.winners Domain

The content of this Answer to Question 18 set forth below which describes the plans for TJX Companies, Inc.'s ("TJX") registry constitutes the "purpose" of the registry as that term is used in paragraph 1.b. of Specification 9 of the Draft New gTLD Registry Agreement found in Module 5 of the Applicant Guidebook dated January 11, 2012 (the "Purpose"). TJX will publish its Charter and its policies, guidelines, and other supporting documentation related to the implementation of the registry consistent with the Purpose, all prior to launch. All second level domain names registered by TJX on behalf of itself will be registered through an ICANN-accredited registrar and will be consistent with the Purpose.

The .winners registry will be a standard, not a community-based, registry open only to TJX. For the avoidance of doubt, TJX has no current plans for any third parties to register domain names in the second level of the .winners registry. TJX intends to limit registration and use of .winners gTLD to only TJX as the single registrant. There will be no market for second level registrations.

TJX is the leading off-price retailer of apparel and home fashions in the U.S. and worldwide, ranking 119 in the most recent Fortune 500 listings. TJX had nearly $22 billion in revenues in 2010, more than 2,800 stores in six countries, and more than 160,000 employees worldwide.

TJX seeks to become the registry for the .winners top level domain name. The new gTLD, .winners, corresponds to the WINNERS trademark which is registered to TJX in various countries throughout the world. By way of example, see Canadian Reg. No. TMA393643.

The .winners gTLD will help protect TJX's online presence, further TJX's marketing and promotional efforts, and provide a more safe and more secure destination for consumers to conduct business with TJX. The Purpose includes:

1. The facilitation and improvement of consumers' shopping experiences by providing domains that align with TJX categories, trends, and products.
2. The enhancement and elevation of the TJX brand through being viewed as forward thinking in the Internet space.
3. The protection of TJX consumers by providing a more safe, more secure, and controlled platform for the delivery of information about TJX's goods.
4. The enhancement of marketing campaigns by directing consumers to brand-specific content.
5. The protection of the TJX brand within the domain name system.
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How do you expect that your proposed gTLD will benefit registrants, internet users and others?

TJX believes that the .winners gTLD will offer considerable benefits to TJX's millions of customers. The .winners gTLD will facilitate customer trust and allow TJX to improve its existing online marketplace. The registry will be restricted and strictly administered by TJX personnel. As such, TJX believes that the registry will benefit the following stakeholders:

1. TJX customers. A .winners registry will benefit TJX's customers by providing targeted Internet locations that align with relevant categories, trends, and products. A .winners registry may also allow TJX loyalty members opportunities for deeper levels of engagement with the brand. Additionally, a .winners registry will help protect consumers from possible confusion by becoming the internet location for authentic and accurate information about TJX and TJX's good and services. A .winners registry will also help facilitate consumer access to customer service content and FAQs and will enable consumers to access more relevant marketing materials. Further, TJX hopes that a .winners registry will result in less cybersquatting in the second level since clients and others will be able to easily locate TJX in the top level. TJX believes that this will ultimately lead to lower social costs, including lowering TJX's need to consume the resources of the courts and various arbitration providers due to lower instances of cybersquatting in the .winners registry than in unrestricted gTLDs generally, such as .com.

2. TJX employees. The .winners gTLD will reinforce the TJX brand throughout the world. It will also provide a channel for more secure communications among TJX employees. A .winners registry will ease communications with media, investors, internal associates, and vendors.

3. The free press and relevant governments. Since the .winners will be a single registrant, restricted registry, the free press and relevant governments will be able to take advantage of a single location for accurate information regarding TJX.

TJX believes that these combined goals of a more safe domain space for our customers, more secure communications for our employees, and a single location for accurate information for the free press and governments all serve the global public interest.

What is the goal of your proposed gTLD in terms of areas of speciality, service levels reputation?

TJX's demographic reach is among the widest in retail. The addition of a .winners registry with second level domain names that serve as an information point and email mechanism will enhance TJX's reputation in the marketplace. The .winners gTLD will help stem cybersquatting, phishing attacks, piracy, and counterfeiting since the content at .winners domain names will be trusted and emails from .winners domain names will only be sent by TJX. The .winners gTLD will also allow TJX to engage in localized marketing to engage with differing demographics throughout the world.

What do you anticipate your proposed gTLD will add to the current space in terms of competition, differentiation or innovation?

