[ga] Did ICANN and Verisign cut a deal? WLS for SiteFinder?

[George Kirikos <gkirikos@xxxxxxxxx>]

Hello,

Given that there's another controversial matter that VeriSign wants
ICANN to "give" on, namely WLS, I wonder whether ICANN and VeriSign
have cut a deal, horse-trading WLS fast-track approval on favourable
terms to VeriSign, in exchange for a SiteFinder suspension. 

For instance, despite ICANN "warning" VeriSign not to use an October
27th launch date for WLS, they still do so at:

https://www.nextregistrationrights.com/backorder.sn

That "warning" might have been a charade, though, for their defense of
the the legal case against them (see www.stopwls.com), as it seemed
very half-hearted. Given the warning was made almost a month ago:

http://www.icann.org/correspondence/twomey-letter-to-gomes-04sep03.htm

and ICANN is not enforcing VeriSign's obligations, it leads me to
believe that the delay might be a result of continuing "negotiations"
on how to put the best public "spin" on things, for VeriSign to get
what it truly wants. It only takes 2 minutes to edit a website, but I
can imagine a month's delay, given the "need" for lawyers to stretch
out negotiations at fancy restaurants, etc., all on the registrants'
bill (it is domain name registrants who ultimately fund all of ICANN).

If ICANN wants to prove that it is not a paper tiger, and that it has
not been "captured" by VeriSign and is simply a front for the VeriSign
PR machine, it should immediately announce that:

1) they are allowing the Independent Review Panel to review WLS, as had
been requested formally by Dotster in 2002 (and which ICANN refused)

2) they will not submit contract amendments for WLS to the Department
of Commerce until such time as the legal case before the courts is
concluded, and/or Consensus Approval of the proposed service is
achieved.

Sincerely,

George Kirikos
http://www.kirikos.com/