AW: [registrars] Balloting interrupted. - Next steps???

["Thomas Keller" <tom@xxxxxxxx>]

Hi,
 
yes we do, as the council has initiated a PDP on tasting. The outcome of
this PDP might possibly have even more severe results as "just" a fee on the
AGP.
 
Best,
 
tom 

  _____  

Von: owner-registrars@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx
[mailto:owner-registrars@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx] Im Auftrag von Jeffrey Eckhaus
Gesendet: Dienstag, 29. Januar 2008 15:41
An: Registrars Constituency
Betreff: [registrars] Balloting interrupted. - Next steps???



Based on reading the Preliminary Report for the Special Meeting of the ICANN
Board of Directors and the result below (in italics) , do we even need to
vote? What are out next steps here now that the following resolution has
been passed? 

 

THEREFORE, the Board resolves (2008.01.04) to encourage ICANN's budgetary
process to

include fees for all domains added, including domains added during the AGP,

and encourages community discussion involved in developing the ICANN budget,

subject to both Board approval and registrar approval of this fee.

 

 

 

 

6) Compliance Report on Network Solutions' Domain Reservation Activities

 

Bruce Tonkin recused himself from the discussion and dropped off the call
during the discussion of items 5 & 6 due to potential conflict of interest.
Kurt Pritz indicated that tasting is a practice that has grown over the
years and that many recent discussions and writings demonstrate that the
Board is already well versed on the related issues. Kurt indicated that
ICANN has collected some information that a few parties have taken the
practice to its logical conclusion, and operate exclusively on this model -
deleting as much as 95.5% of names registered within the five-day grace
period. Others exercise degrees of restraint. There are a spread percentage
of names deleted in the grace period across all registrars that ranges from
0% to 99.5%. ICANN has had many discussions and consultations on this issue.
It was proposed that ICANN charged a transaction fee on add-grace deletes in
the 2004-2005 budget but there was substantial criticism that such a fee
would be de-facto policy making by ICANN staff. Recently the GNSO voted to
recommend that staff take action to change its transaction fee to change in
for tasting deletes. If ICANN changed transaction fee in this manner, most
think practice would cease. The vote represents Supporting Organization
policy support for alternative budget.

 

The staff paper discusses three options for addressing tasting, to eliminate
the practice. These are three options that have been discussed recently in
many recent writings describing the tasting practice and its effects. As
discussed in the GNSO report and elsewhere, there are basically three
options that could be used to attack domain tasting: (1) ICANN could revise
its registrar-level transaction fee (the current rate is US$0.20, which is
subject to raise as the contracted rate is US$0.25) to cover all new
registrations and discontinue the exemption for "tasted" domains, (2)
registries could impose a "restocking" fee for disproportionate domain
deletions, or (3) ICANN could establish a new "policy" effectively deleting
the add grace period policy in the registry agreements.

 

Revising the registrar fees would be discussed with the community and
specifically with registrars whose approval would be sought in accordance
with the 2/3 requirements relating to approval of the ICANN budget by the
registrars. Imposing a registry level restocking fee such as .org has
implemented in its registry, is problematic because pricing and imposition
of fees for registry services is considered as outside that "picket fence"
that describes constraints on consensus policy. A consensus or temporary
policy to delete the registry agreement contractual provision that specifies
the add-grace period might not be an effective means of eliminating the
practice. Tasting could still be offered as a short-term pricing or
introductory price discounts even if the five-day period did not exist.

 

Susan Crawford noted that she had been consulting with parties involved with
and concerned with tasting and watching the Board discussion and the points
of view discussed. In light of this, she circulated a resolution for the
Board to consider that suggested that the Board take an emergency step to
impose a fee on names deleted during the add grace period (AGP). This could
be accomplished in the regular budget cycle. In order to expedite
implementation, Susan proposed the Board adopt a resolution today as an
emergency policy focused on the impact on security and stability and
relating it to the recent service introduced by Network Solutions.

 

With regard to the proposed resolution, Jean-Jacques Subrenat thought it was
not absolutely necessary to include the reference to 'security and
stability'. Citing his understanding of the urgency for the Board to take
such a motion, he considered however that these practices under scrutiny do
not in a significant way endanger security and stability, he suggested ICANN
drop the reference to security and stability.

 

Paul Twomey suggested that the resolution should encourage further
exploration of the issue rather than reach a conclusion because we need to
give at least 21 days public notice on such a proposition, and the ICANN
Board should not agree that the fee be imposed until after public comment.
Dennis Jennings and Steve Goldstein suggested additional proposed changes to
the language.

