Showing posts with label Domain Name Industry. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Domain Name Industry. Show all posts

2017-03-05

News Review: China Will 'Vigorously' Promote the Reform of ICANN

News Review | ©2016 DomainMondo.com
Domain Mondo's weekly review of internet domain news:

 Features •  1. China Will 'Vigorously' Promote the Reform of ICANN; 2. A New Independent Organization for the World's Internet; 3. ICANN & Online Content Regulation; 4a. ICANN "WHOIS Privacy / Domain Registration Extortion"; 4b. Are you an ICANN insider or ICANN outsider? 5. “Something is rotten in the state of Denmark”--ICANN58;  6. CPH Letter to ICANN Board; 7. ICANN, Verisign & Cyber Sovereignty; 8. Internet's 329.3 Million Domain Names; 9. i2 Coalition Award to Elliot Noss; 10. Internet Society Online Forum; 11. 3 Most Popular Posts.

1. China releases its first strategic report on the internet, saying China "will vigorously promote the reform of ICANN"--
The International Strategy of Cooperation on Cyberspace, jointly issued by the Foreign Ministry and the Cyberspace Administration of China, excerpt below (emphasis added):
"4. Reform of Global Internet Governance System: China will participate in the follow-up of the outcomes of the World Summit on the Information Society [WSIS], support the international community to consolidate consensus and implement the outcomes, ensure equal sharing of the benefits of information society, and list information society building and Internet governance as important items for review. China will push for institutional reform of the UN Internet Governance Forum to enable it to play a greater role in internet governance, strengthen its decision-making capacity, secure steady funding, and introduce open and transparent procedures in its member election and report submission. China will participate in international discussions on fair distribution and management of critical Internet resources. It will vigorously promote the reform of ICANN to make it a truly independent international institution, increase its representations and ensure greater openness and transparency in its decision-making and operation. China will actively participate in and contribute to activities of global Internet governance platforms, such as the "Future of the Internet" Initiative under the World Economic Forum."
See also:
Editor's note: Considering that the U.S. government ceased exercising its "historic stewardship role" over the internet sometime in 2012 coincident with ICANN's decision to proceed with its ill-advised and misbegotten new gTLDs program, and then the U.S. completely abdicated its role at the end of NTIA's "IANA transition" (March, 2014-September, 2016), the field is now clear, and the need is obvious for some kind of multilateral, intergovernmental oversight, if not regulation, over the world's internet, by treaty or otherwise (see Microsoft's proposal below). ICANN, incompetent at best and corrupt at its worst, with its inept Board and dysfunctional leadership epitomized by Fadi Chehade and Rod Beckstrom, and its "community" dominated by domain name registrars, registry operators, plus a gaggle of special interest lawyers and lobbyists (see my note and Steve Crocker's comment under ¶ 4. below), has failed the global internet community, including most domain name registrants.

2.  Microsoft wants a "Digital Geneva Convention"supported by a New Independent Organization for the World's Internet:
"The world needs a new independent organization like the International Atomic Energy Agency"--Brad Smith, Microsoft (emphasis and link added)
A "Digital Geneva Convention"
source: Microsoft (see video below)
source: Microsoft (see video below)
Others have now picked up on the Microsoft proposal: Digital Geneva Convention: multilateral treaty, multistakeholder implementation | DiploFoundation | diplomacy.edu--
".... future cyber governance architecture will be discussed in many contexts during 2017. The UN GGE will have to propose next steps after the conclusion of its mandate this year. The 12th International Governance Forum (IGF), which will be held in Geneva in December 2017, could be also a place where security, economic, technical, and other communities can converge to address Internet issues in a multidisciplinary way, without the pressure of reaching a binding commitment at the end of the meeting. Microsoft’s proposal for the Geneva Digital Convention provides inspiring analogies and initiates discussion on the future of digital governance, in particular in the security field. While there are major differences among stakeholders, there is also considerable convergence and many common interests. Major actors from government and the business sector stand to lose in the absence of a unified and stable Internet. This common interest provides some optimism for the future discussions and negotiations on digital governance."--Dr Jovan Kurbalija, Founding Director of DiploFoundation and the Head of the Geneva Internet Platform. A former diplomat, Dr Kurbalija has a professional and academic background in international law, diplomacy, and information technology.
Protecting and Defending against Cyberthreats in Uncertain Times:

Video above published Feb 14, 2017--Brad Smith, President, Microsoft speaks at the Cybersecurity Conference - US 2017 | RSA Conference in San Francisco, Feb 13-17, 2017--"While many hacks, data breaches and leaks are the work of criminals seeking financial gain, new threats continue to emerge targeting civilians, businesses and governments. Microsoft President Brad Smith discusses these growing and evolving cyberthreats and what’s needed to protect and defend this critical infrastructure." See also: The need for a Digital Geneva Convention - Microsoft on the Issues.

source: Microsoft.com supra

3. ICANN & Online Content Regulation: 
ICANN President & CEO congratulates Donuts & MPAA
Notice and Takedown in the Domain Name System: ICANN's Ambivalent Drift into Online Content Regulation by Annemarie Bridy |  papers.ssrn.com: "... After discussing ICANN’s history, mission, and circumscribed role in the resolution of disputes over trademarks in domain names, this article reckons both descriptively and normatively with the fact that registry operators are now acting — without precedent but with ICANN’s blessing — as private copyright enforcers. No matter how vehemently ICANN officials insist that they are minding the limits of their mission, the truth of the matter is that ICANN knowingly created a contractual architecture for the new gTLDs that supports a program of private, DNS-based content regulation on behalf of copyright holders and, potentially, other “trusted” parties. Moreover, in creating that architecture, ICANN did nothing to secure any procedural protections or uniform substantive standards for domain name registrants who find themselves subject to this new form of DNS regulation. That omission should be a red flag for those who worry that ICANN’s newly minted independence from the U.S. government will make its internal governance more susceptible to capture by powerful commercial and governmental interests ..."--Annemarie Bridy, University of Idaho College of Law; Stanford University Center for Internet and Society, Date Written: February 20, 2017--Washington and Lee Law Review, forthcoming (emphasis added).  See also Private Anti-Piracy Deals With Domain Registries are Dangerous, Professor Warns | TorrentFreak.com.

