Re: [soac-newgtldapsup-wg] Discounted Pricing for Underserved Communities

[Evan Leibovitch <evan@xxxxxxxxx>]

On 26 June 2011 22:44, Richard Tindal <richardtindal@xxxxxx> wrote:

>
> I think it would be useful for the JAS to indicate whether this sort of
> contribution from commercial interests is welcome or not
>


I disagree. Actually, I think it's quite irrelevant and out of scope.

It's not for us to determine what's "welcome" (which is quite a subjective
evaluation); it will be up to applicants and sponsors to judge for
themselves.

It's our goal to provide an environment in which barriers are removed to the
use of TLDs to serve communities in need -- by ICANN as well as non-ICANN
factors.

The best, most "welcoming" activity we can do is to design and produce a
program that effectively provides the necessary level of support to those
applicants who are eligible, using the fund as well as other available
tactics (such as fee reduction and in-kind help). In such a program,
contributors would know from its documentation that the primary direct
beneficiary of their involvement would be the communities to be served by
the applied-for TLDs,

Any messaging beyond that is well outside our task. The JAS group is
explicitly not charged with fund-raising.

- Evan