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Master Of Your Domain
ICANN has been in the news quite a bit recently. Although new TLD's have been in the works for more than five years now, ICANN has given in to the lobbying of its patron mega-corps and stated that no new TLD's would be created unless trademark holders got first dibs on them. So much for a personal TLD exempt from trademark considerations... ICANN is currently pushing its At-Large Membership, which everyone should join, even though the system has been carefully rigged so that the public cannot make meaningful changes in the composition of ICANN's Board. All these and more will be discussed in their Cairo meeting, which will be Webcast starting 2 a.m. EST on March 8.
I was simply expanding on the thoughts of the other poster. If we "owe" big business preferential treatment in the cyber-sphere, don't they also deserve extra property rights in all realms?
-- Don't Tase me, bro!
Who needs those ICANN controlled root servers, anyway?
You can actually run your own root server. Then you have total control over what TLDs will be present and which registry supplies the zone data. All that is needed is for you know how the name servers to point to for the traditional and national TLDs, if you even want to carry them.
A couple years ago I created a concept I called Grass Roots Servers . The idea was that the root servers would really be run as described above. I came up with this idea because of the issue of deciding who would be the one to supply zone data for a new TLD. Since I didn't want political cronies or mega corporations making the decision for everyone, and I didn't want to be making that decision, either (as if I could), I figured the best place to decide was as close to each user as possible. One interesting thing about this is the fact that nothing has to be done by any sort of political or corporate power to enable it.
The difficulty in such a thing is that most people don't want to deal with the complexity of dealing with finding all the TLD name servers, and building the appropriate zone data file. That's where I came up with the web site Grass Roots Servers which would be a way to select the TLDs you want to have, or don't want to have, and have a zone file built for you. If the idea caught on, surely more tools would be created that just my first attempt, of which source can be downloaded if you want. Keep in mind I did this a couple years ago and have not updated it. The data is kind of old, but some of it may work.
So, do you want them to control your view of the domain name system, or do you want to control it yourself?
now we need to go OSS in diesel cars
> The right of free assocation shall not be infringed.
Not in Il Duce Giuliani's New York! Go to Central Park and attempt to address more than twenty of your fellow citizens. If the tenor of your discussion pleases Il Duce, then you'll be all right, no official will lift a finger to infringe upon that "right" of yours; on the other hand, if you are so injudicious as to displease his majesty he cries out to his Brown Shirts, "Avanti!" and it's a vigorous thrashing with nightsticks and then off to the Tombs for you, you anarchist scum!
Or, for a few years there in Chicago, you retained the right to free association, unless you happened to be young, male and black; then you and your four-or-more friends became, by definition, a "street gang" and were thus subject to immediate arrest and incarceration. As it happens, thanks to those wildeyed radicals at the ACLU that law got invalidated.
Yours WKiernan@concentric.net
While I think that this is a great idea and would really help out the problem, I don't think it's enforcable.
What would probably happen is that it would just be driven underground more. Instead of buying the domain, you give them money in order to "encourage" them to give it up (thus leaving it open for you).
Plus, you get into issues of international law. ICANN can say that domain names can't be sold, but they don't have the authority to enact a law. I suppose that where they do control who the registrars are, that they could "blacklist" non-compliant registrars. And, they do have ultimate authority in a domain dispute don't they? Would they have the authority to require that a registrar revoke the domains of a squatter? Perhaps this could work.
Nodens
The .org TLD lost its Non-profit requirement years ago, so it's a bad example. Such a qualification requirement isn't really useful, anyway. The TLD could be used in ways the registry never intended... Some English words mean something else in other languages, for example... The .club TLD could run country clubs and night clubs, but also golf clubs and TheClub(tm). You don't need to specify a holy purpose for a TLD, only that it's useful for _something_. Why stop with 5 TLDs? By following the instructions at Name.Space you can resolve 550 new ones from .art to .zone. We've been operating them for years.
-- The Funk, The Whole Funk, And Nothing But The Funk
Does that make Verisign a greedy octopus-like corporation?
Here's the c|net story on the Verisign/NSI deal.
Work for Change & GET PAID!
We have the power and the technical expertise to free ourselves, so why not do it?
The Future of Human Evolution: Autonomy
Absolutely! Have a look at Open Root Server Confederation for one example. I have had my local DNS daemon configured to point to ORSC's namespace for a good while, and I have found it to work quite well. Just to add to the fun, my DNS also has .localnet for anything behind my firewall.
I have looked all over the various RFCs and found that the current root DNS servers ARE the root servers only because Jon Postal said so. That was before all of the NetSol/ICANN debacle. As it stands, neither NetSol nor ICANN even own the root servers or the networks they reside on.
The trick to making an alternate root DNS become commonly available is customer demand. If there are 'cool' sites that can only be accessed by the alternate root (or IP address), people will want that tld to resolve. If a less cool but informative site on .org tells them that their ISP can easily make it resolvable, they will pester them to do so. It costs the ISP nothing but a few minutes to do it, so why not?
Perhaps if we had a TLD server for .geek to get things started? Perhaps a colo in the Caribbean
If desired, all .geek sites COULD be mapped by the root server to .geek.org for the 'uncool' people still using the lame ICANN TLDs. :-)
IANL, but couldn't such a server/service maintain that all trademark disputes are a matter between the two parties and that the service will do nothing about it unless/until compelled to do so by court order? Could someone who IS a lawyer comment?
I have also considered a scheme where the records get updated throughe a protocol based on the dining cryptographers problem so that the admin/owners can honestly say they have NO IDEA who registered the domain.
As the other poster who replied said, you're making assumptions: "The Net is nothing but the Web, and the Web is nothing but companies."
A proper URN system will do this properly. Maybe for US people typing in "McDonalds" alone will find the fast food chain, but maybe in the UK it will prompt so you can choose the family group (clan?) instead. A proper system will have to avoid simply creating another monopoly space where only big businesses show up.
By the way, the IETF URN Working Group might help explain some of the issues.
The problem with the catagories that you suggest in addition to the existing top level domains is that there is something of an overlap between the two. I would argue that your .art in most cases would fall under commercial, and in most cases so would your .log... I'd say that the vast majority of news sites are most definately comercial in nature. Frankly I don't think .act differs substatially enough from .org to warrent the distinction... and to be honest, its unlikely that even if there were very distinct groups, its unlikely that you'ld run into much name conflict there.
In reality what you are proposing is some sort of combination between the classifying by the nature of the organization (I wanna make money, I wanna change the world) and the specific thing that they produce (I sell cars, I want to save the whales). This is going to cause a lot of overlaps. Probably what you were heading more towards is classifying things by the topic (ie. news, activism) which would also elimate the .coms and .orgs. This actually looks more like a step back to orginal news hierarchy.
--
--
Point?   None.   Cob!
Is yours a trademark law practice? Will differences be hammered out? Yes, of course. The question, and hence the crisis, is how painful the hammering is going to be. I don't think the current trademark model holds up well in a global net based economy where suddenly everything is local and remote at the same time. Our business practices laws depend on physical separation quite a bit. You can have a lot of A-1 Auto Body businesses without problems when each business is in a different city. Now what happens when all those business start competing over the net? It's going to be a bit ugly for a while. This is one area where new rules are needed to deal with the realities of this new economy.
I don't know, I'm still not overly fond of the idea of having sites that could easily fall in to more than one catagory.
Maybe an alternative would be to have two levels (I know, I know, we wanted this simple, but it still doesn't carry as much useless information as the current country/state/city crap we have in the us). You would have your catch alls as top levels. Then the more the specific things as one level down. Finally people would register domains at the second level. It keeps more information in the site/url (but not too much), gets rid of a number of different conflicts, and doesn't tie your company to a geographic location.
Just a thought.
--
--
Point?   None.   Cob!
Atlas Shrugged is vaguely interesting, though The Fountainhead is a better philosophical work. You have not read the "greatest work of philosophy since Aristotle". Think. Whatever that is, it's almost certainly buried in an obscure library somewhere.
I have seen the future, and it is inconvenient.
_________________
rooooar
This is exactly right.. This is the philosophy of the Name.Space project, which has been operating nameservers (now with 550 emerging TLDs) for 3 years. Point to our nameservers and resolve everything from .art to .zone.. We're taking registrations as well as votes for even more TLDs. Switch to Name.Space's nameservers and route around ICANN and all this beaureaucratic stuff..
-- The Funk, The Whole Funk, And Nothing But The Funk
Assuming you're the same troll as in the other thread (if not disregard), you most definitely need to spend a few more weeks studying Rand's philosophy if you think there's some kind of a problem with pornography. And you need to study some corporate records if you think it isn't economically viable.
I have seen the future, and it is inconvenient.
As a trademark (or other intellectual property) owner, you are required by US and International law to protect your TM/IP, or lose it. The law clearly and firmly places the burden of policing possible infringements on the TM owner.
If they would just start using the TLDs properly, they wouldn't have to do nearly the policing that they do now. If only commercial interests could use .com domains, then Microsoft.org could not possibly be related to the Microsoft Corporation, and would therefore not be infringing on Microsoft's trademark.
As for them passing the burden of guarding trademarks on to the registrars, I have to agree with you that it should be stopped. I think it would (and already does, really) make the current (flawed) registration system quite unfair to the little guys. But again, if they would start using the TLDs correctly, we wouldn't have this problem.