Also note: A Response to Paul Vixie’s "Notice, Takedown, Borders, and Scale” | Center for Internet and Society | cyberlaw.stanford.edu: ".... What I actually wrote is that the Domain Name Association, of which Donuts is a member, misses the mark when it characterizes the trusted notifier program as a form of “self-governance” for registry operators. That’s because the obvious regulatory targets of the trusted notifier program are [domain name] registrants, whose alleged bad behavior the program is aimed at sanctioning. It is true that Donuts came to its agreement with the MPAA voluntarily. The same cannot be said, however, for registrants who are ultimately subject to actions taken under that agreement. I stand by my conclusion that the trusted notifier program is not simply a form of voluntary self-governance by registries but is actually a form of DNS governance in which registries are as much governors of others as they are governors of themselves."-- Annemarie Bridy, March 3, 2017

Editor's Note: None of this should surprise anybody. These are the natural consequences of the dysfunctional leadership of Fadi Chehade when ICANN became a member of INTA--Why Did ICANN Become a Member of Trademark Lobbyist Group INTA?--and as a result, ICANN staff coaching and strategizing with INTA members.

 4a.  ICANN "WHOIS Privacy / Domain Registration Extortion"
19 Feb 2017 Letter from Bryan T. Meehan, Sr. to Göran Marby | ICANN.org published by ICANN on March 2, 2017: meehan-to-marby-19feb17-en.pdf [pdf - 463 KB]--Editor's note: Bryan, good luck on getting any "help" from ICANN. You should have filed a complaint with the FTC. ICANN is in the business of enabling various rackets for financial exploitation of domain name registrants. The "ICANN community" is dominated by registry operators, registrars, plus a gaggle of special interest lawyers and lobbyists. Here's a prime example:
"[ICANN's] new gTLD[s] program, which no Internet end-user asked for, and which proceeded from inception to implementation with no commercial support outside of the commercial registrars and registries"--Dr. Paul Vixie in circleid.com. (link added).
Also note the point made recently by current ICANN Chairman Steve Crocker:
"I appreciate your reference to the wider community. One of the more strongly debated aspects during the [IANA] Transition was whether ICANN should become a membership organization. The Board pushed back against this idea because ICANN is responsible to the entire Internet community, not  just the SOs and ACs or, more narrowly, the people who are active among the SOs and ACs ... "--Steve Crocker, March 3, 2017, writing on the CCWG-ACCT public mail list (emphasis and link added). 
4b. Quote of the Week: (Are you an ICANN insider or ICANN outsider?)
[CCWG-ACCT] Terminology for the ICANN trinity"Make it as simple as possible so that ICANN outsiders will understand it. Thanks to the 1000+ acronyms ICANN has created enough confusion not only among the "people in the street" who are using domain names but also among Internet policy makers who are not ICANN insiders but have to deal with implications coming from domain names." --Wolfgang Kleinwächter
5. “Something is rotten in the state of Denmark”--ICANN58 
ICANN58 meeting in Copenhagen--pre-meetings begin March 10, 2017. The ICANN Community Forum meetings are March 11-16. More information here. After ICANN58 has ended, Domain Mondo will have a full report on all the "mischief" ICANN and the "ICANN community" have been up to in Copenhagen.

 6. Speaking of ICANN and registry operators and registrars who make up GNSO's Contracted Party House (CPH), read the Letter of 14 Feb 2017 from Contracted Party House to Members of the ICANN Board | ICANN.org (published by ICANN on March 2, 2017) highlighting added:



 7. ICANN, Verisign & Cyber Sovereignty:


 8.  Internet Grows to 329.3 Million Domain Name Registrations in the Fourth Quarter of 2016 (NASDAQ:VRSN) | investor.verisign.com: "The increase of approximately 2.3 million domain name registrations globally equates to a growth rate of 1.8 percent over the third quarter of 2016. Domain name registrations have grown by 21 million, or 6.8 percent, year over year. The .com and .net TLDs had a combined total of approximately 142.2 million domain name registrations in the domain name base in the fourth quarter of 2016. This represents a 1.7 percent increase year over year. As of Dec. 31, 2016, the .com domain name base equaled 126.9 million domain name registrations, while the .net domain name base equaled 15.3 million domain name registrations. New .com and .net domain name registrations totaled 8.8 million during the fourth quarter of 2016. In the fourth quarter of 2015, new .com and .net domain name registrations totaled 12.2 million."  More at The Verisign Domain Name Industry Brief Q4 2016.

9.  i2Coalition To Present Tucows CEO Elliot Noss With Internet Community Leadership Award | i2Coalition.com: The “Ron Yokubaitis Internet Community Leadership Award” 2017 recipient will be Elliot Noss, the Chief Executive Officer and President of Tucows, Inc. (Hover, OpenSRS, eNom). The award will be delivered at a ceremony on May 3rd in Washington, D.C., during the closing ceremonies i2Coalition’s yearly Washington, D.C. Fly-In.
“Elliot has been challenging industry norms since the early days of the commercial Internet. He is one of the Internet’s most effective champions for users’ rights during that entire period.”--i2Coalition Executive Director Christian Dawson
10.  Letter to the Editor: Would you be able to help?

