ICANN acknowledged on their blog today, that they received a letter today from the US Department of Commerce opposing the introduction of the new gTLD’s program in Cartagena.
In its letter to ICANN, The Department of Commerce writes: (pdf)
“I am concern over the apparent failure of ICANN to carry out its obligations as specified in the “Affirmations of Commitments”.
The letter goes on to chastise ICANN for not completing the economic study it agreed to conduct to evaluate the potential consumer benefits vs. consumer costs.
“It appears ICANN has not completed this study.”
The Department also expressed concern of how ICANN changed its position on cross ownership between registrars and registries, from its position In May of this year which limited cross ownership of registrars to registries to a maximum of 2% to the current position that allows 100% cross ownership.
“”ICANN needs to clearly document and explain the decision”
Finally the Department complains about the short time frame for comments and review of the latest guidebook.
The comment period for the Guidebook is scheduled to close on December 10th the same day the ICANN meeting in Colombia ends.
teest
Sweet.
Now ICANN should also explain it’s shady deal with Verisign. It’s about time ICANN is forced to scarp this shady deal and bring back the .com prices to $3/domain registration/renewal instead of over $8/domain currently.
ICANN is like an out of control corrupt mafia that just fulfils it’s own pockets.
ICANN just fulfils it’s own pockets or help verisign rip off the registrants.
ICANN is a DISGRACE and ICANN should be BANNED.
Feds need to replace ICANN with another body that can truly represents the registrants and all countries so that internet does not breat-up in to million individual pieces.
ICANN should change it’s name to: ICANN’ T
🙁
“It appears ICANN has not completed this study.”
Of course, ICANN is one of the most negligent, self-serving, and I would speculate corrupt organizations on the planet. Quasi-mafia actions are the only thing to come from them — it’s sickening.
When you have an out-of-control gov’t sanctioned monopoly acting like a mafia that colludes to raise domain name fees, what does the Commerce Department expect them to do? Play nice ?
Sadly, ICANN should be broken up into a gov’t like system of checks and balances. There should be a legislative, judicial, and executive powers run ICANN. The damn organization’s actions are too important to the Internet and the world to be carelessly left for little scrutinization.
New launch date for gTLDs : 2020.
This should be ICANN’s mission statement:
————————————————————————————————————
We solely exist to screw up the domain registrants.
Our mission is to bite the hand that feeds us.
We are 100% committed to let Verisign hijack the .com registry and charge outrageous fees.
We hate open competition, that’s why we let verisign continue screw up the domain registrants.
We like money and we can’t have enough of it even if it means that our actions will break-up the internet in to 100s of separate internets.
WE HATE DOMAIN REGISTRANTS.
WE DO NOT GIVE A DAMN.
———————————————————————————————————–
Seriously, no matter how long this takes if ICANN does this wrong it will be the end of ICANN supremacy.
Do not underestimate Beckstrom’s influence in DC.
The letter asks why ICANN changed its position on registry-registrar ownership. Could it be that there are some interested parties who want to launch new gtlds that will each have only one registrar? And that such exclusive registrar will be owned by the same entity that owns the registry?
Is that too obvious?
very good
I agree with them
David
I think ICANN will approve the new gTLD process at the SF meeting.
They are going to get to the point that they will just make calls on issues and leave plenty of people bitching and screaming and heading for the lawyers.
You will see application being taken before June 30 2011 and applications approved by the end of 2011.
Too much money for ICANN for them to do otherwise.
I hope they will cut some useless TLDs
ICANN is a disgrace and I agree thoroughly with the comments above. Each and every year the increase registration/renewals costs dramatically and are a law unto themselves. They really do need to be brought into check.
who needs a dot name
This makes me smile 🙂
Do not care about new dot whatevers other than to comment that they help the branded dot com or genuine country codes. The ever expanding mobile advertising use (small screen) The brand will subconsciously resonate with the user in a far more important way as the text is limited with the brain picking up only the relevant part to the user.
@MHB – “They are going to get to the point that they will just make calls on issues and leave plenty of people bitching and screaming and heading for the lawyers”
This is what most are fearing. If that happens, in lieu of the volume of widespread opposition clearly voiced, then ICANN will immerse itself in many years of problems. For ICANN to be that cavalier and indifferent to public sentiment would threaten the legitimacy of the organization moreso than ever. ICANN cannot justify taking risks with a massive tld rollout when so many more reasonable alternatives exist. It’s common sense.
It’s a very simple internal formula being exercised by ICANN, i.e. our self-enhancing profit trumps incalculable global stakeholder costs. One would assume ICANN are weighing projected profits against the cost of being embroiled in lawsuits and years of damage control? Too many other reasonable rollout options exist so the original proposal becomes increasingly absurd.
I wonder if FIFA and ICANN are related in anyway , since they seem very similar in business “practices” ?.
Oh and since I own a few .com domains, I think it would be great if they do NOT start any more Gtld’s. Hmm, the US Gov has made a good decision to challenge ICANN’s legitimacy .
