There are two links - firstly Ken Stubbs holds senior positions at both Afilias and
CORE.CORE is a member of Afilias - agreed?
As well as that Melbourne IT is a
CORE member and also forms a half of the JVTeam company now called Neulevel.
It
is not coincidence that the applications are similar.
Indeed Melbourne IT abandoned
the Neustar .web application after the application was written and approached Afilias
to become a member (a level A member I think they call it).
This information is
to be found in the Q & A section of the Afilias application (they were asked if other
people had shown interest in Joining Afilias).
Importantly, by leaving JVTeam,
Melbourne IT took with it considerable financial and technical capability.
Neustar
cannot run .web alone.
All of the other Neulevel applications (other than .web)
include Melbourne IT as a partner and are therefore considerably stronger financially
and technically.
Hope that clears things up.
Anthony