Don Cameron wrote:
] With respect to your closing comment, I am quite prepared to accept that
] there may be issues of which we are unaware. One that comes to mind is the
] funding of auDA itself (and in truth I have no idea of how this works, but
] the following is a likely scenario). If auDA itself is funded, then it's
] highly likely the original funding application and submitted business plans
] contained a 'sustainability clause' outlining the ways by which auDA would
] sustain it's existence beyond the funding period. If this is the case, auDA
] is limited to deviations from the plan without a formal Government
] redirection approval - and whilst these can be obtained (perhaps for the
] purpose of waiving charges on asn.au domains), the process is time-consuming
] and won't happen overnight.

Just to be clear on this, auDA receives no funding from Government,
except for that provided by the gov.au registrar (NOIE), which is in
line with the funding from other 2LD registrars (except Robert Elz)
over the last 1-2 years, and well under 10% of auDA's budget.

See http://www.auda.org.au/about/news/2000120401.html where the
Government expects auDA will:
     * operate as a fully self-funding and not-for-profit organisation;

I presume Don is talking about the idea of auDA being Government
funded, which I think is mutually exclusive with "fully self-funding".

For the new system, the Competition Panel recommended:
     * Funding for auDA will be secured primarily, but not exclusively,
       through a levy on domain name registrations and renewals.

Hence the $5.50/year Domain Name Fee in the new competition model
(see the Registry RFT).

__________________________________________________________________________
 David Keegel <djk&#167;cyber.com.au>  URL: http://www.cyber.com.au/users/djk/
Cybersource P/L: Unix Systems Administration and TCP/IP network management

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