[CPWG] A white knight on the horizon for .ORG?

Thu Jan 9 00:28:28 UTC 2020

Greg,

I disagree with your concern that resistance to the deal is being driven by
"special interests". I've witnessed several accusations of that sort in
this very group. I think there are enough significant players to say their
is genuine lack of consent across the community. I can list
significant players in a future email if you'd like.

However I think your point below is very useful ...

"From an individual end-user perspective, how do we define what "good"
means and how do ensure that, if the sale happens, it's good for end-users
(and if it's not good for end-users, it shouldn't happen)?  That is where
we need to focus our efforts."

Cheers,
David

On Wed, Jan 8, 2020 at 4:48 PM Greg Shatan <greg at isoc-ny.org> wrote:

> In my view the Cooperative idea is a non-starter, if its stated goal is to
> take .ORG away from ISOC and leave ISOC with nothing.  This does more to
> muddy the waters than to to clarify them -- though it is a great way to get
> attention.
>
> ISOC never said it didn't want to run .ORG. And there's no reason to
> believe that the Ethos sale was contemplated when the contract was
> renewed.  As for the price caps, ICANN has been the primary driver for
> removing them, by getting all registries on the 2013 agreement.  There are
> legitimate reasons for concern about the transaction, but these are not.
> These are distractions.
>
> As a matter of good governance, ISOC had to consider the concerns arising
> from largely relying on a single source of income.  It's not unheard of,
> but it's best avoided. (See footnote)  ISOC had no choice but to consider
> whether it would be a more responsible steward of its mission (
> https://www.internetsociety.org/mission/) by changing this situation,
> e.g., by selling PIR. I assume this has long been on ISOC's mind. That does
> not mean that this sale to this buyer is the right decision -- but it
> provides much-needed context.
>
> Simply losing .ORG would be incredibly destructive of ISOC's mission and
> operations, and would be the worst possible outcome from an ISOC governance
> standpoint (and every other ISOC standpoint).  It's interesting that Dyson
> et al. are making a proposal that would essentially bury ISOC.  It's
> certainly not an outcome that ISOC would or could ever put on the table.
>
> I would not jump to the conclusion that a sale of PIR is counter to the
> interests of any other non-profit, much less every other non-profit.  Ethos
> Capital is largely an unknown factor.  Whatever their strategy, their goal
> is almost certainly to increase the value of PIR. Driving away its customer
> base will do the opposite.  Ethos may be able to make investments in PIR
> that ISOC could not (e.g., turning PIR from a consumer of back-end services
> to a provider of back-end services), and which would make PIR a stronger
> company.
>
> That said, I'm still skeptical about Ethos Capital.  I have plenty of
> experience with the private equity world and its hard to imagine any PE
> (Private Equity) firm as the ideal home of .ORG.  On the other hand, PE
> firms have many different approaches, and we can't jump to the conclusion
> that Ethos will repeat some other PE horror story.  (And there have been
> numerous PE horror stories, along with even more numerous PE success
> stories.)  Their stated approach provides some comfort, though it's too
> vague and too oriented toward loose "promises" rather than binding
> commitments.  Their current investments (all minority holdings which may
> have been contributed to the PE fund rather than originated by it) are
> fairly standard tech investments that do not reveal any public interest
> orientation.
>
> As for community resistance, a lot of it still seems ill-informed and may
> well be driven by "special interests" wielding the "community" as a tool.
> The resistance is likely sincere on the part of many non-profits, based
> only on the information they've been fed and concerns about Ethos arising
> from lack of information.  (For a fascinating and disturbing example of
> non-profits being manipulated to lobby against their own interests, see the
> article about the Energy industry and NAACP chapters  at
> https://www.nytimes.com/2020/01/05/business/energy-environment/naacp-utility-donations.html.)
> And who knows if the opposition is "widespread"?  It's noisy, and its
> gotten attention, but that's not the same thing...
>
> On paper the sale of .ORG is a Good Thing for ISOC; in reality, it's only
> good for ISOC if it's good for .ORG.  From an individual end-user
> perspective, how do we define what "good" means and how do ensure that, if
> the sale happens, it's good for end-users (and if it's not good for
> end-users, it shouldn't happen)?  That is where we need to focus our
> efforts.
>
> Best regards,
>
> Greg
>
> Footnote: Cooper Union, the storied engineering school in New York, is
> largely dependent on rent from the land it owns under the Chrysler
> Building. For decades, this allowed Cooper Union to be tuition-free, but
