The DotCom Act and Why Democrats Think It is Unnecessary - The DotCom Act is starting to get a little more steam behind it, over the past week Grover  G. Norquist, President, Americans for Tax Reform, sent a letter urging support and in that letter picked out .SUCKS. The ability to establish domain names does indeed come with its own powerand responsibility. ICANN has the ability to “extract defensive registration payments,” which blackmail businesses and threaten intellectual property. Senator Rockefeller was correct when he spoke out a gainst the ... read more ...

Politico: House Appropriations Proposes To Cut NTIA Funding To Prevent ICANN Transition - According to Politico.com the House Appropriations Committee is proposing to slash NTIA spending by 20% to defund the IANA transition. “The House Commerce-Justice-Science appropriations subcommittee report on its FY15 funding bill unveiled this week expresses wariness about NTIA’s plan to relinquish oversight of ICANN.” “The language won’t be official until the full committee approves it – but it’s not a huge surprise, given the House committee is led by Republicans, who have generally ... read more ...

ICANN Seeks Provider To Conduct A Review of The Generic Names Supporting Organization (GNSO) - The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (“ICANN”) is seeking a provider to conduct an independent review of the Generic Names Supporting Organization (GNSO), as mandated by ICANN’s Bylaws. The GNSO is the policy-making body responsible for generic top-level domains, such as .COM, .NET, and .ORG. Its members include representatives from generic Top Level Domains (gTLD) registries, gTLD registrars, intellectual property interest, Internet service providers, businesses and non-commercial ... read more ...

After 50 ICANN Meetings, Its Amazing ICANN Never Held A Meeting In These 10 Places - ICANN is about to hold its 50th meeting in London from June 21st. June 25, 2014. Looking back at the previous 49 ICANN general meetings and where they have been held.  I figured I would point out 10 spots around the globe that its pretty hard to believe ICANN has not held a meeting in. None of these cities have ever been the host of an ICANN meeting: 1. New York City In my opinion still the greatest city on earth and certainly in everyone’s book one of the most influential. If you were going to ... read more ...

WSJ: If The UN Gets Control Of ICANN Your Domain Registration Fees May Increase, A Lot - The Wall Street Journal just published a story by Karl Borden who is a professor of financial economics at the University of Nebraska who warns that if the US gives up its oversight control over ICANN and the United Nations winds up in that roll, expect that fees are going to be imposed on every domain registration to support not only ICANN but UN activities. The professor cites “As far back as 2001, a U.N. report, “Financing the Global Sharing Economy,” proposed that the U.N. be given the ... read more ...

Strickling, Fadi, Steve DelBianco All Set To Testify In House Hearing On ICANN Tomorrow - There is going to be a house hearing tomorrow on the US giving up its oversight control over ICANN. The hearing is being held by the Energy Commerce Committee of the United States House of Representatives The Subcommittee on Communications and Technology has scheduled a hearing on Wednesday, April 2, 2014, at 10:30 a.m. in 2322 Rayburn House Office Building. The title of the hearing is “Ensuring the Security, Stability, Resilience, and Freedom of the Global Internet.” Witnesses will be announced ... read more ...

Well At Least Microsoft Is Happy About The US Giving Up Oversight of ICANN - In a statement issued by Microsoft today they “applaud The  US NTIA’s transition of key Internet domain name functions” The statement was made on behalf of Microsoft by David Tennenhouse Corporate Vice President, Microsoft Technology Policy “”The U.S. Department of Commerce National Telecommunications and Information Administration’s recent announcement of its intent to transition key Internet domain name functions to the global multi-stakeholder community is a significant and welcome ... read more ...

Who Should Oversee The Web ? - Who Should Oversee The Web ? PBS covered the topic of just who should oversee ICANN and what part government should have in that role. Host Judy Woodruff sat down with Vint Cerf from Google and Randolph May of the Free State Foundation. There is a full transcript on the site if you do not wish to watch the video. Cerf and May discuss their concerns with how the process may turn out, I think May summed up what a lot of people are concerned about. RANDOLPH MAY: I do have some concerns. And my concerns ... read more ...

Former CEO Of ICANN Beckstrom: US Surrender of Internet Governance Leads to Turbulence & Risks - In an email to subscribers of his newsletter, the former CEO of ICANN Rod Beckstrom says the US surrender of Internet governance role will leadsto new turbulence and risks Here is his statement: “During my tenure as CEO of ICANN, I signed both the 2009 Affirmation of Commitments and the 2012 IANA contract that governs changes to the global Internet’s root zone – the authoritative database of top-level Internet domain names and addresses. These are the definitive agreements that codify the relationship ... read more ...

ICANN: Important Corrections To Inaccuracies and Misconceptions Regarding U.S. Announcement - ICANN in a blog post today, entitled Important Corrections to General Inaccuracies and Misconceptions Regarding U.S. Announcement and IANA Functions tries to quite the outrage coming from many in the domain community and Congress. Here is some of the blog post (edited) On Friday, March 14 the U.S. Government announced its intention to transition its stewardship responsibilities of the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA) Functions to the global multistakeholder community—a key component of ... read more ...

ICANN Last Resort Contention Auctions Look Like a Go With 1st Planned For Jun 4th - ICANN just published a schedule of contention resolution Last Resort Auction and they start on June 4th with a goal of having 20 a month and resolving all of them in 1o months. This should push many applicants to go into a private auction where the funds go to the other applicants or in the RightoftheDot.com model even to Charities and other non-profits. There is a schudule of auctions and 10 pages of very firm rules on how the Last Resort Auctions will be conducted. One of the advantages of private ... read more ...

Strickling Refines Last Weeks Announcement On ICANN: No Government-Led Solution Will Be Accepted - Lawrence E. Strickling the Assistant Secretary for Communications and Information and NTIA Administrator seems to have backed off the statement he made last Friday, that the US was ready to let ICANN go out of United States control. In an announcement he made today Stickling said: Our announcement has led to some misunderstanding about our plan with some individuals raising concern that the U.S. government is abandoning the Internet. Nothing could be further from the truth. This announcement in no ... read more ...

Here Is a Offical Statement Of The US Giving Up Control Over ICANN - We just published that the United States is giving up control over ICANN Here is the official statement from the U.S. Commerce Department’s National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA): “”To support and enhance the multistakeholder model of Internet policymaking and governance, the U.S. Commerce Department’s National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) today announces its intent to transition key Internet domain name functions to the global multistakeholder ... read more ...

Breaking: US To Give Up Control Over ICANN: We Predicted It in 2008 - According to the Wall Street Journal, the U.S. government is preparing to relinquish oversight for the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN). We predicted back in 2008 that the Obama Administration would give up control over ICANN. According to WSJ.com the move is viewed as a response to increasing international concern about U.S. control over the Internet’s structure, particularly in light of the recent disclosures about surveillance by the NSA and other U.S. intelligence ... read more ...

ICANN Publishes Its Financials For The Six Months Ending Dec 2013 - The ICANN change in net assets is $3.3M, or 13.6%, higher than budget during the first six months of FY14 mainly as a result of (i) delays in planned operations ($2.8M, see Operating Expenses below), (ii) timing differences of ccTLD contributions ($1.3M), (iii) Reserve Fund and New gTLD investment income of ($3.7M) and ($1.4M), respectively, offset by (iv) delayed evaluation processing in the New gTLD program resulting in lower revenues recognized for the period (-$8.0M). The Funds under Management ... read more ...