[At-Large] Auction Proceeds - where we are and what you can help

[John R. Levine]

As Roberto and others have pointed out, the auction money is unrelated to 
the new TLD application money, and it would be wrong for many reasons to 
turn it into a gift to the applicants.

> Calculating the "costs" of the new gTLD program, is very similar to the 
> telecom industry adding new services.  Exactly what would be the costs 
> for a particular new service? ...

ICANN has segregated the revenue and costs for the new gTLD program 
from other costs and expenses all along and breaks them out in their 
quarterly financial statements, which I presume you have read.  You can 
argue about the details but the general numbers seem accurate.

The most recent statement, from last September, says they had $125M left 
and expect to have $70M when it's over. , I expect give or take defending 
the inevitable lawsuits from unhappy applicants.

There's a separate question of what to do with the extra application 
money.  Personally, I find it hard to have a lot of sympathy for the dire 
conditions of speculators and marketers who applied, and I'd treat the 
extra the same way as the auction money, use it to support projects 
relevant to ICANN's charitable mission.

Regards,
John Levine, johnl at iecc.com, Primary Perpetrator of "The Internet for Dummies",
Please consider the environment before reading this e-mail. https://jl.ly