I'm not sure where I stand on this. You may very well be right.

Even though, I'm still thinking: would we grant a registry application 
if the applicant would say : "for the market price of a domain in a 
competing TLD, all our clients will have to use our platforms, hosting, 
etc ... . If not, we will charge them 25 times as much. That's how good 
the TLD semantics is, and also we bank on the fact that it takes forever 
for you guys to approve anything else that we think can compete".

Like I said, I'm not sure where I stand. I will probably wake up 
tomorrow and think you are right.

Nicolas

On 30/03/2015 12:14 PM, Amr Elsadr wrote:
> Another perspective may be that .sucks is competing with a whole bunch 
> of other gTLDs, right? They surely don’t have a monopoly on platforms 
> for online criticism,do they? Just the use of their string.
>
> Thanks.
>
> Amr
>
> On Mar 30, 2015, at 6:00 PM, Nicolas Adam <[log in to unmask] 
> <mailto:[log in to unmask]>> wrote:
>
>> If the registry and the platform are the same, then it means that the 
>> registry uses its monopoly power over the string to have a 
>> competitive advantage in a downstream market, which is bad. If 250$ 
>> is higher than market value for a regular domain, it also mean that 
>> they are actively using their monopoly power over the string to force 
>> ordinary user to use their platform. That is bad as well. In a world 
>> where a .sucks competitor cannot readily spring about, these are 
>> legitimate competition concerns.
>>
>> Nicolas
>>
>> On 30/03/2015 11:45 AM, Amr Elsadr wrote:
>>> Hi Sam,
>>>
>>> Thanks. I hadn’t seen this article. It does suggest that the 
>>> platform belongs to VOX Populi, but does not make it implicitly 
>>> clear (at least not to me). It could still be a platform that VOX 
>>> Populi has contracted with and is using. I’m also not so sure that 
>>> it would be terribly detrimental if it did own the platform. Folks 
>>> are always free to elect not to register a domain under .sucks, 
>>> aren’t they? :)
>>>
>>> Also not very concerned with how they define “individual”, but 
>>> that’s just me. I wouldn’t mind if this product is reserved for 
>>> actual individuals. This doesn’t mean that CS organisations can’t 
>>> register .sucks domain names, but just that they can’t use this 
>>> package. I would at least prefer that to ICANN dictating the rules 
>>> to Vox Populi on how they can sell to who, and for how much.
>>>
>>> Thanks again.
>>>
>>> Amr
>>>
>>> On Mar 30, 2015, at 5:17 PM, Sam Lanfranco <[log in to unmask] 
>>> <mailto:[log in to unmask]>> wrote:
>>>
>>>>
>>>> Amr,
>>>> The following article says that VOX Populi is owned by the Ottawa 
>>>> based Momentous Corporation and that VOX Populi also owns the 
>>>> everything.sucks consumer advocacy forum platform. It appears that 
>>>> VOX Popular as a Registry had a contract with itself as either a 
>>>> Registrar or a Registrant.As of now there is no public information 
>>>> on the everything.sucks consumer advocacy forum platform. One 
>>>> concern from the not-for-profit and civil society perspective is 
>>>> whether or not the VOX Populi definition of "individual" includes 
>>>> not-for-profit and civil society organizations, or is it restricted 
>>>> to individual meaning a single person. Along with you, many are 
>>>> waiting for further information. At the moment 
>>>> thehttp://www.everything.sucks 
>>>> <http://www.everything.sucks/>returns a blank page.
>>>>
>>>> http://business.financialpost.com/2015/03/27/vox-populi-makes-waves-with-sale-of-edgy-dot-sucks-domain-name/
>>>>
>>>> Sam L.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> On 30/03/2015 11:06 AM, Amr Elsadr wrote:
>>>>> Is the consumer advocacy platform “everything.sucks” owned by VOX 
>>>>> Populi? I wasn’t aware of that. I thought they just said that they 
>>>>> had contracted with them. I may be wrong.
>>>>>
>>>>> I’d be interested to learn more about the everything.sucks 
>>>>> platform as more information becomes available. But I wouldn’t 
>>>>> jump to the conclusion that it will be a particular concern for 
>>>>> NFPs and CS until this information is somehow provided.
>>>>>
>>>>> Thanks.
>>>>>
>>>>> Amr
>>>>
>>>>
>>>
>>
>