ICANN made over $500k in secret lawyer payments over [REDACTED] legal dispute

ICANN has approved a payout of over half a million dollars to outside lawyers for work on a legal dispute it does not want you to know about.

The board of directors a week ago approved the disbursement of a “[Redacted – Privileged & Confidential]” sum to undisclosed parties in relation to “extensive activity in [Redacted – Privileged & Confidential]”.

Under ICANN policy, the fact that board approval was required means that the amount being paid is at least $500,000. The redacted resolution also authorizes additional payments up to $499,999.

ICANN isn’t providing any hints about what the payments concern, other than that it’s a legal dispute of some kind. The resolution states:

When required, ICANN must engage outside legal counsel to help prepare for and defend against all types of disputes that are brought against ICANN. When those disputes become highly contentious they often require significant involvement during a certain time period by outside counsel and that significant amount of time also results in significant fees and related expenses.

The words “related expenses” may be telling. We may not just be talking about lawyers’ fees here.

ICANN also does not state when the expenses were incurred, other than to note that the org’s budget for fiscal 2020, which ended June 30, “contemplated” the need for such payments.

So we’re talking about a legal issue that ICANN was aware of before May 2019, when the FY20 budget was approved, possibly as far back as December 2018, when earlier versions of that budget were published.

Known legal disputes that were active back then and have seen activity in the last few months include the Afilias Independent Review Process complaint about the .web auction and DotConnectAfrica’s court appeal over its .africa loss.

But both of those cases are matters of public record. ICANN even regularly publishes legal documentation on both. They’re not secret.

The only cases I’m aware of that ICANN has actively tried to keep secret involve allegations of sexual discrimination and harassment made against at least one former senior staffer. One such lawsuit was filed late February 2019.

But the hundreds of thousands doled out by ICANN last week could be related to just about anything.

ICANN’s bylaws give the board a broad brush when it comes to redacting information from published resolutions:

any actions relating to personnel or employment matters, legal matters (to the extent the Board determines it is necessary or appropriate to protect the interests of ICANN), matters that ICANN is prohibited by law or contract from disclosing publicly, and other matters that the Board determines, by a three-quarters (3/4) vote of Directors present at the meeting and voting, are not appropriate for public distribution

Usually, when ICANN redacts information, it’s related to personnel matters such as management bonuses.

Whatever it was ICANN just spent your money on, ICANN ain’t saying.

2 Comments Tagged: budget, ICANN, sexual harassment, transparency

.spa registry relocates to .xyz

Newly installed .spa registry Asia Spa and Wellness Promotion Council has started using a .xyz domain for its official registry web site.

The organization last week had its IANA records updated to change its “URL for registration services” from aswpc.org to dotspa.xyz.

It currently resolves to a placeholder “Coming Soon” page.

Choosing a TLD other than its own, which entered the DNS root in September, is pretty unusual.

Most new gTLD registries activate nic.example pretty quickly after delegation, even if they ultimately use a domain such as get.example or register.example for their primary marketing sites.

Activating nic.example is actually an obligation under ICANN contracts. ASWPC has registered that domain, but only whois.nic.spa currently resolves.

The dotspa.xyz domain was registered about a year ago, about a month after ASWPC’s former business partner, DotAsia, washed its hands of its stake in the TLD.

Both the .com and .org versions have been registered for well over a decade, so perhaps .xyz was picked as the default third-choice generic.

But that still doesn’t explain why a registry would select a domain outside its own TLD for its primary site.

1 Comment Tagged: .spa, .xyz, aswpc, dotasia, xyz.com

.forum sunrise period will cost less than half the regular reg fee

Trademark owners rejoice! There’s a new gTLD registry seemingly not bent on ripping you off during its sunrise period.

Those defensively registering their marks in .forum, which begins its sunrise period on Monday, in some cases could find themselves paying less than half the regular registration fee.

French registrar Gandi today said that its sunrise retail price is $452.13, versus a genera availability price of $1,042.08, and prices at other participating registrars appear to be roughly in line.

.forum’s is being managed by MMX, though the ICANN gTLD contract appears to still belong to original applicant Fegistry.

The first-come, first-served sunrise period will run until December 16. General availability is due to begin.March 2 next year.

I have to admit to finding the $1,000 base registry fee something of a head-scratcher.

I can just about see why gTLDs such as .cars, representing big-ticket niches, can command four-figure reg fees but, anecdotally, I’ve often heard that web forums can be quite expensive to run and difficult to monetize. Hardly obvious candidates for premium-tier recurring prices.

