
The Billion-Dollar Battle over .Org - walterbell
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/01/07/technology/dot-org-private-equity-battle.html
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OskarS
These kinds of statements are infuriating:

> Ethos Capital has pledged to adhere to the 10 percent cap, though it would
> have no contractual obligation to do so. In blog posts, the private equity
> firm said it planned to invest in new services and clamp down on spam,
> security attacks and other abuse launched from some illicit dot-org domains.

Like, is there any person in the universe who is naive enough to believe that
the motives of a private equity company are totally pure and just about making
the web better? It's a private equity company: OF COURSE they are buying it so
that they can milk as much cash as possible out of the sale, with absolutely
zero concern what's best for the "health of the internet" or whatever. That is
their reason for existing. Pretending that this is anything other than a
private entity trying to profit at the expense of the public is ludicrous.

~~~
ohashi
Just look at what the defenders are saying on ICANN mailing lists. You can't
assume ill intent from Ethos they say, they could do a better job than ISOC
for all we know. It's a bullshit argument coming from registry lobbyists and
ISOC members. And they throw out 10% annual price increases per year like it's
normal. Since 2003, .ORG has had 7 price increases at 2.5, 10, 7, 3.5, 7, 10,
10 (percent). Which is an average of 7.5% per price increases, which have
happened every 2.4 years. So an annual 10% price increase is well out of line
with the norm.

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ohashi
I'd like more details about who is behind it and what their goals are. But it
sounds better than Ethos at its core. The fact it's not being run for profit
puts motives well above Ethos who pretend 10% per year price increases are
reasonable and accepted. ORG hasn't raised prices in years and hasn't had a
need to. It was one of the arguments for uncapping the price is that they were
a responsible steward not taking advantage of their annual 10%, so why would
it be abused? A PE company acquiring it is exactly why.

If Internet Society imploded and had contract taken away and their revenue
stream of .ORG revoked it would be karma for selling out the community they
were supposed to represent. I suspect if this were to happen the new COOP
would be required to supplement ISOC budget at least for a while. But
personally, I would love to see ISOC get nothing. It should be a harsh
reminder that representing your community properly is important.

------
eps
Did I miss it or they don't at all mention the blatantly obvious arms length
distance between this 2-person newly formed Ethos and ICANN?

~~~
ohashi
Not mentioned.

