A private equity firm is buying all the .org domains.

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blackacidevil

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New York (CNN Business) In a move that could shake up the internet, private equity firm Ethos Capital is buying the company that owns every .org domain on the web.

Ethos, which was founded in May 2019, is expected to close its deal to acquire the Public Interest Registry (PIR) during the first quarter of 2020. The sale price has not been released.

https://www.cnn.com/2019/11/27/tech/org-domain-sale/index.html
 
I want to know the chain of events that caused ISOC (Internet Society), an entity that was entrusted by the orignal ICANN in 1992 to manage *.org to and was a trusted entity formed by founding engineers of the Internet (nee ARPAnet) - now apparently has a Board of Trustees who's only purpose was to sell out.

Old/Archived of what Internet Society was: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Internet_Society&oldid=921911245

WTF happened where this entity went from Internet steward to "fire sale for the $$$$"
 
From the article:
The petition signers are worried that this purchase could come with increases in domain prices and censorship, according to SaveDotOrg, a website run by NTEN, a community of nonprofit tech professionals.
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The dark cyberpunk future really is going to begin in 2020 at this rate... :eek:
 
Frankly they can keep their .org domains until they turn sour. Nobody cares if you have an .org domain anyway. It is meaningless, has been for a long time.
 
Red Falcon said:
I think you aren't seeing the forest through the trees... unless of course you are ok with more censorship. o_O
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There are much worse censorships already in effect than not being able to register an org domain for your organization. So perhaps we are already in the forest.
 
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M76 said:
There are much worse censorships already in effect than not being able to register an org domain for your organization. So perhaps we are already in the forest.
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This has nothing to do with not being able to register a .org domain - did you even read the article???
Apparently you don't even see the trees...

Mega6 said:
All about a money grab by locking up the .org dom so what. It’s just a name.
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FFS, did either of you read the article???


From the article:
A statement from the Internet Society states that Ethos plans on keeping the .org domain accessible and reasonably priced, but the price could increase it up to about 10% annually.
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Again, from the article:
The petition signers are worried that this purchase could come with increases in domain prices and censorship, according to SaveDotOrg, a website run by NTEN, a community of nonprofit tech professionals.
Click to expand...
 
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Red Falcon said:
This has nothing to do with not being able to register a .org domain - did you even read the article???
Apparently you don't even see the trees...



FFS, did either of you read the article???


From the article:


Again, from the article:
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Yeah I read it. So what. Change to a godaddy .xyz domain for five bucks. Yawn.
 
Mega6 said:
Yeah I read it. So what. Change to a godaddy .xyz domain for five bucks. Yawn.
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Obviously, you didn't, or just don't care, and either way, that's not how things work with professional organizations.
Hope you enjoy your censorship and slave collar!
 
Mega6 said:
LoL.
Oh no save the .org

The internet and the world will survive and move forward- give me a break.
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Under the guise of mass censorship and exorbitant fees - that isn't moving forward, it is moving backwards, and I highly doubt the Internet as we know it is going to survive much more of this.
Unless you enjoy living in a society like what China has, because that is exactly what this is going to become.

Again, hope enjoy your slave collar, because with your thinking, or lack there of, you've more than earned it.


Those who do not learn history are doomed to repeat it. - George Santayana

destroy-the-four-olds-l.jpg


^ That's what censorship does to a nation, and to the world.
So you are ok with that?
 

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Red Falcon said:
Under the guise of mass censorship and exorbitant fees - that isn't moving forward, it is moving backwards, and I highly doubt the Internet as we know it is going to survive much more of this.
Unless you enjoy living in a society like what China has, because that is exactly what this is going to become.

Again, hope enjoy your slave collar, because with your thinking, or lack there of, you've more than earned it.
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you’re really over-reaching and over-reacting. Stop shouting “the book of revelations” and analyze this more coherently for what it is.

three letters.
 
Mega6 said:
you’re really over-reaching and over-reacting. Stop shouting “the book of revelations” and analyze this more coherently for what it is.

three letters.
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This is more than three letters, it is about mass censorship and increased fees for these domains which were previously protected from such heinous acts.

Lenin had a term for people like you:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Useful_idiot
 
Red Falcon said:
This has nothing to do with not being able to register a .org domain - did you even read the article???
Apparently you don't even see the trees...
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There is no explanation on how this is censorship in the article.

If they tried to hike the domain price for specific organizations selectively that would be a case a first year law student could win. That's the only way it could be considered censorship. But instead of acting arr superior why don't you explain where is the censorship.

You know what's actual censorship however? Google arbitrarily(based on their political and social bias) promoting and suppressing search results, instead of showing results based on popularity and relevance. That's much worse than having to pay $20 for an org domain instead of $10, and nobody seems to care.
 
Mega6 said:
So clever the paranoid are.
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Did the 20th century not happen?
Was Communism and mass-censorship just a fantasy?

I think not.
History repeats itself, thanks to uncaring and indoctrinated individuals such as yourself.

