Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Pay up or Sell up, ICANN Tells Failing New gTLD (domainincite.com)

Posted by msmash on from the meanwhile-in-domain-registry-world dept.

ICANN has responded to a request for it to reduce the $25,000 annual fee it charges gTLD registries. The answer is no. From a report: That wholly unsurprising reply came in a letter from registry services director Russ Weinstein to John McCabe, CEO of failing new gTLD operator Who's Who Registry. McCabe, in November, had asked ICANN to reduce its fees for TLDs, such as its own .whoswho, that have zero levels of abuse. ICANN fees are the "single biggest item" in the company's budget, he said. His request coincided with ICANN commencing compliance proceedings against the company for failure to pay these fees.

Weinstein wrote, in a letter [PDF] published today: "We sympathize with the financial challenges that some new gTLD registry operators may be facing in the early periods of these new businesses. New gTLD operators face a challenging task of building consumer awareness and this can and may take significant time and effort." But he goes on to point out that the $25,000-a-year fee was known to all applicants before they applied, and had been subject to numerous rounds of public comment before the Applicant Guidebook was finalized.

9 of 70 comments (clear)

  1. Sorry, not sorry by OverlordQ · · Score: 4, Insightful

    If you can't afford the main thing you're building your business around, maybe you shouldn't be in business.

    --
    Your hair look like poop, Bob! - Wanker.
    1. Re:Sorry, not sorry by jellomizer · · Score: 3, Insightful

      $25,000 for a small business is a lot, but normally prohibitively expensive, especially if you plan to have it as an important part of your business.
      But I see this price akin to getting a delivery truck, or yearly rent on a storefront.

      However this price is good against "get rich quick scammer businesses" such as buying as many crap TLD as you can, sit on them, awaiting for someone to really want it and sell it for thousands more. Like which was popular in the late 1990's and early 2000's for the .COM domains. These are 0 value to society businesses. Changing $25,000 means these guys will need to spend millions of dollars upfront to get enough names to scalp later on. And their markup prices may be too much for most customers. So there is a high cost and little return.

      --
      If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
    2. Re:Sorry, not sorry by cshark · · Score: 3, Interesting

      So I looked it up. They're located in Manhattan. One of the most expensive places to operate on earth. If $25,000 a year is prohibitively expensive, as far as business costs go... where are they renting their office space? Have you seen what office space costs in Manhattan? Anywhere in NYC? They couldn't even rent a place in Brooklyn for $25,000 a year.

      And what about salaries? They have to pay people. Do you honestly mean to tell me that the entire staff costs less than $25,000 a year? Shit dude, how are they pulling that one off? Are they running the whole company with interns? My guess: No, probably not.

      What about marketing? This is the first I've ever heard of these guys, so I'm guessing that they haven't done any. But if you look at their "partners" section, there's some muscle there. There has to revenue.

      Anyway, I suppose my point is, that they're completely full of shit.
      They're trying to pull a fast one, and they're asking you to believe a story that either paints them as utterly incompetent, or impossibly small.

      I'm not buying any of it.

      --

      This signature has Super Cow Powers

  2. TLDs by darkain · · Score: 2

    Im aware of tons of novelty TLDs, following them closely for various business purposes. I've never even heard of "whoswho" until this article, and on top of that would never even think about registering it. That TLD is just a bad phrase. Who in their right mind would want a domain like Bobman.whoswho, it just looks and sounds ridiculous.

  3. The math holds up by dilvish_the_damned · · Score: 5, Insightful

    It stands to reason that no sales would result in no resource usage, so the $25k may be the only real expense. This is not evidence that the price is too high, but rather a bunch of TLDs are stupid.

    --
    I think you underestimate just how much I just dont care.
    1. Re:The math holds up by dissy · · Score: 2, Insightful

      It stands to reason that no sales would result in no resource usage, so the $25k may be the only real expense. This is not evidence that the price is too high, but rather a bunch of TLDs are stupid.

      Or looking at it from the other way, presume you sell domains on your new TLD for $25/year.
      You would need to sell 1000 domains to pay just the ICANN fees.
      Or only 2000 domains to pay the fee and have $25k/yr for operating expenses.

      If there aren't enough people wanting 1000 domains, there is pretty much no reason what so ever for that TLD to exist as a separate group in the first place, IMHO.

  4. Legit Who's Who, or spammer? by Mike+Van+Pelt · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Spam touting bogus "Who's Who" publications ("You have been selected! Pay use $$$ and we'll put you in our publication that's only bought by other suckers!!") used to be really rampant. Maybe they still are, but I haven't seen one in a while... my rules for this sort of thing are pretty draconian, though.

    But just the phrase "Who's Who" makes my eyelid twitch, and my "Ban the domain, ban the IP address, ban every phrase appearing anywhere in the email" finger starts to itch.

    1. Re:Legit Who's Who, or spammer? by Mike+Van+Pelt · · Score: 2

      Is there currently a legitimate "who's who"? Was there ever?

      The Marquis Who's Who that's been around for over 100 years is legit as it gets. They don't spam. I think someone they want to include, they send paper mail to, and they don't charge for being listed.

      I think there are some British publications along those lines that have been around since the Tudors or something.

  5. Re:Maybe they can get it down by BlackOverflow · · Score: 2

    It's just a string in a database somewhere. They could literally charge anything. 25,000$ is just some arbitrary number. It seems outrageous to pay that much when there are so many cheaper alternatives available. Maybe if you have a brand new company, get a cheap one first, then go for the expensive one in a few years if things are going well.