ISOC sells PIR

[Ayden Férdeline]

This is a very significant decision in the history of ISOC.

Given PIR returned $48 million to ISOC last year, and has consistently funded 90% or more of ISOC's annual budget over the past decade, it is a little surprising to me that they have sought to sell this very lucrative asset. I am so curious as to what terms they have negotiated and I wish there was a bit more transparency here, given the final price will become public knowledge next time they file their tax return.

That said, I am willing to accept that ISOC has negotiated a good deal that will see it able to create an endowment able to support its work for years to come.

I am also encouraged that ISOC is clearly no longer dependent on or loosely accountable to an arm of the US government, given it has gone down this route (and now has a non-US CEO for the first time in its history). I think both are good developments.

But I still have concerns. Perhaps I've been reading too much on the impact on venture capital on big pharma and live sciences, but venture capital firms do strike me as caring more about profits than they do about doing good.

I see there being ways for Ethos to increase margins without raising fees in the short term (i.e. achieving efficiencies by moving technical services away from Affilias), but in the mid- to long-term, it seems very plausible to me that registration fees are going to rise.

Ayden

‐‐‐‐‐‐‐ Original Message ‐‐‐‐‐‐‐
On Wednesday, 13 November 2019 22:12, Kathy Kleiman <kathy at DNRC.TECH> wrote:

> price increases.... and "rights protections mechanisms" never intended for legacy gTLDs such as .COM, .ORG and .NET.
>
> Our member -- Electronic Frontier Foundation -- has shared the dangers of extending the URS (ultra-fast domain name suspension process) to .ORG registrants in the .ORG contract renewal when the URS was never intended for the complex evaluation of noncommercial vs. commercial domain name disputes by the GNSO.
>
> EFF Council and NCSG member Mitch Stoltz said:
>
> — "When non-profit organizations use brand names and other commercial trademarks, it's often to call out corporations for their misdeeds — a classic First Amendment-protected activity. That means challenges to domain names in .org need more careful, thorough consideration than URS can provide. Adding URS to the .org domain puts non-profit organizations who strive to hold powerful corporations and governments accountable at risk of losing their domain names, effectively removing those organizations from the Internet until they can register a new name and teach the public how to find it. Losing a domain name means losing search engine placement, breaking every inbound link to the website, and knocking email and other vital services offline."
>
> http://www.circleid.com/posts/20190806_urs_is_a_bad_fit_for_dot_org_says_eff/
>
> Issue is still before ICANN and this new turn of events is very troubling.
>
> Best, Kathy
>
> On 11/13/2019 1:04 PM, Ayden Férdeline wrote:
>
>> Price increase on .org domains in 3, 2, 1…
>>
>> ... and when that happens, we really must hold ICANN org to account to justify its decision to remove price caps.
>>
>> -- Ayden
>>
>> ‐‐‐‐‐‐‐ Original Message ‐‐‐‐‐‐‐
>> On Wednesday, 13 November 2019 18:38, Stephanie Perrin [<stephanie.perrin at MAIL.UTORONTO.CA>](mailto:stephanie.perrin at MAIL.UTORONTO.CA) wrote:
>>
>>>  I must say, this casts the decision to drop price caps for .org in a slightly different light.  I will keep you posted as I learn more.
>>>
>>> https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20191113005661/en/Ethos-Capital-Acquire-Public-Interest-Registry-Internet
>>>
>>> Stephanie Perrin
>>>
>>> NCSG Chair
>
> --
> Kathy Kleiman
> President, Domain Name Rights Coalition
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