Comment Tagged: Fegistry, forum, gandi, mmx, new gTLDs, sunrise

.trust finds a new home with UNR

UNR has acquired the contract to run the .trust new gTLD.

According to ICANN records, the registry agreement was transferred to UNR, the registry arm of the former Uniregistry, back in June.

It’s the second time the TLD has changed hands since it was delegated back in 2014.

It was originally awarded by ICANN to Deutsche Post, but was quickly sold to NCC Group, which launched it in early 2015.

While .trust is technically live, it has not actually sold any domain names yet and doesn’t appear to have any registrars. The only domains in use, a mere half-dozen, all appear to belong to NCC.

Expect that to change under its new ownership.

I first speculated that .trust was for sale back in 2016, after the then-CEO of NCC utterly slagged off the new gTLD program.

But when NCC sold off its domain name assets in 2017, .trust remained with the company.

The gTLD seems to be following UNR’s chief legal officer, Jean-Christophe Vignes, who ran it under NCC before joining UNR two years ago.

I believe it’s UNR’s 25th gTLD. The company has not yet announced its plans for .trust.

2 Comments Tagged: acquisition, ICANN, ncc group, new gTLDs, trust, unr

Web.com acquires Kiwi registrar Freeparking

Web.com has acquired what it calls New Zealand’s largest registrar, Freeparking.

Freeparking, not to be confused with other registrars of the same name, was part of the Umbrellar Group of web services companies.

According to Web.com, its new buy has 90,000 unique customers under management.

The company, which also owns the likes of Register.com and Network Solutions, said the acquisition is part of its strategy to expand in the Asia-Pacific region.

Freeparking also owns the Open Host, Domains4less and Discount Domains brand registrars. It also appears to be a Tucows reseller.

No financial details of the deal were announced. Web.com was taken private two years ago by private equity firm Siris Capital.

Comment Tagged: acquisition, freeparking, umbrellar, web.com

GoDaddy set to pay millions to settle robocalling class action

GoDaddy is due to pay a bunch of class action lawyers millions of dollars to settle a lawsuit alleging historical illegal robocalling practices, while giving affected customers a lousy $35 apiece.

The lawyers have reportedly filed for final approval of a settlement (pdf) agreed to in May that put GoDaddy on the hook for up to $35 million.

The Alabama suit, Drazen v Goddady, alleged that the registrar between 2014 and 2016 broke the US Telephone Consumer Protection Act by using software to automatically call and text customers with upsell offers without their permission.

GoDaddy denied, and continues to deny, any allegations of wrongdoing.

Still, it’s decided to pay the lawyers to go away, to avoid costly ongoing litigation.

While the payout is capped at $35 million, in reality the company will be paying substantially less.

Affected US-based customers who filed a claims form before October 7 will either receive a check for $35 cash or store credit, redeemable within one year, for $150.

Reportedly, only 24,000 of the 1.46 million potential class members filed their claims by the deadline, so GoDaddy only stands to pay out $840,000 cash, $3.6 million in store credit, or some value between the two.

The class action plaintiff’s lawyers, on the other hand, stand to get up to 30% of the $35 million settlement, or $10.5 million.

The representative plaintiffs who put their names to the complaint get $5,000 each for their trouble.

Comment Tagged: class action, godaddy, robocalling

Tributes as “great mentor” Marilyn Cade dies

Social media was flooded with tributes today after it was sadly announced that one of ICANN’s elder statespeople, Marilyn Cade, has died.

Cade, who participated in ICANN and the wider internet governance community for decades, was widely admired not only for her dedication to fighting her corner, but also her habit of taking the time to bring newcomers, particularly women, the young, and those from under-served regions, into the community.

Reading through tributes on social media and elsewhere today, the word “mentor” appears over and over again.

“She was incredibly dedicated and always trying to bring new people into the multi-stakeholder Internet Governance world. Every time I saw her at an ICANN meeting she would be introducing me to someone new,” wrote one community member.

“What meeting have I been to where Marilyn have not been? She was a mentor, a fighter, lots of energy, but also with attitude,” wrote another.

I myself recall being schooled, and charmed, by Cade over drinks in Mar Del Plata, when I was still a little green, over 15 years ago.

In the ICANN context, Cade was long a member of the Business Constituency of the GNSO, which she chaired for three years from 2010.