Hi John,
The Internet Society is looking for a group of young people between 13 to 25 years old to join us for a conversation about the Internet. We want to know what the Internet means to them today and what they hope it will be like tomorrow.
Do you know someone who fits this profile? If so, please invite them to register for our next online forum, scheduled for Thursday, March 16 at 16h UTC (more details below).
The event will also serve to launch the Internet Society’s "25 Under 25”, a programme to recognise passionate, committed young people who are using the Internet to change the world. Feel free to forward and share this message widely!
Participation details:
Date: Thursday, March 16; Time: 16:00 UTC, 11:00 am EST (US). Pre-register here.
--Toral Cowieson, Senior Director, Internet Leadership, Internet Society

11. The 3 Most Popular Posts (# of pageviews Sun-Sat) this past week on DomainMondo.com:

 -- John Poole, Editor, Domain Mondo 

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2016-12-29

Caveat Emptor Domain Name Registrants re: ICANN Base New gTLD RA

There is now no question that ICANN, post-IANA transition, is a domain name industry-captured organization and does not operate in the global public interest, but completely disregards the interests of domain name registrants. Ted Cruz may have been right, the IANA transition may have been a terrible mistake, premature at best. Maybe Trump can do something.
Caveat Emptor new gTLD domain name registrants: ICANN intends to eliminate price increase transparency for new gTLD domain names in its ICANN base new gTLD Registry Agreement (RA):
"Comments on the proposed amendments. A number of comments relate to the proposed amendments to Sections 2.9 and 2.10. The proposed amendment removes the requirement that a Registry Operator notify ICANN (in addition to its contracted ICANN accredited registrar partners) of increases in the price charged by a Registry Operator to register a domain name in the TLD. ICANN and the Working Group agreed to this modification for several reasons. First, it should be noted that a Registry Operator is not required to provide ICANN with the registration pricing initially charged to ICANN accredited registrars to register names in a TLD. Second, the price charged by Registry Operators is viewed as the “wholesale” price for registering a domain name in a TLD and is not necessarily the price ultimately charged to registrants by ICANN accredited registrars. As such, Registry Operator’s pricing is only one data point that leads to the price charged to registrants, and the disclosure and analysis of this data may be misleading to registrants. Third, it is not necessary for ICANN to be notified of price increases in order to ensure Registry Operator’s compliance with the substantive requirements of Section 2.10 as ICANN’s compliance department is entitled to request this information as part of its normal compliance process. Fourth, ICANN is concerned that collecting, retaining and analyzing this information could be seen as ICANN playing a role in the pricing policies and decision-making of Registry Operators, which historically ICANN has not done."--Updated ICANN Staff Report on Proposed Amendments to Base New gTLD Registry Agreement (pdf) at page 9 (emphasis added).
What's wrong with removing price increase transparency? Healthy competition in a free market is destroyed when price transparency is removed:
A 'free market' in healthcare is doomed | LATimes.com: Unleashing the power of choice and competition is the best way to lower healthcare costs and improve quality,” declares House Speaker Paul Ryan in his conservative manifesto “A Better Way.” The problem with that, however, is that the healthcare industry — hospitals, drug companies, insurers — have worked tirelessly to prevent the medical marketplace from functioning with sufficient transparency and efficiency to allow consumers to benefit from classic supply-and-demand economics. Instead, the opaque and frequently unfathomable healthcare market promotes runaway corporate greed that often can be countered only by shaming businesses into behaving fairly and responsibly.
And that Fourth reason for not even collecting and publishing pricing information:
Fourth, ICANN is concerned that [merely] collecting, retaining and analyzing this information could be seen as ICANN playing a role in the pricing policies and decision-making of Registry Operators, which historically ICANN has not done."
"ICANN is concerned"? Really? How so? Sounds like ICANN can not handle the responsibility of being a responsible steward acting in the global public interest--pricing information should be transparent to everyone in a free competitive market--but ICANN shirks its responsibilities to the global internet community, which includes domain name registrants!

ICANN obviously never really wanted "competition" in the domain name marketplace, instead ICANN prefers crony capitalism and monopolistic franchises exploiting domain name registrants, enabling opaque pricing that encourages the 'runaway greed' of ICANN's "partners," the gTLD domain name registry operators. Likewise the ICANN fee waivers enabled by the amendments will encourage gTLD registry operators' dependency upon ICANN for favoritism, and will ultimately lead to corruption between ICANN management/staff and the gTLD registry operators.

ICANN Publishes Updated Staff Report on Proposed Amendments to Base New gTLD Registry Agreement | ICANN.org: 
Los Angeles – 22 December 2016 – "ICANN today published a revised Staff Report of Public Comment Proceeding regarding Proposed Amendments to Base New gTLD Registry Agreement. Read the Reissued Report [PDF, 544 KB]. The reissued report supplements the staff report published on 17 August 2016 and includes additional explanatory text in Section I and a revised Section IV to reflect an analysis of the public comments by ICANN and the Working Group. More Information: Public Comment: Proposed Amendments to Base New gTLD Registry Agreement." Updated as of 22 December 2016:
"This Staff Report (see Reissued Report below) supplements the Staff Report published on 17 August 2016 to include additional explanatory text in Section I and a revised Section IV to reflect discussions between ICANN and the Working Group in response to the public comments. On 17 August 2016, ICANN published a summary report outlining comments received and committed to later publish an updated Report of Public Comment Proceeding to include analysis of the public comments, once considered with the Working Group as provided for in the Registry Agreement. For convenience, Sections I, II, and III have been reproduced from the 17 August 2016 Staff Report below for reference. As a result of the analysis, a few minor adjustments were made to the originally posted amendment. The updated version is reflected in the clean and redlined documents below:
Background:

Clean version of amended base New gTLD Registry Agreement as of December 2016:



Redlines from previous version of the amended base New gTLD Registry Agreement as of December 2016:



Updated Next Steps according to ICANN: "According to Section 7.7(c) of the Registry Agreement, the Proposed Revisions shall be submitted for Registry Operator Approval (as defined in Section 7.6) and approval by the ICANN Board of Directors. If such approvals are obtained, the Proposed Revisions shall be deemed an Approved Amendment (as defined in Section 7.6) by the Applicable Registry Operators and ICANN, and shall be effected and deemed an amendment to this Agreement upon sixty (60) calendar days notice from ICANN to Registry Operator."