It's not enough to bash in heads, you've got to bash in minds. - Captain Hammer
Is this either a troll, ironic sarcasm, or a very twisted individual.
I think the word you are looking for is 'insightful'.
I mean, at least NSI was utterly inconsistant with their conflict resolution policy. They weren't totally in the pockets of greedy octopus-like corporations. NSI just screwed everyone ;)
Who would have ever thought that one day we'd be cursing the name 'Dyson'?
-- This and all my posts are in the public domain. I am a lawyer. I am not your lawyer, and this is not legal advice.
I just don't see what the complaint against that is. Afterall, we all were happy when Linus was given the Linux(TM) trademark, right? It's just a way for people and companies who are identified with a mark to keep their identification and for them to easily be found.
Addlepated - punk & metal
The terminology we're using is different, but your idea looks basically the same as mine.
.com, .org, or .sum. However, go up a level, and all news sites fit .log and only .log. So slashdot.org and cnnsi.com respectively become slashdot.log and cnnsi.log; they may have different backgrounds but they're both news sites on the second level.
And the problem is, sites will always overlap categories. The idea is to arrange domains in such a manner that at the highest level a site fits into at all, it only fits one of the TLD's. That one TLD becomes the one the site must use.
Let's take news sites. At the lowest level, a given news site might fit into
Call it earning a place at the table before you get to sit down. We would get rid of "Naked Petrified Grits" imbeciles and Stallmanist collectivists by ramping up access costs, and we would get rid of cheap fly-by-night web garbage by seriously increasing the cost of a domain name.
Sheer idiocy.
You are completely ignoring the egalitarian nature of the Internet, which is what made it as popular as it is in the first place.
If anything, the cost of entry is too high, as decent broadband is still expensive and limited in coverage.
New XFMail home page
/bin/tcsh: Try it; you'll like it.
What I'm about to say is heretical, so it'll surely be moderated into oblivion. Oh, well. People have a right to hear the truth anyway, even if they don't like how it sounds.
Yes, we all know the government created the Net. Fine, I'm glad. But so what? If the Internet had not been "exploited" and "taken over" by businesses, it would still be a useless boondoggle. I'm sorry, but there's no justification for spending tax dollars to provide scientific researchers and college undergraduates with alt.flame. As it turns out, the Net could grow into a lot more than that, and we have far-sighted civil servants like Larry Taylor at ARPA in the 1960's (and many others since that time) to thank for keeping it alive until it could pay for itself.
But now it can pay for itself. This boom we're in may have been planted by ARPA, but it was watered and cared for by businesses, and big ones at that. It's them we have to thank for the fact that the Internet is not a useless parasitic drain on public funds. They didn't create the Net, but without them we wouldn't want the Net.
So should they now get special consideration? Should we pause just for a moment and question our compulsion to bite the hand that feeds us? All those who work for a living, raise your hands. Thank you.
Trademark holders go first. You can register www.microsoft.goatse.cx afterwards.
Why should I have to know in which country an organization is based in order to guess their URL? Should we then go down to individual states and provinces? Then instead of the clear, unambiguous slashdot.org, you get the silly slashdot.org.somestate.us. And what if they move? I'm rambling now, but my point is that the internet has the potential to seperate us from awkward physical boundaries, and you are advocating adopting those same boundaries.
Much preferrable would be your first suggestion -- a name heirarchy based on purpose or industry of the registering entity.
--Chouser
--Chouser
"To stay young requires unceasing cultivation of the ability to unlearn old falsehoods." -LL
"I have to hand it to you, the idea of Auto Body "I have to hand it to you, the idea of Auto BodyShops competeing on the Internet is rather amusing to visualize." Thank you. I envision a model whereby you email a jpeg of your damaged car, and the shop sends the jpeg back showing the repairs they would make and how well they would restore your car. Seriously, I realize that auto body shops are not the best example, but I couldn't think of another business with a common name like that on the spot. And a quick check of Yahoo! shows that there are a number of body shops with web sites. It's tought to be absurd in this market.
This sounds like a good idea..
-- The Funk, The Whole Funk, And Nothing But The Funk
Yeah, I agree with that. They don't have any real "American citizen", "European citizen", etc. channels set up for selecting the non-pre-selected members. I agree with the critics that it does allow for special interests (i.e., people who provide ICANN with funding) to try to unduly affect the selection process.
You can trust me. I'm with the government.
First of all, thanks for your input.
.ca, .to, .tv, whatever. I don't think these domains are hotly contested over like .com, .net, and .org - and these are completely controlled by the US as far as I know. Perhaps there's more leverage there. I do agree that it's to the registrars' advantage to have people registering hundreds of domains for no good reason though.
What would probably happen is that it would just be driven underground more
I thought of this, and perhaps it was naive of me to think that most companies would not feel comfortable offering under-the-table bribes to people for their domains. Even so, a policy could be created (not a law) that forces a domain holder to give up the domain as soon as they offer to do so in exchange for money. A company could then go to ICANN and say that the person attempted to sell them the domain, and presto, no more domain ownership (and perhaps no refund either). This causes a problem with false accusations though, which means that more complicated rules are needed to prevent this from happening. Basically to defend from an accusation like this would mean that you could not get rid of your domain (to do so would be to admit guilt).
Alternatively, it could be made a point of policy not to award domains to entities who paid for their release from scalpers. This would mean that companies could not buy domains from people and the trade would dry up. While fly-by-night domain scalpers don't care about under-the-table deals being hidden from view, don't companies have to make their accounts public to some degree? Here's my naivete again, I have no idea.
These arguments are based on the assumption that companies wouldn't want a back-room deal to smear their public image and that the risk of doing so would keep them from doing truly shady deals for a domain. Of course, having some law passed might make this easier, just like ticket scalping.
I suppose that where they do control who the registrars are, that they could "blacklist" non-compliant registrars.
True, they don't control all the geographical domains like
The Signal/Noise ratio can be improved in two ways. Remaining silent is the OTHER way.
I figured you had some personal vested interest. Not that I'm saying there's anything wrong with that...but I dunno, I could just tell.
.co.uk address if the US company doesn't have to attach .co.us? Does the fact that the US invented the internet give it the right to buly the rest of the world? Do the same rights apply for smaller companies colliding with bigger ones, just because of the US dominance? This isn't fraud, my friend.
Anyway, that aside...the way this whole thing is new was something you just glossed over...this is a new realm. Business and personal stuff are intermingled...trademarks for a strictly business world don't apply. This new world does away with old borders, as well...who's entitled to IBM.com, if some guy in Japan registers it first for his company? Treat the net as if it were a new country, because that's basically what it is...in the new country, trademarks go to whoever gets there first.
I guarantee that someone with a legitimately large business would yell til he's red in the face at you if you told him he had to give up rights to his domain name because it was stealing legitimate business from a bigger company. I'm positive he's not going to view his taking a domain name that incorporates a "contested" name as stealing their business...won't they be stealing HIS business if it were the oter way around?
There's only one real way to settle this for right now...until all the other TLD's are handed out...and if the current proposed system is enacted...it won't actually solve ANYTHING. The only way is to let whoever gets there first with a legit interest gets it first. Other people should then have the rights to search engine rights to properly direct people to their sites, and a link on the "offending" page.
You haven't answered why this is fraud if ther are international cases with involve simlar names. Why should a UK company get strapped with a
Netjak.com independent reviews of domestic & import video ga
Since you didn't clarify, I'll assume this is part of the alien joke.
[Me:] If people want to create and read Web pages, the system would adjust to accommodate them, distributing its load as needed.
[You:] That sounds like a free market to me. But who pays for it? The taxpayers, I suppose. If these services you so much enjoy were really worth having, wouldn't people have paid for them willingly? Of course they would. But they didn't. Government picked up the tab. Had they not, the Internet never would have been born because it offered nothing of value to anybody capable of paying his own way.
You're trying to predict a priori what the Internet was like from a set of theories, but your conclusions don't match the reality of what it was. Therefore, either your theories or your logical framework is flawed.
In this case, you're relying on a basic flaw of many free market arguments-- the notion that if a product is worth something, people will pay money for it. However, there are many counterexamples. Are you saying that food is worthless to a starving man if he can't pay for it? You allude to this with your phrase "to anybody capable of paying his own way". But the repugnant conclusion is the idea that only the well-being of moneyed people matters. Few people truly consciously believe this; do you?
Regarding the Internet then, it was worth a great deal to students, but how many students could have afforded to pay for the infrastructure? There's such a thing as investment in a society's future. Many of the "no tax" crowd don't seem to realize this. (They also don't seem to notice the benefits they themselves have reaped from various tax-funded projects, but that's a bigger topic.)
Another totally different counterexample: Loving physical intimacy (including sex) is worth a lot, but how can you pay money for it? Some things by their nature can't be bought and don't fit into the free market framework.
Another flaw in your argument is that people would have paid for all this, except the framework was already in place so they didn't have to. And in fact, they pay today with their ISP bill. And they were doing so for years before the Net was overrun with businesses.
Note that there was a huge active network of BBS's for years, complete with image-oriented pages, that had functions similar to the Internet. It was operated and funded entirely by the individuals involved.
Ha! Who are you trying to kid? Corporations are the biggest welfare recipients in the country! They're always looking for a handout. Unfair taxation? What the hell are you talking about? We're all subject to arbitrary and irresponsible taxation. What makes them so special that they should be above it? They aren't hoping for a small return. They wouldn't be in the internet business if they were hoping for a small return. They want to achieve monopoly status and consumer lock-in. That's where the big bucks are. That's what corporations shoot for. They don't like competition. They don't make astronomical profits when competition exists. The system wasn't set up to give corporations full reign to do as they please in this country. It was set up to benefit the people as a whole. Where the interests of the general population conflict with that of corporations, the interests of the general population should prevail.
