.webs Domain

The Applicant, Vistaprint Limited, is the Intellectual Property holding company of the publicly traded company, Vistaprint NV, a large online supplier of printed and promotional material as well as marketing services to micro businesses and consumers. It offers business and consumer marketing and identity products and services worldwide. Vistaprint Limited and its subsidiaries also operate the WEBS and VISTAPRINT websites (webs.com, vistaprint.com and others) and benefits from online transactions with customers. Through its subsidiaries, the Applicant also provides hosting and other Internet related services. This is done in particular through the WEBS website, accessible through webs.com
According to the Applicant, the purpose of the TLD is manifold, as will be further explained below:
i. Securing, protecting and operating one of the Applicant's business lines ("WEBS") to the benefit of its stakeholders, referred to below and in particular, members of the WEBS community;
ii. Reflect and operate Applicantʹs ʺWEBSʺ business at the top level of the DNS' hierarchy;
iii. Provide stakeholders of the Applicant, including subsidiaries, and their respective suppliers, customers, sponsorships, and their respective directors, officers, employees, with a recognizable and trusted location on the Internet;
iv. Provide such stakeholders with a secure and safe Internet environment that is mainly or even fully under the control of the Applicant and its stakeholders.

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i. WEBS is displayed by Applicant on its web site, webs.com. Through the WEBS community, Applicant has gained international exposure in hosting services and website related services. The proposed gTLD aims at consolidating the reputation of Applicantʹs WEBS services and the community it represents;
ii. From the Applicant's perspective, .WEBS will bring a high degree of recognition and specialization to the currently existing name space. Where in most cases the specific connotation that has been initially given to the gTLDs (or even ccTLDs) has disappeared, the .WEBS top-level domain will be unambiguous as regards the identity of the Registry Operator. Furthermore, it will be clear that the services offered under the .WEBS space were made possible thanks to the products and services offered by and for the Webs community;
iii. As mentioned in the vision / mission statement before, some of the key reasons why Applicant is applying for .WEBS are:
1. Marketing and branding: reflect the Applicant's WEBS business at the top-level of the DNS' hierarchy,
2. Safety and security, given the fact that the TLD and most if not all of the domain names registered therein will be completely or at least partially under the control of the Registry Operator;
3. Affiliation between WEBS and the various product brands registered and/or used by the Applicant and/or its subsidiaries in their day-to-day business;
iv. The Applicant intends to implement the following policies and procedures with respect to the registration of domain names in the .WEBS top-level domain include but are not limited to:
1. Reservation of domain names in the name of the Applicant. These names include:

a) descriptive names, referring to the actual day-to-day business activities of the Applicant and/or its subsidiaries;
b) descriptive names, referring to the internal departments of the Applicant;
c) descriptive names, referring to the subsidiaries of the Applicant;
d) product and service brands promoted by the Applicant and/or its subsidiaries now and in the future;
e) etc.

2. Launch of the TLD:

a) Sunrise: allow physical persons, organizations and entities that meet the eligibility requirements in force at that point in time to choose the domain names that are identical to their trademarks;
b) General availability: other available domain names may be registered by physical persons, organizations and entities that meet the eligibility requirements in force at that point in time to choose the domain names in accordance with the applicable terms and conditions.
c) Depending on the terms and conditions in force at the time of launch of the TLD, these domain names may or may not be registered in the name of the applicant for the domain name or in the name of the Applicant for the TLD (Vistaprint Limited). In any case, the Applicant reserves the right to impose additional and other restrictions from time to time at its sole discretion;

v. The Applicant currently has privacy and data protection policies in place in relation to the services it offers. The Applicant is committed to implement similar privacy policies in relation to the use of the TLD. The privacy policy that is currently in place in relation to services offered in connection with WEBS is accessible on http://www.webs.com/privacy.htm. At the time of submitting this application, this privacy policy is as follows:

"Webs is a website building and hosting service provided at http://www.webs.com and http://www.freewebs.com and its directly associated domains, widgets, tools, services and applications that are operated by Webs, Inc. (collectively, ʺWebsʺ or ʺServicesʺ). Your privacy on the Internet is very important to us. We strive to make your online experience satisfying and safe.

This ʺPrivacy Policyʺ explains what information we gather from our users and how we use it. By using or accessing our Services, you are accepting the practices described in this Privacy Policy. (Capitalized terms not defined herein have the meaning set forth in our Terms of Service).

