The ICANN board just issued a resolution renewing the Contract with Verisign to run the .com registry for another six years.
Under the contract Verisign has the right to increase the wholesale price of .com 7% in any 4 of the six years of the contract.
I appears the Board of ICANN did not adopt any of the suggestions made during the comment period
Here is the resolution:
“Whereas, the current .COM Registry Agreement is due to expire on 30 November 2012.
“Whereas, Section 4.2 of the current .COM Registry Agreement provides that the Agreement shall be renewed upon the expiration of the initial term so long as certain requirements are met, and that upon renewal, in the event that certain terms of this Agreement are not similar to the terms generally in effect in the Registry Agreements of the five largest gTLDs (determined by the number of domain name registrations under management at the time of renewal), renewal shall be upon terms reasonably necessary to render the terms of this Agreement similar to such terms in the Registry Agreements for those other gTLDs.
“Whereas, the proposed .com renewal Registry Agreement includes modified provisions to bring the .com Registry Agreement into line with other comparable agreements (e.g., .BIZ, .INFO, .NET, .ORG), including modifications to terms such as functional and performance specifications, Whois, indemnification, and broad audit provisions.
“Whereas, ICANN commenced a public comment period on the proposed .com renewal Registry Agreement on 27 March 2012 (see, <http://www.icann.org/en/news/public-comment/com-renewal-27mar12-en.htm>) that was closed on 17 May 2012.”
“Whereas, ICANN received 40 comments from 34 different commenters addressing subjects such as rights protection mechanisms, thick Whois, Whois protocol replacement, application of subsequent policies ratified by ICANN, equivalent registry contracts, chief compliance officer, single-character registrations, presumptive renewal and pricing provisions, competitive contract bidding and a summary and analysis of those comments was prepared and provided to the Board.”
“Whereas, no revisions to the proposed .COM renewal Registry Agreement are necessitated after taking into account the thoughtful and carefully considered comments received.”
“Whereas, the proposed .COM renewal Registry Agreement includes significant improvements in security and stability as compared to the current .COM Registry Agreement.”
“Resolved (2012.06.23.20), the proposed renewal .COM Registry Agreement is approved, and the President and CEO and the General Counsel are authorized to take such actions as appropriate to implement the agreement.”
“Under the contract Verisign has the right to increase the wholesale price of .com 7% in any 4 of the six years of the contract.”
Wow – that is so huge – I wonder if they will implement those 7% increase options the first 4 years 🙂
I mean really – thank god for Verisign and all their lobbists – boy will I sleep good tonight 🙂
Why do they bother having a comment section on their website?
Good point
and I actually took the time to comment
“The ICANN board just issued a resolution renewing the Contract with Verisign to run the .com registry for another six years.”
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1. Verisign does NOT have the ONLY .COM Registry
2. Verisign (and ICANN) do not have any Peer-2-Peer DNS Solutions
3. ICANN is NOT about DNS they (and Verisign) are all about WHOIS
4. The Verisign .COM lock-in Contract is NOT with ICANN it is with the U.S. Department of Commerce
5. The Verisign-ICANN deal (contract) is to give ICANN Registrars (Franchisees) preferable and predictable pricing into the THIN .COM Registry
6. Verisign could give “others” a different deal and access to the THIN .COM Registry they operate – Verisign does not do that because of #4 above
7. ICANN is planning a THICK .COM Registry which is not run by Verisign
(that of course will be extra cost)
8. The P2P .COM Registry is All about DNS and NOT about WHOIS
Summary: There will be THREE dominant .COM Registries – THIN, THICK & P2P
The cost of P2P is spread across millions of boxes and systems that provide the storage and electric power and collectively “host” the registry.
The.Network.IS.the.Registry.®
The 4 price increases are pure profit.
If my math is correct here are the new prices.
registrars presently pay – $ 7.85
first increase $ 8.40 ($ 0.55)
Second increase $ 8.99 ($ 0.59)
Third increase $ 9.62 ($ 0.63)
fourth increase $ 10.29 ($ 0.67)
(increased amount $ 2.44)
That amounts to 31% incease over 6 yrs.
Top 10 Registrars COULD Take .COM Away from ICANN
IF the Top 10 Registrars approached Verisign and offered to NOT create their own .COM clone in return for more favorable pricing – What would Verisign do ?
Prior to ICANN there were groups of Registrar-like companies planning to have Volume Pricing Agreements with the .COM Registry – ICANN headed them off
ICANN might argue that no one is stopping companies from doing what they did with 99.9% HUBRIS – ICANN brased it out – Other companies could have done that – The Top 10 Registrars have the clout to pull it off, but clearly not the financial incentive
It would be ironic if the Top 10 Registrars did that and asked Verisign why they were never offered a deal and Verisign would likely answer: “Gee, you never asked for a special arrangement”
ICANN claims to have an exclusive to bring the Registrars to Verisign. Where does that exclusiveness come from ? other than pure hubris. It is one of the strangest business relationships where ICANN selects (accredits) Verisign’s customers.
With a THICK .COM – domainers would interface directly with the .COM Registry which is the way it worked before ICANN inserted their tax regime.
In a content-centric network (currently the web is source-centric), how important is WHOIS?