April 2019 - comments-info-renewal-18mar19@icann.org

[Comments-info-renewal-18mar19] Comments of Leap of Faith Financial Services Inc. opposing proposed .org, .info, .biz and .asia contract renewals
by George Kirikos May 3, 2019

May 3, 2019

Submitted by: George Kirikos Company: Leap of Faith Financial Services Inc. Website: http://www.leap.com/ Date: April 29, 2019 We write to oppose the proposed contract renewals posted by ICANN for the .org, .info, .biz and .asia contracts, as posted for public comments at: https://www.icann.org/public-comments/org-renewal-2019-03-18-en https://www.icann.org/public-comments/info-renewal-2019-03-18-en https://www.icann.org/public-comments/biz-renewal-2019-04-03-en https://www.icann.org/public-comments/asia-renewal-2019-03-27-en While our arguments are focused on the .org TLD, to the extent that the contractual terms are similar for the other TLDs, we repeat the same comments for .info, .biz and .org. Indeed, while the majority of the thousands of public comments to date have focused on .org, ICANN should read those comments as also applying to .info, .biz and .org, even if the submitters did not explicitly submit their comments to all 4 email addresses. 1. We support and endorse the great groundswell of opposition as expressed in the thousands of thoughtful public comments opposed to these proposed agreements. It is shocking that ICANN did not learn its lesson from 2006, when similar massive opposition existed for comparable contracts which would have allowed for unlimited fee increases: https://forum.icann.org/lists/org-tld-agreement/ The proposed contracts are simply unconscionable, and ICANN should instead simply extend the existing contracts by another 6 or 10 years, rather than make any other changes. 2. Within the At-Large, we had a video discussion/debate, archived at: https://freespeech.com/2019/04/10/impact-of-the-urs-and-unlimited-fee-incre… https://youtu.be/KW3I1oFGbv0 where many of the points below are discussed, and I include them here by reference. 3. We particularly agree with the comments and/or blogs submitted/posted by: a) Nat Cohen / Telepathy: https://mm.icann.org/pipermail/comments-org-renewal-18mar19/2019q2/003067.h… http://www.circleid.com/posts/20190423_spurious_justifications_for_eliminat… b) NameCheap: https://www.namecheap.com/blog/keep-domain-prices-in-check/ c) Zak Muscovitch / Internet Commerce Association: https://mm.icann.org/pipermail/comments-org-renewal-18mar19/2019q2/000006.h… d) Jay Chapman / Digimedia: https://mm.icann.org/pipermail/comments-org-renewal-18mar19/2019q2/002967.h… e) Andrew Allemann: https://mm.icann.org/pipermail/comments-org-renewal-18mar19/2019q2/003091.h… 4. It should be noted that in the past ICANN trumpeted lower fees as one of its main achievements. For example, the testimony of ICANN General Counsel and Secretary John Jeffrey at: https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/CHRG-109hhrg30233/html/CHRG-109hhrg3023… "STATEMENT OF JOHN JEFFREY, INTERNET CORPORATION FOR ASSIGNED NAMES AND NUMBERS (ICANN) ... Among ICANN's main achievements are the following: ... Market competition. Market competition for generic top-level domain registrations established by ICANN has ****lowered domain name cost in some instances as much as 80 percent with savings for both consumers and businesses.****" (emphasis added) It is not consistent with those past statements for ICANN to abrogate its responsibilities, and permit unlimited fee increases by registry operators. Unlimited fee increases are not in the public interest, and do not even attempt to balance the needs of registrants against those of registry operators. ICANN was handed a responsibility to balance the interest of affected stakeholders when it achieved (against our wishes) independence from US government oversight, and it's now clear that it is not living up to those commitments given such one-sided contracts that have been presented here for public comment. Unlimited fee increases are not balanced, and do not promote stability of the internet or competition. ICANN is engaging in corporate welfare and/or crony capitalism through such anti-competitive proposals as are here before us. 5. As has been pointed out by others, under competition the cost of providing registry services (really just the management of a central database plus the operation of various nameservers) would be under USD $1.00 per domain name per year. This is evidenced by the .IN (India) tender, where Neustar beat Afilias with a winning bid of USD $0.70 per domain name per year (70 cents/domain/yr): http://domainincite.com/23364-afilias-sues-india-to-block-12-million-neusta… A similar competitive tender process happened in France: