NGOs use Davos World Economic Forum Stage to Protest Sale of .org Domain Registry

[Sam Lanfranco]

Bruna,
I share part of your worry but it is important that we recognize that we do
live in an information sharing world, one where both true and false
information can go viral with little warning and even less control. We have
to take every opportunity, in the flow, to enhance the understanding of the
stakeholder community, and the second/third/etc degree of separation
communities. We have to take this as an opportunity to be a learning
moment. Here is what I wrote as a Comment in response to the Devex posting
from Davos:
	There are many reasons to be concerned here, no matter who is the buyer of
the Public Interest Registry (PIR) that holds the .org registry contract
with ICANN. One that has been underestimated is that the current proposed
price of S1.13B USD is practically a multiple of the market valuation that
would be assigned to PIR’s holding the .org registry contract if based on
current revenues. That means that serious domain name annual fee increases
will be “baked in” into the sale at this price. It also means that a
the .org registry, previously held by a debt free non-profit entity (PIR),
will carry seriously indebtedness where substantial domain name revenues
will be needed to service that debit and not be available to support
beneficial public interest uses. While the Internet Society (ISOC) has
every right to sell PIR and control over the .org registry, it does not
have the right to engage in a sale that encumbers the .org registry with a
seriously burdensome debt and costs to the .org domain name holders.

	 The sale requires ICANN Board approval, be the sale to Ethos Capital or
anyone else. A wise Board decision would be to return to an open and
competitive sale. ICANN has both the right and the obligation to insist on
an ownership structure, and .org registry contract wording that protect the
integrity of the .org registry, the public interest, and .org stakeholder
interests. The choice to do the right thing, and do it right, in the hands
of the ICANN Board of Directors.

	Lastly, and this is sad, some comments from within the NCSG community are
becoming increasingly uncivil and are beginning to look more like responses
based on old wounds from long ago fights. There are enough substantive
reasons to be concerned with the sale as it is now constructed. It is only
proper to ask the Board to show the leadership that its position
(constituted as the Board) is supposed to show, and do the right thing
right. Likewise, none of us in NCSG should have a "private horse" in this
competition and we should be both asking the Board to rise to the occasion,
and we can help by suggesting the right high integrity things that the
Board should consider. 
	Sam L (NPOC/CNSG)
---- Original Message ----
From: Bruna Martins dos Santos 
To: NCSG-DISCUSS at LISTSERV.SYR.EDU
Sent: Fri, Jan 24, 2020, 2:37 PM
Subject: Re: NGOs use Davos World Economic Forum Stage to Protest Sale of
.org Domain Registry

I honestly just hope we do not end up regretting the amount of attention
from Legislators and Government officials that this campaign is bringing to
ICANN. 
Bringing our subjects to the communities outside of ICANN is definitely
important if and when we manage to properly explain the issues and things
that are being advocated for within this community, but the way this is
being done might truly be harmful to our model. (Hope I am wrong on this
one) 
best, 
B
Le ven. 24 janv. 2020 à 17:33, Caleb Olumuyiwa Ogundele  a écrit :

This is another blow and absolutely a bad global press focus on ISOC.
Perhaps, a time for them to step back and reflect.

On Fri, Jan 24, 2020 at 8:28 PM Sam Lanfranco  wrote:
Colleagues,
https://www.devex.com/news/ngos-use-davos-stage-to-protest-sale-of-org-domain-96410
(https://www.devex.com/news/ngos-use-davos-stage-to-protest-sale-of-org-domain-96410)
NGOs use Davos stage to protest sale of .org domain

By Adva Saldinger (https://www.devex.com/news/authors/815508) // 23 January
2020
	DAVOS, Switzerland — Plans to sell the .org domain to a private equity
firm have international NGOs worried that civil society, which is already
faced with a closing civic space, will lose its digital commons.

	The executive directors of 11 international NGOs released an open letter
Wednesday calling on the leaders of two nonprofits — the Internet Society
and the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers — to stop the
sale of the .org domain.

	For the rest of the Davos World Economic Forum coverage see: 
https://www.devex.com/news/ngos-use-davos-stage-to-protest-sale-of-org-domain-96410
(https://www.devex.com/news/ngos-use-davos-stage-to-protest-sale-of-org-domain-96410)
-- 
Ogundele Olumuyiwa Caleb
muyiwacaleb at gmail.com (mailto:muyiwacaleb at gmail.com)
234 - 8077377378
234 - 07030777969 
-- 
Bruna Martins dos Santos 
Skype ID: bruna.martinsantos

@boomartins

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.ncsg.is/pipermail/ncsg-discuss/attachments/20200124/cd7aef47/attachment.htm>