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<p><i>First a little humor. </i>As U.S. actor-turned-President
Ronald Reagan liked to say: “<i>There you [I] go again</i>”. <br>
</p>
<p>I would like to approach the issue of Mechanisms and Costs in a
reverse order. If we start from the deliverables, they are the
same for each Mechanism, and baring different Mechanisms facing
different prices for similar skills, the overall dollar costs
should be about the same. Thus, costs probably should not be a
deciding factor in ranking preferences for Mechanisms A, B, and C.
All three options will be approached of course with “…a best
practice approach with a prudent and modest administrative cost
allocation.”</p>
<p>There may be some cost savings from Mechanism B depending on how
partner expertise is costed out, and there may be some one-time
additional cost to set up a Foundation for Mechanism C. ICANN
services and staff provided for Mechanism A (and B) would probably
be costed competitively to those provided by others within
Mechanisms B and C. <br>
</p>
<p>In my view a best practice approach to making the Mechanism
choice is to complete this Work Phase focused on the complicated
issues we have explored, what we want the Mechanism to do, and how
we want it to work. This is then handed off to the Implementation
Phase, along with comments (and questions) about the issues
relevant for ranking A, B and C. These might include elapsed time
to implementation (i.e., how long to the first round of grant
applications), prospects for receiving additional funds from other
sources, (to do more things or do things longer) and the like. <br>
</p>
<p>In this scenario the Implementation Phase would be where the
Mechanism choice was identified, and then subject to whatever
ICANN stakeholder approval process is appropriate. If we are to
make that choice at this Work Phase, we need to make a list of the
factors, other than costs, about what evidence we need to assess,
and what decisions (e.g. open to supplemental funding) need to be
made before ranking the Mechanisms.</p>
Sam L.<br>
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