Re: There is no government mandate
This is a typical response by those who don't actually undertand how the Internet or ICANN works, and assume the worst when there is nothing to it.
Yup, and yours is a typical response when you have no idea what a poster's actual experience. Sometimes there are clues in the text..
..it would be terrible business to raise the price much and lose them to the many other domains. So they won't.
... that highlight the level of cluefulness of a poster. Me, I've been building/running/consulting on and around aspects of telecomms & the Internet since the very early '90s. But you seem to miss a rather fundamental point.
So 'Ethos' has valued .org at $1.2bn. How will that investment look at $10/yr? How much better will it look at a more 'market level' rate of $50-60 a year? Which was a point Kieren made in one of the earliest articles on this fiasco. And then dear'ol Vint Cerf chipped in to say that $60 was just fine.
Also, neither ICANN nor ISOC nor a registry has "legal" authority, the way the FCC and ITU own phone numbers.
Again you're providing clues. So DNS is very much reliant on a delegation of authority. Much of that authority also relies on contracts between ICANN and the entities authority is delegated down to. So for example, ICANN making Verisign stump up a rather large renewal fee for the legal right to print cash from .com (et al). In case you were not aware, those contracts between entities and ICANN are legally enforceable.
And you're also missing some more points. So thus far, the Internet has largely been self-regulated. Some as an accident of history in the US's role in it's creation. The rest because it's now a global thing, and coming up with an alternative entity which can regulate globally would be a massive political bun fight. But the ITU is there, waiting, and has tried to assume responsibility for aspects of the 'net in the past. Which could be equally bad, partly because ITU meetings are a LOT less fun than typical 'net industry ones.
But the big issue is that if ICANN's demonstrating it's not a fit and proper body to regulate key aspects of the Internet, then pressure will grow to take that away. An obvious and easy one is to fold the work of the IETF into the ITU.
Oh, and just as a general point.. You may be unaware that national regulators like the FCC already do have legal authority over aspects of the Internet. And the ITU remains a technical authority that keeps the glue holding it together sticking.
Biting the hand that feeds IT
