Re: [wg-c] breaking up (names) is hard to do

[Milton Mueller <mueller@syr.edu>]

Kevin J. Connolly wrote:

> There is a
> certain amount of anticipation that the opening of the Shared Rehistration
> System may reduce the size of the ratio, but there are those who suspect that
> NSI has erected barriers to entry which are so substantial that the
> monopoly pricing will continue unabated.

The registry is and always will be a monopoly.Whatever reduction in retail price
that occurs with shared registration
will occur as a result of *regulation* of the wholesale price by NTIA.
Just as federally-regulated "access charges" paid to monopoly
local exchange carriers sets the floor price for long distance service
(as long as there is no facility-based competition) so the
federally-regulated registry price is the most important determinant
of the retail price of domain name registration.

Given that NTIA itself has set the wholesale price, the ratio of
retail price to "average variable cost" (don't you mean marginal
cost?) will be viewed as irrelevant unless DoJ could prove that
NSI's conduct prevented effective competition at the registrar
level. So the issue would become the conduct, not the price.

Now, what does this have to do with *new* gTLDs?

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m i l t o n   m u e l l e r // m u e l l e r @ s y r . e d u
syracuse university          http://istweb.syr.edu/~mueller/