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2016-06-29

Hillary Clinton Endorses Obama's IANA Stewardship Transition, Reaction

Hillary Clinton's Initiative on Technology & Innovation  https://www.hillaryclinton.com/briefing/factsheets/2016/06/27/hillary-clintons-initiative-on-technology-innovation/ [Note that Clinton does not mention explicitly "ICANN" nor "IANA" but her reference to "transition" is clearly a reference to the IANA transition]:
"Promote Multi-Stakeholder Internet Governance: Hillary believes that internet governance – the coordination of the technical systems that allow the internet to function seamlessly across the globe – should be left to the global community of engineers, companies, civil society groups, and internet users, and not to governments. That is why as Secretary of State she championed the “multistakeholder approach” to internet governance and vigorously fought back against efforts by national governments to control the internet through government-led multilateral organizations, such as the International Telecommunications Union. She supports the Department of Commerce’s plans to formally transition its oversight role in the management of the Domain Name System to the global community of stakeholders*, viewing the transition as a critical step towards safeguarding the internet’s openness for future generations. She will continue to fight to defend the internet from government takeover and to empower those internet governance organizations that advance internet openness, freedom, and technical innovation." (emphasis added)
*The term "global community of stakeholders" a/k/a "global multistakeholder community" a/k/a "global internet community" as used here just means ICANN, a California corporation controlled by the domain name industry and other special interests (lobbyists and lawyers), which is neither reflective of, nor representative of, the values and interests of the real global multistakeholder community. For example, the vast majority of domain name registrants (who fund most of ICANN's budget via fees charged for each domain name registration and renewal) have no stakeholder group representation within ICANN's main policy-making body known as the Generic Names Supporting Organization or GNSO. ICANN stakeholders have acknowledged the GNSO is "broken" and there is a "massive power imbalance" within ICANN. That was one of the main reasons the ICANN Board of Directors rejected all proposals for a membership model for ICANN in the course of the IANA transition and ICANN accountability (WS1) planning process: see Why the ICANN Board Does NOT Support the Single Member Model | DomainMondo.com (2 Oct 2015): "... A recommendation requiring a substantial governance restructuring will suggest that ICANN is currently broken -- a politically risky message going into the transition ..." 

Akram Atallah, the current President of the money-making arm of ICANN, known as the "Global Domains Division," has even said new gTLD registry operators are the "customers" of ICANN, and his crony, former ICANN President & CEO Fadi Chehade, said ICANN is a "partner" of the for-profit new gTLDs domain name industry and its lobbyist organization. 

The IANA Transition has now become a fully "politicized" issue in U.S. politics, with the Obama administration and the Democratic presumptive nominee, Hillary Clinton, pushing the IANA transition, while Republicans in Congress are questioning whether the transition, as proposed, is premature, unconstitutional, or illegal. Meanwhile, Donald Trump's position, as the Republican presumptive nominee, is unknown, although he may be in an awkward position since his campaign's legal counsel is Jones Day, the same law firm that also represents ICANN, see Jones Day: Helping Donald Trump To Make America Great Again | AboveTheLaw.com.

Reference:
For more on use of the term "Global Multistakeholder Community" as a misnomer and false narrative by ICANN, NTIA, and the Obama administration to "package & sell" the IANA transition, see: News Review [24Apr2016]: ICANN Bylaws, Comments, ICANN Chairman's Op-ed Flops | DomainMondo.com.

 One reaction to Hillary Clinton's endorsement of the IANA transition:

 Where this may all lead:

Caveat Emptor.

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2016-04-20

ICANN and the Global Public Interest, A Contradiction in Terms

ICANN--the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers--and the Global Public Interest, a Contradiction in Terms?

Efforts by some within ICANN to "define" (and thereby "restrict") the term "public interest" is a misguided, ill-advised, attempt to supplant the proper role of governments, and will most likely result in a definition favorable to the clients and employers of the lawyers-lobbyists-stakeholders who infest, and have largely captured, ICANN structures and processes, principally representing domain name industry and other special interests, all to the actual detriment of the global internet community and the global public interest.