It's not enough to bash in heads, you've got to bash in minds. - Captain Hammer
Two companies - one called ATI, the other called ATI.
Who gets ATI.com?
If ATItech wanted it, they should have gotten it first. Some other ATI beat them to it.
No crime.
So would it be slashdot.log or slashdot.act ??
What makes you think that new TLDs would be complicated? They would simplify a lot of things.
now we need to go OSS in diesel cars
To put it simply, there exists no universal namespace in human conversation. All names are qualified to some degree. We need a domain naming system to address this fact. A hierarchical namespace may or may not be the answer. But a global namespace is most definitely not the answer.
Actually, the problem is that domains have not been delegated properly.
.coms and .orgs which describe what kind of business and organisations we're dealing with. A new set of top level domains isn't going to help.
There should be a set of subdomains under the
ie.
sun.os-vendors.software.com
microsoft.os-vendors.software.com
microsoft.productivi.software.com
Linux.os.free.software.org
*.telecoms.electronics.com
etc etc
The client software then hides the various domains from the user.
The existing flat structures are completely fucked up. I bet they'll fuck up any new structures as well.
Deleted
Maybe for US people typing in "McDonalds" alone will find the fast food chain, but maybe in the UK it will prompt so you can choose the family group (clan?) instead
I'm off topic, but you must be kidding: McDonalds the hamburger chain has thoroughly colonised the UK (where I live) as well as every other country that I've been to.
And ironically, as a Scot I'm sad to say that there is probably more interest in Scottish family history on your side of the pond (among the numerous descendants of the victims of the Highland Clearances, and homesick expat Scottish engineers in S.V. too) than there is on mine. If homebound Scots these days gave a toss about their cultural identity they'd have seceded from the UK years ago.
Consciousness is not what it thinks it is
Thought exists only as an abstraction
Ditch the country codes. All of them. The whole point of the Net is that physical location isn't supposed to matter.
.AU domains have different legal restrictions than do .DE and .US ones.
We can ditch country codes exactly when "countries" become obsolete--when the governments that define those countries stop trying to pass different laws governing how things work.
"If one is really a superior person, the fact is likely to leak out without too much assistance" -- John Andrew Holmes
Hmmm - if what you (and others) are saying should happen happens, prolly 90% of the links in http://roadlinks.cjb.net would die :( Now you tell me those are evil websites that shouldn't be up.
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=%E5%8D%8D&bt
Another totally different counterexample: Loving physical intimacy (including sex) is worth a lot, but how can you pay money for it? Some things by their nature can't be bought and don't fit into the free market framework. Hey hey hey! Who says you can't buy sex!
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=%E5%8D%8D&bt
If we were to go back about 5 years, the discussions on a forum such as Slashdot would have meant something. As a forum of computer literate people, our opinions would be accounted for in the decision on domain name issues, because as a group we are fairly qualified to help in the process. I've read much of this topic, and there are many good ideas on how domain name issues should be handled. What pisses me off is that none of the good ideas on this topic count for jack.
I guess that's what annoys me so much about the current domain name problem. I don't feel like I can make one bit of difference in the solution. It's now up to the government and business.
This stinks.
--Frog
I agree with you except I feel it can be made simpler than that. You should simply be able to type United Airlines and go the the United Airlines website or United Truck Movers or something. If you simply entered United, it would return to you a page with a list of possible companies you might be looking for. And THIS should be the default behavior for all web-browsers when you enter stuff into the Address line (I won't call it the URL line anymore)
IE has something they call "Internet Keywords" which seems like a step in the right direction here.
Mmmm.. Donuts
An Indirect Election Discourages and Disenfranchises Voters - The two-tier membership structure currently proposed - where a public electorate votes for members of an At-Large Council which in turn elects the At-Large Directors of ICANN's Board.... Critics bitterly complain that such a system disenfranchises members, and provides little incentive to vote and little on which to campaign.
Tell that to the Federal Election Committee.
The US Presidency has been elected the same way for all of its history. And according to Britannica:
Although the Constitution still allows electors to use their discretion, electors now are usually pledged to support a party's candidate.
I haven't heard people complaining about that.
Terrorists can attack freedom, but only Congress can destroy it.
Pornography is completely moral and rational, as opposed to socialism or subjectivism. Even so-called "geniuses" like Einstein screw up. Relativity! Ha! It's got "relative" built right in. Can't be objective, must be wrong.
Next, please?
---
Ayn
> ...public "education" (which isn't even education in any meaningful sense)...
Get serious! Where did you learn to read? OK, there's a slim chance that you learned at home, before you went to school (well, I did) but if so, where did you learn basic arithmetic and algebra? I'll bet your old Grandma didn't teach you trigonometry. Maybe you think teaching algebra isn't "education in any meaningful sense," in which case I've got to ask you, what is meaningful, anyway?
And it's obviously true that your public school didn't teach you any economics or politics or history, or else you wouldn't have posted what you did, but ultimately that really isn't the public school system's fault. The disgraceful utter lack of public knowledge in these fields is a result of political pressure from above - we certainly wouldn't want to conjure up the spectre of old Karl Marx anywhere within five hundred feet of the schoolyard, now would we?
Yours WDK - WKiernan@concentric.net
> Pay as you go. Any other arrangement is theft.
More Randite nonsense. Sounds as thrilling and makes as little sense as the lyrics on a heavy metal album. I hope you never have any children, or if you do that you have thought these issues out a little bit more thoroughly by then. Because, see, your two-week-old infant can't "pay as he goes." He's, like, too young to get a job, get it?
By the way, if Americans had adopted your attitude in, say, 1941, then today you and I would both know all the lyrics to the "Horst Wessel Lied" by heart.
Yours WDK - WKiernan@concentric.net
If wealthy creators do the best work, we'd all benefit by filtering out the trash at the bottom of the heap.
Too bad the best work is often done by high school and college kids with no money who don't even know sombody who knows sombody who can name a single VC. Then there's the distinct possability that some worthy ideas are anathema to VC's by nature. For example who would fund a site warning about an unprofessional VC who ripped a person for all they were worth?
Consider this site! It did not exactly start out as a multi-million dollar investment. Part of the real power and usefulness is that anybody can have their say here for a very modest fee.
Lazy people will be too lazy to get their site set up and bring it to your attention. Useless people reveal their uselessness quickly enough to not be a problem.
Now, you're probably asking, "where did
It doesn't have to stop there, of course. Consider my original idea of
The idea is that
I own a couple of .com's. I also own the .org and .net of each one.
So which is it? You're a commercial group, a network provider, or a non-profit organization? All three?
Now I'm going to have to buy more TLD's to avoid cybersquatters?
[...]
Where are the TLD police? Can't they troll the internet for misused TLD's?
I'm not attacking you personally, but I love the irony of this.
Turn on, log in, burn out...
Bah. Then .NET's are a subset of .COM's. All the commercial interests out there are a .COM, but if it happens to be a network-providing commercial interest, it gets a .NET.
And if .SHOP gets ratified, that could be treated the same way. Are you a commerical interest with an online store? Then we've got something more specialized for you than the boring old .COM you were looking at.
The proposed .ARTS could be treated the same way as a subset of .ORG.
Seems like a no-brainer to me.
Masem is right, though. The true TLD's should be the country codes. Let individual countries deal with their own trademark laws in their own fashion. Dumping the whole world in one big pool for the .COM addresses has only made the problem that much worse.
Constitutionally Correct
The argument that others have made that I haven't seen directly addressed yet is what happens when two companies or individuals both have valid trademark claims. I don't know what businesses your pseudonymous Fooco and Fooco inc. are in, and you haven't actually made it clear if they have a trademark on their company name. These are pretty important bits of information. If your companies aren't in competition (some of the tone of your story indicates that you might be, but I can't assume that), then, as I understand trademark law, it's perfectly acceptable for them to be called Fooco inc. I think the only exceptions to that are if your company happens to be heavily established and very well known. That is to say that startup companies International Ballista Makers and Irma's Boutique for Marriages wouldn't be able to trademark IBM, although they would be able to if International Business Machines were a five year old company operating only in one state. This so partly because IBM is so well known that the standard claim that the other companies are taking a free ride on IBM's fame would actually have some validity in this case, although how that would hurt IBM in any way I have no idea. The other obvious reason is that IBM has a zillion lawyers (Note: slight exaggeration, I'm not actually trying to claim that IBM actually has ... how much is a Zillion anyway?) whose job is to protect the IBM trademark and who do so zealously, even when it isn't really what the courts would normally consider infringement.
