[ncdnhc-discuss] One suggestion for .ORG TF participant!

[Kent Crispin]

On Sat, Apr 27, 2002 at 09:50:30AM -0400, James Love wrote:
> Kent,
> 
> I would like the ICANN staff to spell out the details that would satisfy its
> legitimate concerns regarding the quality control issue, and offer something
> that would work, within the context of the NC proposal.

Just to be sure that you are completely clear on this, I am not the
"ICANN staff"; I am not a part of the ICANN staff that would do this; I
don't speak for ICANN, or the ICANN staff; in fact, I don't even know
much more about this than I did before I became an ICANN staff member. 
Whatever expertise I bring to this issue comes from the fact that I have
been participating in these processes for a long time, not because I
manage computer systems for ICANN. 

> I have expressed
> flexibility on this, including the notion that the ICANN staff could even
> select the actual operator itself, wholly apart from the process of
> selecting the non-profit (although I don't think this is the only or
> necessarily the best way to do this, but it isn't out of the question
> either).

Just my personal opinion: having the ICANN staff select the operator
seems like a profoundly bad idea to me.

> The NC report is a DNSO requirement that the bid go to a non-profit
> organization.   The ICANN staff has concerns about the qualifications of
> operators.

I believe that the "ICANN staff" has hundreds of concerns, of which this
is one, and they balance, as best they can, between them all. 

> (some) Domain name holders have concerns over the
> anticompetitive characteristics of the bidding process.   I think each and
> ever one of these concerns can be addressed, or just as likely, only some
> will be addressed.

As I said, the devil is in the details.  Within the vast generality that
you describe your idea, I can instantly think of multiple versions, some
of which might work and some of which clearly wouldn't.  You haven't
made a compelling case why your scheme would do anything any better than
any other scheme.

> I have always assumed that you and Dave have in the past sought to protect
> the domain name owners from monopolistic practices by registries, such as
> netsol, and I appreciate this, as a domain name holder.  I would like the
> .org bid to be designed to protect the .org domain holders from abusive
> practices by the next registry.

So would I.

>  The non-profits are not going to run the
> registry themselves, they will pick an operator. The question is, will the
> operator really be controlling the non-profit, because it funded the cost of
> submitting the bid?   Will the non-profit have much bargaining power with
> the operator, if it negotiates before the 1st round award is made?  I don't
> think the non-profit will have any real bagaining power in the current
> staff/board proposal, and I think this hurts me, as a .org domain name
> holder.

I think you (as well as many others) have a fundamental lack of
appreciation of the nature of the non-profit and the relation it must
have with the operator.  You seem to think that the non-profit will just
sit there and cash the checks that the operator sends each month, and
otherwise spends its time doing good works, while the operator handles
all the dirty work.  A nice fantasy, but this is not my view. 

The non-profit that runs the registry is the entity that really has the
bottom line responsibility for running the registry, whether they pick
an operator before or after the fact, or, indeed, if they have a
separate operator at all (there are some non-profit organizations with
significant technical chops).  A non-profit that isn't competent to pick
an operator beforehand is not going to suddenly gain that competence if
ICANN picks an operator for it -- instead, it is more likely that it
will end up being controlled by that operator, because the non-profit
wouldn't be competent to handle a rebid, in any case. 

Your claim is that weak non-profits will be captured by unscrupulous 
registry operators before the fact;  I claim that weak non-profits 
aren't qualified to run a registry whether they pick a registry 
operator before or after the fact.

> Iif the ICANN staff won't help flesh out a plan that will work, and just
> keeps complaining about my proposals,

The "ICANN staff" isn't complaining about your proposals.  The ICANN 
staff hasn't received any proposals from you, that I know of.

> we will end up with something that
> looks a lot like what happened in the new TLD round, but with more cynicism
> among the bidders.

I disagree.  I think ICANN will get some good, serious bids from 
respectable non-profit organizations.  There may indeed be some 
ringers, but I don't think they will get very far.

> I am a weak party in these discussions.   You guys
> have all the cards.

Once again, you are speaking to your own demons...there's no "you guys" 
here -- there's only me.

Kent

-- 
Kent Crispin                               "Be good, and you will be
Technical Support Manager, ICANN            lonesome."
crispin at icann.org,kent at songbird.com                    -- Mark Twain