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Re: [soac-newgtldapsup-wg] WT-2 who/what

  • To: Andrew Mack <amack@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
  • Subject: Re: [soac-newgtldapsup-wg] WT-2 who/what
  • From: Elaine Pruis <elaine@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
  • Date: Mon, 24 May 2010 11:58:04 -0700

On May 24, 2010, at 10:29 AM, Andrew Mack wrote:

To Richard and Elaine's points, what can I say. I agree. Especially think the point about the use of mobile devices is a good one.
The idea of setting a floor was to create some sort of minimum  
number for financial viability, but especially if we're using  
alternative back-end models (e.g. pooling resources for smaller  
applicants, standardization) + some sort of assistance, I think it  
would be hard to say what a floor number is.
The question was asked, because intuitively it seems for a registry to  
meet ICANN's viability requirements, these minimums would be necessary
That said, I'm not that familiar with .ki, but the idea of $1000/ domain strikes me as pretty steep. Who buys the .ki's?
Its seen as a "niche" registry... very rare. So people that collect  
rare things I suppose.
I know there are some concerns about a rush of new gTLDs creating a need for indefinite defensive registries (e.g. cocacola.new-gTLD). Would our group see this as a kind of gaming as well?
The community, in my opinion, has developed extensive rules and  
prohibitions for making a business model on defensive registrations.  
No worries there.
Perhaps this won't be an issue, but if we're planning to subsidize/ 
support (temporarily) needy applicants, I'd want to make sure the  
benefit was captured by the community first and foremost.

Andrew A. Mack
Principal
AMGlobal Consulting
+1-202-256-1077
amack@xxxxxxxxxxxx
www.amglobal.com


From: Richard Tindal <richardtindal@xxxxxx>
To: soac-newgtldapsup-wg@xxxxxxxxx
Sent: Mon, May 24, 2010 12:34:38 PM
Subject: Re: [soac-newgtldapsup-wg] WT-2 who/what

i agree that a minimum number of eligible community members will be hard to define, and may not be relevant.
RT


On May 24, 2010, at 9:25 AM, Elaine Pruis wrote:

The question "-Is it ok if the applicant only serves a very small part of the public?" was posed and the responses so far:
Andrew:  The answer depends on what we might describe as “very  
small”. Denmark is small in population but has a relatively larger  
footprint on the web than the Hausa community which is much larger  
in terms of population.  Absent a very compelling reason to carve  
out a specific small TLD (and an organizational structure to  
support it), for viability I agree that there would need to be some  
sort of “floor” number of say, arbitrarily 500,000 community  
members, before an application is considered.  (This is not a  
proposed number, just a guess).
Avri: One data-point on community size.

I have been working on infrastructure projects for the last 10 with the Sámi people years who are an indigenous semi-nomadic population that lives in the northern most regions of Norway, Sweden, Finland and the Kola Peninsula in Russia.
This community is estimated at 80,000 - 135,000.  I always assumed  
that they were a large enough 'community' to apply for a TLD.  I  
think they assumed that as well.
Andrew: To the second (implied) part of the question, what is the  
public?  If nearly the only people interested in the TLD are its  
members, is that OK?  I would argue yes, since the community  
building function is a positive good in most cases, even though the  
“general public” might not care much about Hausa literature for  
example.
After some thought it seems to me that we should not require a  
floor nor a minimum projection of registrations in our criteria.  
For example, ,  .ki ccTLD has less than 1k registrations, yet it  
serves the 96,558 people of its community, Kiribati, and is  
commercially viable (at $1k/domain).
Another reason is that we are seeing significant growth of mobile  
users in 'developing countries'.  Even if there is limited  
projected demand for domain name registrations today, by 2012 when  
new TLDs are launched, entire populations could be using domains  
through mobile technology,  leapfrogging the required  
infrastructure for 'traditional' domain usage.
Elaine Pruis
VP Client Services
elaine@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
+1 509 899 3161


Elaine Pruis
VP Client Services
elaine@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
+1 509 899 3161



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