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<DIV><FONT size=2 face=宋体>Hi, Evan and all,</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=2 face=宋体></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=2 face=宋体>Thank you very much for your reply and
comments.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=2 face=宋体></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=2 face=宋体>From the very beginning, I understand that my
suggestion about a "refund" to applicants of new gTLDs is not going to be
popular, especially within the At-Large community. However, as an
academician, my professional conscience tells me to say what I believe is
right.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=2 face=宋体></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=2 face=宋体>First of all, I do not want to exclude other ways of
spending the auction revenue, but only to use part of the funds for refund to
applicants.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=2 face=宋体></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=2 face=宋体>Secondly, the auction revenue is clearly beyond the
estimated costs for the new gTLD program, for the USD $175K is supposed to fully
recover all the costs, including possible legal costs, and is already proven to
create a surplus.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=2 face=宋体></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=2 face=宋体>Thirdly, if we use this revenue to start new programs
for ICANN, given that this is a one-time-only surplus, those programs will be
hard to continue in the future and may likely create problems. (Also,
diffrent new programs may favor different stakeholders within ICANN, thus making
it hard to reach an agreement among all.)</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=2 face=宋体></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=2 face=宋体>Thus, if ICANN recognizes that the new gTLD program's
revenue is more than expected, it is only reasonable to refund the payees
as an NPO.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=2 face=宋体></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=2 face=宋体>I have noticed some of the replies talked about the
"least sympathy" to speculators, which I fully agree with. As a matter of
fact, over half of new registrations within the last few years are being
"parked", especially in China. This is why I insisted to include sections
on domian parking in the CCT-RT report, since most of those parked domains
are believed to be for speculation.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=2 face=宋体></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=2 face=宋体>However, for those applicants who applied for new
gTLDs for REAL usages, ICANN clearly over-charged them. This is not
ICANN's fault, but ICANN's original calculation of costs was too high without
considering the auction revenue which happened beyond expectation. Thus,
we OWE them a refund.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=2 face=宋体></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=2 face=宋体>Therefore, as ICANN's original purpose of the new gTLD
program was to facilitate usage of new domain names, refunding those who
paid the hefty $175K for real usage of new gTLDs would only be
natural. In addition, if ICANN's refund is proportional to the real usage
of domain names but excluds those being parked, it could motivate
registries/registrars to discourage domain parking in the future.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=2 face=宋体></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=2 face=宋体>Furthermore, it is already recognized that the new
gTLD program also has its down-sides. One of those is trademark holders
are often forced to spend money to "defensively register" domain names in new
gTLDs, with some of the costs substantial. Thus, using some of the auction
revenue to subsidize those who suffered from this new gTLD program would also be
reasonable. Abstract on this of the INTA (International Trademark
Association) survey is attached FYI.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=2 face=宋体></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=2 face=宋体>ps: Sorry that I so far have not gone thru
