Filed under: chain-gang,fly-by-wire,international,Not so popular
Updates: EFF letter, PIR’s update; IGP’s insider take; ICANN resolution;
Ways to act, Reg essay x2, Ohashi, Tim Berners-Lee response;
Letters from ISOC(😇), Ethos(🌈), and a banker (🚩🚩📜)
(See also Part 2: How to Flip .org)
Ethos Capital, a new commercial investment firm founded in the past few months in Boston, has 2 staff and only one pending investment: a deal to acquire the 501c3 non-profit that currently runs the .org domain (valued at a few $B), for an undisclosed sum. This was initiated immediately after ICANN decided in May, over almost universal opposition, to remove the price cap on .org registrations with no meaningful price protections for existing or future registrants.
This seems to run afoul of a range of ethical, ICANN, ISOC, and non-profit guidelines. It is certainly the privatisation of a not-for-profit monopoly into a for-profit one, which will benefit ISOC and a few individuals by inconveniencing millions of others. I have questions:
- Do affected parties have recourse?
- Yes: Drew DeVault suggests state and federal options.
- Other than polite letters, do any responses have teeth?
- Maybe: Official complaints have been filed, but don’t expect results.
- Chronic optimists can .. take part in ICANN and ISOC governance
- Has anyone currently at ICANN + ISOC made substantive comment?
- Yes: Richard Barnes, ISOC trustee, explains why he voted to sell .org
- Vint Cerf said: ‘Hard to imagine $60/year would be a deal breaker for even small non-profits.‘
- How did we get to Net pioneers embracing 99% profit margins?
For more backstory, read on…
(more…)