https://www.thedomains.com/2012/08/07/afnic-awarded-new-contract-to-run-fr-… where AFNIC had to lower the wholesale fees for .FR domain names, and the contract was for 5 years. Similar competitions are held for the .US ccTLD: https://www.ntia.doc.gov/legacy/ntiahome/press/2007/Neustar_101907.html You'll note that registry operators do not have presumptive renewal in those ccTLD contracts, yet are more than willing and able to compete effectively and make investments. It was a major policy blunder of ICANN to have agreed in the past to presumptive renewal, a decision that has had a multi-billion dollar negative impact upon registrants, compared to a situation where there are regular competitive tenders. Even the US government has argued for those competitive tenders for both initial agreements and for renewals of agreements: https://www.ntia.doc.gov/files/ntia/publications/icann_081218.pdf (Ms. Garza's analysis begins on the 3rd page of the PDF, after the covering letter by Ms. Baker of the NTIA) The absence of such competitive tenders can only be rectified through the protective fee caps which have been long established, and which the registry operators themselves have agreed to since the times they entered into their respective agreements. If current registry operators are not prepared to renew the existing contracts (which have fee caps in place), then there would be no shortage of other prospective registry operators who would be prepared to step in and replace them (and at a much lower cost, with fee caps in place). Indeed, ICANN themselves have argued (in court) that such caps are *pro-competitive*, see: https://www.icann.org/en/system/files/files/icann-reply-on-cfit-26may06-en.… "....in a single supplier market, price caps are, if anything, procompetitive (Mot. at 13-14);" (line 13, page 6 of 15) 6. We would like to openly make ICANN the following offer: We will run the .org registry for USD $5 per domain name per year, and keep all other existing terms the same. [We would then simply subcontract it to one of the many registry operators who would bid for the job at USD $1 per domain per year or less, and pocket the difference!] This is lower than the $9.93 per domain name per year that PIR currently charges. ICANN cannot of course accept this improved deal, even if it wanted to, because its hands are tied by the foolish decision to agree to presumptive renewal in the past. Looking forward, an agreement to permit unlimited fee increases in the future (far beyond the already generous 10% per year permitted increases) would similarly hamper ICANN's ability to negotiate future "win-win" deals, giving it no negotiating leverage in the future, as it would have already given away the farm if it entered into this proposed agreement. Agreeing to permit unlimited fee increases is like letting the genie out of the bottle, as there's no way that registry operators will ever agree to voluntarily undo such a change in the future. Presumptive renewal means that registry operators can safely ignore any future attempts by ICANN to renegotiate. This is why these contractual changes are so important, because they'll be impossible to fix in the future (without giving up even more to registry operators, e.g. via a buyout or something). This alone should be reason for caution. Given there's no urgency to making a change (i.e. registry operators have *falling* costs, not increasing costs), then the status quo should prevail. 6. Some have suggested that the Internet Society and/or PIR would never raise fees by a large amount. However, "hope is not a strategy." Past performance is no guarantee of the future. Leadership can change, as can priorities/missions. It's clear from section 7.5 of the the draft contract itself: https://www.icann.org/sites/default/files/tlds/org/org-proposed-renewal-18m… that ISOC/PIR could simply sell or assign the registry contract to another entity (e.g. Private Equity, just as registry operator Donuts was sold by its founders), and that new owner/entity could take the heat for future egregious fee increases. ICANN would not be able to stop such a deal. Such a sale would allow ISOC to create a huge endowment for itself worth billions of dollars, given that .org is arguably the second most desirable gTLD, after only .com. 7. The ability to renew a domain name for 10 years is not sufficient protection for registrants. Eventually the bill will come due, and nothing can offset the enormous switching costs. Any goodwill/links/etc. built up will be reduced to zero, totally destroying one's investment in one's web identity that may have been built up over 20+ years (even longer than ICANN has existed, in many cases). URLs that have been printed in offline media such as books, DVDs, etc. can't be updated, thus it's impossible for many to simply stop renewing after 10 years and switch, as some people will still see the old URL. E-mails aren't forwarded by the new registrants to those of past registrants, meaning that all existing email addresses can't easily transition to a new domain name without risk. Business cards would need to be reprinted (and can't be "recalled" from past recipients). Registrants expect URLs to be permanent, not transitory. Registrants of legacy gTLDs like com/net/org own their domain names, and are not temporary tenants (like those in the failed new gTLDs). 