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<p><font face="Times New Roman, Times, serif">We have been talking
about this for quite awhile. Is there a statement under
preparation at the moment to come from At Large? I don't see
anything there. <br>
</font></p>
<p><font face="Times New Roman, Times, serif">I am afraid that our
non-response might be viewed as a response in favour of the
sale. That isn't the impression I have -- I don't think our
community is in favour of the sale. <br>
</font></p>
<p><font face="Times New Roman, Times, serif">Marita</font><br>
</p>
<div class="moz-cite-prefix">On 1/20/2020 3:49 PM, Holly Raiche
wrote:<br>
</div>
<blockquote type="cite"
cite="mid:1B3A6A08-53EC-4259-85E8-E49D9F6CAF26@internode.on.net">
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Alan raises some very good points for discussion. Could we put
his letter on the wiki for PIR please
<div class=""><br class="">
</div>
<div class="">Holly<br class="">
<div><br class="">
<blockquote type="cite" class="">
<div class="">On Jan 21, 2020, at 10:07 AM, sivasubramanian
muthusamy <<a href="mailto:6.internet@gmail.com"
class="" moz-do-not-send="true">6.internet@gmail.com</a>>
wrote:</div>
<br class="Apple-interchange-newline">
<div class="">
<div dir="ltr" class="">
<div class="">Dear Alan,</div>
<div class=""><br class="">
</div>
<div class="">(With apologies for commenting on your
letter that is directed at the Board, some comments
inline)</div>
<br class="">
<div class="gmail_quote">
<div dir="ltr" class="gmail_attr">On Tue, Jan 21, 2020
at 3:01 AM Alan Greenberg <<a
href="mailto:alan.greenberg@mcgill.ca" class=""
moz-do-not-send="true">alan.greenberg@mcgill.ca</a>>
wrote:<br class="">
</div>
<blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0px 0px
0px 0.8ex;border-left:1px solid
rgb(204,204,204);padding-left:1ex">Perhaps of
interest, I sent the following message to the ICANN
Board <br class="">
of Directors today.<br class="">
<br class="">
Alan<br class="">
<br class="">
At 20/01/2020 09:44 AM, Alan Greenberg wrote:<br
class="">
>To: ICANN Board<br class="">
><br class="">
>This message is being sent purely on my own
behalf. I do not expect <br class="">
>a personal reply commenting on this issue but I
did want to share a <br class="">
>few thoughts.<br class="">
><br class="">
>With the various assurances that Ethos Capital
has made, I was <br class="">
>starting to feel comfortable that the sale might
not come back and <br class="">
>bite us. However, with the recent revelations of
the complexity of <br class="">
>the corporate structure and the multiple
partners (and loans) <br class="">
>involved, the odor has started to rise again.<br
class="">
><br class="">
>When I look at the transaction (and I am
ignoring here any public <br class="">
>relations aspect in relation to ISOC, PIR or
even ICANN), I see a <br class="">
>number of possible very unfortunate
consequences.<br class="">
><br class="">
>1. Price increases: Perhaps inevitable after the
decision to remove <br class="">
>pricing limitations, I have found that the
statements made by Ethos <br class="">
>are less than direct. I have heard multiple
times that 10% increases <br class="">
>could (in the extreme) result in the wholesale
price doubling in 10 <br class="">
>years. That is not accurate. The 10% would in
fact be compounded and <br class="">
>this could result in a 2x in 8 years, 3 x in 13
years and 4x in 16 <br class="">
>years and 6x in 20 years. Perhaps such an
increase would harm sales <br class="">
>sufficiently to cause caution on Ethos' part but
I am disturbed that <br class="">
>the actual numbers are not being mentioned. But
as I said, it is too <br class="">
>late to change this, regardless of owner.<br
class="">
><br class="">
>2. The largest potential harm I see is to the
perceived nature of <br class="">
>the TLD. There is no restriction on who can
register a domain under <br class="">
>.org, but when you look at the .org domains that
show up in real <br class="">
>life (my own contact list, web searches, etc.),
almost all of them <br class="">
>are not-for-profit type-organizations or
individuals. Rarely do you <br class="">
>see an out-and-out business using a .org domain.
