[AfrICANN-discuss] Help with .africa history

[Mark Elkins]

On Sun, 2012-07-29 at 10:55 +0100, Pierre Lotis NANKEP wrote:
> Dear community,
> 
> 
> 
> Without any doubt : All this (virtual) battle is about money... 
Running a gTLD definitely has a money component - but its not the only
one.
UniForum already has a good track record with spending surplus funds on
outreach, an example being two schools a month are given a Computer Lab.
UniForum has stated its registry system fee would be about 1$ per domain
- the rest of the fee is for outreach purposes (after paying back
UniForum's loan for the application). So almost all of the money stays
in Africa. UniForum has been operating "CO.ZA" for the past 16 years and
is trusted by the local community.
 
DCA has indicated they will use a UK company to run the registry system
- money will leave Africa. I believe they have "investors" so money will
continue to flow to these people many years from now.

> If the interest of the African community was the priority, why DCA or
> UNIFORUM (AfricaInOneSpace or African Union) did not applied also
> for : 

Fair comment - perhaps we are all hoping that ICANN will be more
generous in the second round of gTLD applications. ICANN wanted the same
fee per "string".

> With respect to ICANN and his guidebook that some consider to be the
> Bible or the Koran, on the pretext that it was realized by the
> contribution of the entire global Internet community, I think this
> document could be improved : the registration for a new geoTLD should
> automatically caused the registration in other codified languages in
> this geographical area.

Well - its their business so we should observe their rules. I totally
agree about the languages though. ICANN does listen to what the Industry
says though. Make your voice heard - join the "At Large" community.

> To return to the issue of dotAfrica, the Steering Committee of DCA or
> AfricaInOneSpace is not representative enough. The multi-stakeholder
> model is not balanced. All Africa sub-regions should be represented in
> the Steering Committees. All this leads us to ask questions about the
> final aim.

Have you checked? "http://africainonespace.org" lists seven out of of
the twelve SteerCom members. North, South, East and West are
represented. There is also some gender balance and people are from
different parts of the Internet industry. A bigger Steercom would
probably be more inefficient.

> To prove to the African community their good intention,  DCA or
> AfricaInOneSpace websites must be available in all major languages ​​
> used in Africa (English, Arabic, French, Portuguese, Spanish, etc.).

http://africainonespace.org is already available in English, French and
Portuguese. Arabic is currently in progress. There is only one African
country who's official language is Spanish and I'm sure that'll happen
one day too.

-- 
  .  .     ___. .__      Posix Systems - (South) Africa
 /| /|       / /__       mje at posix.co.za  -  Mark J Elkins, Cisco CCIE
/ |/ |ARK \_/ /__ LKINS  Tel: +27 12 807 0590  Cell: +27 82 601 0496

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