Webs is not intended for children under 13 years of age. Consistent with the Federal Childrenʹs Online Privacy Protection Act of 1998 (ʺCOPPAʺ), we will never knowingly gather or use personally identifiable information from anyone under the age of 13, and we do not allow anyone under the age of 13 to register on Webs.

What information does Webs gather?
Webs gathers and stores three types of information about users that are subject to our Privacy Policy:

Information users provide to us:
These are voluntary submissions made when creating an account on Webs or through your use of the Services, such as your name, date of birth, location and email address provided during registration, Content posted, or payment information provided during purchases. Please understand that when you sign into Webs or post Content, your information is not anonymous to us.

Information we collect when you interact with Webs:
We keep track of the actions you take on Webs, such as adding a friend, adding an application, or posting Content. Also, when you access our Services, we may collect information about your access method (such as hardware and software attributes), location, IP address, and pages you visit. In addition, we store certain information from your browser using ʺcookiesʺ. (For more on cookies, please see the section ʺWhat are cookies?ʺ)

Information we receive from third parties:
We do not own or operate the third-party applications, user websites and other services offered that you may use or interact with through Webs (collectively, ʺWebs-enhancedʺ applications, websites and services). Whenever you visit, use or interact with a Webs-enhanced application, website or service, we will receive information from them, including information about actions you take and Content you post on that application, website or service.
Why does Webs gather information about me?
Webs collects information in order to provide a safe, efficient and customized experience. This information allows us to better tailor our content to usersʹ needs and to help us better understand the demographics of our audience. Webs may use some of this information for contacting you, customizing the content and advertising you view, improving our services, conducting research, and providing anonymous reporting for clients. We only collect personally identifiable information from you because you are voluntarily submitting the information to us in order to enjoy certain Services.

How will Websites and Applications on Webs treat my information?
As mentioned above, we do not own or operate Webs-enhanced applications, websites and services. We take steps to ensure that providers of Webs-enhanced applications, websites and services use information that you share on Webs in a manner consistent with your privacy settings and the terms of this Privacy Policy, but we cannot guarantee that they will follow our rules. Please take the time to familiarize yourself with the privacy settings of your account, as well as the settings and policies of the applications, websites and services that you visit, add or use on Webs. Here are some specific things to remember:

By visiting or becoming a Member of a Website on Webs, the Content and information you provide during the registration process (including your email address) and other interactions with the Website may be accessed by the Website Creator and their authorized representatives and administrators, as well as any Application Developer whose Applications run on that Website.
By adding or using an Application or a service provided by one of our affiliates or business partners, the information you provide in the interactions with that Application or service may be accessed by the respective Application Developer, affiliate or business partner and their authorized representatives.

Although certain categories of profile information (such as your birthday) have privacy settings, others (such as your name, gender, profile photo, geographic region, list of friends, list of websites you have joined) are considered publicly available and have no privacy settings associated with them.

Even after you remove information from your profile or delete your account, copies of that information may remain viewable elsewhere to the extent it has been shared with others, it was otherwise distributed pursuant to your privacy settings or privacy settings of the Website(s) or Application(s) you used, or it was copied or stored by other users.
Certain types of communications you send to other users cannot be removed, such as messages.

When you post information on a Website, that information is subject to that Websiteʹs privacy settings and privacy policy, which may change from time to time.

Publicly available information may be accessed by everyone on the Internet, including third-party search engines that may index, cache and store that information.

You should always review the policies of third party websites, applications and services to make sure you are comfortable with the ways in which they use information you share with them. Any information you share with them is at your own risk. If you find an application, website or service that violates our rules, you should report the violation to us using this automated form, and we reserve the right to take action as we deem appropriate without assuming any obligation or liability to do so.

What are cookies?
Webs may place a text file called a ʺcookieʺ in the browser files of your computer. These cookies help us make Webs easier to use, to make our advertising better, and to protect both you and Webs. For example, a cookie may be used to store or ʺrememberʺ your Member login information (but not your password) so that you are not required to manually log into the site at every visit. You can remove or block cookies using the settings in your browser, but in some cases that may impact your ability to use some of our Services.

