CIRA - I don't trust anyone (1.Viewing)

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jamesaepp

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For those who don't get them, below is the latest email from Alex B which I received last night.

Dear james,

CIRA was established as a not for profit corporation, for Canadians, recognizing that the “.CA” domain space is a key public resource. A condition of license is that CIRA conducts activities in an open and transparent manner that ensures wide public access to all relevant information. It has breached the conditions of license from Canada by acting more a like a private for profit corporation that in turn begs the question – who profits then (or follow the money).

• CIRA has breached its conditions of license as set in the Binder letter and specifically no longer acts in public interest but in self-interest with abandon, acting sometimes as scofflaws.

• CIRA has refused to provide any further information to members on the transfer of its core property, FURY without members consent. The deal was announced in October 2023 from Hamburg and confirmed from Istanbul in November 2024. It may be very contrary to CNCA.

• CIRA has allowed excessive executive compensation for an NFP/NPO, all done in secret.

• CIRA’s corporate performance, while touted as outstanding, is actually quite sub standard.

Could the CEO be building an empire, as a deliberate strategy to increase his executive compensation, already substantial and outside the norm for a NFP, while providing no value to Canadians, with a prospect of providing more domain names for cyber squatters/speculators?

Having brought all these points up to members, CIRA has now decided to try and expel me as a member of the corporation. The board will make that decision this week.

CIRA claims that I have engaged in conduct that may be detrimental to the corporation. The Bylaws allow expulsion with a 2/3 vote of the Board. CIRA has provided me with a copy of some of my emails but refuses to expand on the charges (why my emails have been detrimental to the corporation). Their expectation is that I show up, listen to the prosecution (a high-priced lawyer from Toronto) and respond to charges immediately thereafter. Are we in Venezuela? Soviet Russia? Trump land? Agree with corporate interests or be banished?

CIRA has stated that membership is a privilege and not a right. Does that sound like an exclusive country club, for those who are favored or seek to win favor?

CIRA states “The issue is not actual detriment but potential detriment”. So, CIRA does not object to what I have said but it may affect things going forward for CIRA. Exactly what is CIRA hiding or where ii is going?

CIRA will invite others to the in-camera board meeting but refuses to disclose who will be in the gallery in addition to board members. Does that seem right?

Not much passes the smell test. Knowing the fix is in, my recommendation going forward is to

a. Pay attention as more will come out in due course and it will not be pretty

b. I will stop writing mass emails to members if I am no longer a member

c. Do not vote for any incumbent as they are not doing their job now

d. Do not approve the auditor for next year, request another auditor who will work on behalf of members and Canadians, and not CIRA management.

e. I can respond personally should you want more information.



That begs the question - does this look like a secret society and who is in and who is out?

If you have strong social media skills we would like to hear from you. Lets work together to fix CIRA .

Alex Beraskow, P.Eng., MBA, ICD.D

Fellow CIRA member

I empathize for Alex in an "underdog" fashion but he does have his moments where he ... for lack of better expression ... doesn't seem to be playing nice in the sandbox.

I don't trust CIRA though based both on his emails and from what I observed from CIRA during the last AGM. I don't trust the CEO (p*rngate, anyone?). I don't trust the board. I don't trust their lawyers.

What's a guy in the middle to do? At this point I'm very tempted to give up all my (personal) .CA domains and go to something more neutral like a .net instead.
 
The number one goal should be to keep .ca renewals affordable for everyone.
 
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Shocked at the responses so far. I'm running this thread on the broader topic of CIRA governance and if we can trust them (and their skeptics), and instead the responses are to do with the affordability?

Shaking my head on this. I see domains kind of like land. No one owns land (in Canada) - the crown has all rights to land and we have to register the land and pay taxes on it. Whatever the cost of the land is in taxes comes from a bunch of different variables. Whether you're allowed to use land for a given purpose gets into a bunch of different policy.

Same goes for domains - how much a domain costs to register is one of the least important things. When you have an authority that essentially has a monopoly on the supply of a TLD, you need to make sure that authority is trustworthy.
 
Shocked at the responses so far. I'm running this thread on the broader topic of CIRA governance and if we can trust them (and their skeptics), and instead the responses are to do with the affordability?

It's not new to us, there have been a number of topics voicing your concerns and they are all documented here and have been discussed.

We have been quite vocal about the fact that CIRA has overstepped it's mandate and if I find some spare time I may post some links here so everyone can read some of the responses so far.
 
For those who don't get them, below is the latest email from Alex B which I received last night.

Welcome to the forum, makes you want to run for the board to take advantage of some of that excessive compensation!
 
Shocked at the responses so far. I'm running this thread on the broader topic of CIRA governance and if we can trust them (and their skeptics), and instead the responses are to do with the affordability?
Welcome James :) I often see criticism of the CIRA here on the board and also Alex B has posted here directly before.

I do feel that CIRA's main issue is a lack of "forum" of communication for and between members and with the board as well. Yet, I've only seen one or two members of the domain investment community ask questions at the AGM before.

As for Alex B, it's hard to look past his style of communication and personal vendetta in the context of communication with CIRA and members. If he were able to focus on individual issues and provide more details, it might serve his purpose and the ones of the other members better. Unfortunately, I had to stop spending any time communicating with him.

Same goes for domains - how much a domain costs to register is one of the least important things. When you have an authority that essentially has a monopoly on the supply of a TLD, you need to make sure that authority is trustworthy.
How would you like to see a TLD ownership structured? I've recently had a chance again to look at how other ccTLDs handle this and don't think the ideal/fair setup has been found yet.

The number one goal should be to keep .ca renewals affordable for everyone.
Number one goal has to be stability of the .CA TLD in itself. Keeping the prices low should be a goal as well, for sure. I was not a fan of the last increase. of course and I'm not convinced it was a necessity either, at least this high. I do have to say though that 5 years compared to the consistent Verisign price increases seems much more reasonable.

Welcome to the forum, makes you want to run for the board to take advantage of some of that excessive compensation!
A $10k compensation and travel expenses for the elected board members seems reasonable to me.
 
How would you like to see a TLD ownership structured? I've recently had a chance again to look at how other ccTLDs handle this and don't think the ideal/fair setup has been found yet.

There probably is no ideal. I'm in no way qualified to discuss how to structure any kind of organization and it quickly gets into a myriad of ethical questions before you even talk about what the mission of the organization is.

I'm not the first person to run to the Government for assistance, but in this case given that (as far as I see it) the .CA TLD is the property of the Canadian Crown, we should ask the Canadian Government to review CIRA's current license to operate the .CA registry and take it from there. A decision made 25 years ago should probably be reviewed.

CIRA is a democracy which is good, but I as a layperson don't understand how the nominations work. I don't understand how there's a "member slate" and how a nominating committee gets to gatekeep who can run for the CIRA board and who can't. Makes 0 sense to me whatsoever.
 

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