Here's an outline, by region. It contains all registrars except those located in the United States and Canada.

This is a work in progress. The nice thing about baking it in OPML is that it can be incorporated into other things.

Here's an immediately helpful example of outlining.

What nodes would you want to see in this?

What Is This?

The Hindustan Times: "The battle for Internet has begun and India is in the thick of it....Much of the problem with ICANN, as India sees it, relates to the umbilical cord that links this body to the US government."

ICANN President Paul Twomey in a speech to the WGIG: "We are working towards the completion of the MOU by September 2006 -- and to date have completed all milestones on or before the time stipulated."

The Number Resource Organization (i.e. ARIN, RIPE, AfriNIC, LACNIC and APNIC) presentation to WGIG: "The NRO does not see it as appropriate to view ICANN as a controlling body, a source of international regulation of the Internet, or a means of enforcing regulatory provisions."

P.S. It sure would be nice if the WGIG and UN and ITU folks would use HTML. Why is everything posted in Word and Acrobat format?

Catching up on a few items....

James Mitarotonda in a letter to Mitchell I. Quain, Chairman of the Board of Register.com: "We are writing to inform you that RCM Acquisition Co., LLC ("RCM") is willing to pursue a proposal (the "Proposal") to acquire all of the outstanding shares of common stock of Register.com, Inc. (the "Company") at a price of $7.10 per share in cash."

RCOM closed today at $7.15.

Reuters: "NeuStar Inc., the area code and telephone number clearinghouse, on Thursday set its planned initial public offering at 25 million Class A shares at an estimated price of $18 to $20 each."

ICANN today announced that its Nominating Committee had extended the period for nominations and submissions through July 20, 2005.

Old news: Verisign to keep .NET. 

This line of the resolution speaks volumes: "Whereas, numerous public comments concerning the applications were received electronically through ICANN's public comment forums and were posted." But did anyone read the public comments? I don't think so.

Whatever happened to the Manager of Public Participation? The reform process contemplated that this would be an important job. The position has never been filled. Shouldn't that person have summarized the public comments on . NET and made a presentation to the Board? By folding the public participation job into the PR job, ICANN seems to be saying that the "Manager of Public Participation" is really the Manager of Public Perception.  That's not good.

Brazil's Interministerial Group on the Information Society: "Despite the success in ensuring high availability and great stability to the operation of the network, the current structure for global governance of the Internet presents significant limitations."

Pat Trueman of the Family Research Council: "Nonsense."

You can't vote for the ICANN Board, but you can vote for the All-Stars. Vote for Izzy. Golden Glove shortstop batting over .300.

ICANN Press Release: "ICANN is pleased to announce that the independent evaluation process, which began last year, has resulted in a further sponsored Top Level Domain (sTLD) application moving to the next stage. As the process for selecting new sponsored Top Level Domain (sTLDs) continues from a pool of ten applications, ICANN has now entered into commercial and technical negotiations with an additional candidate registry, ICM Registry, Inc, (.XXX)."

BBC News: "Paul Mockapetris, chief scientist at Nominum, has been given an ACM Sigcomm lifetime award. He is widely credited with creating the Domain Name System (DNS) 22 years ago."

ICANN Board Meeting today. The agenda includes discussions of .NET, .XXX and the Strategic Plan.

The GNSO is seeking comments on a draft policy document discussing the introduction of new registry-level services.

A proposed review procedure for ASO policy proposals.

Name Intelligence's Jay Westerdal: "The abuse is huge. Over 750K domains were registered in one day the other week! Then almost all were deleted in the 5 day free abuse period."

John Berryhill: "I have zero doubt that the 'problem' if any is best resolved between Verisign and its contracting parties."

See the whole (and very interesting) Registrar thread here.

Telecordia redux: Verisign, again.

Namescout: "Apply for your .EU domain now to ensure that you are part of the initial launch of .EU."

GoDaddy Press Release: "The Go Daddy Group, Inc., parent company of GoDaddy.com, the No. 1 registrar of domain names, announced today that it recently won two top awards at the 2005 Domain Roundtable Conference in Seattle."

Toronto Globe and Mail: "Tucows is expanding its pasture."

You can't make this stuff up. Verisign, yeah that Verisign, is set to have a No. 1 hit song this week in the UK. It's based on the Crazy Frog ringtone published by Verisign subsidiary Jamba. The truly scary thing is that I suspect this will migrate to the United States. From the stories, it sounds like the next Macarena.

Speaking of crazy, Ross Rader has been sucker punched in the CIRA online elections. The idea that you can withdraw support previously given is a very bad idea...now exploited to the detriment of a candidate. You can't do that in real elections; once you sign your name on the ballot qualification petition, it's there. In ink. The CIRA folks ought to make sure that a digital endorsement has the same effect as ink.