Multistakeholderism, insofar as it applies to ICANN, is just another term for regulatory capture (Wikipedia):
"Regulatory capture is a form of political corruption that occurs when a regulatory agency, created to act in the public interest, instead advances the commercial or political concerns of special interest groups that dominate the industry or sector it is charged with regulating." (emphasis added)
A prime example of ICANN regulatory capture is ICANN's new gTLDs program, which was designed and implemented primarily for purposes of making money for ICANN (for exorbitant salaries, exploding budget, staff levels, etc.), and the domain name industry, principally, new gTLD registry operators, registry service providers, and registrars. The dramatic increase in costs to members of the global internet community to defend against what ICANN enabled by adding over a 1000 new gTLDs to the global DNS, from cybercrimes to trademark infringement a/k/a cybersquatting, matters little to ICANN. By the time legal processes have caught up with the offenders, ICANN, together with the registry operators and registrars, have all collected their respective fees from the abusive domain name registrations and do not have to pay one cent to the victims in the global internet community. ICANN and the new gTLD domain name industry, in effect, constitute a public nuisance, making money by enabling and providing the platforms by which global bad actors, from terrorists to cybercriminals to cybersquatters, profit by exploiting the global economy and the global internet community. It's all win-win, wink-wink, for ICANN and ICANN's partners (@5:35 and 33:06) a/k/a ICANN's customers, or at least, was supposed to be. Read more at ICANN's Boondoggle | MIT Technology Review, August 21, 2012 and ICANN Damaged a Competitive Domain Name Market With Its New gTLDs | DomainMondo.com. ICANN and its domain name industry 'partners' are engaging in rentier capitalism at its worst--"as the economy becomes more and more about information, the crucial ends of capital holders is to take things that could [and should] belong to the commons and instead appropriate them as property rights and sell them off..." 
"ICANN is an organization rooted in the private sector (including civil society) with governments in an advisory capacity. In the Affirmation of Commitments of 2009, ICANN committed itself to act in the global public interest. ICANN is a bottom-up organisation which has its origins in one country and is driven by a community that is dominated by the domain industry and other special interests ... a discussion has started in ICANN about how to better understand the notion of global public interest and how to improve its accountability mechanisms so that the global public interest is better reflected in its decisions ..."  -- Thomas Schneider, Swiss cyber-diplomat and the Chairman of ICANN's Governmental Advisory Committee (GAC); Geneva Digital Watch: Issue 5, November 2015 (pdf),(links and emphasis added).
Contrast ICANN Board Chairman Steve Crocker's letter below with ICANN's current denial in a U.S. District Court of any public interest in new gTLD applications and processes, i.e., the new gTLD guidebook, which resulted from ICANN policy-making! See News Review: dotAFRICA, Public Interest, Judge Holds ICANN Accountable | DomainMondo.com.

ICANN Board Chairman Steve Crocker's letter to GNSO Council Chair James Bladel, 12 April 2016 (emphasis added):

"... historically at ICANN, there has been no explicit definition of the term “global public interest,” the Board has understood the term within the context of Paragraph 3 of the [ICANN] Articles of Incorporation:
“In furtherance of the foregoing purposes, and in recognition of the fact that the Internet is an international network of networks, owned by no single nation, individual or organization, the Corporation [ICANN] shall, except as limited by Article 5 hereof, pursue the charitable and public purposes of lessening the burdens of government and promoting the global public interest in the operational stability of the Internet by (i) coordinating the assignment of Internet technical parameters as needed to maintain universal connectivity on the Internet; (ii) performing and overseeing functions related to the coordination of the Internet Protocol("IP") address space; (iii) performing and overseeing functions related to the coordination of the Internet domain name system ("DNS"), including the development of policies for determining the circumstances under which new top-level domains are added to the DNS root system; (iv) overseeing operation of the authoritative Internet DNS root server system; and (v) engaging in any other related lawful activity in furtherance of items (i) through (iv).” (emphasis added)
"... Future conversation and work on exploring the public interest within ICANN’s remit will require
global, multistakeholder, bottom-up discussion and I am glad to see the GNSO Council, along with other groups, is already taking a keen interest in these next steps."--Letter embedded below (yellow highlighting added):

Resources:
See also on Domain Mondo:

Below is the slide Presentation from ICANN 55, Marrakech, March 7, 2016, Exploring the "Public Interest" Within ICANN's Remit:



Session Overview: Discussions on the topic of the "public interest within ICANN's remit" and potential definitions of this term have been ongoing for years. In 2013-2014, the Strategy Panel on Public Responsibility Framework, led by Nii Quaynor, explored this topic. Based on community input at sessions and webinars, the Panel defined the global public interest in relation to the Internet as: "ensuring that the Internet becomes, and continues to be, stable, inclusive, and accessible across the globe so that all may enjoy the benefits of a single and open Internet. In addressing its public responsibility, ICANN must build trust in the Internet and its governance ecosystem." While some recommended the report, at individual and ICANN meetings, and at ICANN 52 in particular, it is evident there is a need and a desire to revisit this topic. Given limits on bandwidth for additional projects, and given the intense focus on other ongoing dialogues, a wikispace was established as a resource space for all to populate with background documents that will be useful in guiding this conversation forward. As set out in the ICANN Operating and Strategic Plans, ICANN will be facilitating a conversation in Financial Year 16 to explore the "public interest" within ICANN's mission and mandate, and this High Interest Session will form an important part of this work.

Archival Media of March 7, 2016, ICANN55 "Public Interest" Session: 
Exploring the "Public Interest" Within ICANN's Remit | Adobe Connect: Full [EN] Virtual Meeting Room Stream Archive English
Exploring the "Public Interest" Within ICANN's Remit | Livestream: Full [EN] Virtual Meeting Room Stream Archive English
Exploring the "Public Interest" Within ICANN's Remit | Audio: Full [AR] Audio Stream Archive العربية
Exploring the "Public Interest" Within ICANN's Remit | Audio: Full [EN] Audio Stream Archive English
Exploring the "Public Interest" Within ICANN's Remit | Audio: Full [ES] Audio Stream Archive Español
Exploring the "Public Interest" Within ICANN's Remit | Audio: Full [FR] Audio Stream Archive Français
Exploring the "Public Interest" Within ICANN's Remit | Audio: Full [PT] Audio Stream Archive Português
Exploring the "Public Interest" Within ICANN's Remit | Audio: Full [RU] Audio Stream Archive Русский
Exploring the "Public Interest" Within ICANN's Remit | Audio: Full [ZH] Audio Stream Archive 简体中文




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2016-02-21

Verisign Form 10-K for 2015, Domain Name Industry 'Must Read'

VeriSign, Inc. (verisign.com), domain name registry operator (.COM, .NET, and other TLDs), and Internet Root Zone Maintainer, has filed its 2015 annual report (Form 10-K) required by the United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). It is a annual 'must read' for VeriSign investors (NASDAQ:VRSN), and the domain name industry. The entire report, including exhibits, can be accessed via the SEC's EDGAR here, or via the Verisign Investor Relations website.

