Board of Directors, auDA

Congratulations to all of our recently elected auDA Directors ..
and thanks for volunteering your time and energy in this regard.
Meanwhile, perhaps this news of recent NSI / ICANN agreement
may be of some interest ...  

http://it.fairfax.com.au/industry/19991005/A39838-1999Oct4.html 

War of Web All But Won
By John Schwartz
The Washington Post
Tuesday 5 October 1999

PEACE has broken out on one of the Net's fiercest battlegrounds. The US Commerce Secretary, William M. Daley, has announced an agreement to resolve the divisive fight over the future of the Internet's "domain names" system.. 

Under the agreement, the company that now has the government's approval to maintain the list, Network Solutions, will retain control over the database for four years. 

The deal may allow the company to continue to dominate the market for registering domain names, for which it now charges $US35 ($54) a year.

In return, NSI will give $1.25 million to the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), the cash-strapped nonprofit organisation set up by the Clinton Administration to gradually assume the Government's remaining authority over the Internet.

The agreement will speed the process of breaking NSI's government-granted monopoly over issuing domain names ending in .com, .net and .org. And NSI agreed to recognise ICANN's authority over many of the administrative functions of the World Wide Web, ending a fight that threatened to destabilise the burgeoning online medium.

  "Reaching agreement after many acrimonious months is a huge relief," said Esther Dyson, ICANN's interim chairwoman. Everybody here feels they gave a huge amount - This is all about trade-offs and compromise." The agreement will be open for public comment for 30 days. The ICANN board plans to vote on the agreement next month. 
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Cheers,
Stephen Loosley
www.stephen.hm