Struggling gTLD registries ask ICANN for 75% temporary fee cut & add $3 million marketing kitty

A letter from the gTLD Registries Stakeholder Group (RySG) has requested [PDF] ICANN to slash its annual fees for a year and undertake a $3 million marketing effort to promote new domains (new gTLDs)

RySG chair Paul Diaz said that “A number of gTLD operators are struggling” and reducing the fees would give the registries more money for marketing the extensions. As it is at the moment, registries with less than 50,000 annual transactions remit a quarterly fee of $6,250, however RySG would like this fee cut to $1,562.50 per quarter for a year.

The letter also mentions  a registry with just 1,000 names and paying $25.00 per name per year in ICANN fees.  While the registries for domains that existed before new TLDs generally pay lower fees.

RySG also wants ICANN to seed $3 million in a fund “to promote universal awareness of new
gTLDs to the general Internet user community, and universal acceptance of new gTLDs across the
Internet.”

RySG points that the money should come from the $100 million surplus it expects ICANN to have from running the new TLD program. (This amount does not include the $200 million + in auction proceeds). Funding the discounts and marketing would cost about $20 million.

ICANN however has said its fee structure for the new TLD program was designed to be cost neutral.