Dear .ORG Community,
Public Interest Registry informed ICANN today that the agreement between the Internet Society and Ethos Capital to sell PIR has been terminated by the parties. That means that there no longer will be a change of control under our .ORG registry agreement. We also informed ICANN that we will not file a Request for Reconsideration of its decision or take any other action to try to revive the transaction. You can find the letter we submitted here.
In short, the door is closed on a sale of PIR to Ethos, and ISOC has announced that PIR is not for sale. Similarly, because a sale to Ethos was not “consummated” after the ICANN rejection, the door is closed on ICANN transferring .ORG to any other registry operator. Such a transfer by ICANN is a contractual impossibility under our registry agreement.
PIR looks forward to continuing to serve our mission as an exemplary registry operator and responsible steward of .ORG. I recently shared my thoughts on how we see that future in a May 1 blog post.
Building the best possible future for .ORG is the sole focus of the passionate, skilled and experienced team at PIR. We never have lost sight of this – it always has been and will be about the future of .ORG.
Jon Nevett, President and CEO, Public Interest Registry