All,

Thanks to Phil Corwin for catching this, but buried in the new budget document (http://www.icann.org/en/news/public-comment/op-budget-fy13-01may12-en.htm) just put out for comment is a note on “reconfiguring” the URS.  Excerpt provided below.   I guess they could not find any URS providers that could do it for the costs that they had projected, so ICANN is holding 2 summits to work on a new model.  My question for the Council, is whether this is really a policy issue that should be referred back to the GNSO Community as opposed to having  ICANN on its own resolving after holding 2 summits.  Given the controversy around this over the past few years, any tweaks to the URS should probably go back to the community in my opinion.

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Uniform Rapid Suspension (URS) – $175K

At present there is a significant gap between the features specified for the URS procedure and the desired cost. In order to bridge this gap we will: hold two summit sessions to reconfigure the URS to arrive at a lower cost model (one session in FY12 budget and another in this FY13 plan), conduct a process to develop and finalize URS Model in consultation with current UDRP providers and community members; and conduct RFP based on URS Model and select URS providers. The goal is have a URS program in place and providers contracted and onboard by June 2013.

Jeffrey J. Neuman
Neustar, Inc. / Vice President, Business Affairs
21575 Ridgetop Circle, Sterling, VA 20166
Office: +1.571.434.5772 Mobile: +1.202.549.5079 Fax: +1.703.738.7965 / jeff.neuman@neustar.biz / www.neustar.biz