To whom it may concern, According to this new agreement, Verisign will be allowed to increase the
wholesale price to registrars for .COM domains every year for 8 out of the next 10 years, and the increases don’t stop there.
What additional benefit to the public will coincide with these increases? Managing a public good like domain registration means that you have to act as a good caretaker. It would be one thing if there was some new benefit to the public that would justify years of cost increases. Instead it seems like you're using your near-monopoly to allow a private company to extract profits for no discernible reason. Alongside these contract changes, *Verisign agreed to pay ICANN an
additional $20 million dollars over five years to support* ICANN's domain name system initiatives, without any clarity about how ICANN will spend the money, or who will ensure that the funds are properly spent on domain infrastructure.
I think the proposed changes will be a net negative. Thank you, Kirby Best