2002-10-14 - Successor Operator for .org Registry

Whereas, the May 2001 .org registry agreement between VeriSign, Inc., and ICANN provides that VeriSign will cease being the registry operator for .org top-level domain as of 31 December 2002;

Whereas, in resolutions 02.36 through 02.39 the Board directed the President to make arrangements for soliciting proposals from organizations seeking to become the successor operator of the registry for the .org top-level domain;

Whereas, a detailed request for proposals, including a statement of criteria for assessing the proposals, was developed and, after public comment, comments from the ICANN Board, and comments and questions from prospective bidders, finalized and posted on the ICANN web site;

Whereas, in response to the solicitation, eleven organizations submitted proposals;

Whereas, a Public Forum was held on the evening of 28 June 2002 in Bucharest, Romania, during which the eleven applicants gave presentations to the Board and community on their proposals;

Whereas, numerous public comments concerning the applications were received electronically through ICANN's e-mail and web-based comment forums and were posted;

Whereas, applicants provided responses to various requests for clarifying data, with both the requests and responses posted on the ICANN web site;

Whereas, a preliminary staff evaluation of the proposals was prepared and posted based on preliminary evaluations (also posted) prepared by Gartner, Inc., an Academic CIO team, a team from the DNSO Non-Commercial Domain Name Holders Constituency (NCDNHC), and the ICANN General Counsel, each of which evaluated various criteria in its area of expertise;

Whereas, comments from the applicants and the public on these preliminary evaluations were invited, received, and posted;

Whereas, responding to those comments, the Gartner, NCDNHC, General Counsel, and staff evaluation teams prepared finalized evaluation reports, which were posted on the ICANN web site;

Whereas, each applicant was afforded the opportunity to submit final explanations as to the merits of its proposal;

Whereas, the eight explanations that were received were posted on the ICANN web site;

Whereas, several public comments on the finalized evaluation reports were received by e-mail and ICANN's web-based comment forum and were posted;

Whereas, the Board has reviewed the applications, the evaluation reports, and the various the comments and other materials received;

Resolved [02.110] that the Board selects the proposal of the Internet Society for negotiations toward an agreement with ICANN to become the successor operator of the .org top-level domain;

Further resolved [02.111] that the President and General Counsel are authorized to negotiate a registry agreement with Public Interest Registry consistent with the model .org Registry Agreement posted as part of the final Request for Proposals, supplemented as appropriate according to the proposal submitted by the Internet Society;

Further resolved [02.112] that, in the event that negotiations are not completed by 23 October 2002 the President and General Counsel are directed to report the circumstances to the Board;

Further resolved [02.113] that the Board shall be notified of the complete posting of the .org registry agreement and appendices and after that notification seven days shall be allowed for Board members to make any additional comments to the President and General Counsel;

Further resolved [02.114] that in the absence of the request of any Board member to the contrary based on policy considerations, the President is authorized to sign the posted agreements for .org after the conclusion of those seven days; and

Futher resolved [02.115] that, upon signature of the .org registry agreement, the President is authorized to take such actions as appropriate to implement the agreement, including causing reports to be made to the United States Department of Commerce.
(The Board approved the above resolutions by a 11-1-3 vote, with Mr. Auerbach voting in opposition and Mr. Mueller-Maguhn, Dr. Pisanty, and Dr. Quaynor abstaining. Dr. Blokzijl was not present for this portion of the meeting.)