Anyway, I'm sure nothing I've written is news to you, but it's important to be clear on this point: multiple individuals (companies are legally people in most ways) can own a trademark on the same arrangement of latin characters (Logos are outside the scope of this discussion). By definition, all domain names are unique. It doesn't take a genius to spot the obvious problem with trying to apply the trademark laws to that. Add to that the fact that, even though companies do have as much of a right to be on the internet as the rest of us, the rest of us also have as much of a right to be on the internet as companies. In other words, the internet and the WWW are not exclusively commercial media. In Real Life (TM and Pat. Pending) companies can't get away with telling people that their names interfere with their trademark. You could even, in theory, name your child IBM and I don't think they could legally touch you (I'm not aware of any actual legal precedent on this one, does anyone know if a case like this has ever been tried?) There might be a bit of a problem, however, if this child grows up and then tries to start a company with his/her own name; especially a computer company. More realistically, Colgate-Palmolive couldn't sue anyone for naming their child Ajax, since it is a person's name, with thousands of years of prior use. Colgate-Palmolive's lawyers did, however, try to force ajax.org to give up their domain name. Ajax.org, of course, has nothing to do with cleaning products. They don't have a trademark, but they have no reason to need one. And, who can forget the attempt by the makers of Archie comics to shut down Veronica.org. Obviously trying to enforce trademark on url's doesn't work very well. The legal basis for it is a little fuzzy also. People are allowed to use trademarks in spoken and written language, what isn't allowed is use of someone elses trademark to misrepresent your relationship with that company. So, you can't try to pretend that you are that company, that you have a relationship with that company, that they endorse you in some way, or try to use their fame to steer people to your own goods and services. The reason given for why companies often go well out of bounds and go after those who aren't really infringing is that if they don't defend their trademark, they could lose it. In other words, it's a big gray area, but it gives the lawyers something to do to justify their jobs.
As you can see, I think the whole thing is ridiculous. Trademark laws have no place in domain names. Obviously though, something has to be done.
This is really a technology problem: a new technology has arisen and people are trying to apply law that was never designed with such things in mind to it. The solution should not be via the law or new policies, it should be technological. I remember when I first heard about the company that was offering a single keyword internet address system. I thought it was a stupid idea. I still think the idea of a single company implementing it is a stupid idea, and there are obvious huge flaws in the idea of trying to create an internet where all adresses can be mapped to single words. On the other hand, I think a similar idea might be the solution to the current problem. Not using keywords, but company or product names. There could be a registration process with stringent criteria so that no registered company would be misrepresenting itself in any way with its name. In the case of multiple ip addresses mapped to the same name, the browser could present the user with a list of available sites, perhaps accompanied with small abstracts and company logo, etc. It shouldn't be too hard to build that into future web browsers.
It would be a bit like using a search engine to try to find a companies address, but simpler. I've tried to find the websites of companies that don't fit into the www.foo.com pattern before using search engines, and it can be done, and it usually doesn't take more than ten minutes, but it really should not be a research project. Lots of search engines will arrange things so that if someone is searching using a companies name then their web page will come up early in the listings, but they usually demand money from the company to do this. Even with a stiff registration fee, having this sort of thing done at one central location will save a company a lot of money over paying every search engine.
If this was implemented, then all of the arguments against people using trademarked words in their addresses would lose any validity. So, instead of forcing everyone who uses the internet playground to play by the rules of a small group, give them a sandbox that's still part of the playground, but set aside just for them. Those are my thoughts anyway.
> Those. Days. Are. Over. Face it. Look it in the eye. Get used to it.
No. They're. Not.
> We have no need to maintain a vast archive of irrational political
> nonsense, virus-infested "free" software, and pornography.
"We"? Who the fuck are you, you loser troll, and who the fuck are the "we" you claim to be part of? Who appointed you dictator?
Actually that was harsh and uncalled-for. You aren't a "loser troll," actually you are quite a successful troll, and you've done a fine trollish job. Two thumbs up! Up where, I'll discreetly decline to specify.
Yours WDK - WKiernan@concentric.net
We'll compare the two: The Slim Corporation creates wealth and jobs. Mr. Slim wants to post pictures of his fat girlfriend.
By that logic, if K-mart wants the land your house is on, you should have 2 weeks to get out.
So your solution is to destroy the happiness (and possibly livelihood) of millions of artists and intellectuals who have places online, just because you're too lazy to use a search engine or link page properly? The net is so big by nature that the clutter of personal pages and low-end users is not doing any damage other then to those inflexible minds who can't take Natalie Portman jokes in stride. What of the spammers and porn sites? They've got money, they're getting rich. You would leave an internet of nothing but that and corporate pages. Not a good future. A personal friend of mine has managed to acquire one of the few 4 letter .com's left, out of his own money, and he's quite happy with the current state of the internet. No one else was using it, so why shouldn't he?
Then you're making the same bad assumption that others who are coming up with these policies are making: The Net is nothing but the Web, and the Web is nothing but companies.
.@.
Unless the domain names allow for the type of detail necessary to distinguish between trademark uses -- is this domain for a company that sells detergent or operating systems? -- it will continue to completely undermine the very notion that trademarks are assigned for specific uses and don't automatically remove normal words from everyday language. Nevermind complications from considering multiple languages
What is to be done about various international trademark disputes? In some countries, "aspirin" is a trademark owned by Bayer Aspirin, but not in the US where it's considered the generic name for acetylsalicylic acid. Is it just that US policy will continue to dictate how the internet functions on a global basis?
"If one is really a superior person, the fact is likely to leak out without too much assistance" -- John Andrew Holmes
Or is that too obvious.
Working for the (other) man
I have no problem with this... at least it will slow down these name hogs who call themselves "brokers" and then try to scam everyone. Trademarks and Corporate names should be protected they are the ones who have gone to all the hard work to make the name not some "broker". Just my two cents...
Nathaniel P. Wilkerson
NPS Internet Solutions, LLC
www.npsis.com
Nathaniel P. Wilkerson
www.haidacarver.com
Indeed, secondary-level domains can be fun as well. I approve of something like ".co, .ac/.edu, .gov, .net" or variants on a theme; only if there's a whole category of things that are missing should it be added under the country level. Incidentally, if you're in .ca, how come there's a www.worldvisions.ca ? .co.uk people who aren't companies.
Maybe a ".home.uk" would be fun, though, if only to clear out all the
~Tim
--
Rushing on down to the circle of the turn
I think that in most cases, there will be much of a conflict.
If it's a small company vs a large company, the small company will get squashed in an instant.
If it's a high profile non-profit vs large company, then the we may end up with etoy/etoys
fight.
The most interesting one where there will cause a crisus, or at least alot of lawyers getting rich,
will be large company vs large company - although I expect we will only see a few of these battles.
"The best part? I became an ordained minister while not wearing pants." -- CleverNickName
Make them work. Because geography really does matter.
An organization should not be able to register in a global top lovel domain unless they have full time employees (in the case of for-profit) or members in at least 3 countries.
Companies will be permited to have domains in other country domains but only if they have full time employees there.
Set up a personal domain in each country. It makes no sense to have personal domains in international domains. (Unless you can find someone who is a citizen of 3 countries)
Within the US, require registration in a state 2ld unless the company has full time employees in 3 or more states. Since people are much more mobile than compies, I would not restrict personal domains in this way.
Now geography isn't everything and the above won't resolve every conflict, but it will reduce the conflicts. "Type" classification can also be overlayed. There would, for example, be a "restuarants" domain at the root, the us domain, and the ca.us domain.
So if two different companies hold a similar trademark, who will get the new domain? Probably the bigger company.
Something similar is available in the UK, where the .ltd.uk and .plc.uk domains are there so companies can guarantee that their unique name is available. My company is "Litebase Solutions Ltd.", so I can always get litebase-solutions.ltd.uk if I want it. Very few companies make use of this provision.
I think the only way for it to work is if some sort of trademark treaty recognises the problem, and allows a few TLDs to be "trademark-free", so that any trademark disputes are thrown out immediately. ICANN, being a tool of the US government, are NEVER going to represent the global commercial and non-commercial population fairly. The UN are probably the only ones that can. However, the likelyhood of any of this actually happening is pretty much zero.
The thing that worries me most about this is an email I received this morning from my lawyers, which I'll quote:
.Com .COM, .EDU, and .ORG top level domains registered. Although the Decision
------------------- begin quote -----------------
US SEIZES JURISDICTION OVER DOT.COM COMPANIES
Mere registration of top level domain sufficient
US companies able to seize worldwide registrations
US trademark owners able to have domain names of others expropriated
Over the last few years we have commented on Internet cases from around the world which
we believe would be of interest to UK businesses and others. For some readers these
cases may have been more relevant than others. Today however we report on a decision of
the District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia which has perhaps the furthest
reaching implications for worldwide internet governance.
In its Decision of Friday 5th March 2000, Caesars World, Inc -v- Caesars-Palace
and others (Civil Action No 99-550-A), Judge Albert Bryan effectively decreed that his
court would be the arbiter of the property rights in respect of all the approx.
7,000,000
dealt solely with the motions of two of the defendants to dismiss an action for lack of
jurisdiction, the effect of the Decision is to open the floodgate to litigation by
holders of US trademarks against domain name proprietors based outwith the US (or at
least outwith Virginia.
-------------------- end quote ------------------
Now, it may have escaped your attention in America, but the Internet is international; it has been international since Arpanet was linked to Janet in the early eighties. When we set up ICANN (I say 'we' - I was convenor of one of the Geneva sessions of the working party which led to the setting up of ICANN) it was precisely to prevent this sort of thing from happening.
The only possible consequence of this sort of nonsense is that the domain name service will collapse; courts and politicians in Europe (and, I imagine, in Japan) are not going to like being told that American trade-mark owners have first claim on an international resource. Either the Virginia court is persuaded to see sense, or we'd better get on with developing a replacement for the Domain Name System.
