RE: [gnso-vi-feb10] Notice: VI Call Thursday with the Economists Salop/Wright at 20:UTC

["Thomas Barrett - EnCirca" <tbarrett@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

The Salop/Wright economic study encompassed interviews with four registrars:
enom, tucows, network solutions and Melbourne IT.  Based on this sample,
they concluded that vertical promotional programs by registries were not
anti-competitive.

This is not surprising as vertical promotional campaigns are often biased
towards the "tier" represented by the four registrars above.


The questions I have for the group are:

1. are we limited to considering harm only to consumers?
2. should ICANN be concerned about harm to existing or future registrars?
3. Does ICANN want to continue to encourage new registrars to enter the
marketplace?  Or is it done?
4. Is there any harm to consumers if there are a lot fewer registrars than
today?
5. what if there were fewer registrars than gtld's.  Is this a healthy
marketplace for consumers?


tom barrett
Encirca