Re: [wg-c] Unofficial report on L.A. meeting

[Kent Crispin <kent@songbird.com>]

On Wed, Nov 10, 1999 at 09:54:35AM -0800, Christopher Ambler wrote:
> > The underlying presumption is that if either approach is later deemed to
> be
> > mistaken, it would be easier to parcel off a non-profit registry (say, by
> > auction) rather than to take the registry from a private owner. In short,
> the
> > public resource blunder would be easier to fix than the proprietary
> blunder.
> 
> A non-profit has a private owner just as a for-profit does. The accounting
> is
> just slightly different. You'll run into the same problems either way.
> Consult
> an economist and/or business attorney at your convenience.

I'm not sure what you are talking about.  In either the for-profit or
the non-profit model the registry doesn't "own" the TLD or the data
-- in all models ultimate control of the TLD rests with ICANN -- it
has to -- the registry operator might go bankrupt, go out of
business, etc.  What we are discussing, really, is a new registry
contract.

And I wasn't even talking about taking the TLD away from the registry
-- I was talking about the business model.  If ICANN granted a
company a right to run a non-profit registry, and later decided that
it would be OK for that company to convert to for-profit operations,
no taking of any kind is involved.  On the other hand, if ICANN
granted a company a right to run a for-profit registry, and then
decided that the company must run the registry on a non-profit 
basis, you could argue that there was a "taking" of some kind.

That's the reason that it is necessary to start with a non-profit 
model -- conversion of a non-profit to a for-profit is not a 
"taking", going the other way, arguably, is.

> >The proprietary gTLD
> > model has had its chance, and it's time for an alternate model to be given
> a
> > test.
> 
> Unfortunately, since NSI has its extension agreement, barring new
> competition under the same conditions is problematic at best. Antitrust
> and unfair competition come to mind immediately.

Price controls such as NSI operates under are one way of dealing 
with a monopoly situation; non-profit operation is another.  
Obviously we should try alternatives.

-- 
Kent Crispin                               "Do good, and you'll be
kent@songbird.com                           lonesome." -- Mark Twain