Re: [wg-c] lock-in

[John Charles Broomfield <jbroom@manta.outremer.com>]

Can someone please translate?
Yours, John.

> I got something out of Kent's URL Lock-in and Competition note, and the
> follow-ups by Bill and John.
> 
> I have to confess that there is something to this discussion that I just
> don't get. Ample evidence exists that buyers exist for price points well
> above the cost to create and service a record. The speculative market is
> not hidden.
> 
> The arguement appears to turn on the existence, or inexistence, of names
> for which such a price point is asserted to the registrant, nuanced by a
> temporal association. If the price assertion is subsequent to the record
> creation date it is "lock-in", and some arguementative point is in play,
> if prior it is "speculation" and no factional values are contested.
> 
> I don't think it is necessary to establish that there exist instances of
> super-cost pricing both prior to, and subsequent to, record creation, as
> the issue arose from consideration of opportunities to maximize return
> on investment, that is, from consideration of whether the assertion that
> for-profits and non-profits are indistinguishable for some range of test
> conditions. It is discretional conduct to price well above cost, and one
> of the two forms has the discretion to so price, if not the internal
> duty. If the operator limits its discretionary conduct to one, the other,
> or both of "lock-in" and "speculative" pricing, that's about as interesting
> as its preferences for horses or dogs at the track.
> 
> If those attached to the notion that some significant issue is in play
> due to the temporal association of price assertion and record creation
> wish to advance the arguement that my parents were closely related, or
> that I lack intelligence or integrity, feel free.
> 
> The issue is only really interesting if one thinks of registry operators
> as deriving a strategically significant (but non-recurring) net revenue
> stream from registrations only of highly referenced names. This kind of
> operator is not deriving strategically significant recurring net revenue
> stream from references to highly referenced names, and is unlikely to be
> able to mount a competitive bid and retain a delegation.
> 
> Looters make less money than cultivators, and cultivators are far better
> neighbors. The quick cash-out of some few, some luck few, that band of
> brothers, present at the fall of ICANN's Harfleur Castle on some Saint
> Crispin's Day or another, is not very interesting, or significant.
> 
> My teen's drama club just did a Shakespeare-a-thon, and being a dutiful
> parent, I soaked up enough to cook up the above glib line.
> 
> Cheers,
> Eric
>