It is the reason I <br class="">
>registered <a href="http://alangreenberg.org/"
rel="noreferrer" target="_blank" class=""
moz-do-not-send="true">alangreenberg.org</a> and
used .org for the domain name of my <br class="">
>local genealogical society. And it is why you
find .org used for <br class="">
>ISOC (and that predates PIR), ICANN, Wikipedia
and the Internet Archive.<br class="">
><br class="">
>That is, in my mind, a core strong strength of
.org, and one that <br class="">
>has been well supported by PIR under ISOC
control. However, the lure <br class="">
>of profit may make it extremely attractive to
try to transform .org <br class="">
>into another .com. With just 7% of domains under
.org compared to <br class="">
>.com, the name space is wide open with far fewer
name conflicts. </blockquote>
<div class=""> </div>
<blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0px 0px
0px 0.8ex;border-left:1px solid
rgb(204,204,204);padding-left:1ex">>If it is
marketed as a more generic TLD (as opposed to the
very <br class="">
>targeted marketing for .org to date), it could
grow - a lot! </blockquote>
<div class=""><br class="">
</div>
<div class="">It might be counter productive to scale
.ORG into a more generic TLD, but then .ORG might
become like any other generic TLD. There may be
greater value in actually "preserving the nature of
.ORG" limiting the number of .ORG registrations to
authentic organizations (individuals engaged in ORG
like pursuits) </div>
<div class=""><br class="">
</div>
<div class="">If newPIR pursues this path of retaining
and perhaps streamlining .ORG's unique position, it
would be fair to let go of the concerns about price
increases, in compensation for the revenue foregone
by NOT adopting the path of making .ORG into a more
generic TLD. This is just a thought, shared in
context.</div>
<div class=""> </div>
<blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0px 0px
0px 0.8ex;border-left:1px solid
rgb(204,204,204);padding-left:1ex">And <br class="">
>along the way very quickly loose its current
perceived nature. The <br class="">
>lure of capturing just a small fraction of the
.com market, with its <br class="">
>annual gross revenue of over $1.1B will be very
difficult to ignore.<br class="">
><br class="">
>Ethos has stated that it will preserve the
"nature of .org". Those <br class="">
>assurances are perhaps comforting but
non-binding. </blockquote>
<div class=""> </div>
<blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0px 0px
0px 0.8ex;border-left:1px solid
rgb(204,204,204);padding-left:1ex">However, far more
<br class="">
>important is the new information that Ethos may
not be calling the <br class="">
>shots and those other entities who may have
control have made no <br class="">
>such assurances at all.<br class="">
</blockquote>
<div class=""><br class="">
</div>
<div class="">Not sure if Ethos would have designed
the pattern of ownership in a manner that would so
easily concede control.</div>
<div class=""> </div>
<blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0px 0px
0px 0.8ex;border-left:1px solid
rgb(204,204,204);padding-left:1ex">
><br class="">
>I will not comment on whether ICANN should
approve the sale or not. <br class="">
>The Board has far better insight and advice than
I can provide. But <br class="">
>if the sale does go through I believe it is
essential that it <br class="">
>include binding, non-cancellable requirements
that the "nature" of <br class="">
>the TLD be maintained and efforts not be made to
transform it into a <br class="">
>true generic, commercially-oriented domain. It
will sure be <br class="">
>difficult to word that in a way as to
"guarantee" that it be <br class="">
>honored, but I feel confident that it can be
done such that, if the <br class="">
>intent is violated, the TLD operator could face
the potential for <br class="">
>having their contract revoked.<br class="">
</blockquote>
<div class=""><br class="">
</div>
<div class="">That would be fair for ICANN to
stipulate.</div>
<div class=""> </div>
<blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0px 0px
0px 0.8ex;border-left:1px solid
rgb(204,204,204);padding-left:1ex">
><br class="">
>Alan Greenberg<br class="">
<br class="">
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