Rick, I realize the perception is different. For our part, we have no interest in harming smaller registrars. We seem to be competing very well without any such underhandedness. And there was never any hint of that concept in any discussion I was a part of. I see no benefit to ICANN to pursue such an idea either. As I said, I agree that the outreach and the process overall could still be improved. But I also believe in giving credit where credit is due, and this year the ICANN staff made considerable efforts to do better with this process. And the process is not over yet. Kurt seems very interested in the concerns expressed and willing to entertain further suggestions and advice. We should give him and the rest of the staff the benefit of the doubt and concentrate on reasonable alternatives that we can all live with. But if we take steps that completely cut ourselves out of the process, we only have ourselves to blame. Tim -----Original Message----- From: Rick Wesson [mailto:wessorh@ar.com] Sent: Friday, May 28, 2004 10:00 AM To: Tim Ruiz Cc: 'Bhavin Turakhia'; 'Monte Cahn'; ross@tucows.com; 'Rob Hall'; 'Jean-Michel Becar'; 'Registrars Constituency' Subject: RE: [registrars] 66% needed for approval Tim, what you experenced as "outreach" is not how those that were not contacted percieve the same act. ICANN is preported to the "open and transparent" standard -- when ICANN contacts the largest of registrars regarding a budget that HARMS smaller registrars that, my friend, is not outreach. -rick On Fri, 28 May 2004, Tim Ruiz wrote:
Bhavin,
In previous years I don't think even the top 5 registrars were contacted during the budget formulation process. I know that Go Daddy was never contacted prior to this year. So I truly believe the ICANN staff made a concerted effort to improve on that. Still not perfect, a wider range of registrars should be included, but still much better.
And actually, the feedback that they received from the registrars they did contact, as well as other stakeholders, resulted in significant reductions in the budget, twice. They listened!
If we can reach a reasonable agreement on how best to deal with the issues being discussed on this list and offer constructive suggestions, I believe the staff will be very interested and responsive.