> costs outstripped revenue, deficits mounted. Cooper Union was in a bind and
> roundly criticized for this over-reliance, particularly when they started
> charging tuition for the first time in history.  Fortunately, they had
> renegotiated the lease during the real estate boom of 2006 with a schedule
> of future rent hikes that went from $7.8 million in 2017 to $32.5 million
> in 2019 (and then $41 million in 2028), and they are on the road to
> recovery.  But there's no such pot of gold at the end of the .ORG rainbow.)
>
>
>
>
>
> On Wed, Jan 8, 2020 at 2:51 PM David Mackey <mackey361 at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> Alan,
>>
>> Agreed. Your points make sense from an iSOC centric perspective.
>>
>> I guess there's irony in that iSOC's organizational interests seem to be
>> in conflict with interests of other stakeholders in the larger Internet
>> community. Who could have seen that coming? Multistakeholder model?
>>
>> I guess it's not totally surprising as we've seen the Internet expand
>> over decades across the globe to the point where organizations like PIR are
>> valued in the billions of dollars. As the Internet continues to expand, and
>> as the value to global society increases, we probably can all agree that an
>> end user's perspective is probably worth more than ever before, and yet
>> still so hard to understand and express.
>>
>> Cheers!
>> David
>>
>>
>> On Wed, Jan 8, 2020 at 1:46 PM Alan Greenberg <alan.greenberg at mcgill.ca>
>> wrote:
>>
>>> "It's hard to understand why the iSOC organization is pushing back
>>> against strong community resistance."
>>>
>>>
>>> Its not so hard to understand.
>>>
>>> - The deal will be good for ISOC. It gives them financial security and
>>> gets them out of the Domain name business.
>>>
>>> - They believe that this will work out well for .ORG (and with the
>>> recent assurances, perhaps they are right).
>>>
>>> - If this deal is cancelled (or not allowed by ICANN), it is not clear
>>> that there will be a replacement that puts .ORG in non-profit hands and
>>> will be nearly as lucrative to ISOC - which implies they might have to
>>> scale down operations.
>>>
>>> Alan
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> At 08/01/2020 01:24 PM, David Mackey wrote:
>>>
>>> Maybe a bonanza for lawyers, but also it also comes with tarnished
>>> reputations for .ORG, PIR, iSOC, Andrew Sullivan, etc.
>>>
>>> It's hard to understand why the iSOC organization is pushing back
>>> against strong community resistance.
>>>
>>> So much for consensus building with the multistakeholder model. Maybe
>>> we're headed back towards the days of pre-ICANN Internet Governance with
>>> the associated financial costs and time-delays to resolve disputes.
>>>
>>> On Wed, Jan 8, 2020 at 9:54 AM Alan Greenberg <alan.greenberg at mcgill.ca
>>> > wrote:
>>> I don't see how a proposal to ICANN can imply $ to ISOC. The only way I
>>> can interpret this is as Evan has: an outright cancellation of the
>>> agreement by ICANN and re-delegate to the new corp.
>>>
>>> An interesting concept, but if nothing else, the resultant lawsuits
>>> would likely to be a bonanza for lawyers...
>>>
>>> Alan
>>>
>>> At 08/01/2020 09:25 AM, Evan Leibovitch wrote:
>>>
>>> From what I can gather from what's been written so far, they're going to
>>> demand ICANN to simply re-delegate the registry to them and leave ISOC with
>>> nothing (though the actual proposal to ICANN may be different and indeed
>>> include compensation of some sort). Looks like they want to make the case
>>> that .ORG is a resource that needs a custodian rather than commodity that
>>> can be tossed around at will. It's comprised of an interesting group that
>>> includes ICANN's first president and the USG person in charge of handing
>>> TLD control to it.
>>>
>>> - Evan
>>>
>>>
>>> On Wed, 8 Jan 2020 at 07:05, Jacqueline Morris <jam at jacquelinemorris.com
>>> > wrote: Hi Evan Do you know if there is a monetary  value on this bid
>>> that is public yet? Will it give ISOC the endowment that it is looking for? Jacqueline
>>> A. Morris Technology should be like oxygen: Ubiquitous, Necessary,
>>> Invisible and Free. (after Chris Lehmann
>>> <http://twitter.com/chrislehmann> )
>>>
>>> On Wed, Jan 8, 2020 at 3:27 AM Evan Leibovitch <evan at telly.org> wrote: Looks
>>> like Esther Dyson and others are forming a co-operative to offer an
>>> alternative bid to Ethos:
>>>
>>>
>>> https://www.nytimes.com/2020/01/07/technology/dot-org-private-equity-battle.html
>>> It is unfortunate that the proposed alternative is yet another US
>>> corporation, though the bulk of .ORG registrants are American so this will
>>> likely be unchallenged.
>>> Chance of ISOC accepting to even evaluate this alternative bid without
>>> pressure is slim given that many deals like Ethos' contain penalties for
>>> backing out. But the pressure is certainly there, and not abating.
>>> -- Evan Leibovitch, Toronto Canada @evanleibovitch or @el56 _______________________________________________
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