DotOrg Foundation Asks for Clarification Re CIO Report

["Marshall Strauss" <mstrauss@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

The DotOrg Foundation appreciates that the task of evaluating eleven
detailed proposals for the operation of the .org registry is a difficult and
complex one. We also understand that the Academic CIO Team was asked to
prepare only a brief report and that they had limited time to complete their
evaluation. However, we are perplexed by the Academic CIO Team's rating of
our bid's technology as "marginal" and we would appreciate some
clarification. We raise this concern because we received a "top five"
technology rating in the more detailed Gartner analysis, and also because
the RegisterOrg bid was given an "acceptable" technology rating by the
Academic CIO Team. The RegisterOrg and DotOrg Foundation bids have identical
technology components, with Registry Advantage as the common technical
element, so it does not make any sense why our ratings should be so
divergent. Complicating our interpretation of the Academic CIO Team's report
is the absence of any detail regarding how specific bids were ranked. We are
unable to determine the specific reasons behind the rankings, so we cannot
address any misunderstandings that may have occurred during the Academic CIO
Team's one and a half day evaluation session. We wanted to post this message
in advance of the August 29 deadline for comments on the Preliminary Staff
Report with the goal of resolving this uncertainty as soon as possible.

Thank you. Marshall Strauss
President
DotOrg Foundation