auDA ends exclusive negotiations with AusRegistry...

[Andrew Wright]

https://www.auda.org.au/mailouts/au...in+relation+to+the+Registry+Licence+Agreement

"The auDA Board believe, as a key piece of national infrastructure, a market exercise is the most appropriate next step in ensuring a rigorous process is undertaken to test the value, accountability and performance of building a best-in-class registry.

AusRegistry will be invited to participate in the restricted tender process, as will other operators, once the scoping exercise and tender documentation is complete. "

Hmm. Not what I was expecting.

 

[neddy]

Hmm. Not what I was expecting.

As I wrote on Domainer a short while ago, commonsense and transparency have at last prevailed.

 

[Bacon Farmer]

That's embarrassing. So why did aUSregistry get the boot?

Tender by invitation? Who gets to decide who is their mate or not their mate?

 

[snoopy]

Excellent news. Hopefully AUDA is genuine about this and is capable of carrying out the process.

Awarding the contract to someone else would be the best thing AUDA could do for their own credibility and would likely carry significant benefits for registrants in terms of cost.

 

[snoopy]

That's embarrassing. So why did aUSregistry get the boot?

No idea, but if Ausregistry were smart they would have dragged out the negotiations for as along as possible. You drag it out so it is difficult for the other party to find someone else due to time constraints.

This period of exclusive negotiation should have ended within a much shorter period of time, e.g. 30 days (it had been going for 4 and half months going by the dates AUDA has stated) but at least AUDA has done something.

 

[Scott.L]

I suspect the Government said NO - so they made this excuse to look good.

 

[snoopy]

I suspect the Government said NO - so they made this excuse to look good.

Could well be the case as AUDA seem to be rumbling a bit about the Golden Gate Capital stuff and it wouldn't surprise me if the govt was pushing them over that issue. Ownership of the registry has slid too far down the ladder in my view. Bad enough that is went overseas but now it is the plaything of 30 something VC's?

Who would entrust public assets to these guys?

http://www.goldengatecap.com/team/

 

[Scott.L]

I recall the suggestion that C.Boredman said,
We would need to clarify on the policy settings for direct registration first. [before going to tender]

 

[DomainNames]

As I wrote on Domainer a short while ago, commonsense and transparency have at last prevailed.

Not Good Enough from auDA again... It shows a confused auDA and the again lack of "openness" we had been promised. What they have announced is NOT Transparency.... it just raises more questions and doubts about processes and industry, government and domain name registrant consultation.

http://www.domainer.com.au/commonsense-transparency-prevails/

The Department of Communications needs to step in now and do the role of auDA and Wholesale registry database manager.
Cancel the auDA contract. It is due in 2017. auDA staff can apply to do their jobs at the Commonwealth Government who will take over the role completely. Dept of Comms can advertise the roles.
Cancel the Ausregistry / Neustar contract. It is now overdue and has not been renewed.
Use the current $10 million auDA has to for the rollover. That massive money shows the huge profits auDA has made but it does not show the massive waste of money over the years on expenses.
Dept of Comms has evolved to now cover all aspects required. They can manage the registry plus the role of auDA. In many countries this is what is done.. not a self interest group of profiteering supply monopolies which is what we have had for too long in Australia

 

[Scott.L]

Use the current $10 million to build their own registry - why does it need to go to tender? would this not be a win / win for all?

 

[snoopy]

The Department of Communications needs to step in now and do the role of auDA and Wholesale registry database manager.
Cancel the auDA contract. It is due in 2017. auDA staff can apply to do their jobs at the Commonwealth Government who will take over the role completely. Dept of Comms can advertise the roles.
Cancel the Ausregistry / Neustar contract. It is now overdue and has not been renewed.
Use the current $10 million auDA has to for the rollover. That massive money shows the huge profits auDA has made but it does not show the massive waste of money over the years on expenses.
Dept of Comms has evolved to now cover all aspects required. They can manage the registry plus the role of auDA. In many countries this is what is done.. not a self interest group of profiteering supply monopolies which is what we have had for too long in Australia

This would be a far better situation, seems like low odds of it happening though. It is a public asset and given all that has happened it should be run by the government not by a board that has been dragged down by members with conflicts of interest.

 

[DomainNames]

Use the current $10 million to build their own registry - why does it need to go to tender? would this not be a win / win for all?

auDA has failed to properly perform it's role for too long. It needs to be dissolved and removed from it's contracted role completely.