I'm old enough to remember when discussions on Slashdot were well informed.
where there are multiple trademarks on a word or phrase, such as in different industries. (For example, who gets 'linux': Linus or the European laundry soap co.?)
-mark
-mark
If your computer says LINUX, run...computers can't talk! [unless you have text-speech software]
I have questions about the At Large Membership of ICANN.
I have gone to the ICANN site and filled in the form and all that to join the "At Large Membership" thingy.
After I hit that "submit" button, the site told me to wait for a confirmation email (which I got) and a "PIN" number via snail mail (which I am still waiting, already 3 weeks !).
Does any of you received the "PIN" number via snail mail yet?
I wonder if this whole thing isn't a sham after all.
Muchas Gracias, Señor Edward Snowden !
In 1996 (sorry, I've got old information) the USA spent almost $170 Billion on Aid for Dependant Corporations. The same year, they spent $50 billion on all social programs combined. What little of the "arbitrary and irresponsible taxation" they payed went back into their own pockets anyways. Besides that, what taxation are you talking about? Reagan and Bush? Oh, yah, they were such socialists. Corporates have dictated government policy for at least the past decade and a half, and I only draw the line there because I'm not old enough to remember back further. They're getting a return on their investment. They've gone beyond a simple lust for money, now their fighting for power; they want to control the internet, not just cash in.
The only way a clean name space will arise is if there are actual humans looking at each application and rejecting registrations that don't make sense. Without controls, people will do their worst, if not because of beligerance or ignorance then through self defense.
.gov, .mil, some of the country domains) They work because they have people to look at registrations and throw many into the trash.
We now have a pathetically simple set of domains and even this classification system has been completely trashed. There isn't a chance for a more complex system to work without humans manageing the process.
Right now the only domains that "work" are the ones actively managed (.edu,
Having people look at registratoins will be expensive. There's no way around that. But, frankly, I don't this is a real problem. Domain name allocations are permanent. That's an expensive charge against the future. There's no particular reason why it should be monitarily cheap now.
IMO, DNS should be depreceated in favour of new, more intelligent protocols. Just like linux, these should be adopted by the open-source community because it is technically superior and simply makes more sense (tm). Adopt them, and the rest of the world will follow.
The globalization of the economy vai the net is going to create a huge trademark furball. Until recently, someone in Italy and someone in Ventura, California didn't have to worry if their product names were similar. Those two product markets were so distinct that it didn't matter. As we break down the barriers between markets through the net, conflicts that didn't used to exist are going to crop up. For example, let's say there is a small company in Vermont selling a product locally under a given name. There is a company in Texas selling something else under the same or a similar name. Both companies have been using the name for 30 years. Both start selling over the net, creating confusion. Now what happens? Obviously, the same can happen with two large companies from different countries. Trademark law was not really designed to handle these situations in an elegant manner.
Jeez, allowing reserved trademarks is fair. Allowing unlimited so-called "vanity" (personal use) domain names is also fair. Quit arguing!
.VIP or something similar and have it reserved exclusively for non-commmercial and non-organizational use.
The solution is to just petition for a TLD that is reserved ONLY for vanity domain names.
Call it
That should make everybody happy.
Tangochaz
--------------------
"It's not enough to be on the right track -- you have to be moving faster than the train."
-- Rod Davis, Editor of Seahorse Magazine
TangoChaz
"It's not enough to be on the right track -- you have to be moving faster than the train." -- Rod Davis, Editor of Seahorse Mag.
TangoChaz
--------------------
Wise men talk because they have something to say, fools because the
We get all riled up when someone squats on, say, openssh, but we feel its our right and privilidge to be able to grab www.microsoft.sucks.
The whole point of trademarks is that companies can have some control over how their name is used. Am I the only one who notices a double standard?
ICQ: 49636524
snowphoton@mindspring.com
Got Rhinos?
One thing I've noticed a lot lately on Slashdot is the use of acronyms that, unless you're involved in the issues at hand, are a complete mystery. Can someone please elaborate on what a TLD is?
Anonymous Coward on 06:37 PM March 7th, 2000 EST (#199)writes:
"Wealth and jobs are necessary and healthy. Anything that tends to create wealth and jobs is, by definition, necessary and healthy."
In New Jersey, It's been a practise by some to create wealth by poisoning the water supply of community that surrounds you in order to pick up the compeititive advantage of not putting in pollution controls. It was probably considerably healthy for someone's bank balance, but the resulting cancer spikes and other ailments might cause some to question your definition of healthy.
Network Solutions gets a lot of the credit for this trend. If you register a .com name, whether or not you were successful, they'd push the .org and .net versions on you as well, as suggested click options.
The Icann voting process would allow any user who was/is over the age of 16,(Yeah like that can be proved on-line) international election of the special council, then they appoint their on chioces on 9 more members to the board. The other nine will be representing commercial interests only. Follow the money to get to the root of the policy, the whole thing is geared toward big business who can afford to lobby their representetive to the council to push their agenda. The meeting in Cairo will be more of the same. ICANN has members.icann.org (too lazy to link) which is set up for non commercial interests to voice their opinions. I don't beleive this weill get any attention at all, more a pr move than anything else.
More race stuff in one place,
than any one place on the net.
Basically, I don't think there's enuf evidence that the current TLDs are broke to justify "fixing" them.
"It is a foolish contstituency that is the hobgoblin of little mimes."
...The point is to guarantee access to names that are clearly in the public perception. ...
That is hardly a problem, people can register, first come first serve.
You seem to be contradicting yourself... by having first-come first-served in the trademark domain, you'd be having Microsoft Pantyliners Inc. registering microsoft.tm before Microsoft Corporation -- no guarantee of access to names. It's just making the fight happen in a different set of people. Also, this still doesn't address international trademarking. To guarantee availability, you'd need country codes and trademark classes: like foobar.36.tm.us. At this point, the desirability of the names decreases to the point that no-one's going to bother with them -- pretty much the way no-one really bothers with ".us"
Network Solutions suggested a scheme where domain names take six months to register, and in the meantime you can have a randomly-generated domain name, like jozyxqk.com. Big frigging deal!
So, we have the option to "get the governments of the world out of the problem": the thing is, trademarks are pervasive. If you have *any* publically-accessible resource/product, it is subject to trademark law. The problem with DNS isn't that ICANN or NSI suck -- it's that the common-sense policy of "first-come-first-served" doesn't work in a court of law. Trademark law overrides it. The TM holder doesn't have to sign an agreement abiding to the FCFS rule before they file their lawsuit. The only way for your libertarian approach to work is if you could enforce an amnesty within the .tm space. At that point, why not enforce the amnesty on the entire DNS system, and go back to FCFS with no legal recourse? You can't.. not unless you get every (present and future) trademark holder to sign up to that (no chance!)
If ICANN is removed, EVERYONE will end up in the courts. The US courts, most likely, cocking up any chance of fairness when an international party is involved.
By far and away the best solution is to hide URLs, and use an integrated search engine of some sort: how about a system like Google? Microsoft are inherently protected since they're the people that most pages link to. The pantyliners company don't get a word in, and they have absolutely no legal recourse. It also has the added bonus of ditching both "Where it is" addressing (URLs) and "What it is" addressing (supposedly the nicest way of addressing). It uses "What people think of it" addressing, which is a boon to designers of proxy caches!
Another alternative is to scrap the existing GTLDs, and then replace them with new ones with $1,000,000 p.a. pricetags on each domain, thereby forcing all but big multinationals into the country code domains. (Multinationals can fight it out for themselves) Once that's done, let each country devise trademarking schemes most appropriate to their own laws. It wouldn't solve it, but it may help.
[Incidentally, you mention that it's amazing the public accepts URLs. Why? They accept phone numbers!]
Oh, RealNames sucks ass too... things like that don't get around the trademark protection issue -- they just delay it.
In regards your aliasing idea: I guess that's what bookmarks are for.
giving trademark holders first dibs is fine. the better answer is making the domains arbitrary. let's say microsoft get dibs on microsoft.xxx and microsoft.pub and microsoft.sucks...big deal. for the internet's end users (which is ~all~ of us) it's no big deal to get what either the big companies missed (for the squatter in you). keeping 'domains' together still works (support.microsoft.xxx and youthink.microsoft.sucks).
.com's are rerouted without incident. maybe i'm rambling; maybe i'm tired; maybe i'm on the wrong page, but that really seems immediately feasible.
without violating these rules, NSI could still profit from arbitrary names without domain limitations like bill.gates.my.hero, which does ~not~ include license or rights to cmdr.taco.my.hero. NSI makes money; people can choose names better than 1eye41eye.org; trademark holders are happy and i can get the name idiot.freak if i want. name servers need almost no reconfigs or upgrades for this to happen, pop mail services would have to be set up for the exact name, but most
neopets.com
1. If the Internet had not been "exploited" and "taken over" by businesses, it would still be a useless boondoggle.
Really? And all the scientific dialog, the ability for university research programs to communicate quickly and effectively - do I even need to go on? - a "useless boondoggle?" Hm. I expect the creation of alt.flame was probably one of the points at which people realized the 'Net had a lot more potential than simply exchanging research data.
2. They didn't create the Net, but without them we wouldn't want the Net.
You are so wrong. We could still be using it to develop open source software, host useless web pages, and pour nice hot bowls of grits down your pants. Come on, now.
