against unauthorised access to, and use and disclosure of, the Zone File data; and
  • the user under no circumstances uses the Zone File data to:
    • allow, enable or otherwise support the transmission by email, telephone or facsimile of mass unsolicited, commercial advertising or solicitations to entities other than users’ own existing customers; or
    • enable high volume, automated, electronic processes that send queries or data to our systems, or that of any Registrar.

Term of use

Use of the Zone File data will be for a limited time and we or ICANN may require the user to renew the grant of access.

5 Definition and review

This document has been prepared and published to represent our policy regarding the administrative and technical management of the TLD.

All domain names in the TLD are subject to the Published Policies. It is your responsibility to ensure that you read and understand these policies as they apply to you. We may discontinue or amend any part or the whole of this policy from time to time at our absolute discretion.

Further policy and procedure in relation to the TLD can be found at the following link: http://nic.film/