She was such a fixture at ICANN, reliably showing up to the open mic during Public Forum sessions at almost every meeting, that the simple introductory sentence “My name is Marilyn Cade” became something of a catchphrase and a source of friendly ribbing.

The phrase regularly showed up on Public Forum Bingo cards, and I once caught an ICANN technician using it to test the audio on a public webcast before the meeting went live.

But she is also fondly remembered in the wider internet governance governance community for many of the same reasons. At the Internet Governance Forum USA, she held the role of “Chief Catalyst”, a job title that perhaps speaks volumes.

The Internet Governance Forum, which kicks off its 2020 meeting online today, announced that it will hold a special session in Cade’s remembrance tomorrow, via Zoom.

“She was a staunch supporter and advocate of the IGF and Internet governance in general,” IGF wrote. “Her energy, enthusiasm and dedication, in particular to the meaningful inclusion of communities from developing countries resulted in dozens of countries establishing their National, Regional and Youth initiatives (NRIs).”

“We were blessed by her passion, her will and her immense love for IGF and the NRI community. I know many of you will be as shocked as us tonight; your pain and anguish is shared,” IGF-USA wrote.

The IGF has opened a comment forum for tributes. Details of the remembrance session can be found at the same link.

Comment Tagged: ICANN, igf, igf-usa, marilyn cade, obituary

GoDaddy sees 12% growth in domains revenue

GoDaddy delivered another quarter of impressive growth in the third quarter, showing again the resilience of the domain name market to the coronavirus pandemic.

The company reported total revenue up 11% on the same period last year at $844.4 million, with net income sliding from $76.8 million to $65.1 million.

GoDaddy spent more on marketing during the quarter, saying that as demand for its services increases it needs to make sure it captures as many customers as possible.

Revenue from domains slightly outperformed overall growth, coming in at $387.4 million, up 12.2% year over year.

The domains segment was also a bit more profitable because GoDaddy no longer has to pay Neustar for domains in TLDs managed by what is now GoDaddy Registry.

The business applications segment, which includes email and third-party apps such as shopping carts, was the standout growth segment, coming in at $154.6 million, up 18.7%.

GoDaddy expects to see a similar pattern in Q4, with domains growth coming in at low double figures and business apps growth coming in at high double figures.

Both Q3 growth and Q4 outlook were better than analysts expected, and GoDaddy stock was rewarded accordingly.

The company also announced the departure of COO Andrew Low Ah Kee after 10 years with the company. His position will not be immediately refilled, and he is said to be taking a presidential role at a company outside of the domain industry.

Comment Tagged: coronavirus, covid-19, earnings, financials, godaddy

One-letter .lu domains could be bought for peanuts

Luxembourg’s ccTLD registry is auctioning off 2,825 one and two-character .lu domain names, and so far bids are looking very affordable.

The names have been reserved for two decades, but Restena began releasing them to trademark owners in August, and yesterday the landrush phase began.

The company has set up a special website for the auction.

After the first day of bidding, only one domain, j.lu, has attracted a bid in four figures (€2,000).

All 36 letters and numbers have at least one bid. Another 15 internationalized domains — single letters with diacritics or accents — have not yet attracted bids.

The domain with the most action so far is hu.lu — I wonder why — with a €500 top bid.

It’s still early days, and obviously most auction activity happens towards the end.

The plan is for the auctions to run for a minimum of 12 more days, but they could be extended into December.

On December 15, anything not already registered will be released for registration on a first-come, first-served basis.

3 Comments Tagged: .lu, auctions, resterna, single-character

Another domain firm going private as Endurance announces $3 billion deal

Endurance International, owner of registrar brands including Domain.com, BigRock and BuyDomains, plans to go private in a $3 billion private equity deal.

The buyer is Clearlake Capital group, in what appears to be its first foray into the domain name market.

It has offered to pay $9.50 for each Endurance share, saying it’s a 79% premium on the closing price the day before the media first got a whiff of a deal being in the works back in September and a 64% premium on Friday’s close.

The deal is still subject to shareholder approval, but Endurance says institutional investors accounting for 36% of its shares have already promised to vote in favor.

Endurance yesterday also announced its third-quarter financial results. It reported net income down from $7.8 million to $6.7 million, on revenue that was up 3% at $278.4 million.

The company does not break out what portion of its revenue or profit comes from domains. Hosting and web marketing services are also a big part of its business.

Comment Tagged: acquisition, bigrock, buydomains, clearlake, domain.com, earnings, endurance, financials, resellerclub