8. One of the reasons prospective registrants rationally avoid new gTLDs is the lack of certainty over potential future fee increases. As one submission pointed out, they are "leery" of such one-sided contracts, and for good reason. Those failures of the new gTLDs experiment should not be allowed to contaminate the successful and proven legacy gTLDs like .com/net/org. Indeed, if there is to be any harmonization of contracts, the "base agreement" should be that of the successful .com/net/org TLDs which included fee caps, rather than have the future be modeled on the the failed new gTLDs program. Registrants of new gTLDs knew the problems with the lack of price caps, and foolishly agreed to them before registration. Changing the rules for existing registrants of legacy gTLDs is unacceptable, as this amounts to changing the rules in the middle of the game, rules which would never have been acceptable to most prior to registration. One submission suggested that as each new gTLD matures, or reaches a critical mass, it should then transition to the legacy contracts. That was a wise suggestion, to bridge the failed new gTLD program with the successful legacy gTLDs. 9. Even ISOC/PIR doesn't enter into such one-sided agreements, given that its own supplier/subcontractor (Afilias) had to win a competitive tender to retain the contract for managing the back-end of the registry (presumably at an even lower fee than it agreed to years ago -- fees would be able to be estimated once the relevant IRS Form 990 forms become public). https://domainnamewire.com/2016/02/16/32-million-org-contract-up-for-bids/ https://domainnamewire.com/2016/11/14/org-sticks-afilias-backend/ It's entirely inconsistent that Internet Society doesn't give presumptive renewal and/or permits unlimited fee increases for its own suppliers, yet wants such things for themselves. 10. We oppose the ability for the registry operators to unilaterally create and impose their own mandatory RPMs upon registrants. See, for example: https://www.icann.org/sites/default/files/tlds/org/org-proposed-addendum-18… "Specification 7, § 1 The terms of Section 1 of Specification 7 are hereby amended and restated in their entirety as follows: “Rights Protection Mechanisms. Registry Operator shall implement and adhere to the rights protection mechanisms (“RPMs”) specified in this Specification. In addition to such RPMs, Registry Operator ******may develop and implement RPMs that discourage or prevent registration of domain names that violate or abuse another party’s legal rights.****** Registry Operator will include all RPMs required by this Specification 7 and any additional RPMs developed and implemented by Registry Operator in the Registry-Registrar Agreement entered into by ICANN-accredited registrars authorized to register names in the TLD.” (page 6, emphasis added) This should be left to the GNSO, to develop only policies that have consensus, and which balance the needs of both rights holders and registrants. For example, suppose PIR (or another registry operator) was allowed to unilaterally create a RPM on their own which allowed for complaints to be filed for a fee of $100, but which required registrants post a $1 million bond if they wish to file any response to the complaint. Such a one-sided policy could be created by a registry operator under the proposed terms, and would ignore the requirement that ICANN policies need to balance the concerns of all affected stakeholders (including registrants). 11. We also oppose the searchable WHOIS, which ignores the ongoing EPDP on WHOIS: https://www.icann.org/sites/default/files/tlds/org/org-proposed-renewal-18m… (page 37) "Notwithstanding anything else in this Agreement, Registry Operator must offer a searchable Whois service compliant with the requirements described in Section 1.10 of Specification 4 of this Agreement." as it doesn't properly balance the privacy rights of registrants against those who would go on fishing expeditions. A searchable WHOIS system should only ever be adopted, if and only if the Trademark Clearinghouse (TMCH) equally becomes public and searchable, in return. If the TMCH is kept secret and non-searchable, then the WHOIS should not be searchable either. 