TO WHOM IT MAY CONCERN
On behalf of the over 5000 members of Miami-Cass
REMC, I am writing to urge the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers
(ICANN) to approve the proposal for a .co-op top-level domain. The National
Cooperative Business Association (NCBA) and Poptel are proposing .co-op with the
full endorsement of the International Cooperative Alliance.Miami-Cass County Rural
Electric Membership Corporation (REMC) has served the local community with reliable,
quality electricity since 1939. As Director of Communications, I feel we need
to address our members and the public as a unique form of business namely, a not-for-profit
cooperative, that operates under seven basic principles of cooperation between the
employees and members of the corporation. We provide electricity, energy efficiency,
and auditing services to residential, commercial, industrial, and school districts
in North Central Indiana. We serve over 5000 consumers in Miami, Cass and part of
Wabash County in Indiana.
As a rural, consumer-owned electric cooperative,
Miami-Cass REMC works hard to provide our members with the best services possible.
And we follow the International Cooperative Alliance cooperative principles, such
as member ownership and control. That makes our job more challenging than investor-owned
businesses, but it has also earned us the trust of the people we serve.
As consumers
become increasingly cynical about the constant ebb and flow of new and defunct e-businesses,
it's critical that cooperative businesses have an opportunity to identify themselves
to consumers and others who prefer to do business with us. While many cooperatives
use .com and .org, neither accurately characterizes co-ops to Internet users. Consumers
need a way to find the businesses they trust on the Internet. The .co-op TLD will
help do that.
Though my cooperative provides electric service to predominantly
rural consumers, co-ops operate in virtually all industries, in 100 countries, and
in both rural and urban areas; there are 750,000 cooperatives worldwide with 725
million members. As a result, the .co-op TLD will apply to a broad range of businesses
across the globe.
I urge you to move quickly to approve .co-op.