[NCUC-DISCUSS] on the proposed transfer of PRI

[Wisdom Donkor]

*A STRONGER FUTURE FOR .ORG AND THE INTERNET*



By VINTON G. CERF



Over the past several weeks, I have watched with disappointment the
controversy surrounding Ethos Capital’s proposed acquisition of the Public
Interest Registry – which runs the .org domain – from the Internet Society.
I am in favor of this acquisition and would like to explain why.



First, it is worth remembering that .org was managed by several for-profit
companies in the past: Network Solutions, SAIC and VeriSign. As nearly as I
can tell, these operations were beneficial and, at least, not harmful, to
the .org brand.



Second, when the operation of .org was transferred to the Internet Society,
it created the non-profit called Public Interest Registry, or PIR. PIR’s
primary objectives were, first, to operate .org and, second, to provide
significant support for the Internet Society by essentially allocating any
surplus from the operation of PIR to fund the Internet Society’s work in
promoting a more accessible and secure Internet. This amounted to about $50
million a year, which was hugely helpful to the Internet Society but
limited PIR’s ability to invest in improvements to the operation of .org or
even the creation of new products and services for the non-profit community.



The consequence of PIR’s non-profit operation and its obligations to the
Internet Society was that it limited PIR’s ability to invest in its own
operation. Now, let’s consider the situation after the proposed
transaction. First, ISOC will receive an endowment of over $1 billion,
which it will need to manage. That’s a non-trivial task, but also one that
is independent of the ups and downs of the domain name business. Second,
PIR becomes a for-profit operation and its investors can establish a policy
of investing profits back into the company in addition to distributing
earnings to shareholders. Both organizations end up with new incentives for
their operation that are beneficial compared to their earlier relationship
of interdependence.



Third, nothing prevents Ethos from adopting – and in fact it has every
incentive to adopt – community-friendly policies for the operation of PIR.
Indeed, it is wise for Ethos to take steps to reassure the .org customer
base, especially about costs. Even though the Internet Corporation for
Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) has relieved registry operators from
constraints on price increases, Ethos has voluntarily agreed to policies
based on the earlier guidelines established by ICANN, and has said that any
increase would not be more than 10% per year on average. Moreover, as a
for-profit company, PIR has a clear rationale for not driving away its
customer base by any excessive raising of prices. Given current .org
pricing, a 10% increase in price would be less than $1. Even if an
organization had registered a dozen .org domain names, it is hard to
believe that such an increase would be viewed as unsustainable for most
non-profits. Of course, companies that hold domain names in the tens of
thousands for speculative purposes might find such increases more
troubling, but I don’t have much sympathy for that business model in the
context of the organizations the .org brand is intended to serve.



Fourth, it is worth pointing out that the Internet Society did not seek
this transaction, but its Board of Trustees responded with due diligence
and with the help of highly qualified financial advisors to conclude that
this was a transaction in its interest, and that it would further the
Internet Society’s fundamental purposes regarding the Internet and its
beneficial operation.



>From the perspective of PIR’s millions of customers, what is important is
what Ethos actually chooses to do regarding the operation of .org. In
addition to its commitment to limit price increases, Ethos has proposed to
create a Stewardship Council to advise the Board on key decisions that
could affect .org users or the Internet ecosystem. It is my understanding
that Ethos intends for the Stewardship Council to have considerable
authority. The Council, for example, will take on the role of ratifying
strong rules protecting freedom of expression and safeguarding against
censorship.



Ethos is also proposing to set up a Community Enablement Fund for the
purpose of underwriting efforts beneficial to the .org community, which
will be funded at a level that is substantially more than PIR can invest
today. The Stewardship Council will manage the process of evaluating
proposals to be supported.



All of these commitments, as well as the fundamental logic of the proposed
transaction, convince me that this is the right path forward for the
Internet Society, for PIR, for Ethos and for the .org community.



*Vinton Cerf** is Google’s chief Internet evangelist. *



*Sharing for information purposes.*
*WISDOM DONKOR*
President & CEO
Africa Open Data and Internet Research Foundation
P.O. Box CT 2439, Cantonments, Accra | www.aodirf.org  / www.afrigeocon.org
Tel: +233 20 812 8851
Skype: wisdom_dk | Facebook: kwasi wisdom |  Twitter: @wisdom_dk
__________________________________________________
Specialization:
E-government Network Infrastructure and E-application, Internet
Governance,  Open Data policies platforms & Community Development, Cyber
Security,  Domain Name Systems, Software Engineering, Event Planning &
Management,
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