Or... Inside a Drop Catcher’s War Room: How eNom Arms Maker Chris Ambler Is Turning The Tide for Club Drop.  Interesting new piece in Domain Name Journal by Ron Jackson.

I just picked up a copy of Verisign's new complaint, filed August 27th in Los Angeles Superior Court (state court). Unlike the one recently dismissed in federal court (copy here), this one has only two causes of action: declaratory judgment and breach of contract. In addition to dropping the antitrust claims, Verisign has also dropped a number of state law causes of action. I expect ICANN will post a copy shortly.

ICANN is significantly stronger today than it was yesterday. The decision in Verisign v. ICANN, issued yesterday by U.S. District Judge A. Howard Matz, is a major victory. Judge Matz was careful to limit his holding only to the facts before him, but it's easy to read the decision as a broad victory for ICANN qua ICANN. As byzantine as the ICANN structure often seems, that same structure also acts to compartmentalize and channel common business interests in such a way that one group of competitors can never dictate the outcome of an ICANN policy process. The Court wrote:

"[T]here is nothing inherently conspiratorial about a 'bottom-up' policy development process that considers or even solicits input from advisory groups. 'Participation' is not enough to give rise to antitrust liability; control is required.... Verisign has not alleged, and cannot allege, that the co-conspirators comprised a majority of the ICANN Board of Directors. It has not alleged and, given that the bylaws provide otherwise, it cannot allege that the 'supporting organizations' within ICANN's structure that do include competitors of Verisign dominated the Board."

I can't imagine an opinion that would have provided ICANN a more secure foundation on which to continue its work.

This doesn't necessarily mean that Verisign will lose the war. It never needed to bring on the antitrust battle in the first place; a declaratory judgment of its rights under its registry contract ought to be sufficient to determine whether Verisign can launch new registry services. Any ruling on those issues, however, will come far down the road. I can only wonder now whether Verisign will appeal Judge Matz's decision to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit or get the real issues rolling in state court.

But see: Steven Forrest has a different view.