Dept of Commerce, Overseen by the Energy and Commerce Committee, who if people remember, had the next likely chairman and current member of the Committee at the Domain Holdings launch party just before Traffic in Miami that Sunday. I and a select few had the quality yet short time during dinner to discuss our issues and concerns and I must say, Mr. Stearns was a very knowledgeable person and will be leading the charge in changing the Telecom Act of 2011. While industry groups pay millions and millions of dollars to lobby causes, the short amount of time and money that was contributed MIGHT have had a small effect based on the knowledge and passion that was shared. Todd Rokita is now likely moving up to the junior spot on the committee and Mr. Stearns as Chairman so the more time these ICANN decisions get derailed the better. Its Politics and no one person on these committees have the power to control decisions but it all helps. My personal discussion with Mr. Stearns, I mentioned how you control the most powerful database in the world (root A server), why would you let ICANN push you around like they do, let them go to Europe and start a new controlling body. Thats far fetched but when people push or flex power too far, sometimes canceling a deal gets people back into a straight line on the negotiations. Who knows if this meeting paid off but I know the Dept. of Commerce is not going to keep sitting around and letting ICANN run freely anymore as they have established. ICANN is very powerful, but if your making bets against the US Government, I’m picking government over ICANN every day. They work together and these power trips have to stop and it just goes to show how the power of information really changes markets. When I went to the Whitehouse before ICANN existed back in 1998 (ruffly) and met with Ira Magaziner, they considered issuing these extensions into the market. 13 years later, we might be one year or 10 years away from these extensions going live. Either way build a solid portfolio of one or thousands of domains with any extension, i do .com/.net/.org, but have an execution plan and play the web-based Internet strategy around domain technology and your already ahead of the game. We as an industry need to really continue to support groups like ICA and those political candidates that can influence our bottom line and effect decisions. Time will tell, as it usually does.
MHB :I think (almost sure )you broke the news worldwide .
I am a little suprised the Dept of Commerce used stern words not only in realtion to the New GTLDs but in general , nothing but good news.
The meetings will start Dec 5th .
Chad
Of course You are correct.
Through your efforts you have given the domain industry access to the decision makers at obviously one of the most critical and controversial times in the history of the net, over who is going to control the root.
I cannot urge domainers, large and small to get behind this effort, support those that we have access to, yes by making political contributions (If you are US based).
Once again each person in the US is limited to $2,400 per year per candidate.
I maxed out my contribution to Mr. Rokita and plan to give to Mr. Stearns as well.
But I can’t nor can Chad stroke out more than that by law.
So EVERY domainer is going to have to step up to get our voices heard or we are going to very sorry we didn’t a few years from now.
Domo
“The meetings will start Dec 5th”
and I will be there on the 4th to report on them
re: “David J Castello permalink New launch date for gTLDs : 2020.”
Thank christ ICANN are a slow disorganised bunch. This at least gives domain investors another ten years of quality potential sales before their domains get overshadowed and depreciate in value as they try to compete with “the next generation” of TLD’s.
A good example, if (dot) search came into existence then maybe search (dot) com will find it hard to compete with the likes of com (dot) search or if the long talked about (dot) post was to be considered post (dot) com will likewise face stiff competition with the subdomain com (dot) post.
Lets hope for our sake that ICANN somewhat understands how much money has been spent in the domain aftermarket as a whole and decides to relieve itself from the temptation of approving hundreds of these ‘pseudo’ new age TLD’s.
JayJay permalink
Thank christ ICANN are a slow disorganised bunch.
**********
I disagree, they are very well organized when it comes to organizing lavish parties in exotic locations .
@JayJay – You allude to domainers’ dotcom interests being eventually compromised and a rationale for opposition to ICANN, but that’s a relatively minor consideration.
It is not just domainers who are opposing ICANN’s floodgate tld proposal. It’s the entire global business community. Domainers and their interests comprise a tiny part of the opposition. Many, many major corporations, internet business owners, and government agencies submitted a wealth of letters in opposition to the proposal.
It’s all a ruse to keep the world from realizing Verisign’s damaging policy of Bulk Transfer After Partial Portfolio Acquisition of dot com and dot net. But I keep writing the government, including the Department of Commerce. Maybe it will be caught in time – this news gives me hope – thanx for breaking it, Mike, and thanx for all the comments – you read my mind! 🙂
so if the enemy of the enemy is my friend icann and wikilieaks will anounce frustration with the US government and join?
new root:the only thing that trumps new gtlds is a breakdown and threat to the main root system (and icann’s governance)
if icann sees the LACK of new tlds as the salvation of the root, than the process will get derailed, short of that it seems like if they can get the application fees they will, ( of course who says even an approved tld will get admiitted to the root) but i doubt they will offer refunds. so current CEO and board get the applications done, Dept of commerce holds up insertion into the root, new board and CEO down the road assess actual economic merits that were supposed to be discussed before this round launched. applicant fees are kept and held, as long bad news doesnt come til after san francisco everythign is ok.
economic study
say 120,000 million .coms
over 90% available in net or org
over 95 % available in info biz or pro/travel/asia
so for 1 to 5 to 10% of the the total names taken in com and 1 other tlds we somehow need 1-/100/or 1000 new tld’s
reasoning is thus 1000 people want sex.?? or plasticsurgery.??, whats wrong with the highest and best and most well funded buys the com, everyone else gets a keyword plus another word and we go on.
the world expects ICANN to control the internet, its not broken so why unfix it?
page howe
newtlds.com
Facebook should be filing suit shortly over their use of the term Guidebook.
I can here Rod Beckstrom shouting at the US government YES, I CANN!!!
No problem.
See http://www.unifiedroot.com