The American Society of America, The Internet Society (ISOC), sells its assets , including the Public Interest Registry (PIR) operator, which manages the .org domain zone. Created in the "public interest" for public organizations, the domain zone passes into the hands of the commercial company Ethos Capital for an unknown amount. The deal is planned to close in I quarter. 2020 (see press release ).
Thus, a registry of 10 million domain names. org and financial management give back to a commercial company. Interestingly, five months ago, ICANN unlimitedly lifted any restrictions on the maximum price of .org domains . In support of its decision, ICANN provided two comments from the public. At the same time, during the public discussion, the organization received 3315 comments, of which 3252 were against (98.2%).
According to critics, on the part of ISOC it was a pre-sale preparation, and ICANN was misled (or she was involved in a conspiracy). Apparently, now the suspicions have been confirmed.
The recently established Ethos Capital Closed Joint-Stock Company will acquire both ISOC and PIR, which was created in 2002 to manage the .org registry.
Everyone opposed the removal of price restrictions, including domain name registrars. Now it’s clear that in the case of a registry sale, price increases are almost inevitable. The main losers will be the current .org domain owners. for which renewal prices will rise.
The managers who arranged the deal are happy with the agreement: “This is an important and exciting event for both the ISOC and the PIR registry,” said Andrew Sullivan, president and chief executive officer of Internet ISOC. “The deal will provide the Internet community with sustainable funding and resources to advance our mission on a wider scale as we continue our work to make the Internet more open, accessible and secure.”
However, not everyone is sure that PIR as a non-profit organization will continue to work in the same spirit. Obviously, the new owner has other - commercial - interests.
Community concerns were expressed by the Internet Commerce Association community group in an open letter (pdf) to ICANN. In fact, she took the liberty of expressing in words what the others do not say, although thoughts are in the air:
“Of course, now you can appreciate the terrible mistake you made. Key policy decisions that have multi-billion dollar implications and that affect the stability of the Internet should be the subject of active board involvement, and not left to the discretion of ICANN staff.
If you were made to believe that removing the price restrictions on .org domain names was a reasonable approach, because the registry would remain in the hands of a nonprofit fund, you were clearly misled. If you were made to believe that although you are the actual owner of the .org registry, for some reason you should allow your service providers to indicate prices for services, and not vice versa, you have been misled. If you were told that the .org domains are not of commercial value in the public sector, you have been misled. If you were told that competition from other gTLDs would restrain .org prices, you were misled. ”
Section 7.5 of the registry agreement between the Public Interest Registry and ICANN states:
Except as otherwise provided in this Section 7.5, none of the parties may assign any of their rights and obligations under this Agreement without the prior written consent of the other party, which will not be unreasonably refused.
Therefore, ICANN has the right to block the transfer of the .org service contract, which it is invited to do. An open letter ends with these words:
“If your miscalculation of a perpetual agreement without any price restrictions was based on the fact that the registry remains in the hands of an organization serving the public interest, then the planned sale of the registry to a commercial firm should force you to reconsider your approach. Fortunately, the proposed sale of the .org registry gives you the opportunity to not give your permission, terminate the Registry Agreement after any completed transaction and put up a competition contract.
Where is the ICANN board when it comes to advocating for nonprofits that have registered domains? ”
In 2018, the Public Interest Registry revenue amounted to about $ 101 million, of which almost $ 50 million was transferred to the Internet Society, the previous year - $ 74 million.
An appeal to ICANN to terminate the registrar contract under clause 7.5 may be a cry to the void if ICANN members themselves are involved in this transaction. But there are such suspicions.
The founder and CEO of Ethos Capital is Eric Brooks, who until recently worked at the investment company Abry Partners . A year ago, Abry Partners acquired Donuts, the domain zone operator for .guru, .software and .life, and another 240 other TLDs. Akram Atallah, the former president of ICANN's global domain division, was invited by Donuts's Executive Director, and Donuts co-founder served as Executive Director of Public Interest Registry. Ethos Capital also has former ICANN senior vice president Jon Nevett, and former ICANN chief executive Fadi Chehadé is an adviser to Abry Partners, Domain Name Wire writes .
In other words, Abry Partners has “very good connections” at ICANN.
Ethos Capital itself was created recently, just before the deal to buy the .org zone. The domain name EthosCapital.com was registered at the end of October 2019.
The scheme with the employment of former officials in new commercial enterprises is often used in Russia . For example, one of the main suppliers of DPI equipment to block Telegram and other services in Russia is RDP.ru, which owns 40% of the capital in Traffic Technologies, which was created four days after the draft sovereign Runet bill was submitted to the State Duma. Another 60% is owned by IT Invest, where Ilya Massukh, the former deputy minister of communications, worked as the general director.
It looks like such schemes can even work at the ICANN level.