A .winners gTLD will facilitate customer trust by providing an innovative Internet space for consumers to discover information about TJX products and services and to interact with the brand. Additionally, a .winners gTLD addresses both the cluttered name space within .com and other unrestricted gTLDs as well as the currently crowded gTLD market. Further, by utilizing intuitive second level registrations, TJX will be able to find pertinent information more quickly and with more confidence regarding its source.

What goals does your proposed gTLD have in terms of user experience?

TJX's goal is to provide a single, trusted source of information about TJX and to provide a more secure channel for communication. Whether the stakeholders are customers, employees, the free press or relevant governments, TJX believe that a .winners registry enhances TJX's ability to communicate with such stakeholders in a more secure, less confusing fashion. TJX is a company with global reach and transitioning from .com or ccTLDs will allow consumers worldwide to easily recognize, trust, and access information from TJX.

Provide a complete description of the applicant's intended registration policies in support of the goals above

TJX, as registry operator, will develop a TJX Domain Management Policy (the "TJX Policy") and will be responsible for its enforcement. The TJX Policy will be updated from time to time to reflect changes to ICANN consensus policies and changes in the law which effect the domain name space. Since the .winners registry will be a single registrant, restricted registry, the TJX Policy will reflect these restrictions. The TJX Policy will also establish various dispute policies which will apply to .winners; for example, the UDRP and the URS.

TJX will establish a process to confirm that the registrant of any second level domain name is is The TJX Companies, Inc. Upon confirmation, the process will then verify that the second level registration meets all required conventions and falls within TJX's acceptable registration and use criteria. Once registered, it is currently anticipated that the domain name will remain the property of TJX. There will be no aftermarket in any .winners domain names.
In order for a finalized decision on registration to occur, each second level string must meet the following criteria:

1. It must not match any character strings reserved by ICANN
2. While hyphens may be used, it must not start or end with a hyphen
3. It consist of letters, numbers, and hyphens and not other characters
4. It must not correspond to any known mark of any competitors of TJX
5. It must be between 3 and 63 characters long
6. It must not match protected geographic terms until such time as ICANN provides a GAC-approved process for the registration of such terms in the TJX's registry

At the present time, TJX does not anticipate that internationalized domain names (IDN) will be registered in the .winners registry at the second level, although the capacity for such registrations will be supported by Neustar, TJX's back end services provider. However, IDN registrations may occur as consumer recognition of the new gTLD space evolves.

As stated above, there will be no aftermarket for second level registrations in the .winners registry. Since TJX will be the single registrant, there will be no transfer of ownership of second level domain names. All second level domain names must be used to advance the business activities of TJX and TJX will reserve the right to cancel any second level domain name should it no longer be necessary to advance such goals.

Second level registrations must not be used to knowingly infringe the rights of another nor for any improper use which could be considered a moral or public order abuse.

Moreover, TJX will full comply with ICANN requirements, including interfacing with the Trademark Clearinghouse. All second level registrations and registry operations must comply with the URS and the UDRP, among other consensus policies.

If at some point in the future TJX opens the name space to affiliates or third parties operating under a trademark license with TJX, TJX will amend the TJX Policy accordingly while ensuring all safeguards of third party rights remain in place, including but not limited to the intellectual property rights of others.

Will your proposed gTLD impose any measures for protecting the privacy of confidential information of registrants or users?

Since TJX will be the sole registrant in the .winners registry, there will be no personal information of a natural person which is gathered or used within the registry. Further, any information posted in the WHOIS record will be that of TJX. Even so, TJX is committed to compliance with all privacy obligations found in the ICANN Registry Agreement. TJX will, when appropriate, audit the work of the WHOIS data escrow provider and will maintain best practices in privacy management, including compliance with any applicable ICANN consensus policies currently in place or promulgated in the future. If at some point in the future TJX opens the name space to affiliates or third parties operating under a trademark license with TJX, TJX will ensure that all treatment of privacy data is consistent with relevant local and national laws governing privacy rights protection, as they are interpreted and applied, and has obtained a similar warranty from its backend services provider.

Describe whether and in what ways outreach and communications will help to achieve your projected benefits?