 

John Jeffrey advised that any attempt to invoke consensus policy would need
to comply with bylaws. Resolutions to address tasting by invoking the
consensus (or temporary) policy provisions of ICANN's registry or registrar
agreements would have to comply with both the terms of those agreements, and
with ICANN's Bylaws.  Bylaws Article III, Section 6, for example, requires
that "With respect to any policies that are being considered by the Board
for adoption that substantially affect the operation of the Internet or
third parties, including the imposition of any fees or charges, ICANN shall
[.] provide public notice on the Website explaining what policies are being
considered for adoption and why, at least twenty-one days (and if practical,
earlier) prior to any action by the Board ."
<http://www.icann.org/general/bylaws.htm#III-6>.

 

Susan Crawford agreed with changes to her proposed resolution by
Jean-Jacques, Dennis Jennings, Paul Twomey and John Jeffrey.

 

Janis Karklins advised that during the last GAC call there was a request to
engage with the Board on domain name tasting in New Delhi, and he will be
requesting a staff briefing for the GAC as well.

 

The Chair asked in the context of the problem the registry and registrar
agreements, and under the bylaws, if the Board is able to do this and make
such a resolution.

 

Susan Crawford considered that the Board adopts lots of resolutions like
this, the "whereas" clauses identify scope, issues and what ICANN is
encouraging through a budget process that we think will address tasting. She
indicated that ICANN is not adopting a policy, but are directing staff to
take actions in compliance with the existing budget process.

 

The Chair considered the next general issue is the reference to the issue of
the NSI practice, and asked whether it is clear that that practice will be
addressed by this approach?

 

Kurt Pritz advised that the NSI practice is enabled by the AGP: putting the
name on hold for 5 days. If NSI is required to pay a transaction fee then it
is general opinion that the practice would end. John Jeffrey confirmed that
in conversations with NSI, a representative had indicated that the service
had already been revised since it was initiated, and also that if ICANN were
to impose a fee for the AGP than they would likely roll back the service.

 

The Chair asked for further developments on the NSI situation.

 

Kurt Pritz advised that ICANN wrote to NSI to investigate the practice and
determine if the practice is in violation of the RAA. NSI had already
amended the practice prior to that writing to bring it into compliance with
the RAA. These were essentially nuances to the initial version of the
practices - in essence, it has the same effect. There may be one more change
to the practice to bring it into RAA compliance.

 

Steve Crocker advised that SSAC had spent a lot of time thinking about this
and he made two observations. The AGP is the connective tissue between NSI's
goals in the new service and their ability to offer the service, but it is
not the right issue. Information supplied by the user when checking name
availability disadvantages the user in an unexpected way and when exposed a
registrant would not want the registrar to operate in this way. Raising the
price on five-day registrations is a pragmatic approach but it does not get
to the core value underlying this. We may feel good about the fee but it
does not get to the core of what's going on. We should not casually drive by
and address a serious underlying issue with the fee. Regarding other ways to
eliminate tasting, removing the AGP as a registry contract requirement would
not necessarily be effective because a registry might choose to offer some
fee discount period for whatever reason that would effectively replicate the
AGP. Therefore, although ICANN might remove the AGP as a requirement, it is
not assured that this would remove this as an option. If the transaction fee
is imposed on add-grace deletes ICANN could subsidize costs resulting from
typos or fraud.

 

Steve continued that the dialogue we're having has been about imposing a fee
during the AGP, another option is we simply stop defining AGP: taking away
any recognition of it as a separate type of transaction. Everything gets
simpler if we remove the AGP as having any special meaning or purpose. The
NSI situation is distinct from other uses of the AGP and depends on the AGP
for efficiency but that is not the only example of a registrar or entity
taking advantage of information supplied by customer. Steve's perspective on
AGP is that we should stop subsidizing the practice and the other issues
will be resolved.

 

The Chair asked Steve his opinion of Susan's resolution. Steve Crocker
responded that he is sympathetic to adopting the resolution, and also agreed
with Bruce Tonkin that it would be very difficult to declare an emergency
policy since AGP has been actively practiced for three years. He also
pointed out that what NSI is doing is qualitatively different from what
others have been doing.

 

The Chair considered that it might be, that tasters are prepared to pay the
transaction fee, and, if that is the case, we may consider a resolution that
addresses the issue of front running.