They have seemingly shown over the years to look after themselves and several powerful auDA Board members as first priority.

"Industry Self regulation" has not worked especially when several Supply entities will seemingly always do whatever they can to maximise their own profits.

"Supply" has basically run auDA and policy for many years. Still today several auDA Demand members say this is true and they have little if any power or say.... We noted several Demand members campaign over the years against the competing proposed additional supply pushed .au extension and other changes and improvements FREE COR, wholesale registry open tendering etc but in the end what happened.. they fell silent and muted once on the auDA Board yet several Supply parties and their associated entities remained seemingly vocal in their own agenda's even though facts where against their statements and claims.

 

[Scott.L]

"The auDA Board believe, as a key piece of national infrastructure, a market exercise is the most appropriate next step in ensuring a rigorous process is undertaken to test the value, accountability and performance of building a best-in-class registry.

Yes, build it - no need for any more speculation, argument or disputes about tenders.

,

 

[snoopy]

auDA has failed to properly perform it's role for too long. It needs to be dissolved and removed from it's contracted role completely.

They have seemingly shown over the years to look after themselves and several powerful auDA Board members as first priority.

"Industry Self regulation" has not worked especially when several Supply entities will seemingly always do whatever they can to maximise their own profits.

Agree, the demand/supply model is broken. It needs to be run in the public interest and not demand/supply members interests. It took all the shenanigans of .au to really bring this to the forefront.

Dissolution of AUDA is the only way to solve the conflicts of interest and branch stacking. AUDA is never going to be able to sort itself out because the problem is the board, the problem is the members.

Under the current CEO things have not improved, transparency has actually gotten worse with minutes disappearing and a very dubious member code of conduct. How was that even possible for the transparency situation to actually get worse?

At least the contract is now going out to tender though, why did we just waste 4 months talking to Ausregistry though?

 

[snoopy]

Speculation file (courtesy of domainer.com.au): Australian Govt may have said no to AUDA wanting to reaward contract to Ausregistry/Golden Gate Capital resulting in in AUDA being now forced to take it out to tender.

Has Ausregistry/Golden Gate been blackballed completely?

Is this the first stage of heavy government intervention?

 

[Scott.L]

if you want a "Speculation file"

Imagine for a moment that auDA is loosing ground with the supply side because the new .au is loosing traction - so to get around this auDA simply builds its own registry to manage the DNS itself - Effectively becoming Austregistry, now the scene is set to offer cheaper wholesale pricing to the supply side and satisfy the demand sides NO vote against implementing the new .au - win/win

,

 

[chris]

https://www.auda.org.au/mailouts/au...in+relation+to+the+Registry+Licence+Agreement

"The auDA Board believe, as a key piece of national infrastructure, a market exercise is the most appropriate next step in ensuring a rigorous process is undertaken to test the value, accountability and performance of building a best-in-class registry.

AusRegistry will be invited to participate in the restricted tender process, as will other operators, once the scoping exercise and tender documentation is complete. "

Hmm. Not what I was expecting.

Good news, a positive step in the right direction!

Also big thanks to Tim and the other board members that are pushing for these changes.

 

[snoopy]

if you want a "Speculation file"

Imagine for a moment that auDA is loosing ground with the supply side because the new .au is loosing traction - so to get around this auDA simply builds its own registry to manage the DNS itself - Effectively becoming Austregistry, now the scene is set to offer cheaper wholesale pricing to the supply side and satisfy the demand sides NO vote against implementing the new .au - win/win

,

I don't think it would be a good idea to have AUDA running anything of a critical nature, can you imagine them being in charge of a registry? I think it would need government department running it personally.

 

[snoopy]

Good news, a positive step in the right direction!

Also big thanks to Tim and the other board members that are pushing for these changes.

Tim was pro competition in his campaign but I don't think we know anything about the position of other directors to say they are pushing for these changes. If anything most seem to be pushing for Ausregistry to keep the contract and it appears likely that government intervention has brought about this change.

 

[chris]

Tim was pro competition in his campaign but I don't think we know anything about the position of other directors to say they are pushing for these changes. If anything most seem to be pushing for Ausregistry to keep the contract and it appears likely that government intervention has brought about this change.

True @snoopy, just assuming there must have been some support to make it happen.