Public Comment is a vital part of our multistakeholder model. It provides a mechanism for stakeholders to have their opinions and recommendations formally and publicly documented. It is an opportunity for the ICANN community to effect change and improve policies and operations.
This public submission is my personal comments in connection with the proposed .NET Registry Agreement. In addition to this public comment, I will also be providing an additional private communication to the ICANN Board of Directors. The reason for this separate communication is that it will reference ICANN attorney-client privilege material that I had access to during my term on the ICANN Board which I believe the current ICANN Board should be aware of.
The attached PDF document provides a detailed analysis regarding the following concerns in the proposed .NET RA.
- Advancing the Global Public Interest Through Uniform Registry Agreements
- One ICANN, One Definition for Consensus Policy
- Better Understanding the Domain Name Ecosystem; and
- Addressing Public Comment Concerns Regarding the .NET Registry-Registrar Agreement (RRA)
Notwithstanding the inability of ICANN Org to mandate any changes to the existing .NET Registry Agreement (RA), the ICANN Community should be made aware of several concerns regarding the proposed .NET RA and the proposed recommendations that ICANN Org should take, including but not limited to the following:
- ICANN Org should publicly post a red-line of the proposed 2023 .NET RA against the Base RA;
- Accompanying this red-line, ICANN Org should post a separate scorecard document summarizing these differences and detailing any potential global public interest impact(s);
- ICANN Org needs to explain why it has permitted two different definitions of Consensus Policy to appear in the RAs and its impact on its mission.
- As part of its upcoming five-year strategic plan, ICANN Org needs to undertake a comprehensive economic analysis of the domain name marketplace;
- ICANN Org should immediately make available all documentation in connection with the bilateral negotiations on Security Threats that Verisign and ICANN Org have had in connection with the Letter of Intent; and
- Until such time that the ICANN Community can be part of ICANN Org / Verisign bilateral Security Threat discussions, ICANN Org should advocate for the inclusion of the best practices of PIR and Identity Digital in publishing aggregate take-down information.