3. Here's an interesting question: if I decide that I want to name the street I'm developing something like "Apple Street," should Apple be able to stop me? No. Because while Apple(TM) may be a trademark, apple (or even Apple) is not. Isn't that roughly analagous to this situation? Think about the implications of businesses with plain-language names getting involved here. There are many. There are also many businesses names that are common last names. What if mister Slim buys Slim.ert before the diet company does? is there a problem with that?
nope.
[|]
If you get rid of the country codes, how are you going to distinguish between the governments of all the countries, since they`ll all come under .gov? At the moment I can go to .gov.uk and get the UK government; I assume that under your proposals I`d go to .uk.gov. What`s the difference? (And why, for that matter, don`t I go to .gov.us to get the US government? Surely .gov, being international, should belong to something like the United Nations?)
Of course, one asks how do internation rules come into play. For that, we need to force the use of country codes, then have each country decide the usage of the TLD within that country code. If you are looking for megacorp.com, the browser should be smart enough to start at www.megacorp.com.us if you are in the States, or www.megacorp.co.uk if in britian or so on. Thus, the *true* TLDs are the country codes, then each country can set it's own restrictions, so that the definition of a US non-profit organization does not play into how the UK might decide who gets org.uk domains.
But it all falls down to teaching the public and businesses that those TLDs *are* important in distiquishing between commercial and non-commercial interests. Commercial companies should have absolutely no reason to grab an .org name, and should be prevented from doing so. Thus, trademark dilution due to domain names in a unappropriate TLD become null and void; the TLD indicates that the word is not associated with the commercial business. (Mind you, if the content on the page is libel, that's something different).
Alas, the days when URLs were meant to be invisible to the non-proficent user are long gone.
"Pinky, you've left the lens cap of your mind on again." - P&TB
"I can see my house from here!" - ST:
I go to namespace.ORG, and right in the center of the page is an advertisement, from "Name.Space" for domain registration for $69.95.
Just because they charge money doesn`t mean they`re necessarily for-profit. For all you know, they`re charging the minimum necessary to cover their costs. And since they`re fighting a legal battle at the moment against Network Solutions, they probably need all the money they can get.
Here`s another point. At the moment, most people looking for a business either know the URL from advertisements or use search engines. Why should this change when we have new TLDs? So why should more choices be a problem?
pgMedia, Inc. (PGMEDIA2-DOM
11 e 4 st
new york, NY 10003
US
Nowhere did i find any mention of a non-profit "cause," or any charities they contribute to. It looks exactly like a 100% for-profit business. If you have some evidence to the contrary, please cite it.
Several months ago, i read a bit of their suit. PgMedia, Inc. is fighting a legal battle because they *chose* to sue Network Solutions, Inc. (NSI) and the National Science Foundation. (Not the other way around.)
I don't like NSI, because i think they do a sucky job, and i'm very happy to see other registrars setting up. But i think that pgMedia, Inc. sued so that they could make money by selling a virtually unlimited range of TLDs. I have not seen any evidence that pgMedia, Inc. attempted to establish a new standard for TLDs for everyone's benefit, or that they attempted to build a coalition of ISPs and potential registrars to bring pressure to bear on NSI and NSF to allow *everyone* to register TLDs.
So my conclusion is that their ultimate goal in suing NSI and NSF was to further their business goal of being the preeminent (perhaps sole?) vendor of the new TLDs, not the greater good of the 'Net.
Your second point does not seem very compelling. You are arguing that a business' domainname is irrelevant because, "most people looking for a business either know the URL from advertisements or use search engines."
The same argument is at least as persuasive, against needing any more TLDs. Let me give you an example of this:
Someone is looking for the website of a company named "AAA, Inc." What you are saying is that people either
1) Saw the company's URL ("http://www.tripleAinc.com") on TV and already know what it is.
or
2) They use a search engine to find it. If there are so hundreds of TLDs,people will still not think it's worthwhile to make a guess at the URL, and so they will rely on TV ads or search engines.
So if more TLDs does not make it any easier for people to find the entities they are searching for, why should we add them? In a world-wide name-space like the Internet, the "desirable" (readily apparent) TLDs are going to fill up immediately, and all the businesses that currently have to compromise and put something unintuitive in front of ".com" will wind up putting the same unintuitive text in front of ".biz" or ".food." Or, they will be coming up with unintuitive TLDs like "AAA.FoodsofDelware".
The example of pgMedia, Inc. choosing an *improper* TLD demonstrates that there will always be some entities that insist on getting "whatevertheywant"."whatevertheycan" .
The fact of the matter remains that pgMedia, Inc. registered "namespace.org" after someone else registered "namespace.com." In a future with virtually unlimited TLDs, an entity like pgMedia, Inc. that puts their personal interest ahead of the philosophy or conventions underlying the TLDs, would attempt to register "name.space." Finding it taken, they would then invent a new TLD, and register something like "name.spc".
This does not help anyone find either entity.
Mega-corporations with cadres of IP lawyers are not going to limit the enforcement of their trademarks or copy rights to ".com," ".biz" or any other TLD. Cocacola, Inc. will want cocacola.*. (Go check: you will find they already own cocacola.com, cocacola.net and cocacola.org) It doesn't matter if it's cocacola.com, cocacola.biz, cocacola.dev, or cocacola.code. Their IP lawyers will tell them that they need them all.
And if you think it's just CocaCola, you should ask Volkswagen of America, Inc. ("vw.com"), why they sued Virtual Works, Inc. for "vw.net." (This case is still in the courts.)
I really wish that companies would behave so "logically" with regards to TLDs. But the record is very clear. More than a few companies with money and lawyers will sue anyone who gets in their way over domain names, even domain names they do not really need. It's not going to help to have anymore TLDs.
Exactly. Ever heard of Expropriation?
It's a fine line between trolling and karma-whoring... and I think you just crossed it.
--
- Sean
It's a fine line between trolling and karma-whoring... and I think I just crossed it.
- Sean
Nothing good can come from a meeting in Cairo. Didn't M$ name a project after Cairo? Something like NT4 or some other useless project?
"I threw up my hands in disgust and wondered whether it had been such a good idea to have eaten my hands in the first place."
"I threw up my hands in disgust and wondered if it had been such a good idea to have eaten my hands in the first place."
I own a couple of
This is about US$35.00 each or US$105.00 per year for a domain name.
Now I'm going to have to buy more TLD's to avoid cybersquatters?
Where are the TLD police?
Can't they troll the internet for misused TLD's?
my
-- Andy
* "Uncle this droid is malfunctioning" -- Luke Skywalker
The problem was more in how the switch from being ARPA to comercial was handled. A lot of loose ends were left up in the air and the real power went to NSI. Everytime ICAN rattled the saber they were slapped around by certain congress members. 21 Bil for NSI goes a long way.
At any account the two large issues were trademark and the incredible chunks of change a row in a database cost.
As for trademarks I echo what others have said. Although there are rules in place they arn't applied across the board. For instance, by NSI's rules etoy should have never been pulled. But the deeper issues are corporate interests VS. "the little guy".
An example is nissan.com. This domain is owned by Mr. Nissan, (who's family has held the name for almost 3000 years). Nissan Computer Corp has had a trademark since 1991 on the name. Nissan Motor corp wants the name. Although NSI rules have kept Nissan Motors from taking the name outright they can still litigate Mr. Nissan into the poor house.
No matter how you cut it money and power pervail over rightful ownership.
Thanks for all the info, but just out of curiousity is this story a record for the most number of links in a non-quickie post?
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There is nothing magical about the existing DNS tree, except that everyone uses it. Why not establish another group of root servers in some country that doesn't give a rat's ass about US trademarks (say...China?) and create whatever TLDs we want. If we all chip in our registration fees that would otherwise go to Network Solutions, I'm sure our new "Open" DNS organization could buy the hardware / bandwith needed. OK, for interoperability, it would have to be set up to forward queries not resolved in the "new" namespace to servers linked to the "old" namespace, but that shouldn't be difficult. Load up a new root cache file and tell ICANN where they can stick their board.
This might be a stupid couple questions (moderate accordingly:-)):
Lets say that any TLDs would have to protect trademarks as proposed. So is there a great big Trademark database out there to be consulted (and can I find it on the web)?
I'm reminded of an old article in an MS TechNet CD (not sure if it's still on there) that actually had a list of all the computer related Trademarks and who owned them. It was always fun to browse through and see what people trademarked.
If there is then is it just a national dB or does it cover international Trademarks?
What if some international Trademarks conflict?
Would the rules protecting Trademarks protect "current" Trademarks, or could domains with those new TLDs get kicked out by someone claiming the domain after Trademarking something?
Every time a DNS/ICANN related story comes up, myself and several others post relevant information about how you can get involved, how you can participate, and what you should be doing if you don't like or don't agree with the way these policies are being developed.
Now, here's another story, stating the truth of what I and others have been saying for $DEITY knows how long now.
I'll make this very simple:
IF YOU DON'T LIKE THIS, GET INVOLVED AND CHANGE IT!
And that doesn't mean joining the ICANN At-Large membership. It means getting involved with the Domain name Service Organization, specifically Working Groups B and C, and working to get rid of business-centric, short-sighted policies before they're enacted. In the end, it all comes down to numbers: Right now, the corporate lawyers and the businesspeople have a stronger lobby within ICANN than the individuals and the end-users do.
Don't be fooled, you will NOT have any impact on policy from the At-Large Membership. The proper venue for activism is within the DNSO working groups.
See this page for the mailing list archives of the working groups, and instructions on how to join. It's as easy as subscribing to a mailing list.