Wendy Seltzer: "We worried about this kind of gaming when I worked with the early ICANN membership studies, but I hadn't seen it happen before. Instead, ICANN has gone so far in the other direction as to eliminate individual representation entirely. CIRA's prompt investigation can show that there's a better balance of representation and accountability."

Agenda for the next ALAC meeting (May 25th)

Agenda for the next GNSO Council meeting (June 2nd).

GoDaddy Press Release: "The Go Daddy Group, Inc., parentcompany of GoDaddy.com, the No. 1 registrar of domain names worldwide,announced today the launch of its newest venture, Radio Go Daddy."

Reuters story on IPOs of 2005: "Among other offerings backed by private equity firms that have filed for public offering this year are Hexion Specialty Chemicals Inc., Neustar Inc. and Refco Inc." I'm planning to buy a little bit of Neustar stock. I don't know the price yet -- a big factor -- but I'm bullish on registration services generally, and Neustar seems like a solid play.

Jovan Kurbalija making a point on Internet Governance: "There are many analogous elements between climate change and the Internet...."

Not many comments yet on the next Proposed ICANN Budget.

Question: why did IANA not issue a report on .EU?

I think it's great that ICANN Staffers will be attending this week's Domain Name Roundtable conference in Seattle. It would be a great opportunity to make a pitch for At Large membership. These are exactly the people we need in the At Large: registrants of domain names....on a massive scale.

ICANN needs two more lawyers. I don't think it's a good sign that, going forward, ICANN thinks it needs a full-time lawyer to oversee litigation.

The other day I said I wasn't the typical domain name consumer. I suspect Rich Miller is closer to the target. He has a weblog called "DomainWorks" which focuses on the business of domain names. (And he's using one of those newfangled TLDs: domainworks.biz).  I've subscribed. Today's story: "Cleveland Man Patents WHOIS Integration in Search Results." Worth reading.

Speaking of the business of domain names, two conferences (Seattle / Las Vegas) are competing next week for the hearts and minds of the domain name industry. I really wish I could attend both of them but a family vacation will take me home to Arkansas next week. Next year, if you folks hold the conferences at different times, I'll attend them both.

Question: How do we get all of the people who are paying to go to these conferences interested in the work of ICANN?

Interesting story on ICANNWatch, but temper it with this: The first time I heard that an "exclusive, invitation only" meeting was occurring in Washington, D.C., I was surprised...and offended. No longer. It's happened so many times over the last seven years that I've lost count. The folks in Washington think they have some exclusive authority to govern. That may be true when it comes to things like the U.S. tax code, but it's ridiculous when it comes to the Internet. Let them choke on their own cigar smoke. I no longer worry about the private meetings in D.C. It's all a charade to make them feel important...or, at best, look important to their employers and constituents. Kudos to ICANN for opting out.

New ICANN Help Wanted Ad for Regional Liaison Managers: "The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) has immediate job openings for the position of Liaison Managers for multiple world regions." Closing date for applications is 30 June 2005.

Alick Wilson: "It seems inappropriate...to post these 'immediate job openings' when Version 7.3 of the plan is still open for comment; Version 7.3 proposes deferment and detailed treatment of issues related to regional presence; and the Board has not approved Version 7.3 of the plan or any variation thereof. Perhaps this is a logistics error, in which case the job listings should be removed ASAP with appropriate notice. If it is not a logistics error, would Board and/or staff please explain?"

It's not yet posted on the Reconsideration Committee's web page, but last week, I submitted another in my continuing series of requests related to posting minutes. By sharp contrast, the GNSO posted an mp3 of the Council's call within minutes after the call ended. Transparency has never been an impediment to the Council's work.

Today's blog entries courtesy of the United Airlines terminal at SFO.

Another May 16th has rolled around, and now I finally understand. You know, 42, Deep Thought's answer to life, the universe, and everything? I have reached the age of enlightenment. Celebration tonight at Dodger Stadium. I hope the team knows they're expected to win.

The comment period on the Strategic Plan, version 7.3, has been extended until Friday, May 20th.

Glen de Saint Géry, GNSO Secretariat: "Please find attached an excerpt from the draft minutes of the GNSO Council meeting held on May 12, 2005 where it was agreed to post the Council discussion on dot Net to the ICANN public comment forum."

Dotster Promotion: "We're giving away domain names every day. Visit us today for your chance to win. In fact, visit us every day - there's no limit to the number of times you can win." I guess I still don't understand the domain name industry very well. A domain name only has value to me when I want to use it to identify a host, and my need for a new domain probably doesn't coincide with a domain name promotion very often. Which suggests to me that I'm not the typical domain name consumer.