12. Additional RPMs that were developed for new gTLDs were the result of bad predictions that were made of massive cybersquatting prior to the adoption of the program. For example, in testimony before the US government: https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/CHRG-112shrg74251/html/CHRG-112shrg7425… "First, the immediate costs imposed on business is likely to be in the multi billions of dollars." "This Program in aggregate has multi-billion dollar implications for all marketers, both in the commercial and the nonprofit sectors, and their brands. It would cause irreparable harm and damage to the entire online business community. It would throw the domain name universe into substantial confusion for both marketers and consumers." "So there are billions of dollars that are going to be spent and it's not going to be providing a use for the economy." "And when we're talking about billions of dollars here, when we're talking about companies with 3,000 or more brands, even big companies will be facing really large expenses. So this is a very, very significant economic issue for this country and for the world." "An unlimited expansion of the TLDs will cost the business community billions of dollars." "The unlimited expansion of TLDs would dramatically increase the cost and complexity for trademark holders to protect their rights. The immediate cost imposed on businesses is likely to be in the billions of dollars." "We believe ICANN's gTLD program would impose billions of dollars in unnecessary costs on the restaurant industry at a time when restaurant operators are looking forward to investing in their businesses and hiring employees after the worst recession in decades." These predictions exaggerated and overestimated the actual risk that was realized by the launch of new gTLDs. Thus, the justification for the adoption of the URS and other RPMs turned out to be false predictions, and should now be undone. They were never intended for, nor should be imposed upon, registrants of legacy gTLDs. Prospective registry operators at the time were willing to accept such terms, as the trademark lobby threatened to thwart and delay the release of new gTLDs unless their demands were met. Registry operators were blinded by dollar signs in their eyes, for example, predictions by Name.Space: "Name.Space, whose business has a potential value of over 1 billion dollars, has been deprived the opportunity to fully launch and operate its portfolio of gTLD properties under what we believe is the most responsible, fair, and ethical practices yet to be employed in the commercial domain name industry." (same link as above for testimony) 13. Given that the RPM PDP of the GNSO is actively reviewing the URS, including determining whether or not it should be a consensus policy, no steps should be taken by ICANN staff and/or the registry operators to unilaterally impose it upon registrants. Indeed, there are numerous proposals to actively change the URS (including a proposal to explicitly eliminate it), see: https://community.icann.org/display/RARPMRIAGPWG/URS+Proposals (click the "Individual URS Proposal" tab to see the 33 individual proposals, 14 of them from us) The current URS is deeply flawed. For example of just one of the defects, currently complaints are required to be in English (unlike the language rules for the UDRP, where complaints must be in the language of the registration agreement, which varies by registrar). Thus, many registrants defending a URS dispute have no idea what the actual URS complaint is about, if they do not understand English. This is particularly egregious, given that new gTLDs are most popular in China. Such flawed RPMs whose creation was rushed before the launch of new gTLDs, and which are tilted in favour of large multinational companies, need to be reviewed and corrected before they are ever adopted for legacy gTLDs like .com/net/org. 14. In conclusion, ICANN's proposed contracts represent a failure of the multi-stakeholder model, and are instead evidence that ICANN has been captured by registry operators. ICANN claims these contracts are the result of a negotiation, yet what did registrants receive in return for these contractual changes? We received absolutely nothing in return, except for higher fees and higher regulatory burdens (via the imposition of the URS), with all the gains being received by the registry operators at the expense of registrants. That's not a negotiation -- that's a giveaway. We expect and demand that ICANN and the registry will simply extend the current contracts, rather than enter into these one-sided arrangements. Sincerely, George Kirikos 416-588-0269 http://www.leap.com/

