The news will be greeted with some dismay by other internet
companies, already smarting over
ICANN
's earlier plans
to introduce just a 25-cent charge. It is now quite clear that
ICANN's intention is to fund its ever-increasing and expensive
costs with a flat-rate fee on all internet interactions.
In its Strategic Plan (which, interestingly, it has just revised
and released for "public comment"),
ICANN
annoyed
registrars by saying it would stick a 25-cent transaction charge on
domain changes and sales. It even annoyed the country code
registrars (like .
uk
for the
UK
, or
.
de
for Germany) despite offering a lower 20-cent
rate.
Then, at the end of the year, it became clear that the renewal
of the .net registry (which
ICANN
starts negotiations
with VeriSign over this week) would see a higher 75-cent tax on
each domain, possibly higher. Renegotiation of contracts is going
to be an expensive business in future, it would seem.
The jump to $2 will worry many though and may explain the
lengthy and ongoing discussions that
ICANN
is holding
with other sponsored top-level domains. According to the agreement
reached between
ICANN
and .jobs and .travel, they will
pay a "registry level transaction fee" of $2 on every domain sale
or change, and they will pay it as a lump sum, quarterly (see page
17 of the
agreement (21-page
PDF
)).
The companies behind .travel and .jobs look as if they have
finally caved in and agreed to the charge, putting the others under
pressure to do the same.
Currently,
ICANN
is in formal negotiations with
another six new domains. The .asia domain has been discussed in
ICANN
Board meetings twice this year, once on 24
January and again on 18 February. But we can't tell what the upshot
of those meetings has been since
ICANN
has still
failed to make the minutes available, breaking its own bylaws.
The .cat domain has likewise been discussed at the self-same
Board meetings. Negotiations opened with the controversial .mobi
domain in December last year, but it would seem the powerful
companies behind that bid aren't yet ready to agree terms with
ICANN
.
That leaves .post, with whom negotiations have been going on
since October last year; and .
xxx
, which was discussed
in the January Board meeting but not the subsequent one.
It would seem that the bid for .tel by Pulver has been passed
over in favour of the bigger Telnic bid for .tel. The
ICANN
Board discussed that one last week, but, again,
the organisation has not released the minutes.
And as for .mail – we've heard nothing at all.
© The Register 2005