Since you don't care about censorship or the impacts it can have on everyone, here is a picture with you to the right of Stalin:

The-Commissar-Vanishes-July-2017.jpg


Oh wait...

M76 said:
You know what's actual censorship however? Google arbitrarily(based on their political and social bias) promoting and suppressing search results, instead of showing results based on popularity and relevance. That's much worse than having to pay $20 for an org domain instead of $10, and nobody seems to care.
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I agree with you on that.
They discuss censorship in the article, and I even quoted it in this thread, twice.
 
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Red Falcon said:
Did the 20th century not happen?
Was Communism and mass-censorship just a fantasy?

I think not.
History repeats itself, thanks to uncaring and indoctrinated individuals such as yourself..
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I care about things that are important. .org is not one of them. Now if someone was to threaten something like the tor network- that would be an impact to free speech and censorship. We don’t have anything close to that here.
 
Mega6 said:
I care about things that are important. .org is not one of them. Now if someone was to threaten something like the tor network- that would be an impact to free speech and censorship. We don’t have anything close to that here.
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Frog in a boiling pot, and death by a thousand cuts
Do these phrases ring a bell?

Also, who cares about tor?
To quote you:

Mega6 said:
you’re really over-reaching and over-reacting. Stop shouting “the book of revelations” and analyze this more coherently for what it is.

three letters.
Click to expand...
 
Red Falcon said:
Frog in a boiling pot.
Death by a thousand cuts.

These phrases ring a bell?
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Rationalize your paranoia any way you want. I’m not into it. You haven’t made the case that it it’s that important.
 
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So am I understanding correctly that this will affect sites that already have a .org domain?
 
xrror said:
I want to know the chain of events that caused ISOC (Internet Society), an entity that was entrusted by the orignal ICANN in 1992 to manage *.org to and was a trusted entity formed by founding engineers of the Internet (nee ARPAnet) - now apparently has a Board of Trustees who's only purpose was to sell out.
Click to expand...
This certainly isn't the whole story, but Techdirt showed enough interest in recent events to write about some of the self-dealing:

https://www.techdirt.com/articles/2...execs-self-dealing-regarding-org-domain.shtml
 
^ From that article:
In other words, the folks involved here are all very closely connected, and it happened right after ICANN, going against the public's clearly stated interests, suddenly made the .org domain space much more open to profit exploitation. The whole thing is incredibly sketchy.
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It's ok, though, because window lickers like Mega6 say that it's "just three letters", so what's the big deal? :rolleyes:

More from that article:
... the bulk of the money would come from the investment vehicles of renowned US Republican billionaires: Perot Holdings, tied to former presidential candidate Ross Perot; FMR LLC, closely associated with the Johnson family, one of the Republican Party’s biggest backers; and Solamere Capital, tied to Republican senator Mitt Romney.
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But, according to Mega6, that's just "paranoia".
The term useful idiot could not be more accurate for their line of thinking.
 
Red Falcon said:
This is more than three letters, it is about mass censorship and increased fees for these domains which were previously protected from such heinous acts.

Lenin had a term for people like you:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Useful_idiot
Click to expand...

Red Falcon said:
Did the 20th century not happen?
Was Communism and mass-censorship just a fantasy?

Since you don't care about censorship or the impacts it can have on everyone, here is a picture with you to the right of Stalin:
Click to expand...

Red Falcon said:
Under the guise of mass censorship and exorbitant fees - that isn't moving forward, it is moving backwards, and I highly doubt the Internet as we know it is going to survive much more of this.
Unless you enjoy living in a society like what China has, because that is exactly what this is going to become.

Again, hope enjoy your slave collar, because with your thinking, or lack there of, you've more than earned it.

That's what censorship does to a nation, and to the world.
So you are ok with that?
Click to expand...

Free market activity that you don't like equals... communism?

I mean, I get being opposed to this as harmful to people and the internet overall, but comparing it to communism and mass censorship seems like a non-sequiter. This is the result of unregulated economic forces, not some central government authority.
 
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I thought net neutrality was over? I read here, that if net neutrality dies, the internet dies.

So? What happened? Do we have net neutrality? Or is the internet dead?
 
Liver said:
I thought net neutrality was over? I read here, that if net neutrality dies, the internet dies.

So? What happened? Do we have net neutrality? Or is the internet dead?
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Net neutrality has nothing to do with top level domains. Net neutrality is about tcp packet prioritization.
 
Damn it, don't know about censorship, but that statement Richard Barnes put sure was cringy (why didn't he just say he likes bribes).
I knew I should've gone .net instead of .org
 
auntjemima said:
You know, you could have avoided 90% of this thread by understanding that "could" doesn't mean will.
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The second article in this thread basically shows that higher fees and mass censorship is basically what is going to happen to these previously protected domains, especially with who is going to be in charge of it.
Of course if I end up being wrong, and none of that happens and things remain the same, I will happily admit to it, and really, I truly hope I end up being wrong on all of this.
 
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