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[Comments-info-renewal-18mar19] Registration fees - tropping of price cap (.org)
by Oscar Niezen April 30, 2019

April 30, 2019

Dear Sirs, Please note that a drastic price raise in domain registration fees will lead to cancellation/giving back of (in my estimation) millions of registered domain names by SME’s world-wide. I hope and trust that existing rates will be maintained, and advise you to selectively raise fees (if that is deemed necissary in the first place) focusing on companies and entities with 100+ staff and or 5 million+ turnover, and let wealthy corporations pay the highest rates! Best regards, O. Niezen, The Netherlands Registered domain name: cohortconsulting.org Verzonden vanuit Mail voor Windows 10

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[Comments-info-renewal-18mar19] (no subject)
by Hoonie Park April 30, 2019

April 30, 2019

I am against raising the price. I do not want to see price-caps removed and believe price increases would be unfair.

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[Comments-info-renewal-18mar19] Please Keep The Cap
by Luke Hackenberg April 30, 2019

April 30, 2019

Please keep the price cap that has allowed the internet to be accessible to all; raising rates only lessens that.

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[Comments-info-renewal-18mar19] I oppose the removal of the price cap
by Paul Pliska April 30, 2019

April 30, 2019

As someone who uses .info domain as a main email and web address, I understand that existing registrants will keep their price protection, but even so I oppose the removal of the price cap. I don't think older TLDs, such as .info, can be compared to newer "vanity" TLDs. Moreover, I see no reason to give them a new Registry Operator a new better deal, let them stick to what was originally agreed.

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[Comments-info-renewal-18mar19] Comment on the proposed renewal of .info Registry Agreement.
by Paul Tattersfield April 29, 2019

April 29, 2019

Mr. Russ Weinstein, Global Domains Division 29-04-19 Dear Mr. Weinstein, Thank you for the opportunity to comment on the proposed renewal of .info Registry Agreement. ICANN needs to decide if it wishes to be a bottom-up consensus driven governance organization or simply a trade organization looking after its own contracted parties from which it derives its own revenue. This conflict of interest is not new In 1776 Adam Smith in “An Inquiry Into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations (vol. 1 chapter 10)” wrote: “People of the same trade seldom meet together, even for merriment and diversion, but the conversation ends in a conspiracy against the public, or in some contrivance to raise prices. It is impossible indeed to prevent such meetings, by any law which either could be executed, or would be consistent with liberty and justice. But though the law cannot hinder people of the same trade from sometimes assembling together, it ought to do nothing to facilitate such assemblies, much less to render them necessary.” Smith's point is that the only way businesses can succeed in a ‘conspiracy against the public’ is if they are given protection by governmental regulation. Under the false premise of competition and standardization of contracts ICANN GDD staff are asking the public to believe that they are acting in the public interest even when it is quite straightforward to show that the removal of pricing caps is clearly to the detriment of consumers. The justifications for additional commercial freedoms for ICANN’s contracted parties are being presented as being in return for the acceptance of improved protections such as URS. Whilst this may at first sound plausible ICANN GDD staff must be aware that the URS rights protection mechanism is currently being reviewed by the All Rights Protection Mechanism Working Group (RPM WG) through the bottom-up multi-stakeholder consensus driven model. Indeed one of the questions being asked by the RPM WG is should URS be extended to all gTLDs including .info and .org? So one has to wonder why ICANN even bothers having a bottom-up multi-stakeholder model, where some of the most qualified people in the world freely give up hundreds of hours of their time to find the best solutions, if its outcomes are to be pre-determined top-down by ICANN GDD staff. The other justification is competition through an equal playing field this is based on ICANN’s mission to introduce competition. >From the 1998 MOU part of ICANN mission was to introduce competition II.C.2. Competition - This Agreement promotes the management of the DNS in a manner that will permit market mechanisms to support competition and consumer choice in the technical management of the DNS. This competition will lower costs, promote innovation, and enhance user choice and satisfaction. 1 More specifically V.C.9.c. Potential consumer benefits/costs associated with establishing a competitive environment for gTLD registries. 1 One way of establishing competition is to allocate the rights to run a registry for a fixed term and on expiry of that term hold an invitation to tender for a subsequent term. The alternative approach to registry competition which ICANN has tried to adopt is to award each gTLD to a registry in perpetuity and then try and generate the competition, sort under the various MOUs, by awarding new additional gTLDs to competing registry companies. Whilst this approach has provided substantial benefits for ICANN’s contracted parties this approach has provided very few tangible consumer benefits. This is quite simply because domains are not substitutable. The disruption cost to move to an alternative far outweighs the cost to provide the service, so rather than creating the required competition ICANN is simply creating a series of non-competing private monopolies and the removal of prices caps will simply compound this policy failure. One only has to look around the world where contracts to run TLD registries are awarded at $2-$3 per domain to realise that ICANN’s attempts to introduce competition are failing. If ICANN is not prepared to operate a model where it puts the running of its gTLDs out to tender then it should be looking at introducing wholesale price caps in the $3 - $4 range. .info is used by a lot of small site owners often on a low or non-profit basis around the world. These users are particularly sensitive to price increases and especially so when their local prices are multiplied by a strong US Dollar exchange rate against their own currency. So ICANN really does need to reflect on how it can provide greater consumer benefits/costs associated with establishing a genuinely competitive environment for gTLD registries as opposed to its current approach of creating an increasingly generously rewarded series of non-competing private monopolies. Yours sincerely, Paul Tattersfield https://gpmgroup.info/

