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

[Comments-org-renewal-18mar19] Proposed Renewal of .org Registry Agreement
by Rebecca Lo April 26, 2019

April 26, 2019

I am a domain name registrant. ICANN does not seem to recognize the difference between a legacy extension created with the support of the US government, that predates the existence of ICANN and that has millions of existing users and the brand new extensions that started off with a new set of rules, in particular no price controls, and no existing registrants. They have completely different characteristics, history, and ownership structure. It is not acceptable for ICANN to ignore these differences and to propose that they be treated the same. Removing price caps is not fair to .org domain owners. Many of them have websites that they have used for years. If price caps are removed, the cost to renew their domain names may become too expensive, and they could be forced to give up websites that are important to them. The Uniform Rapid Suspension policy is too new and untested to apply on domain names that may be 20 years old or more. With the URS, the domain names could be taken down in a matter of days with little notice. ICANN should be doing more to protect owners of .org domain names. Why is ICANN trying to remove price protections for .org domain owners, so many of which are non-profits, so that they can be overcharged for their domain names? Sincerely, Rebecca Lo rebecca.saclolo(a)gmail.com

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[Comments-org-renewal-18mar19] Proposed changes could be harmful
by Jad Halaoui April 26, 2019

April 26, 2019

The proposed changes on lifting the ceiling / cap on are quite dangerous and if I understood correctly would allow wholesale registries to increase prices as they wish on domain names. My concern is that if a domain name I already own becomes interesting for whatever reason then I can be priced out of that domain in the future by the wholeseller -- *Jad Safi Halaoui* | Co Founder & COO (t): +971.4.770.6822 | skype: jad.washmen www.getwashmen.com

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[Comments-org-renewal-18mar19] No to .org price increase
by Thomas Pope April 26, 2019

April 26, 2019

Nuts! Allowing unlimited price increases means many .org companies will lose their website domains that have been in use for years. Many nonprofits simply do not have much money to pay for web sites. I know this is true for my church. Please reconsider this change. Thank you.

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[Comments-org-renewal-18mar19] Proposed Renewal of .org Registry Agreement
by Ian Godfrey April 26, 2019

April 26, 2019

I am a .org registrant (not-for-profit). The ICANN website states that: "ICANN was formed in 1998. It is a not-for-profit partnership of people from all over the world dedicated to keeping the Internet secure, stable and interoperable. It promotes competition and develops policy on the Internet’s unique identifiers." and that: "ICANN doesn’t control content on the Internet. It cannot stop spam and it doesn’t deal with access to the Internet. But through its coordination role of the Internet’s naming system, it does have an important impact on the expansion and evolution of the Internet.” Bearing this in mind, ICANN staff should not unilaterally impose URS in legacy TLDs when that issue is precisely what is being examined by the volunteer ICANN Working Group who has been mandated to review this issue. ICANN policy making is supposed to be a ‘bottom up, multi-stakeholder model’. I believe that legacy gTLDs are fundamentally different from for-profit new gTLDs. Legacy TLDs are essentially a public trust, unlike new gTLDs which were created, bought and paid for by private interests. Registrants of legacy TLDs are entitled to price stability and predictability, and should not be subject to price increases with no maximums. Unlike new gTLDs, registrants of legacy TLDs registered their names and made their online presence on legacy TLDs on the basis that price caps would continue to exist. Unrestrained price increases on the millions of .org registrants who are not-for-profits or non-profits would be unfair to them. Unchecked price increases have the potential to result in hundreds of millions of dollars being transferred from these organizations to one non-profit, the Internet Society, with .org registrants receiving no benefit in return. ICANN should not allow one non-profit nearly unlimited access to the funds of other non-profits. ICANN appears to be entirely catering to registries by removing price caps. ICANN should stand up for the public interest and registrants! One wonders whether ICANN been offered ‘incentives’ by huge corporate players… Kind regards Ian Godfrey

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[Comments-org-renewal-18mar19] .org comment period
by Fr. Thomas Clark April 26, 2019

April 26, 2019

Hello, I'd like to offer that our religious community struggles to afford most things we do including our web presence. We focus our efforts of doing helpful things with our income and raising fees or opening up .org domain names to increased fees could be devastating to non-profit organizations. Please don't make it more difficult to be of service to others. -- Warm Regards, Fr. Thomas

