At 09:29 PM 1/14/99 +1200, Joop Teernstra wrote:
>At 23:33 13/01/99 -0800, you wrote:
>>At 01:02 AM 1/14/99 -0500, Gordon Cook wrote:
>>>For the past 48 hours I have done nothing but research and write the
>>following.
>>>
>Dear listmembers
>Sorry for not coming out and offer strong support for Dave Farber's call
>for open ICANN Board meetings.
>I guest for many on the list the call was a case of preaching for the
>converted and no -one saw the need to support Dave or criticize him, hence
>the somewhat stunned silence.
I wrote a piece, directly to the ICANN BoD, last Novenmber. I got very
polite acknowlegement from Esther. It was official, from the CEO of MHSC,
FWIW. I know they read it. I recieved complements on the letter. They took
no decernable action. I was not the only one, there was a great hew and cry
about the ICANN operation policy. I support Dave in his call and all, but
where was he when it could have counted? Day late and a dollar short, comes
to mind. If he'd have thrown his weight in, back then, it might have made a
difference. Now it is down to the wire, we either protest the one-source
contract or stand down. Those are the only options, other than an open war
of attrition. The latter being *real* bad for business.
The point that Gordon makes, and he is 100% correct, the alternatives have
to be a responsible party. They must have the means, the skill, and the
credit, to win a bid on such a contract. BWG wasn't even a legal entity,
ORSC was, but ORSC was not prepared to take the contract from ICANN. This
left only ICANN, a slim choice for the NTIA. None of the rest of us were
prepared to ante-up the ponies required to run the IANA. ICANN magically
was. I hate to say this, but the ORSC hand was called. Given the
time-frame, I doubt any of the players could have raised the required
capital, other than ICANN, because of the GIP funding.
Now let me throw some numbers around to get this DNSO thing in perspective.
If memberships were flat and the costs are $50US then with 10,000 domain
holders we are talking about $500KUS annual revenue. There are 2 million
domain holders in COM alone. This is the size of the pie for the DNSO, an
organization that does nothing much more than talk. The ICANN position of
not wanting to cover liability for the DNSO is ludicrous in light of these
numbers. It indicates that they either don't know what they're doing, which
I don't believe anymore, or there are rules and plans in place that we know
nothing about.
One possibility, in light of statements that the DNSO has no operational
ability, why would domain-holders join? Let's get down to basic marketing
here. Are you going to pay $50US per year just to kibitz? Hell no, you can
do that for free. No matter what the DNSO decides/recommends ICANN can
over-rule. In other words, the DNSO is not even empowered to spread peanut
butter, only recommendations for how to spread it. So, would you spend the
$50US? What's the point?
Which such an emasculated DNSO, the ICANN can basically do what it wants.
In fact all the SO's are useless. The control is in operations, that's
where the rubber meets the road. The silly part is, I don't see the revenue
stream for ICANN there either. How do they stay solvent? It looks to me
like they have cut themselve off from all sources of funding. Since the BoD
is noted more for their business acumen, I think appearances are deceptive.
There is a huge potential funding source that they are not revealing.
I have a bad feeling.
___________________________________________________
Roeland M.J. Meyer -
e-mail: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]
Internet phone: hawk.lvrmr.mhsc.com
Personal web pages: http://staff.mhsc.com/~rmeyer
Company web-site: http://www.mhsc.com
___________________________________________________
KISS ... gotta love it!
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