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

[Comments-org-renewal-18mar19] Proposed Renewal of .org Registry Agreement
by Peter Maxymych April 24, 2019

April 24, 2019

I am a domain name registrant. 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! Sent from my iPhone

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[Comments-org-renewal-18mar19] Opposition to Proposed Renewal of .org Registry Agreement
by Thought Maybe April 24, 2019

April 24, 2019

I vehemently oppose ICANN proposing to allow unlimited fee increases for .org domain names. We already have the allowed increase to a maximum of 10% annually, which came about after public outcry in 2006 when a comparable proposal to eliminate price caps was made, and successfully opposed by the public. It seems that ICANN is not learning! If these unlimited fee increases are permitted, it is likely that Verisign will seek to further increase their fees for .com and .net. These models are not financially sustainable for small independent groups who already face huge challenges with tech infrastructure costs.

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[Comments-org-renewal-18mar19] Renewal of Org domains
by Ted McLaughlin April 24, 2019

April 24, 2019

I am a volunteer leader for several Scouting related groups, all of which have .org websites. We are volunteer based groups who's leaders all spend way to much of our own money trying to help kids out. I personally pay for the renewal of our domain names simply because our groups don't have the available money for them. If I didn't pay for them the names, (and the associated sites), would end up going away. This is probably true for a lot of .org groups that work with youth. Please don't take the cap off the price increases. Every time these prices go up now it's bad enough for me, but at least knowing they are somewhat limited helps. Thank you. Ted McLaughlin Scoutmaster

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[Comments-org-renewal-18mar19] No to increase of .org fees
by spiritplumber＠gmail.com April 24, 2019

April 24, 2019

Please don't. A lot of nonprofits can barely stay afloat as it is. All you would achieve is them migrating exclusively to facebook for their web content, and everyone loses if that happens.

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[Comments-org-renewal-18mar19] OPPOSED! Proposed Renewal of .org Registry Agreement
by Kindle admin April 24, 2019

April 24, 2019

I am a .org registrant. 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! john andrews kindle(a)johnandrews.org

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[Comments-org-renewal-18mar19] Proposed Renewal of .org Registry Agreement
by john andrews April 24, 2019

April 24, 2019

I am a .org registrant. 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! Also fire the ICANN people who advocated for this... they do not represent registrants! john andrews 206-459-9584 johnandrews.org

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[Comments-org-renewal-18mar19] Price cap
by Peter Taylor April 24, 2019

April 24, 2019

The proposal to remove the price cap on .org registration seems to be unnecessary and unreasonable, and the justification given seems to be back-to-front. In evidence that it is unnecessary, one need merely observe that the registry has not found it necessary to increase prices up to the cap of the previous agreement. No argument has been given for why running a registry could be anticipated to suddenly become more expensive. As for reasonableness, one should consider the expectations of registrants and the power balance between registry and registrants. If the registry should choose to raise prices by orders of magnitude, the only options for existing registrants would be to capitulate and pay up or to spend even more on migration to a different TLD: the leverage is entirely one-sided. Registrants can reasonably expect ICANN to act in the interests of the many and not the few by maintaining the current stability mechanisms in the new agreement. Indeed, it is disappointing that the base registry agreement should not favour the many over the few, and this is what I mean when I say that the justification seems to be back-to-front. Equitable treatment would be equally well served, if not better, by requiring price stability in all gTLDs.

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[Comments-org-renewal-18mar19] ending price caps for .org
by Peter Slavcheff April 24, 2019

April 24, 2019

I can’t think of a single reason that doesn’t involve greed that would propel this proposal. It’s tough enough doing business on the web. Please don’t make it more costly than it already is.

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[Comments-org-renewal-18mar19] I oppose this
by Taras Shemchuk April 24, 2019

April 24, 2019

I do not support the removal of the price cap provisions from the renewal of the.org gTLD agreement. These provisions which limited the price of registrations and allowable price increases for registrations, are important to allowing small organizations, especially non-profit charity organizations to exist on the Internet. Many of these organizations have long-held.org domain names and a substantial percentage of their meager funding is tied to donors being able to find them via those domains. The massive potential price increases (as opposed to the moderate ones that are already possible) would prohibit smaller organizations and personal projects from having a place on the Internet. Let me be clear, there is no inherent 'worth' to domain names and no registry 'deserves' to profit from the sale of domain names. These are in infinite supply and simply a ledger entry. They are not a product where the registry provides any innovation nor are they a product which costs any substantial amount of money to produce. The costs of domain registration must ONLY cover the costs of administering said registry which are very minor costs given the automation level possible. While I understand that legacy gTLD providers are upset that they are limited in what they can charge when newer TLD providers are not they do have a distinct advantage of being more recognizable and are thus more than making up for it in volume. The greed of gTLD providers should not be a reason to allow unreasonable price increases. If a legacy gTLD provider does not feel they can cover their costs in a price-capped arrangement we should instead seek out a new provider for the gTLD. I'm certain that there are many organizations who would be more than happy to take over the oversight of these legacy gTLDs while still agreeing to the price caps. Indeed I would support a reverse-auction of qualified bidders for all legacy gTLDs where the winner would be the organization which would guarantee the lowest price for registrations. THIS competition would best serve the users of the Internet, not the opposite which is to remove price caps. Let me quote from an excellent article on this subject which well explains why competition is a false idea in this marketplace -- : "If price caps are eliminated, competition will not keep prices in check. Competition is effective in restraining prices only if registrants can easily switch one domain name for another. An organization's domain name becomes its online brand for the life of the organization. Moving to another domain name requires undergoing the hugely expensive and disruptive ordeal of rebranding and is to be avoided at nearly any cost. Organizations wish to continue using their existing domain name, for which there is no adequate substitute. When there is a unique product that cannot be easily substituted for any other, there is no effective competition. In the absence of competition, registrants can be protected from extortionate pricing only through pricing constraints, such as price caps. ICANN as the trustee for the legacy name spaces has the responsibility of an owner" Sincerely, Taras Shemchuk

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[Comments-org-renewal-18mar19] Proposed Renewal of .org Registry Agreement
by Clara Robin April 24, 2019

April 24, 2019

I am a domain name registrant. 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!

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