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[Comments-org-renewal-18mar19] Lowering .org to the same status as .singles and other garbage gTLDs is a historically bad step
by Thomas Hruska April 26, 2019

April 26, 2019

The .com, .net, .org, and .gov gTLDs are the four oldest gTLDs underpinning the Internet. The proposed change in Section 2.10 of the .org renewal agreement to eliminate pricing limits for .org domains runs directly counter to how the Internet should and currently operates. According to Wikipedia.org: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/.org "The [.org] domain is commonly used by schools, open-source projects, and communities, but also by some for-profit entities." The .org gTLD is managed by the Public Interest Registry (PIR) and supported by Afilias, Inc. Overall, PIR looks to be a reasonably and fiscally responsible 501(c)(3) organization: https://pir.org/about-us/ https://www.charitynavigator.org/index.cfm?bay=search.profile&ein=331025119 In general, I'm seeing a lot of overblown concerns that PIR will dramatically raise rates for all .org registrations. Doing that is not in PIR's continued best interest if they want to keep .org as a viable platform for the types of entities that utilize it. Their .ngo and .ong domains are not astronomically priced at the registrar level, so .org pricing will probably not experience the overdramatic changes cited by various registrars that I'm seeing. However, this proposed change is easily perceived by myself and many others as testing the waters for similarly transitioning .net and then .com to the base pricing model. The Registry for .com and .net is Verisign, Inc., which is a publicly traded company on NASDAQ (VRSN). That alone is what makes this proposal for changing the pricing model for .org a very slippery slope that should not be pursued. Finally, in my opinion, the three main gTLDs should remain untouched. Instead, if a specific gTLD attains a certain level of status (longevity + general reputation + # of domains), its renewal model should transition away from the newer unlimited gTLD base pricing model to the traditional pricing model to allow the gTLD to continue to grow and flourish and reduce the overall risks involved. Most gTLDs will then continue to naturally fall by the wayside due to the costs involved in running a gTLD while a few will attain sufficient stature over a long period of time to become fixtures. -- Thomas Hruska CubicleSoft President Great, time saving software that you will find useful. http://cubiclesoft.com/

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[Comments-org-renewal-18mar19] No rate hike for .org domains!
by Aaron Gutman April 26, 2019

April 26, 2019

My group has had the same .org domain since the mid 90s. We are not squatters, and we are not a commercial entity. Why should we see increases charges? Technical systems should get cheaper over time, not more expensive. Don't change the pricing for .org domains!!!!

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[Comments-org-renewal-18mar19] Oppose removing all price restrictions on the .org domain
by Todd Hahn April 26, 2019

April 26, 2019

ICANN’s current contract with Public Interest Registry (PIR), the group that runs the .org domain name, allows PIR to increase the wholesale price of .org domains by 10% a year. Now ICANN is proposing extending the contract to operate .org but letting PIR set whatever prices it wants. Rather than a 10% increase to renew a domain, PIR could charge registrars as much as they'd like. In turn, registrars would have no choice but to pass these charges on to customers. As a former board member of a small local non-profit charitable organization, the potential for increased costs is concerning and may affect our organization's ability to reach out to the public and continue our mission. Therefore, I oppose removing all price restrictions on the .org domain. Sincerely, -Todd Hahn Sugar Land, Texas, United States

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[Comments-org-renewal-18mar19] Against unrestricted .org pricing
by Todd Fincannon April 26, 2019

April 26, 2019

I run websites for a number of nonprofits with .org domains as a volunteer. They would not be able to afford a large price increase in .org domain registration. I see no reason to permit price increases larger than the current arrangement. Please do not allow this. Todd Fincannon Berkeley, California

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[Comments-org-renewal-18mar19] Don't remove the cap on .org renewal pricing
by Kevin Rolfes April 26, 2019

April 26, 2019

As the long-time holder of rolfes.org I am writing to urge you to maintain a price cap on .org domain renewals, and furthermore, to continue to regulate the price of renewals to ensure affordability. There are many people and organizations with email, web sites, and other infrastructure based upon their .org domain, and if the price cap is lifted and the pricing becomes outrageous, you will be responsible for a lot of unnecessary work as people change change to different domain names with a different suffix in order to avoid paying high renewal fees. Sincerely, Kevin Rolfes

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