So I'm trudging through the ICANN-Verisign documents, and one thing has jumped out at me: the Settlement Agreement is not conditioned on ICANN's approval and execution of the new .COM Registry Agreement. The only place that the 2005 .com Registry Agreement is mentioned is in the third recital and the notice provision (Paragraph 11). If this is a stand-alone agreement, by all means, sign it now and put an end to the litigation. And then don't sign the proposed new .COM Registry Agreement. It's horrible.

If there's a side understanding that we haven't heard about -- expressly conditioning the settlement upon ICANN advocating for or executing the new .COM Agreement -- we need more disclosure. I suppose I'm also a little suspicious since the settlement does not contain a merger clause and alludes to other, undefined obligations in Paragraph 9 where it obligates the parties to "execute and deliver any additional papers, documents and other assurances that are necessary to carry out the intent of this Agreement." As written, the Settlement Agreement practically screams out that there's a side deal somewhere. Have I missed something, am I just paranoid, or....?