[ALAC] Proposed Renewal of .NET Registry Agreement

Mon May 8 15:47:55 UTC 2017

Thank you all for this great discussion. Maureen 
has kindly transcribed most of these e-mails to 
the WIki and I have just added the last two.

PLEASE let's move the discussion there - https://community.icann.org/x/l9rRAw.

Alan

At 08/05/2017 09:49 AM, Alberto Soto wrote:
>I think we have several problems on this topic, perhaps in others as well.
>- We are lacking time to read all of the 
>reference documentation, at least to me, and limit my participation.
>- On several occasions a specialist is required to clarify this documentation.
>- In particular with this topic: we are missing 
>data and that increases the reading time by 
>adding the search time. And after searching, we 
>find that specific information is not available.
>
>I think with the suggestion to dump our opinions 
>in the wiki, we start with facilitating the analysis.
>Perhaps we should require the missing 
>information (when the terms allow) to the 
>corresponding constituent unit. But also suggest 
>as a policy that those missing data today, be 
>recorded by that constituency, somewhere, and 
>when necessary we can access it. For example, the evolution of prices.
>Another issue to be discussed, as it affects end 
>users, and also ICANN: this is how ICANN allows 
>according to its contracts, the increase of the 
>cost of a gtld, and the amount to be received remains fixed.
>
>Regards!
>
>Alberto
>
>De: alac-bounces at atlarge-lists.icann.org 
>[mailto:alac-bounces at atlarge-lists.icann.org] En nombre de Seun Ojedeji
>Enviado el: Monday, May 8, 2017 7:05 AM
>Para: Bastiaan Goslings <bastiaan.goslings at ams-ix.net>
>CC: ALAC <alac at atlarge-lists.icann.org>; Alan 
>Greenberg <alan.greenberg at mcgill.ca>
>Asunto: Re: [ALAC] Proposed Renewal of .NET Registry Agreement
>
>Oops so it means I sure interpreted that section 
>wrongly then. However i wonder what this section was talking about:
>
>"The price to ICANN-accredited registrars for 
>new and renewal domain name registrations and 
>for transferring a domain name registration from 
>one ICANN-accredited registrar to another, shall 
>not exceed a total fee of US$8.95"
>So it perhaps was referring to current pricing 
>as Bastiaan noted and that pricing can then be 
>increaed by 10% every year till 2023. Wow! that 
>is really really huge fees there! I guess its 
>the more reason why ALAC should comment then
>Regards
>
>On Mon, May 8, 2017 at 10:48 AM, Bastiaan 
>Goslings 
><<mailto:bastiaan.goslings at ams-ix.net>bastiaan.goslings at ams-ix.net> wrote:
>I wonder where authoritative numbers are to be 
>found with regard to price increases over the 
>years - and how these compare to other gTLDâ€™s
>
>I took the 2012 $7.85 from 
><https://icannwiki.org/Verisign>https://icannwiki.org/Verisign
>
>'In January 2012, Verisign raised the wholesale 
>prices of .com and .net registration by 7%, 
>increasing the price from $7.34 to $7.85. 
>Registrars generally passed the price increase on to their customers.'
>
>However e.g. 
><https://onlinedomain.com/2017/01/19/domain-name-news/net-domain-name-registrations-renewals-will-cost-com-february-1st/>https://onlinedomain.com/2017/01/19/domain-name-news/net-domain-name-registrations-renewals-will-cost-com-february-1st/ 
>mentions a different 2012 price and also that 
>â€˜On February 1st, 2017 it goes from $7.46 to $8.20 ($0.74)â€™
>
>(That a.o. tells me the current price is not 
>capped at $5.40, it supposedly has been increasing annually by 10%)
>
>
> > On 8 May 2017, at 11:07, Seun Ojedeji 
> <<mailto:seun.ojedeji at gmail.com>seun.ojedeji at gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> > Hello,
> >
> > From my quick read of the agreement it seem 
> to be that a renewal option is already existing 
> (ofcourse subject to compliance of certain 
> requirement) and nothing major is changing in 
> that section (ref: section 4.2). I think it's 
> just appropriate to renew if all is fine, I 
> don't see why things should be opened to competitive bidding.
> >
> > Secondly I am not sure where the commenter's 
> pricing forecast comes from but my reading of 
> section 7.3 seem to imply a maximum price cap 
> of 8.95 USD with maximum of 10% annual increase 
> from current cap of 5.4. I guess the question 
> to answer is whether that maximum isn't too 
> much considering it was initially and currently 
> capped at 5.4USD. I personally think it is too 
> high as that allows for over 50% increase and 
> 100% of the increase actually goes to the 
> operator (ICANN remains at .75USD). I do not 