Excerpts from the VeriSign, Inc., 2015 Form 10-K (emphasis added) embedded below:



 Takeaways:
  • Verisign Registry Services operates the authoritative directory of all .com, .net, .cc, .tv, and .name domain names, among others and the back-end systems for all .gov , .jobs, and .edu domain names, among others... 
  • Verisign also administers and operate two of the 13 root zone servers that contain authoritative data for the very top of the DNS hierarchy. Our domain name servers provide the associated authoritative name servers and IP addresses for every .com and .net domain name on the Internet and a large number of other TLD queries, resulting in an average of over 120 billion transactions per day. These name servers are located in resolution sites which are in a controlled and monitored environment, incorporating security and system maintenance features. This network of name servers is one of the cornerstones of the Internet’s DNS infrastructure... 
  • Verisign faces competition in the domain name registry space from other gTLD and ccTLD registries that are competing for the business of entities and individuals that are seeking to obtain a domain name registration and/or establish a Web presence .... there are over 840 other operational gTLD registries, over 250 Latin script ccTLD registries and more than 40 IDN ccTLD registries ...
  • Under Verisign's agreements with ICANN, Verisign is subject to certain restrictions in the operation of .com , .net and .name on pricing, bundling, marketing, methods of distribution, the introduction of new registry services and use of registrars that do not apply to ccTLDs and other gTLDs and therefore may create a competitive disadvantage ...
  • We also face competition from service providers that offer outsourced domain name registration, resolution and other DNS services to organizations that require a reliable and scalable infrastructure. Among the competitors are Neustar, Inc., Afilias plc, Donuts Inc., RightSide Group, Ltd., and CentralNic Ltd... 
  • In addition, to the extent end-users navigate using search engines or social media, as opposed to direct navigation, we may face competition from search engine operators such as Google, Microsoft, and Yahoo!, operators of social networks such as Facebook, and operators of microblogging tools such as Twitter. In addition, we may face competition from these social media businesses to the extent they are used to establish an online presence by end users instead of through the use of a domain name. Furthermore, to the extent end-users increase the use of web and phone applications to locate and access content, we may face competition from providers of such web and mobile applications ... 
  • .com Registry Agreement: On November 29, 2012, we renewed our Registry Agreement with ICANN for the .com gTLD (the “ .com Registry Agreement”). The .com Registry Agreement provides that we will continue to be the sole registry operator for domain names in the .com gTLD through November 30, 2018. The .com Registry Agreement includes pricing restrictions for .com domain name registrations consistent with the terms of the Cooperative Agreement [with the US government which ends November 30, 2018, unless sooner terminated or extended]... Verisign pays $0.25 to ICANN for each annual increment of a domain name registered or renewed during such quarter. 
  • ICANN and Verisign are in the final stages of drafting the new Root Zone Maintainer agreement ... to ensure that root operations continue to perform at the same high level during the expected 10-year term of the Root Zone Maintainer agreement, ICANN and Verisign are in discussions to extend the term of the .com Registry Agreement to coincide with the expected 10-year term of the Root Zone.
  • One customer [GoDaddy?] accounted for approximately 31% of revenues in 2015 and 2014, and 30% in 2013. VeriSign does not believe that the loss of this customer would have a material adverse effect on VeriSign's business because, in that event, end-users of this customer would transfer to Verisign's other existing customers. 
Risk Factors:
  1. Risks arising from our agreements governing our Registry Services business could limit our ability to maintain or grow our business.
  2. Governmental regulation and the application of new and existing laws in the U.S. and overseas may slow business growth, increase our costs of doing business, create potential liability and have an adverse effect on our business.
  3. Undetected or unknown defects in our service, security breaches, and large-scale DDoS attacks could expose us to liability and harm our business and reputation.
  4. Changes to the present multi-stakeholder model of Internet governance could materially and adversely impact our business.
  5. We operate two root zone servers and are contracted to perform the Root Zone Maintainer function. Under ICANN’s new gTLD program, we face increased risk from these operations.
  6. The evolution of Internet practices and behaviors and the adoption of substitute technologies may impact the demand for domain names.
  7. Many of our target markets are evolving, and if these markets fail to develop or if our products and services are not widely accepted in these markets, our business could be harmed.
  8. We may face operational and other risks from the introduction of new gTLDs by ICANN and our provision of back-end registry services.
  9. The business environment is highly competitive and, if we do not compete effectively, we may suffer lower demand for our products, price reductions, reduced gross margins and loss of market share.
  10. We must establish and maintain strong relationships with registrars and their resellers to maintain their focus on marketing our products and services otherwise our Registry Service business could be harmed.
  11. If we encounter system interruptions or failures, we could be exposed to liability and our reputation and business could suffer.
  12. Our operating results may be adversely affected as a result of unfavorable market, economic, social and political conditions.
  13. Our international operations subject our business to additional economic and political risks that could have an adverse impact on our revenues and business.
  14. We rely on our intellectual property rights to protect our proprietary assets, and any failure by us to protect or enforce, or any misappropriation of, our intellectual property could harm our business.
  15. We could become subject to claims of infringement of intellectual property of others, which could be costly to defend and could harm our business.
  16. We could become involved in claims, lawsuits or investigations that may result in adverse outcomes.
  17. We continue to explore new strategic initiatives, the pursuit of any of which may pose significant risks and could have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition and results of operations.
  18. We depend on key employees to manage our business effectively, and we may face difficulty attracting and retaining qualified leaders.
  19. Changes in, or interpretations of, tax rules and regulations or our tax positions may adversely affect our effective tax rates.
  20. Our foreign earnings, which are indefinitely reinvested offshore, constitute a majority of our cash, cash equivalents and marketable securities, and there is a high cost associated with a change in our indefinite reinvestment assertion or a repatriation of those funds to the U.S.
  21. Our marketable securities portfolio could experience a decline in market value, which could materially and adversely affect our financial results.
  22. We are subject to the risks of owning real property.
  23. We have anti-takeover protections that may discourage, delay or prevent a change in control that could benefit our stockholders.
  24. We have a considerable number of common shares subject to future issuance.
  25. Our financial condition and results of operations could be adversely affected if we do not effectively manage our indebtedness.
source: Feb 19, 2016, VeriSign, Inc. 2015 Form 10-K / Annual Report

