[council] Registrars Statement regarding .net

[Bruce Tonkin]

Hello All,

The following statement was approved by a large number of registrars
today, and presented on their behalf by the chair of the Registrars
Constituency: Bhavin Turakhia, from Directi.

It was not a formal statement from the "Registrars Constituency" as this
requires a formal voting process that takes several weeks.

Regards,
Bruce


"Registrars trusted the ICANN Board and ICANN staff to act on behalf of
the ICANN community in negotiating a new contract with Verisign for
.net.

Registrars consider there to be a breach of trust by the ICANN Board and
the ICANN staff in approving a contract with Verisign regarding .net
that contains significant changes from the draft .net agreement posted
on the ICANN website, without public consultation.   We believe this is
a breach of the intent of the transparency provision  (Article III) of
the ICANN bylaws that states that ICANN shall operate to the extent
feasible in an open and transparent manner and consistent with
procedures designed to ensure fairness.

This is not the first time this has happened.   When the new transfers
policy was implemented, Verisign negotiated a change in the
registry-registrar agreement with the ICANN staff, which was approved by
the ICANN Board, to accommodate the transfers policy that contained
changes beyond purely for the purposes of the transfers policy without
any public consultation.   ICANN staff gave an undertaking to registrars
that this would not happen again.   It is the registrars view that this
verbal undertaking was breached.

The changes to the .net agreement that specifically concern registrars
are:
- the maximum price ($4.25 including the ICANN registry fee) put forward
by Verisign in the .net application only applies for the first 18 months
of the new agreement.   After that Verisign is free is set any price.
Registrars want the maximum price fixed for the duration of the
agreement.
- Verisign is excluded from new consensus policies that relate to the
introduction of new registry services other than what is in the new .net
agreement.   Registrars want Verisign to continue to be subject to
consensus policies in this area.
- ICANN may not change the above terms in a renewal of the agreement.
Registrars want ICANN to have the ability to negotiate a lower maximum
price at the time of contract renewal."