Rough justice: A statistical assessment of ICANN's uniform dispute resolution policy

Long-standing conflict between domain name registrants and trademark holder s prompted the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) to create a global, mandatory arbitration procedure known as the Uniform Di spute Resolution Policy (UDRP). The UDRP has been used in 2166 cases involv ing 3938 domain names as of 1 November 2000. The policy gives the initiator of a complaint, generally a trademark holder, the right to choose which IC ANN-accredited dispute resolution service provider (RSP) will handle the ca se. During the preparation of the UDRP, some feared that complainant select ion would lead to "forum shopping" that might bias the results. This articl e performs a statistical assessment of the forum-shopping thesis and finds support for it. There are statistically significant differences in the vari ous RSPs' propensity to take away names from defendants; there are also maj or differences in the number of cases brought to each RSP. RSPs who take aw ay names have the larger share of cases. The study examines other variables that might explain differences in market share, such as price, the plainti ff's nationality, or the time taken to decide a case. It finds that nationa lity and time also are correlated with market share. The study concludes th at shopping for a favorable outcome is an important factor in the UDRP.