Unless and until you actually get off your ass and do something to change things, you're just going to be pissing in the wind. Slashdot is a wonderful forum, but all of you should be voicing your concerns where they matter, in the Working Groups, instead of here.
.@.
We could argue all night about whether these new TLD's are a good idea or not, etc., etc...and up 'til now, that's all we could do. At least now ICANN is making an effort to pretend that our opinions count in some official capacity.
The members at large program may be a sham. I choose to believe it isn't. It makes me feel better.
BRENT ROCKWOOD, EST'd 1975
This will be incredibly difficult to manage and simple to defeat but will put a quick and easy end to cybersquatting of Top Level Domains. You can bet that there won't be 3 million weird sounding domains.
Mark
Or are there supposed to be restrictions on who can register these new ones (like country codes)?
--
Patrick Doyle
Patrick Doyle
I mod down every jackass who puts his moderation policy in his sig. Oh, wait a sec....
Well, this certainly poses an interesting problem. Suppose a new TLD, .foo, is formed. On one hand, in a perfect world, companies would not have to worry about cybersquatters and/or other companies with similiar names. Each company would have a robust, intuitive domain name that would allow interested parties to find them with litle problem. On the other hand, in the real world, competition for domain names is fierce, and will remain such regardless of however many TLDs are created. It is certainly justifiable, under these circumstances, for companies to want some sort of assurances that they will not have to deal with squatters whom have no real legitimate claim to a domain name.
But what other ways can this be resolved? Well, there is the current Anti Cybersquatting legislation. I am not familiar enough with it for an in-depth dissection, but from what I've seen it is a rather clumsy, heavy-handed approach
that may harm legitimate, private users.
Until we have an easy, universal set of criteria to aid in determining whether a domain claim is legitimate, we are going to see this problem, and variations thereof.
Perhaps what we need is a "Meta" TLD that would allow multiple companies/individuals with legitimate claims on a domain to register it. Example: I, proprieter of ford computers, wish to register ford.com, a domain to which I have an arguable claim to. However, it's already been claimed by Ford, a popular auto maker. So, with the meta TLD, any queries to www.ford.com would pull up a page that would present choices to the user: (i.e., "Are you looking for Ford auto? Click here." "Are you looking for Ford computers? Click here."). I imagine it would ultimately end up similiar to some of the redirect pages (openssh.org) we see posted voluntarily.
Not a perfect solution, granted, but I think it may go a long ways towards solving some of the current issues.
-- if(game-theory) moderate++;
Here's the deal:
.com, .net, or .org), and have ramrodded through what is now being accepted as a legitimate proposal that would eliminate the possibility of new TLDs without this shift of cost and burden from the TM holder to the domain name registrar.
As a trademark (or other intellectual property) owner, you are required by US and International law to protect your TM/IP, or lose it. The law clearly and firmly places the burden of policing possible infringements on the TM owner.
This includes the time, effort, and cost involved.
There are existing services that charge a nominal fee to do domain name/trademark infringement searches. Some registrars have this as part of their business model (e.g., look at the links off of http://www.whois.net).
Now, ICANN, via Working Group B (which is stacked full of TM/IP lawyers), wants to shift that burden to the registrars themselves, eliminating that business model, and superceeding US and International trademark/intellectual property law!
The folks from Working Group B have even invaded Working Group C, the WG for the addition of new Top-Level Domains (such as a
In short, the TM holders don't like US and International law placing the burden and cost of protecting their marks on their shoulders, and have found a political venue in which they can get away with shifting this burden onto someone else.
And every single one of you who isn't in there fighting to prevent this is tacitly allowing this to happen.
If this becomes reality, ICANN will have effectively superceded worldwide laws and treaties.
And since the DNSO leading body, the "Names Council", and the ICANN Board of Directors is full of trademark/intellectual property owners and biased business owners, this stands a very good chance of happening. The only way to prevent this is for each and every one of you to GET INVOLVED.
.@.
But it wont be. It will be in the hands of the 18 council members who are 50% self appointed. I cant see them giving any decision making ability back to "Free enterprise". The businesses or fields who got them a seat on the council via lobby goups, grants etc. will be the only ones who get direct benefit.
To drastically increase the barriers to entry would be a vast improvement. P. I disagree, not with the basic concept, but I beleive it's way to late to increase the barriers.
More race stuff in one place,
than any one place on the net.
let's get IPv6 working so that people can get better access, then worry about TLDs later. It's all about access!! If someone isn't satisified with the current domain scheme they can always create their own. And they should.
Besides this, country codes only rarely give any indication of the site's purpose, which a domain name should be restricted to doing. Take, for example, my old high school's URL; I think it ran http://flinthill.ind.k12.va.us or something like that. This is a classic example of too much information in a name (Flint Hill, Independent school, K-12, Virginia, US), leading to something a lot longer than a domain name should be. A simple http://www.flinthill.edu would have been better (and isn't taken either).
This also gets around trademark issues, because it makes it quite clear when a name is being used for commercial purposes.
How does this sound to people? The problem is that the current system is too fluid; flexibility has its place but this goes too far. Obviously, more TLD's than these are needed; feel free to contribute more. Just remember that any you add should be thought out such that an entity can obviously fit into only one of these TLD's, or obviously fits into one catecory far better than the rest.
I don't demand a law that stops IBM from taking their name...but what if some guy's got like "Interesting Bomb Materials". (Cuz all that's really on the net is porn and bomb-making stuff...) Doesn't he have an equally valid right to claim IBM.com? Or a "Cyber News Network" claiming cnn.com.
On the Net we are "taller". I'm not saying we have to say that IBM can't have their domain...it's whoever gets to it first...just like it was in the real world. This is a new business paradigm, and the old rules don't apply...the same as when any paradigm shift happens. Otherwise, we'd still be getting our electricity and phone service from one company...times change, and so do the rules. You can't go stamping the old rules on the new playing field...or else we would have just stuck with the old playing field.
Netjak.com independent reviews of domestic & import video ga
I like the rent concept, that's essentially what registering a TLD is anyway.
BTW, good to see AC has more to offer than just Hot Grits. You should log in.
More race stuff in one place,
than any one place on the net.
Almost all network providers are also commercial organizations. In their view, they have a perfect right to both a .com and a .net address. I find it hard to disagree with them.
IMHO half right:) this should not change the fact that each name space has it's own uses.
The {ISP}.COM name space should encapulate the commercial side of the organisation, ie, advertising, press releases, investor relations, etc.
The {ISP}.NET name space should encapsulate the network services, say DNS, email, ftp/web spaces, etc.
Domains should not be "owned." They are assigned on a first-come, first-use basis. Voluntary re-assignments could be allowed, but set a cap on the fee (say $50). This would deal with most of the cybersquatting. Then rewrite TM law so companies don't have to be so rabid in going after similar domain names.
I think there's questionable need for new TLDs. Why complicate things?
"It is a foolish contstituency that is the hobgoblin of little mimes."
non-profit organizations are
Except, of course, for the commercial
-----------------------------------------------
Really there are two problems, and nobody admits they have to be addressed seperatly.
First there is commercial tradmarks and the area the trademark covers. For instance:
McDonalds.com - the fast food restaruant we all know
McDonalds.com - the orginal restaruant that Ray Kroc bought the idea from (Are they still around, in any case the rights of that deal should handle this)
McDonalds.com - a local electrical company in some small city run by some brothers McDonald.
McDonalds.com Same as the last one, but diffierenty city. Maybe these guys are plumbers, whaterver.
McDonalds.com Again a small local buisness. Maybe a hairstylists that takes appointments on the web
You get the idea, a major recignised worldwide name, but it cannot do anything about the small reginal companies that are not compittion. Somehow the needs of all these comercial interests need to be met. (And I think we all agree that McDonalds restaruant and McDonalds heating can be in the same town without problem, but you can't have a second McDonalds restaruant in the world unless it has been McDonalds for 100 years)
On the other side we have personal sites. I want to be McDonalds.per because my family name is McDonald (okay, my last name is not McDonalds, but I know some McDonalds and it makes the point best) which when combined with the rest of my family allows email to bluGill@McDonalds.per and Jounior@McDonalds.per to get through easially. Since .per specificly dissallows anyone with a trademark from getting a domain we are free from the previous problems. Somehow however we need to solve the next one though: There are many families McDonald in the world, and most of them are not blood relatives. (you could up to Adam and Eve or the evoltion equevelent)
Precisely. A useless boondoggle, as I said. You are free to fund your own hobbies. You are not free (morally, anyhow; the law is debased these days) to put a gun to my head and coerce me into paying for your hobbies. And that is exactly what a business-free, publically-funded Internet would be: Your gun to my head, my money in your pocket. As simple as that.
You are free to buy your own books. You are not free to put a gun to my head and coerce me into paying for your library. And that's exactly what publicly-funded libraries would be...
You are free to fund your own childrens' education. You are not free to put a gun to my head and coerce me into paying for your childrens' education. And that is exactly what publically-funded education would be....
You are free to fund your own security team. You are not free to make me pay for public police. I live in a low-crime area. The police department is of no value to me. How dare you put a gun to my head and make me pay for your Police Department?!
Also try:
Healthcare
The EPA
Anything else that recieves public funds that somebody might think is useless.
This was the most insightful comment i've seen in a long while.