TJX will initially use .winners domain names primarily as "redirects" to and from existing .com domains. While there is currently no specific plan or budget for advertising or media outreach given the uncertainty of consumer adoption of new gTLDs in the marketplace, TJX will develop guidelines to outline the registration restrictions and processes in place for second level registrations. In the event that consumers adopt the new gTLD framework, TJX will, in the ordinary course of its marketing efforts, conduct suitable outreach and communications. Since TJX is both the registry and an operating company with a pre-existing marketing budget, there will be no specific line item for outreach and communications in the cost projections which are part of this application.
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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?

TJX has proposed operating rules to limit registration as described herein, which will reduce the social cost of unnecessary enforcement and defensive registration of the TJX mark in the second level in other registries. Social costs will also be reduced because there will be no need and no opportunity for other brand owners to register second level domain names consisting of their marks within the .winners registry. Further, due to the existence of the trusted .winners domain space, TJX anticipates an over all reduction of consumer fraud and phishing as consumers come to recognize and rely on the .winners domain names and move away from use of unrestricted gTLDs to find information about TJX and its goods and services. Since TJX will be the sole registrant, it is believed that social costs will be reduced or eliminated.

How will multiple applications for a particular domain be resolved, for example, by auction or on a first come first served basis?

Since registrations will be limited to TJX, there will be no market in the second level for .winners registrations and there will be no need for any resolution mechanism such as auctions or the like. If at some point in the future TJX opens the name space to affiliates or third parties operating under a trademark license with TJX, TJX will engage in appropriate policy development processes at that time to ensure an equitable distribution of second level domain names should a multiple application scenario arise.

Explain any cost benefits for registrants you intend to implement (e.g. advantageous pricing, introductory discounts, bulk registration discounts).
Since registrations to will be limited to TJX, there will be no market in the second level .winners registrations and there will be no need to devise cost benefits or discounts for any registrants. There is no anticipated market for second level registrations in the .winners gTLD. If at some point in the future TJX opens the name space to affiliates or third parties operating under a trademark license with TJX, TJX will engage in appropriate policy development processes at that time to ensure that any costs allocation methodology adopted are consist with ICANN consensus policy.

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 10 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?

TJX will comply with Section 2.10 of the Registry Agreement, although there will not be any need to inform registrants of any price increases since the only registrant will by TJX. The selection of the number of years for which a particular second level domain name is registered is a decision of the registrant and not the registrar. Given that all second level registrations will be consistent with the Purpose and restricted as set forth above, TJX intends to only register domain names on an annual basis. If at some point in the future TJX opens the name space to affiliates or third parties operating under a trademark license with TJX, TJX will ensure that domain names can be registered for a term of between 1 and 10 years, however, any such domain names will be subject to other contractual relationships, e.g. a trademark license, which will be a condition precedent to the registration of a second level domain name. Should any such contractual relationship terminate prior to the end of a registration term, it is anticipated that the such party's second level domain names will be cancelled. If the party's contractual relationship is terminated due to a breach of an agreement, it is not anticipated that a refund for any second level domain name registrations will issue.
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Response to Q22

Reference is made to all other responses to questions within this application, including but not limited to the response to Question 18, Question 26 (which describes how Applicant will promote WHOIS accuracy) and Question 29 (which addresses how the Applicant will prevent abusive registrations). To the extent that such other responses have defined terms contained therein, this response may use such terms.

Applicant is committed to running the registry in full compliance with all applicable laws, consensus policies, best practice guidelines, binding RFCs and the Specifications of the Registry Agreement. Applicant therefore commits that it will follow GAC advice and Specification 5 and block from initial registration those country and territory names contained in the following lists:

1. 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; and
2. 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
3. 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.

The process for reserving these names, and hence blocking them from registration, will be agreed with our technical service provider Neustar.

Because all second level domain names under this registry will be registered for purposes which serve Applicant's strategic business aims, and are limited to the applicant or parties operating under a trademark license from the applicant specifically allowing second level registrations, the reserved names cannot be offered to Governments or other official bodies for their own use as this would conflict with the mission and Purpose of the TLD. However, for the same reason, they will not be offered to third parties.

The registry only provides for the registration of names at the second level. No third level domains will be delegated at the registry level. It is therefore consistent with GAC advice that Applicant may choose to create subdomains using country names or abbreviations at the third level. Applicant may also use a folder structure to represent country names in its URLs, while the block exists at the second level.

We envisage that over time, there will be demand from brand TLDs leading to the development of a standardized process for requesting GAC review and ICANN approval for the release of country and territory names for registration by the Registry Operator when the registry is a closed registry. Applicant expects to apply for the release of country and territory names within this registry.
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