Our advertisers and partners may also set cookies through our Services. For more information, please see the section ʺWhat about third party advertisers and links?ʺ

What about third party advertisers and links?
In the course of serving advertisements on Webs, a third-party advertiser may place or recognize a unique cookie on your browser. Additionally, some links from Webs may lead to websites operated by other companies. While these websites and advertisements may be co-branded with our name or logo, they are not operated or maintained by us. We do not control these cookies and users of Webs Services should check the privacy policy of the relevant advertiser to understand whether and how it uses cookies. Webs is not responsible for websites operated by third parties that are linked to by any of our sites.

Ads appearing on this website, Webs, and sites hosted by Webs may be delivered to you by Google Ad Manager, DoubleClick, or other advertising partners. Information about your visits to this site, such as the number of times you have viewed an ad (but not your name, address or other personal information), is used to serve ads to you. For more information about these partners, their cookies, and how to ʺopt-out,ʺ please follow the links below.

Network Advertising Initiative (NAI)
Google Ad Manager
DoubleClick
How secure is my information?
Webs uses commercially reasonable physical, electronic, and procedural measures to safeguard personally identifiable information in our possession against loss, theft and unauthorized use, disclosure or modification. We limit access to personal information about you to employees whom we believe reasonably need that information to provide support, products, or services to you or to fulfill their roles within our organization.

Although we have established and maintain security procedures to protect your personally identifiable information, please be aware that no security measures are perfect or impenetrable. We cannot control the actions of other users with whom you share your information. We cannot guarantee that only authorized persons will view your information. We cannot ensure that information you share on Webs will not become publicly available. We are not responsible for third party circumvention of any privacy settings or security measures on Webs. You can reduce these risks by using common sense security practices such as choosing a strong password, using different passwords for different services, and using up-to-date antivirus software.

Please report any security violations to us on this automated form.

How private is the Content I upload?
Any Content uploaded or created using our Services and posted on a Website are by default hosted for the public and are thus publicly accessible unless explicitly protected by the Website Creatorʹs optional password protection setting.

Please note that even if you do not publish links to Content or submit links to a search engine, individuals or search engines may discover and link to your Content by data-mining, guessing the address, spidering sites, or other methods. If you are concerned about the privacy or confidentiality of Content that you produce, please take all appropriate steps to ensure that sensitive materials are password-protected. Webs makes no guarantee as to the reliability or security of the password protection feature.

What control do I have over my information?
As a registered member, you may modify or update your personal account information at any time by logging into your account and (a) accessing the Settings area for each Website you have created, and (b) accessing the Manage Profile area for each Website you have joined by clicking on the corresponding Edit Profile link on your Dashboard page. You may also remove the Website(s) you may have created on Webs at any time by logging into your account and clicking on the corresponding ʺDelete Siteʺ link on your Dashboard page. Should you desire to do so, you may also delete and close your Webs account at any time by contacting our support team. Note that removed or deleted information may persist in backup copies for a reasonable period of time.

How is information shared?
Webs will not share your personally identifiable information with others except as described herein with regards to sharing with Webs-enhanced applications, websites and services and in limited circumstances where we believe such sharing is reasonably necessary to offer the Services, legally required, or permitted by you. For example, we may provide information to service providers to help us bring you the services we offer. Specifically, we may use third parties to facilitate our business, such as to host the Services at a co-location facility for servers, to register your domain name, to send out email updates about Webs, to provide you with email functionality for your domain, to remove repetitive information from our user lists, to process payments for products or services, or to provide search results or links (including sponsored links). In connection with these offerings and business operations, our service providers may have access to your personal information for use for a limited time.

Where we utilize third parties for the processing of any personal information, we implement reasonable contractual and technical protections limiting the use of that information to the Webs-specified purposes. We may store personal information in locations outside the direct control of Webs (for instance, on servers or databases co-located with hosting providers).

Except as otherwise described in this Privacy Policy, we will not disclose personal information to any third party unless we believe that disclosure is necessary: (1) to conform to legal requirements or to respond to a subpoena, search warrant or other legal process received by Webs, whether or not a response is required by applicable law; (2) to enforce the Webs Terms of Service or to protect our rights; or (3) to protect the safety or rights of members of the public or users of the Services. Webs reserves the right to transfer personal information to a successor in interest that acquires rights to that information as a result of the sale of Webs or substantially all of its assets to that successor in interest. We may also transfer such information in the course of corporate divestitures, mergers, or dissolution.

How am I notified of changes to this Privacy Policy
We may change this Privacy Policy pursuant to the procedures outlined in our Terms of Service. Unless stated otherwise, our current Privacy Policy applies to all information we have about you and your account. If we make changes to this Privacy Policy we will notify you by publication here.

