.com settlement

[Kurt Weakland [mailto:kurt.weakland@xxxxxxxxxxxx]]

 I am very concerned about the recently revised .COM registry agreement and
proposed settlement between ICANN and VeriSign. This pending  agreement is
anticompetitive and bad for consumers and the Internet community as a whole.
The proposed agreement provides VeriSign with the ability to increase prices
by 7% annually in four of the next six years without cost justification.
Furthermore, under the new agreement, VeriSign's monopoly would run in
perpetuity as the agreement would automatically renew without the
opportunity for competitive bidding. This is an outrage. VeriSign and ICANN
should not be allowed to establish a perpetual monopoly without 
Congressional oversight and the opportunity for input from the Internet 
community.

 The proposed agreement harms the Internet community by allowing unjustified
price increases when fees for .COM domain names should be decreasing, not
increasing. Even VeriSign last year agreed to drop fees by more than 40% for
.NET domain names to win an extension of that registry agreement. There is
no reason VeriSign shouldn't be implementing the same type of price
decreases for .COM names, as well.

 Sincerely,
Kurt Weakland

--
Kurt Weakland
Meredith Corporation
IT Customer Service Manager
Kurt.Weakland@xxxxxxxxxxxx