Limiting domain names to one per legal entitity would solve most of todays problems. No more cybersquatting. More available domain names. It would enforce use of dns as it was intended. It wouldnt be product.com anymore, but product.company.com.
If course, the problem is what to do with all current domain names - i would think a radical "you get to keep one" stategy would work best in the long run. Granted, it won't do much for trademark problems.. but still.
This is a great idea! Please, moderate that AC up.
Actually, this happened a while ago with ATI. Somoene registerd ATI.com and ran a company called Artificial Turds Inc (they sold fake dog shit - I'm not kidding). ATI had to settle for ATITech.com.
I gather the guy eventually sold it to ATI, but it has happened before.
Oh, note that ATI survived and prospered, despite the unreasonable burden put upon them.
Your arguement doesn't hold, however. Look around. There are many, many cases now of organisations that own multiple radio stations. Huge media conglomerates, even.
I say give the corps the .com TLD to fight over however they wish. All others should be open, first come first served (unless of course the trademark is for a nonprofit, ISP, School, etc.). As I understand it the trademark is only applicable in reference to the holders use of said TM, ergo only nonprofit organizations should be able to claim trademark violation in the .org TLD , schools in the .edu, and so on.
This seems brutally obvious to me... what am I missing? (other than a cynical view of corporate america)
Insanity is the last line of defence for the master diplomat. But you have to lay the groundwork early.
I actually agree with your characterizations, but...
Let me guess: you don't believe in government, do you? Or at least not in taxes.
Can you give me an example of taxation that is not "theft"?
I mean, what do taxes pay for... military (worse than police), social programs, etc.
How about roads? Is using your (stolen) wealth to build roads also objectionable to you?
The people of the United States of America paid for it, and it spread from there. The people own it, corporates just set up there and built some expansions. The Internet is one of the few things I actually thank the USA for. That and the whole helping fight the Nazis thing. I'm thinking there's one AC who's running up and down this board saying all this stuff. Get a name will you? We'd like to get to know you.
I propose:
(1) Allow anything to be used as a TLD.
(2) Still require domain registrations to consist of two parts, i.e., "domain+TLD". No one can register just ".domain"
(3) The TLD will remain unowned by definition and available for all to use.
This allows the following to all happily coexist: apple.com, apple.records, big.apple, apple.farms, joe.apple.
With no one able to own the TLD, it can be reused by anyone. Even by many samed named companies doing different things. This reduces fights. Unlimited TLDs also prevents anyone from "buying up" all of TRADEMARKNAME.* to "protect" their trademark. It becomes financially and almost mathematically impossible. With a wide open domain name space, squatting would nearly end as so many alternate choices would be available. What this all boils down to is a root domain of "." but still requiring registrants to register "domain.TLD" with both parts being necessary to constitute a single registration action. In this context, "first dibs" on TLDs becomes a meaningless statement and a moot issue.
rather than allowing specific people to go first do it this way. On the first day each domain costs $2 million each day after that cut the cost in half until the cost is down to $10. this way, Microsux can pay their $2 mil if they really want their name otherwise I could buy it and post anything I want.
.sigs suck, thus nothing here.
The business world has a severely bloated sense of its own importance, and how much everyone needs them; they make big rationalizations to support this claim. In their ego, they like to take credit for everything. Your post is a classic example of all of this.
The idea that the Internet needs businesses is bullshit, totally unfounded. Businesses need the Internet, the Internet doesn't need businesses. The Internet exploded of its own accord, but the US economy is only exploding because of the Internet (thank you very much).
The Internet was just fine before businesses got involved. It was already exploding. The business world took years to figure out how to take advantage of it, or even whether "this Internet thing is here to stay"! Most had no clue. We have little if anything to "thank" them for. The Internet, and maybe everything else, would do just fine without them.
Your comments show you have no idea what was going on with the Internet before e-commerce. Well, lots of things were. For one, the very technology for the current Internet was developed on the Internet itself, back when it was what you call "a useless boondoggle". For another, it offered great academic and research benefit (but maybe you consider those useless, too). A lot of cross-cultural communication, more than ever before in history. The Internet was transforming the world long before the first banner ad appeared.
OK, so you say "we wouldn't all those high-speed lines and powerful servers if it weren't for banner ads." But this is wrong too. If people want to create and read Web pages, the system would adjust to accommodate them, distributing its load as needed. Instead of having one Yahoo, there would be a directory site, a news site, an email site, a map site.... If you know anything about Web technology, you know it would be very easy to do. The simple fact is, we don't need businesses, and that makes them very uncomfortable. They're used to pushing everyone around, and any situation where they can't is threatening to them.
I could go on. Perhaps you should question your own compulsion to kneel unquestioningly at the altar of business. Where did you get the impression they're doing everyone such favors? From reading and watching the news, maybe? Who controls the news media, hmm?
I do like how the truth sounds, but your post is nothing close to the truth. It's definitely not "common sense". It's revisionist history and pro-corporate propaganda.
I see some problems with letting this happen. Some are technical problems and some are legal problems.
Example is that some software written right now checks the validity of your email address to make sure it contains the right type of characters, an "@" and something with a period following and ending in something. Some of this software erringly expects that this is a three letter code in the form of ".com", ".net", ".gov", ".mil".
Now I see a problem as this software already breaks if you toss it a ".org" domain or a ".us" as the TLD involved. Many websites with new programmers just fresh from highschool or college here in the US have this problem of assuming all the world is a ".com" running on WinNT.
Who remembers AlterNIC? They have been allowing people to use new TLDs since 1995 or so. Unfortunately they didn't always work for everyone due to not everyone adding them into their dns cache file.
Now for the fun legal issue. What if it is legal to sell cocaine in your country and even export it. Well lets say you want to use the domain name coke.com and then CocaCola decides they want coke.com... Remember the etoy.com vs. etoys.com thing.
So now we have a new TLD of say .ARF and your company legally owning the trademark for Coke in the country of Usa (not the US) registers COKE.ARF and then CocaCola decides they have to use COKE.ARF to protect their trademark in the US. Sounds like we are going to have some fun legal issues here.
My vote is ignore the trademark issues, Anyone can use any name in DNS that they want. If someone has a domain name you want buy it from then and don't threaten legal action. If you buy a domain name and don't actually use it, then it should be taken back and you loose it.
The program isn't debugged until the last user is dead.
I believe the trademark McDonald's posesses is only on the logo...which is why you can't put the logo up on a webpage...but if some guy had an auto repair store...there's nothing to prevent him from calling it "McDonald's Car Repair", and having a big sign that says "McDonald's" on it.
Ok, so it is a valid analogy. It hasn't proven anything. www.IBM.com is not explicitly a billboard. It is closer to street adress than it is a billboard. This is basically assigning your computer a name in cyberspace. That name translates to a physical computer location...an address. The fact that the Internet isn't a place of business alone, and that these address find both by the SAME addresses means that trademarks don't apply. Is "www.alkaiser.com" a billboard for me to advertise on? No. It's a address to tell people where to find me. Just because there can be only one doesn't mean it falls under the same auspices of the original trademark. This is a different realm of operations.
These are new ways of doing business, and this is theoretically a whole new world. The old trademarks do not cover new ways of business. (Just ask me how many times new products have come out and these "all" encompassing coupons I have are not honored because new products are not covered by the coupon...it's about time you guys got your own mantras handed back to you on a plate.) Old copyrights on books applied...if the book explicity stated "This work may noy be copied in any means." Electronic copying falls into the auspices of "any means". The trademarks most definitely do NOT give the holders rights to that name "under ANY circumstances", and they most certainly do NOT grant the trademark holders "all business rights to that name under ANY circumstances." Now trademakr holders are upset becuse they didn't have the foresight to claim these things ahead of time...too bad. This is the realm at which I'm most at home...and I'm going to use every advantage I have over you.
Netjak.com independent reviews of domestic & import video ga
The problem with Darwinist logic in modern society is that it often incourages features that, while successful to the individual, are detrimental to the species. Paranoia is often healthy, protecting from spies and subterfuge, however, think about the damage paranoia did during the cold war, nearly bringing nuclear annihilation to us all. Both roads can lead to oblivion. The difference is that one is more humane. Besides, genetic and biological research are improving at such a rate that by the time the average human body is unusable, we won't be needing them anyways.
And I'll say it again...
DNS names were never meant to be seen by the general public. They were never really meant to be seen by anyone, but the process of creating a URL system over a URL system took too long and so people advertise domain names.
What we need to do is simple:
Currently the "location" field in a web browser is only vaguely useful. It's a good place to type in the web site URL when you know it, and it's a quick way to verify what domain/file you're on. But what about when it's what it is in mine right now:
http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=00%2F03%2F07%I, a trained geek who likes to know these obscure things don't need to see that, and the average joe definitely doesn't need to see it. What if that were replaced by a set of fields that gave me my location in some kind of logical hierarchy? "Language: English, Site Type: Online Forum, Site Name: Slashdot, Site Section: Article Comment Posting"
That (from what I understand) is that they're trying to allow with URNs.
That would also mean that when you're trying to reach McDonalds Clothing you fill in McDonalds in one box, Clothing in another, and then you're done. No accidental exposure to grease-filled nutrition free "sandwiches".
If that were done it wouldn't matter who owns mcdonalds.com or ford.com. It wouldn't matter that slashdot has a .org domain and that openssh.org isn't the main OpenSSH web site.
Am I dreaming? I don't think so... All we need is a push to get rid of browsers displaying URLs and we're halfway there.