See also on Domain Mondo:



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2016-02-16

Rightside $NAME Q4 2015 Financial Results, LIVE Webcast Replay

Rightside 1 year chart (NASDAQ:NAME) (source google.com)
$NAME is DOWN 21% from its 12 month high (as of market close on February 12, 2016)
Rightside Group, Ltd. (NASDAQ:NAME), a leading provider of domain name registry and registrar services, will release Q4 and full year 2015 financial results after market close on February 16, 2016.

Conference call and audio webcast with investors and analysts on February 16, 2016, at 4:30 p.m. ET (1:30 p.m. PT):
Live conference call: (844) 413-1777 (domestic) or (716) 247-5761 (international)
Conference call replay available through February 21, 2016: (855) 859-2056 (domestic) or (404) 537-3406 (international)
Conference ID: 38641522

Live and archived webcast: Listen to webcast

UPDATE: Rightside Group's (NAME) CEO Taryn Naidu on Q4 2015 Results - Earnings Call Transcript | Seeking Alpha: Sameet Sinha of B. Riley:"...  looking at your guidance, I mean, you're kind of implying basically mid-point of next year's guidance will be half of what you grew in '15. So what do you think is causing that slowdown, I mean obviously seeing the registrar, the wholesale business is slowing down, registry is at least below our expectations, anything, any specific trend that you wanted to call out or anything that we should be cognizant of?"
Taryn Naidu, Rightside CEO: "Well, we're going to continue to drive and invest in our strategic initiatives. I think the retail and registry business continue to grow for us and we're happy with that. We're going to drive double EBITDA at the mid-point of the guidance. And, yes, the wholesale business and the wholesale industry as a whole has been challenged on the growth perspective which is why we are going to go to the price optimizations and the cost efficiency there." (emphasis added)

 UPDATE: Earnings Press Release: Rightside Q4 EPS of -$0.22 beats by $0.08. Revenue of $55.66M (+7.6% Y/Y) misses by $0.32M. For the full year, Rightside had a 2015 Net Loss of  $11.3 million compared with a Net Loss of $1.9 million for 2014--see below--

Note: see accompanying notes in the Earnings Release.

Fourth Quarter 2015 Financial Highlights
(Unless otherwise noted, all comparisons are relative to the fiscal fourth quarter 2014.)
  • Registrar services revenue increased 6% to $44.7 million compared to $42.3 million.
  • Registry services revenue increased to $2.5 million compared to $1.1 million.
  • Aftermarket and other revenue was $9.3 million compared to $8.6 million. 
  • Total revenue increased 8% to a record $55.7 million compared to $51.7 million.
  • Net loss was $4.1 million, compared to net income of $1.5 million.
  • Adjusted EBITDA was $2.6 million, compared to $0.6 million. 
  • Gain on other assets, net was $0.7 million representing fewer withdrawals of its interest in gTLD applications during the period compared to a gain of $7.8 million.
Full Year 2015 Financial Highlights
(Unless otherwise noted, all comparisons are relative to the fiscal full year 2014.)
  • Registrar services revenue increased 9% to $174.0 million compared to $160.2 million.
  • Registry services revenue increased to $8.4 million compared to $1.9 million.
  • Aftermarket and other revenue was $32.7 million compared to $30.2 million. 
  • Total revenue increased 11% to a record $212.5 million compared to $191.7 million.
  • Net loss was $11.3 million, compared to $1.9 million.
  • Adjusted EBITDA was $4.8 million, compared to Adjusted EBITDA of ($3.1 million). 
  • Gain on other assets, net was $9.4 million representing fewer withdrawals of its interest in gTLD applications during the period compared to a gain of $22.1 million.
Business Highlights
  • Rightside's 39 owned and operated gTLDs in general availability ended 2015 with over 400,000 registered domains, up 14% over Q3 2015.
  • Rightside's retail registrar, Name.com, grew revenue over 25% year over year with over half of that growth driven by higher margin new gTLDs.
  • With over 16.5 million total domains under management as of December 31, 2015, including over 2.8 million domain names registered through its retail outlets, Rightside remains one of the world's largest registrars.
  • Strong momentum behind Rightside's most recent launches - with the fourth quarter's .LIVE and .STUDIO topping 25,000 combined registrations and .NEWS, which launched in the third quarter of 2015, now has over 60,000 registrations and is in the top spot in Rightside's portfolio.
Liquidity and Capital Resources
As of December 31, 2015, Rightside had cash and cash equivalents of $45.1 million, compared to $45.9 million as of September 30, 2015.
At the end of the fourth quarter, the Company had letters of credit totaling $11 million outstanding with approximately $19 million of available borrowing capacity under its revolving credit facility with Silicon Valley Bank.

Business Outlook
For the full year ending December 31, 2016, Rightside currently expects the following:
Total revenue of $218 million to $228 million, inclusive of $12 million to $15 million of GAAP revenue from our Registry Services Business.
Total Adjusted EBITDA of $8 million to $11 million, inclusive of approximately $2 million of incremental discretionary marketing spend for the year.