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[Comments-info-renewal-18mar19] Tucows Comment on Legacy TLD Contracts
by Graeme Bunton April 29, 2019

April 29, 2019

Please see the attached comment from Tucows. Regards Graeme -- ____________________________ Graeme Bunton Director, Analytics & Policy Tucows Inc. PH: 416 535 0123 ext 1634

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[Comments-info-renewal-18mar19] RrSG response to Proposed Renewal of .info, .org & .biz Registry Agreements
by Zoe Bonython April 29, 2019

April 29, 2019

Hello, On behalf of the Registrar Stakeholder Group I would like to submit the attached combined response to proposed Renewal of .info, .org & .biz Registry Agreements. Kind regards, Zoe Bonython RrSG Secretariat

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[Comments-info-renewal-18mar19] Keep Price Caps on Domain Names!
by Derek Gunn April 29, 2019

April 29, 2019

If price-caps removed, prices of domain names will inevitably increase. This will make it that much harder for innovators to take their first steps. Given that the web itself is an innovation, it is not at all in the spirit to allow a hurdle to prevent further innovation. Sincerely, Derek Gunn -- *LERT.Info* Alerting Systems

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[Comments-info-renewal-18mar19] INTA Comments
by Lori Schulman April 29, 2019

April 29, 2019

Please find INTA's comments attached. If you have any questions or concerns, please do not hesitate to contact me. Lori Schulman Senior Director, Internet Policy International Trademark Association 1250 Connecticut Avenue, Suite 700 Washington DC, USA +1-202-704-0408, skype: lsschulman www.inta.org<http://www.inta.org/> [2019_AM_Boston_register (003)] Find us on: [Description: Description: Description: cid:F361C18F-02FE-4CF0-A43E-AA8566DC2514] Twitter<https://twitter.com/INTA> [Description: Description: LinkedIn] LinkedIn<http://www.linkedin.com/groupInvitation?groupID=69899> [Description: Description: facebook-logo (2)] Facebook<http://www.facebook.com/home.php?#!/GoINTA?ref=ts> [Description: Description: pnpb_sig.png]

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