dotPH

Posted on Metropolitan Computer Times

7 November 2003

MR. VIRGILIO PENA
Executive Director
Information Technology and E-Commerce Council

Dear Mr. Pena:

The ITECC recently released the list of members of an Advisory Board that will assist the National Telecommunications Commission (NTC) in its oversight function over domain name registration.

While we welcome the NTC's desire to advise us on improving our services, we think it is important for the NTC to figure out what sort of advice is needed by first identifying what specific problems need to be addressed.

The choice of candidates is puzzling. The NTC Web site refers to Guidelines for Membership to the NTC Advisory Board, yet these guidelines are nowhere to be found. In our meeting five months ago, I suggested that the best way to proceed would be to first compile a list of problems in the management of the PH Domain. You would then be able to identify the people needed to give advice on solving these problems.

For instance:

- Do you think dotPH's domain fees are too high? Increased demand will generate the economies of scale needed to lower costs.

Filipinos are free to choose between COM and PH and a host of other top-level domains. Perhaps we should look for ways to make it desirable for local companies to use PH instead of COM; and for foreign companies to establish an online presence in the Philippines. Someone with experience in marketing online brands globally, or who have built local brands that have outperformed their foreign competitors, would be an asset to the Board.

- Does the NTC need advice on improving the reliability of domain services? If so, then perhaps they should look for people who operate servers with a greater degree of reliability than ours (we guarantee 99.5% uptime on some services, and back this up with a money-back guarantee).

- Are there intellectual property concerns regarding the registration of PH domains? Then perhaps lawyers skilled in intellectual property issues should be part of the Board as well.

We would also suggest you give the public more time to comment on the list of candidates to the Board. The request for feedback on the candidates was posted inside the NTC site at 3:57pm on October 23, and the public was given only one working day to respond.

Please take a look at the consultation efforts we at dotPH have been doing for some time. Public input is requested by posting in a variety of online mailing lists, and comments are posted on our Web site at http://dotph.domains.ph/community-feedback so that the public may discuss (or refute) any suggestions made. We generally give a 3-week period for the public to comment.

We feel that the way to proceed is to avoid the sort of acrimony that has characterized past discussions with PHILDAC. Back then, no progress was made until the DTI looked beyond vague claims about "lack of transparency and consultation" and "governance" and actually investigated specific complaints gathered by PHILDAC -- which were all eventually dismissed.

dotpH supports initiatives that will improve the reliability, usability and competitiveness of the PH domain. We hope that matters can move in that direction by first identifying the specific issues that need to be resolved. Once the specific problems have been identified, we would be more than happy to discuss with you what sort of measures can be taken to resolve these problems.

JOSE EMMANUEL DISINI
.ph ccTLD Administrator