Stuart Lawley: Difference between revisions

Stuart Lawley is an experienced leader, who has acted as Chairman or CEO in a number of UK and US businesses, largely within the Internet and technology sectors. He has acted as CEO of [[Eurofax]] Ltd., [[Alto Group]] Ltd., and has been the Chairman at [[Oneview.net]]. He guided Oneview.net though a public offering within the London Stock Exchange,<ref>[http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/10_28/b4186038373596.htm BusinessWeek.com]</ref> and saw the number of employees double. It was sold in March, 2000 for $200 million. Eurofax grew at a compund rate of over 40% over 12 years. Alto Group doubled in size and share values increased by 450% during his 15 month tenure.<ref>[http://www.lawley.com/Welcome/Introduction.html Lawley.com]</ref>

After Mr. Lawley successfully sold Oneview.net, he gave himself a brief retirement in the Bahamas, where he worked on his golf game and learned to spear fish.<ref>[http://news.cnet.com/2010-1026-5176611.html News.CNET.com]</ref>

ICM faced a constant battle not only with ICANN and its [[GAC]], but also with the community that it claimed to represent. Stuart Lawley registered as a user of Xbiz.net, a members only forum for those involved in the adult industry, to directly answer questions and negative comments he was receiving on the forum. He immediately received a number of questions, and eventually responded to many of them in full. He defended .xxx as a new income opportunity and not a burden; he defended the higher price of registration compared to a [[.com]] registration as necessary given their resources compared to [[Verisign]]'s; he promised to advertise and promote the name space to further increase its value; he claimed to have support from the industry and promised to turn the .xxx space into premium, secure real estate.<ref>[http://www.freespeechcoalition.com/images/pdf/XBIZ.net%20Thread.pdf .PDF Screen shot of Xbiz.net thread]</ref> The conversation was extremely variable in terms of tone and information. Later, a number of prominent adult industry veterans made a movie detailing ICM's business plan and deriding Mr. Lawley and his company.<ref>[http://www.juliemeadows.com/blog/tag/diane-duke/ JulieMeadows.com Blog post]</ref> The full thread from Xbiz.net can be read [http://www.freespeechcoalition.com/images/pdf/XBIZ.net%20Thread.pdf here].

In November, 2011, Mr. Lawley stepped down as Chairman of the [[International Foundation For Online Responsibility]], or IFFOR. The organization was the sponsoring organization required by ICANN of the registries applying for [[SLD|sponsored top level domains]] in 2004. The organization was supposed to be independent, and many saw an inherent conflict of interest that Stuart Lawley was the leader of both the [[registry]] and the sponsoring organization. ICM Registry will still hold a seat on the IFFOR, but the chairmanship has been passed onto [[Clyde Beattie]], former Chair of the Canadian [[ccTLD]] manager, [[CIRA]].<ref>[http://domainincite.com/lawley-quits-as-xxx-sponsor-chairman/ Lawley quits as xxx sponsor chairman, DomainIncite.com]</ref>

<br/>[[Raymond King]] interviews Lawley about ICM Registry, .xxx, and the comapny's new gTLD applications at [[ICANN 45]] in Toronto, Canada.