The Internet Corp. for Assigned Names
and Numbers, the non-profit group poised to assume control of
the domain naming system from the government, has recently sent out soliticitations for donations to help defray the organization’s operating expenses.
Internet pioneer Vinton Cerf, currently senior vice president of
architecture and technology of MCI WorldCom Friday sent an e-mail to members of the Internet Society, seeking financial support
from members.
“The organization has raised a modest amount of funding thus far, in the
$250,000 range, but it needs at least $1 million and perhaps as much as
twice that, before it can establish a funding mechanisms by way of the
domain registrars and Internet address assignment organizations,” Cerf said
in his e-mail.
On the ICANN site, an ICANN Startup Fund page
has been added, and states that it needs funds to cover the initial expenses of supporting organizations and advisory
committees as well as other business-related expenses.
Also on the ICANN site is a short list of contributors to date, who have
donated from $1,000 to $25,000. Among the current seven contributors listed are
Compaq Computer Corp., IBM Corp., Netscape Communications Corp., MCI
WorldCom, UUNET and Symantec Corp.