Who can I contact about this Privacy Policy?


To submit an inquiry about our Privacy Policy, please contact our support department.

[Last updated: February 19, 2010]"

vi. The Applicant is part of a multinational organization that has been established in 1995. In December 2011, the Applicant acquired Webs, Inc., which has continuously been trading as WEBS since 2005 and under the webs.com domain name since 2005. Since its establishment, it has developed an important reputation in printing and Internet services. Therefore, the Applicant has different ways in order to make existing and future clients, visitors and stakeholders aware of the use and possibly the (gradual) move from the group's webs.com domain name to the .WEBS TLD, including but not limited to:
1. Internet advertising campaigns;
2. having Internet traffic to its key domain names resolving into domain names registered in the .WEBS TLD;
3. email marketing campaigns; etc.
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i. The Applicant will organize the registry operation for the .WEBS TLD in such a manner that it will minimize the likelihood of having multiple applications for a particular domain name. This can be achieved in one of the following ways:
1. Given the fact that, at least prior to the launch of the .WEBS top-level domain, the Applicant / Registry Operator will reserve, delegate and use a large number of domain names that are directly or indirectly relevant to Applicant's business in its own name. Since quite a number of these domain names will be of a descriptive nature, the chances for qualifying / eligible applicants / registrants to register such domain names after the launch will be limited;
2. The Registry Operator will release available domain names post launch in a highly controlled manner, which also reduces the likelihood that two or more applicants qualify for the registration of the same domain name in the .WEBS top-level domain;
3. The Registry Operator may give existing (paying) customers a right of first offer or first refusal for the registration of certain types of domain names and/or during one or more specific launch phases. The duration and/or nature of the customer relationship may be used as a criteria to solve contention when multiple applications for a particular domain name occur;
4. As a method of last resort, and subject to the actual domain name registration policy adopted by the Registry Operator and in force at the time of registration, domain names will be allocated on a first-come, first-served basis.
ii. Given the Applicant's activity as an innovative web hosting provider at a limited cost, the Applicant intends to make the .WEBS top-level domain available to qualifying domain name registrants at a limited cost or at no cost as part of a web hosting or other service package. As the Applicant will be less dependent on the service offerings of existing registries, the pricing of the Applicant's services will depend less on the pricing of the service offerings from those registries. The per domain name price to be paid by the Applicant for a web hosting service, inclusive of a domain name, is likely to be lower. This may result in a better price offering to Internet users for the Applicant's value added services. The Internet user and the Internet community would benefit from the Applicant being able to reduce costs, as this may results in better pricing and/or more room for investing in customer service, in innovative Internet solutions, etc. It must be noted that this does not preclude the Applicant / Registry Operator to charge higher fees for the registration of domain names under the .WEBS TLD at its discretion, e.g., as part of premium packages or for certain categories of clients and customers. The fact that some may be willing to pay more for the registration of particular domain names would again be beneficial for other potential domain name registrants in the .WEBS TLD.
iii. The Applicant / Registry Operator may at its discretion make contractual commitments to increase or decrease the fees for the registration of domain names under the .WEBS TLD.
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Given the fact that the Applicant is a multinational organization which holds interests in printing and other services worldwide, it has a vested interest in giving its visitors, clients and business partners a clear and predictable naming scheme in the .WEBS TLD. Since visitors and clients may mainly be looking for offers and activities organized by local branches and subsidiaries on the basis of their geographic destination, the Applicant may indeed develop plans in order to register domain names that exclusively contain geographic names (country names, city names, names of regions, etc.).
However, if such domain names will be registered, the Applicant will do so considering the following confines:
(i) these domain names will be exclusively registered in the name of the Applicant / Registry Operator or its Affiliates, and not in the name of a third party that is not controlled by the Applicant / Registry Operator, unless agreed upon otherwise with the authority competent for giving its consent in accordance with Specification 5 of the Registry Agreement;
(ii) where consents are required prior to the registration and use of a domain name referred to and in accordance with Specification 5 of the Registry Agreement, the Applicant will obtain such consents before actually registering, delegating and using these domain names.
In any case the registration, delegation and use of domain names corresponding to geographic names will at all times be done:
- in the best interest of the Applicant and its business activities in printing, business and consumer marketing and identity products and services, and possibly other markets; and
- in order to directly and indirectly promote local commercial activity in the geographic locations of which the name has been registered in accordance with (i) above.
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