Internetworkers: http://www.ibiblio.org/internetworkers/

["Wolfe, Joanna" <wolfe AT oup-usa.org>]

I received this from Verisign, thought folks might be interested:

As you may be aware, the Public Interest Registry (PIR) became the new .ORG
Registry as of January 1, 2003. The PIR .ORG Registry will maintain the new
authoritative directory of all .ORG domain names taking over management of
the .ORG TLD from the VeriSign Registry (VGRS). 

Beginning January 25, 2003, the VGRS will transition the .ORG directory to
PIR. Nearly 2.5 million domain names will be moved from one registry
operator to another. This transition will impact all .ORG transactions, as
well as certain transactions of other domains. Please pay attention to the
following dates and information carefully.

Impact to Partner Transactions
During this transition, you may experience one or more of the following
situations:

*       Communications: All communications regarding "unsuccessful" or
"failed" transaction for all domains - .com, .net, .org, etc. - will be
delayed up to 5 days (through January 30, 2003). No other transactions or
communications involving other TLDs and gTLDs will be affected. 
*       New .ORG registrations: Fulfillment for new .ORG registrations will
be delayed up to 48 hours (2 days). All requests will queue, and a
communication will be sent when the request is processed.
*       .ORG renewals and modification requests: Fulfillment for .ORG
renewals and modification requests will be delayed up to 5 days. All
requests will queue, and a communication will be sent when the request is
processed.
*       .ORG name servers: All transactions involving .ORG name servers will
receive invalid responses once processed, as name servers will not be
applied. Once the .ORG directory has been transitioned to PIR, you will be
able add the necessary name servers and make the appropriate changes.
*       Multilingual domains with the .ORG extension: No new registrations
or renewals will be allowed for multilingual domain names with the .ORG
extension. If a multilingual domain name with a .ORG extension is available
when you perform an availability check, you will receive an "invalid for
purchase" message. Multilingual domain names previously registered with the
.ORG extension, however, will not be deleted. We await more information from
PIR on the existing multilingual domain names.  


Timeline of events: 

January 25, 03:00 UTC (January 24, 10:00 p.m. EST) - Network Solutions
prepares queue for VeriSign Registry shutdown
Partners will not receive communications regarding failures for up to 5 days
(through January 30, 2003).

January 25, 14:00 UTC (9:00 a.m. EST) - VeriSign Registry shuts down for 33
hours
Any new .ORG domain name registrations and renewals made after this time
will be queued until the PIR registry opens. No additional orders for
multilingual .ORG domain names will be processed. Modification requests will
be queued until PIR's "Stability Period" concludes.  

January 26, 23:00 UTC (6:00 p.m. EST) - Public Interest Registry opens
New .ORG domain name registrations will process, including those already in
queue. Modification and renewal requests will continue to be queued until
PIR's "Stability Period" concludes.

January 26, 23:01 UTC (6:01 p.m. EST) - "Stability Period" begins, not to
exceed 48 hours
Registration of new .ORG domain names will continue to be permitted, however
once created, the same modification and renewal restrictions will apply to
those new registrations until the verification period is complete.  

Please be aware of these conditions as you make any transactions involving
the .ORG top-level domain. Network Solutions is working diligently to
support the transfer of the .ORG directory from VGRS to PIR, and to ensure a
smooth transition for our Partners. We will update you if there are any
notable changes to the above schedule.

Regards, Joanna