RE: [gnso-vi-feb10] new version of the proposal matrix

[Jeff Eckhaus <eckhaus@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Eric - I am at a loss to answer your questions as I believe these are more your 
points of view but I will give it a try. 

1. Are the registrars which have come to you asking you for updates on this 
group, and which have registry aspirations, members of the Registrar 
Constituency? This seems to be an action item for Mason or Stéphane.

Yes, they have come to me for updates on this group. I will take your sage 
advice on who other Registrars should contact and pass that along to the group 
immediately. 

2. Do these registrars have a property right to some strings as applicants, or 
some right in the expectations of their applicants to some strings? I think 
this is an important question, so I hope you'll address my misunderstanding.

I do not know if they have a property right or not. The point of this was that 
TLD applicants in these countries, like Japan and Malaysia and other 
neighboring countries have not found other back end providers other than 
existing Registrars who would like to work with them. These specific Registrars 
that I mentioned as per the Afilias proposals may not set up a Registry , even 
if their Registrar does not distribute the TLD.  

3. Assuming their feelings concerning the willingness of VeriSign, Neustar and 
Afilias to serve the South East Asian and/or Japanese markets are reasonable, 
are these concerned registrars the only alternative to underservice?
Restated, are they making the claim that this Working Group must protect them, 
because they are registrars, from competition for registry operations arising 
from the East Asian IT sector?

I am really unsure how the first sentence relates to the second or even how you 
arrived at your Restated section, so let me answer the first part, which I 
believe is an actual question. As of now the TLD applicants have not seen a 
large number of local Registry providers in the Asia Pacific region and yes, 
incumbent Registries have been the only alternative. 

Again I am not sure what the rest of the point of your email is asking, but I 
do not think Registrars make "the best applicants" and do not think Registrars 
have a distinct advantage, I just think they should not be excluded wholesale 
from applying for a new TLD or serving as a back end service provider. 

Jeff Eckhaus



-----Original Message-----
From: Eric Brunner-Williams [mailto:ebw@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx] 
Sent: Wednesday, June 09, 2010 12:09 PM
To: Jeff Eckhaus
Cc: Olga Cavalli; Mike O'Connor; Gnso-vi-feb10@xxxxxxxxx
Subject: Re: [gnso-vi-feb10] new version of the proposal matrix

Jeff,

As Olga has now responded there are four or five things in your note that ... I 
probably misunderstand.


> ... As
> a somewhat vocal member of this group many of the Registrars from 
> developing and non-US countries have come to me asking me for updates 
> on the group since they are concerned that they will not be able to 
> start a localized Registry in their countries.


As you know, of the the 529 ICANN accredited registrars which are domiciled in 
the United States, 318 are owned by just four (4) ICANN accredited registrars, 
another 23 ICANN accredited registrars own an additional 122 ICANN accredited 
registrars.

There is no reason to think the pattern of ownership is unique to any 
jurisdiction as the phenomena arises from the non-territorial nature of the 
.com drop pool and the secondary market in domain names.

1. Are the registrars which have come to you asking you for updates on this 
group, and which have registry aspirations, members of the Registrar 
Constituency? This seems to be an action item for Mason or Stéphane.



> ... Some of the public
> ones are Registry ASP in Malaysia and GMO Internet in Japan who have 
> TLD applicants in their home country but will not be able to compete 
> with the current Afilias proposal.


2. Do these registrars have a property right to some strings as applicants, or 
some right in the expectations of their applicants to some strings? I think 
this is an important question, so I hope you'll address my misunderstanding.



> ... They feel that their markets will continue to be underserved as 
> the only available options will US based companies like VeriSign, 
> Neustar and Afilias if the 15% number is agreed to.


3. Assuming their feelings concerning the willingness of VeriSign, Neustar and 
Afilias to serve the South East Asian and/or Japanese markets are reasonable, 
are these concerned registrars the only alternative to underservice?

Restated, are they making the claim that this Working Group must protect them, 
because they are registrars, from competition for registry operations arising 
from the East Asian IT sector?


> To be clear these are not community TLDs or SR TLDs but companies from 
> non-English speaking countries who would like to start a TLD and would 
> like to use a local Registry in their pursuit of a gTLD. How do we 
> serve these people as well when the 15% number in the Afilias proposal 
> blocks out Registrars from starting a Registry to compete?


4. The issue here is cross ownership. The "companies from non-English speaking 
countries who would like to start a TLD and would like to use a local Registry" 
share equity in excess of 15% in a registrar, or the reverse, else they would 
have no basis to plead for fair treatment.

Restated, are they making the claim that this Working Group must protect them, 
because they intentionally structured their capital in excess of 15%, from the 
consequences of having made that choice?

Finally, is the fundamental claim that registrars make the best applicants, 
that the ideas and experience of for-profit registrars are so much better than 
the ideas and experience of any other possible applicants, that this Working 
Group must promote their existing advantages in the market to a contractual 
privilege, and protect them from competition from any other entity seeking to 
enter the registry operations market?

Thanks for your thoughts Jeff,
Eric