 

Harald Alvestrand noted that there are two different bad results that have
been discussed here: front running or capturing names from registrants, and
free registration using AGP. Action taken to fix one of them is a good
thing, but we should not forget that both issues should be addressed.

 

Roberto Gaetano reflected on Susan's motion and the 3 alternatives. He is
not enthusiastic about ICANN imposing a fee on a registration of domain
names even if deleted; however, it appears to be the best or only possible
option. For the reasons stated earlier, Roberto would not support the other
two options. ICANN may step outside its authority with requiring registries
to impose fees and eliminating the AGP in the registry agreements may not be
effective. Taking an ineffective action may be perceived badly. I believe we
need to put in place some actions and messages to explain these actions to
anticipate misperceptions. We need make it clear that we take this financial
measure not in a relationship to a financial perspective of profit or loss
but simply as the best way in order to cure problem for certain large parts
of the Internet community. We need a strong statement of the negative
aspects that the current practice entails and consequences of letting this
continue without attempting to stop it. We will see more creative solutions
than NSI's which may have effects worse than what we are trying to cure. I
support the option that follows a proposal in the budget and in favor of
Susan's motion but we need to enrich our action by communicating clearly to
the community why we are doing this and to anticipate the negative and
positive reactions. This communication should take place when we present the
budget and make it obvious to the community that we are not imposing
additional fees on registrants, that this would not result in an increase in
revenue to ICANN.

 

The Chair requested clean wording of a reworked resolution.

 

Susan Crawford moved and Steve Goldstein seconded the adoption of the
following resolution:

 

Whereas, the current version of all gTLD registry contracts provides for a

five-calendar-day Add Grace period (AGP) following the initial registration

of a domain during which a domain may be deleted and the sponsoring

Registrar will be credited for the amount of the registration fee (see,

e.g.,

http://www.icann.org/tlds/agreements/verisign/appendix-07-01mar06.htm);

 

Whereas, the AGP was originally created to allow domain names that had been

accidentally registered to be cancelled;

 

Whereas, the practice of "domain tasting," by which names are registered and

then deleted during the AGP, has grown at a very great rate since 2005, with

tens of millions of domains registered and deleted each month;

 

Whereas, it is apparent that the AGP is being used for purposes for which it

was not intended;

 

Whereas, abuse of the AGP is, in the opinion of the majority of respondents

whose statements were collected by the GNSO Ad Hoc Group on Domain Name

Tasting (4 October 2007 report), producing disadvantages in the form of

consumer confusion and potential fraud that outweigh the benefits of the

AGP;

 

Whereas, the GNSO Council on 31 October 2007 resolved to launch a PDP on

Domain Tasting and to encourage staff to apply ICANN's fee collections to

names registered and subsequently de-registered during the AGP;

 

Whereas, it is the Board's view that abuses of the AGP should speedily be

halted, while the positive benefits of the AGP to consumers should be

retained;

 

Whereas, the positive benefits of the AGP may include, among other things,

avoiding fraud and monitoring, testing and development of registrars'

provisioning, production and/or merchant gateway systems;

 

Whereas, the Board believes that the withdrawal of ICANN's waiver of ICANN's

non-refundable transaction fee to the deletion of names within the AGP will

substantially end the practice of abusing the AGP;

 

THEREFORE, the Board resolves (2008.01.04) to encourage ICANN's budgetary
process to

include fees for all domains added, including domains added during the AGP,

and encourages community discussion involved in developing the ICANN budget,

subject to both Board approval and registrar approval of this fee.

 

A voice vote was taken of all Board Members present and the motion was
approved by a vote of 13-0. Bruce Tonkin abstained from voting on this item.

 

-----Original Message-----
From: owner-registrars@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx
[mailto:owner-registrars@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Robert F. Connelly
Sent: Tuesday, January 29, 2008 12:30 AM
To: Registrars Constituency
Subject: [registrars] Balloting interrupted. Please wait a time with
patience.

 

 

Dear Registrars:

 

The ballot posted at 16:00 Pacific Time, Sunday, 27 January has been
aborted.

 

Please disregard the ballot with the following Subject line:

 

[RC Voting] Re-Balloting on Domain Tasting, View 1 & View 2 (1st Call for
Votes)

 

The required 72 hours for discussion was inadvertently shortened to 60:01
hours.  

 

We have received one comment in less than 72 hours.  Excom is determining
whether that comment is persuasive, requiring an amendment in the ballot.  

 

You shall be notified when the ballot is launched again.

 

Regards, BobC