Re: [ga] Tiered (Variable) Pricing

["Gomes, Chuck" <cgomes@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Karl,

I am not in the least suggesting that any one group of interests should dictate policies or serve as the legislature of the Internet.  A personal opinion I have held for some time is that the GNSO Council  is not a legislative body but I believe there are some that treat it that way.  The main point I wanted to make is this: when people refer to ICANN, they often mean ICANN staff and Directors when in fact it is everyone who is involved in ICANN processes and there are many within that broader definition who support a very regulatory ICANN.

When you talk about the direction ICANN is going with respect to new TLDs, I assume you mean the new gTLD PDP committee.  As a member of that committee representing registries, I am actually encouraged with the overall direction it is going and am even hopeful that for the first time we may actually see much more open expansion of the gTLD space.  I am even optimistic that TLDs such as .web and .ewe will have a fair shot.  I know we still have a long ways to go and ultimately the ICANN Board has to approve the final plan, but I sincerely believe that there are good chances that big changes may occur.  I am sure that the ultimate process approved will not be perfect but I think it will have some significant improvements including some that will address yor concerns.

Chuck


Sent from my GoodLink Wireless Handheld (www.good.com)

 -----Original Message-----
From: 	Karl Auerbach [mailto:karl@xxxxxxxxxxxx]
Sent:	Friday, September 01, 2006 09:19 PM Eastern Standard Time
To:	Gomes, Chuck
Cc:	ga@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject:	Re: [ga] Tiered (Variable) Pricing

Gomes, Chuck wrote:
> With regard to tight regulation of business practices, don't you think 
> there are quite a few people in the community who want the tight 
> regulaton of business practices?

To which I reply - why should they be allowed to dictate the rules to 
the rest of us?  Who made them the legislature of the internet?  What is 
the source of authority?

J.D. Rockefeller felt that his ruthless suppression of divergent 
business practices in the oil refining and distribution industry (there 
was a definite reason why it was called *Standard* Oil) was in the best 
interests of consumers and the industry because it eliminated the 
wasteful effects of competition.

His position has been soundly rejected by nearly every country on the 
planet.

It was more than a century ago in the US when we decided that 
Rockefeller's philosophy was contrary to our national principles.

The idea of competition contains within it the notion that those who 
don't fit into the mold established by the incumbents don't need to ask 
permission from those incumbents.

So what I am saying is that ICANN is trying to swim upstream against 
well established national policies against guilds and 
groups/combinations that try to impose their will on the marketplace and 
the products, services, vendors, and sales terms and prices of that 
marketplace.

Yet that is what ICANN is doing with regard to new TLDs and the 
excessive regulation of existing TLDs.

When, for example, with IOD get to go forward with .web?  They've lost a 
decade, including the .com bubble - the hypothetical lost revenue is 
very large.  And will I ever have a realistic chance of getting my .ewe 
into the ICANN/NTIA root zone?

I draw one exception - protection of those people who have been locked 
into TLDs (Thomas Rossler just wrote a nice concise description of this 
effect at 
http://log.does-not-exist.org/archives/2006/09/01/2082_on_registry_pricing_persistence_and_stability.html#more 
)

The sooner we get enough real diversity in domain name product offerings 
that the consumer can be said to have had a real choice to get the 
product he/she wants, the sooner we can transform that kind of 
protection into a fading legacy.

		--karl--