> see why pricing must increase especially since 
> there is/will be volume increase in .net and 
> maintenance cost usually don't increase 
> significantly as a result of more registration. 
> I think justification for such price increase 
> needs to be made to ICANN before implementation.
> >
> > Considering that the end users are ultimately 
> the registrants who will largely feel the 
> effect of this pricing, I will suggest that we 
> raise our concern about the increase.
> >
> > Regards
> >
> > Sent from my LG G4
> > Kindly excuse brevity and typos
> >
> > On May 8, 2017 9:25 AM, "Olivier MJ 
> CrÃ©pin-Leblond" <<mailto:ocl at gih.com>ocl at gih.com> wrote:
> > Dear Maureen,
> >
> > I am sorry but your comment got me to raise 
> my eyebrow: we wouldn't be expecting an 
> end-user to analyse these costs, but we would 
> expect ALAC members to. That's why they're 
> elected as ALAC members. If we start reasoning 
> that topics in ICANN are out of scope for the 
> ALAC because an end user would not be expected 
> to analyse the topic or be directly involved in 
> the topic, then we can pretty much close shop 
> because the majority of topics that are treated 
> at ICANN are complex and need prior knowledge. 
> I fully subscribe to the point made by Kaili 
> that ALAC members are the end user's lawyers in the ICANN process.
> >
> > On the .NET agreement, it is strange that, 
> once again, the agreement would be just renewed 
> and not put to a bidding process. And the 
> commenter makes a good point about anti-trust 
> laws. But for some reason, the US government 
> has closed its eyes on this industry such that 
> there is one major Registry player and one 
> major Registrar player. It it for the ALAC to 
> call for action? That's the question you need 
> to ask yourselves. It is perhaps the 
> fundamental question for this TLD renewal. It 
> requires answers to two questions: one that 
> requires skills and knowledge; the other that 
> requires a discussion and a choice.
> >
> > 1. Skills and knowledge: in the case of .NET, 
> are conditions fulfilled for an automatic 
> renewal of the Registry agreement, if there is such an option?
> > 2. Discussion and choice: if conditions are 
> not met, or there is no such automatic renewal 
> option, then does the ALAC want to pick this up 
> and make a point, bearing in mind this could 
> start a process with an uncertain end?
> >
> > Kindest regards,
> >
> > Olivier
> >
> > On 08/05/2017 06:23, Maureen Hilyard wrote:
> >> But really Alan, would we be expecting the 
> ordinary end-user to be analysing these costs 
> and other sections of the document in a similar 
> way, without any prior expert knowledge about 
> the ICANN contractual bidding process, previous 
> contracts and other details you have outlined? Its outside of our scope.
> >>
> >> On Mon, May 8, 2017 at 3:32 PM, Alan 
> Greenberg <<mailto:alan.greenberg at mcgill.ca>alan.greenberg at mcgill.ca> wrote:
> >> Maureen and Bastiaan have review the .NET 
> Registry Agreement revisions and are not recommending and ALAC statement.
> >>
> >> There is one comment already pointing out 
> that there the contract (both the current one 
> and the revised one) allow for a 10$ increase 
> in the price to the registrar per year. Note 
> that for New gTLDs, pricing is out of scope of 
> ICANN registry agreements. Based on the 2011 
> price of $4.65 and the 2017 price of 8.20, it 
> would appear that they have used the full 10% 
> over the term of the last current agreement. 
> The 10% rate is the same as that in the current 
> .ORG agreement. .COM presumably due to the size 
> of the registrant base is price-capped.
> >>
> >> The comment also says the contract should 
> not be renewed, but rather put out for 
> competitive bidding - something that is not 
> within ICANN's ability to decide (and confirmed 
> by the statement calling upon government 
> anti-trust action). See 
> <https://mm.icann.org/pipermail/comments-net-renewal-20apr17/2017-April/000000.html>https://mm.icann.org/pipermail/comments-net-renewal-20apr17/2017-April/000000.html.
> >>
> >> Alan
> >>
> >>
> >>
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>
>--
>------------------------------------------------------------------------
>Seun Ojedeji,
>Federal University Oye-Ekiti
>web:     <http://www.fuoye.edu.ng>http://www.fuoye.edu.ng
>Mobile: +2348035233535
>alt email:<http://goog_1872880453> 
><mailto:seun.ojedeji at fuoye.edu.ng>seun.ojedeji at fuoye.edu.ng
>Bringing another down does not take you up - think about your action!
>
>
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