Investor Relations: investors.rightside.co

New gTLD Porfolio at Rightside: (currently available) .ACTOR .AIRFORCE .ARMY .ATTORNEY .AUCTION .BAND .CONSULTING .DANCE .DEGREE .DEMOCRAT .DENTIST .ENGINEER .FAMILY .FORSALE .FUTBOL .GIVES .HAUS .IMMOBILIEN .KAUFEN .LAWYER .LIVE .MARKET .MODA .MORTGAGE .NAVY .NEWS .NINJA .PUB .REHAB .REPUBLICAN .REVIEWS .RIP .ROCKS .SALE .SOCIAL .SOFTWARE .STUDIO .VET .VIDEO

According to ntldstats.com, Rightside is the 9th largest new gTLD registry operator with 3.45% market share although it operates 4.39% (40) of all new gTLDs. For details of Rightside's new gTLDs, including number of domain name registrations per new gTLD, go here.

In addition to being a new gTLD registry operator (Rightside Registry), Rightside operates other brands in the domain name industry, including eNom, Name.com, and NameJet. Headquartered in Kirkland, WA, Rightside has offices in North America, Europe, and Australia. For more information: www.rightside.co.

 See on Domain Mondo:
See also: NAME Stock News - Rightside Group, Ltd. Stock | Seeking Alpha




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2016-01-12

China, ICANN, Domain Names, Lies, Facts, Hype, Truth (video)

3 TRUE or FALSE Questions:

1. Is China's .CN the world's largest ccTLD (country code top-level domain) bypassing Germany's .DE, as recently claimed by the government of China and its official press agency?

2. Is it really true that new gTLD .XYZ "is now the 6th most registered Top Level Domain name" as recently claimed by one domaining blogger?

3. Is it true that ICANN adding hundreds of unwanted, unneeded new gTLDs to the global DNS actually reduces cybersquatting as claimed by ICANN CEO Fadi Chehade?

The answers:
1. FALSE -- see Domain Tools: .CN is the 4th largest ccTLD in the world (after .TK, .DE, .UK)
2. FALSE -- see Domain Tools:  .XYZ is the 22nd most registered "Top Level Domain name."
3. FALSE -- see ....There Is A Lot Of Cybersquatting Going On In The New gTLDs ...

Conclusion? There is a lot of lying or "hype" going on when it comes to domain names--in the domain name industry, at ICANN, and elsewhere. That is one reason (of many) why the editor of Domain Mondo recently urged ICANN (pdf) to stop being in denial and start publishing daily accurate statistics so stakeholders and the general public can make informed decisions about domain names and what is going on in the global domain name marketplace. Apparently ICANN didn't like the comment of Domain Mondo since it unilaterally decided to extend the comment period from January 8th to January 22nd. That's typical ICANN dysfunction--when ICANN gets answers it doesn't like, it moves the goal posts. ICANN needs to stop serving just the "new gTLD domain name industry" and start serving the "global public interest."

Here's something else that may be another embarrassment to ICANN CEO Fadi Chehade and his pandering to the Communist Party of China (CPC) and the government of China--



Missing Booksellers Mystery Rattles Hong Kong, China Involved? (video above)| Financial Times - FT World - "The widely held suspicion is that the five publishers have been taken to China by security forces. The FT's Ben Bland says the lack of clarity about what happened is stoking fears about increased interference in Hong Kong affairs." (FT.com, 10 Jan 2016)





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2015-12-23

A Fair Analysis of Domain Name Industry Leader Rightside Group $NAME

Stock chart of Rightside Group (NASDAQ: NAME)
Stock chart of Rightside Group (NASDAQ: NAME) (source: google.com)
There are few financial (stock) analysts covering the Domain Name Industry (domain name registry operators and registrars) so it was a pleasant surprise to see analyst Paulo Santos (Seeking Alpha) give his take on Domain Name Registrar and new gTLDs Registry operator and services provider, Rightside Group ($NAME, domain name: rightside.co, brands include eNom, Name).

From the chart above, you can tell $NAME stockholders have not had the "best ride" since Rightside started trading as a spin off from Demand Media in 2014.

Santos notes that the domain name registrar business is incredibly competitive: "with around 2,500 existing registrars ... [w]e cannot expect much improvement there in terms of margins, even though revenue has continued performing decently."  61% of Rightside's revenue in the first nine months of 2015 came from its wholesaler registrar services, which Santos says argues against investing in Rightside. In fact, Santos argues that Rightside's wholesale customer concentration is a potential negative:
"Namecheap, Inc. represents 27% of its domain names under management. Namecheap still has a $1 million promissory note outstanding, and doesn't seem in the best of conditions. This could lead both to a fundamental impact and negative news flow."
It is unclear why Santos concludes Namecheap "doesn't seem in the best of conditions." In fairness to Namecheap, it is among the most highly rated registrars in the business, as is Rightside's own Name registrar. The Q3 2015 10Q filed by Rightside discloses that Namecheap paid $1.5 million during 2015, leaving a balance of only $1 million due December 31, 2015. From SEC filings through today, it is unclear if the remaining balance has been paid in full or a further extension has, or will be, granted. In any event, a reason Santos judges Rightside's valuation as "expensive at present EBITDA run rate" seems to be influenced by the fact that all registrars' margins are thin and it is a very competitive industry, e.g., the Registrar giant GoDaddy has not reported a profit since 2009.

Which brings us to Rightside's new gTLDs. The new gTLDs' future potential profitability "means NAME [Rightside] deserves to be monitored ... gTLDs work like a legal monopoly of sorts, and can result in very favorable economics, as Verisign [registry operator of TLDs .COM and .NET] shows."

For more, read the Santos article at: Rightside Group: Pondering A Few Positives And Negatives - Rightside Group, Ltd. (NASDAQ:NAME) | Seeking Alpha

See also: seekingalpha.com/symbol/NAME




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