the new gTLD program's financial statements. However, the idea of
providing refunds does not have a direct relation to the exact method of cost
calculation.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=2 face=宋体></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=2 face=宋体>Thank you again.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=2 face=宋体></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=2 face=宋体>Kaili</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=2 face=宋体></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT size=2 face=宋体></FONT> </DIV>
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<DIV style="FONT: 9pt 宋体">----- Original Message ----- </DIV>
<DIV style="FONT: 9pt 宋体; BACKGROUND: #e4e4e4; font-color: black"><B>From:</B>
<A title=evan@telly.org href="mailto:evan@telly.org">Evan Leibovitch</A>
</DIV>
<DIV style="FONT: 9pt 宋体"><B>To:</B> <A title=kankaili@gmail.com
href="mailto:kankaili@gmail.com">Kan Kaili</A> </DIV>
<DIV style="FONT: 9pt 宋体"><B>Cc:</B> <A title=ja.bhenda@gmail.com
href="mailto:ja.bhenda@gmail.com">ja.bhenda@gmail.com</A> ; <A
title=at-large@atlarge-lists.icann.org
href="mailto:at-large@atlarge-lists.icann.org">ICANN At-Large list</A> </DIV>
<DIV style="FONT: 9pt 宋体"><B>Sent:</B> Sunday, May 14, 2017 3:26 AM</DIV>
<DIV style="FONT: 9pt 宋体"><B>Subject:</B> Re: [At-Large] Auction Proceeds -
where we are and what you can help</DIV>
<DIV><BR></DIV>
<DIV dir=ltr>
<DIV style="FONT-FAMILY: tahoma,sans-serif; COLOR: #0b5394"
class=gmail_default><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: arial,sans-serif; COLOR: rgb(34,34,34)">On 13 May 2017 at
08:22, Kan Kaili </SPAN><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: arial,sans-serif; COLOR: rgb(34,34,34)" dir=ltr><<A
href="mailto:kankaili@gmail.com"
target=_blank>kankaili@gmail.com</A>></SPAN><SPAN
style="FONT-FAMILY: arial,sans-serif; COLOR: rgb(34,34,34)">
wrote:</SPAN><BR></DIV>
<DIV class=gmail_extra>
<DIV class=gmail_quote>
<DIV> </DIV>
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<DIV bgcolor="#ffffff">
<DIV><FONT size=2 face=宋体>I may not disagree with your arguments.
However, regarding calculating the "costs", that is only next to
impossible.</FONT></DIV></DIV></BLOCKQUOTE>
<DIV><BR></DIV>
<DIV>
<DIV style="FONT-FAMILY: tahoma,sans-serif; COLOR: rgb(11,83,148)"
class=gmail_default>And that is at the heart of the issue. Just how much
would you refund? </DIV><BR></DIV>
<DIV>
<DIV style="FONT-FAMILY: tahoma,sans-serif; COLOR: rgb(11,83,148)"
class=gmail_default>The devil is in the details. The GNSO policy was clearly
about cost-recovery. and I would argue that the sunk costs specific to that
round are reasonable to be recovered by the fees.</DIV>
<DIV style="FONT-FAMILY: tahoma,sans-serif; COLOR: rgb(11,83,148)"
class=gmail_default><BR></DIV>
<DIV style="FONT-FAMILY: tahoma,sans-serif; COLOR: rgb(11,83,148)"
class=gmail_default>And then we spend more time debating the amount of refund
than we spent rolling out the next round...</DIV>
<DIV style="FONT-FAMILY: tahoma,sans-serif; COLOR: rgb(11,83,148)"
class=gmail_default><BR></DIV>
<DIV style="FONT-FAMILY: tahoma,sans-serif; COLOR: rgb(11,83,148)"
class=gmail_default>Also: the POTS analogy doesn't work, since we are not
talking costs of physical infrastructure. We can accurately count the
person-hours spent in designing the program, especially that which was
expended on that round alone.</DIV></DIV>
<DIV><BR></DIV>
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<DIV bgcolor="#ffffff">
<DIV><FONT size=2 face=宋体>From the above exmples, I believe you can already
see the complexity of calculating the "real cost" of the new gTLD
program. Simply said, I do not believe in any claims of the "real
cost", becuase it does not exist at all.</FONT></DIV></DIV></BLOCKQUOTE>
<DIV><BR></DIV>
<DIV>
<DIV style="FONT-FAMILY: tahoma,sans-serif; COLOR: rgb(11,83,148)"
class=gmail_default>I am not sure that I follow the logic that asserting that
"the real cost is complex to calculate" leads to conclusion of "the real cost
does not exist at all".</DIV></DIV>
<DIV><BR></DIV>
<DIV>
<DIV style="FONT-FAMILY: tahoma,sans-serif; COLOR: rgb(11,83,148)"
class=gmail_default>-
Evan</DIV><BR></DIV></DIV></DIV></DIV></BLOCKQUOTE></BODY></HTML>