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What Should Happen To Expired Domains?
A good example of why expired domains should be allowed back into the pool comes in the form of another question from Jonathan Mendelson: "I was recently searching to see if mendelson.net was available, and it surprised me to see that Network Solutions was holding it. I used the whois function to find out more, and I saw that their record expired on Nov. 14, 1999. This makes it appear that they are holding the domain illegally. Are they allowed to do this, and if not, is there any action that I can take to prevent them doing so? Is there any particular reason that they might be holding it, and might there be other domains with which they are doing the same?"
Of course, an answer (in the form of another question, obviously) might be found in this bit from conf00sledBynsi who asks:
"There is a domain name I am interested in, which is not being used. It was originally registered in March of 1988, and has not been reregistered, so it has 'lapsed' for over three months, but Network Solutions has not released it for re-registration yet. After a couple of emails to Network Solutions, I received the following reply:
---------------------Does anybody know how long their 'billing cycle' is, or what their algorithm is for determining when to release a domain name? For that matter, has anybody figured out their algorithm for when, exactly, during a particular day the database is updated?"Thank you for contacting Network Solutions.
The expiration date that shows in WHOIS is not the date that a domain name becomes available to be registered by another party.
The expiration date appears in the WHOIS database so that the registrant may be able to verify how long they have locked in there domain name registration.
The registrant still has until the end of the billing cycle before the domain name is deleted, and released to be registered by the public.
We do not release the date a domain name will be deleted from our database to third parties. Please continue to check the availability of the domain name on a day to day basis. As long as it is registered our system will not allow you to register the name. Once it is deleted, the name is able to be registered on a first come first serve basis.
There are no waiting list for domain name registrations.
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Could it be, that by arbitrarily defining their "billing cycle" NSI is able to hold on to domains that have been expired for years. I would think that your normal business cycle is measured in months so this seems rather fishy to me. Might NSI be squatting on their own domains?
How difficult would it be to replace them? The DNS database isn't complicated and shouldn't be difficult to replicate. The customer interface and billing software would be more complicated.
Mea navis aericumbens anguillis abundat
As I understand it, it's not a matter of 'replacing' NSI, it's a matter of only doing business with the competing registrars as a protest to NSI's monopolistic practices.
Network Solutions is abusing their unique position of power, first by claiming to own all domain names, and second by this fiasco.
"DOJ, you've just gotten MS ordered broken up. How are you going to celebrate?"
"I'm going to Disneyland, then I'm cracking heads at Network Solutions!"
ffh.com :01-Feb-2000 :01-Feb-2000 :03-Feb-2000 :09-Feb-2000 :11-Feb-2000 :12-Feb-2000 :15-Feb-2000 :15-Feb-2000 :19-Feb-2000 :20-Feb-2000 :20-Feb-2000 :20-Feb-2000 :20-Feb-2000 :20-Feb-2000 :21-Feb-2000 :21-Feb-2000 :21-Feb-2000 :21-Feb-2000 :21-Feb-2000 :21-Feb-2000 :21-Feb-2000 :21-Feb-2000 :21-Feb-2000 :21-Feb-2000 :22-Feb-2000 :22-Feb-2000 :23-Feb-2000 :24-Feb-2000 :25-Feb-2000 :25-Feb-2000 :26-Feb-2000 :27-Feb-2000
ilt.com
bjr.com
gxm.com
fjn.com
ehk.com
fqq.com
icy.com
jmx.com
eak.com
hbw.com
hjj.com
kdj.com
mmb.com
m2g.com
kye.com
bwv.com
jbb.com
elc.com
fqs.com
haj.com
ezv.com
ghv.com
mws.com
ecm.com
fcc.com
ght.com
klp.com
iny.com
iis.com
epi.com
fbc.com
ever since they lost their monopoly, they have had the petulant attitude of a child deprived of a favorite toy. nsi needs to drop the bad attitude and focus on getting customers through superior service and cost. i suppose it can be hard to compete with the likes of joker, who offers ~$12usd registration for a year, versus $35 - $85 to nsi.
also, has anyone noticed that nsi seems to be giving themselves a rather large amount of domains? they have netsol.com, netsol.org, networksoutions.com, networksolutions.org, networksolutions.net, nsi.com, nsi.net, networksol.com, and netsolution.org - and that's just the ones i can think up off hand.
i will never give a dime to nsi.
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Cybersqutting is usually meant to mean buying a domain that you do not intend to use, to sting money out of people who will later want that name. This is more like cyber-real-estate-speculation.
Squatting is when you make use of a property that you don't own, but that the owner isn't using. If people are going to register names, then leave them unused so they expire like this, then is it possible to start squatting in the domain?
I guess squatting involves:
An organization I work for had its web designer and maintainer recently go out of business. The defunct business arbitrarily placed the organization's website with a new third party host and vanished. After the group committed thousands of dollars to build a new website, I checked Whois to determine who was hosting their existing site. I was shocked to learn that their domain registration had expired 26 days earlier. I immediately called Network Solutions and, much to my relief, was told that there was a 30 day grace period on expirations. Without any assurance of being reimbursed, I took the responsibility to renew the registration for ten years--and was glad for the opportunity to do so!
I have my eye on one domain that expired Feb 07 2000... Its still in the NSI database...
Looks like they purge whne they feel like it...
Didn't a past /. post hint that Network Solutions was getting ready to auction off expired domains..
Could be they are just holding a bunch until this new "service" of theirs is ready...
bah...
While this may seem an expensive endeavor, indeed, I believe that selling these expired domains back to their original owners (or to the public thereafter, should the offer be refused) at a reducced price should raise sufficient funds for such a project.
For further humiliation, and as a warning to those who would follow in the footsteps of NSI, I also propose that sequences of genes be altered stamp all affected with the encoded phrase You have been owned by the Domain Name Liberation Front. This, of course, is purely optional and at the discretion of those who would lead this proposition to fruition.
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seumas.com
If I wrote the rules, I would give the original owner of the domain name a reasonable fixed period of time, say, 90 days, to renew. After that, the name would go back up for grabs. Actually, that's probably more than enough time for the owner to cough up more dough.
Why not release them immediately? It's one thing for someone other than Joe Domain to snap up www.joedomainname.com immediately after Joe Domain lets his renewal slip. But a couple of months ago we had an incident...we host most of our sites with a certain hosting company who shall remain nameless. One client's domain name up and ceased to work one day. The client had paid us, we had paid the nameless hosting company...but the nameless hosting company had forgotten to pay NetSol, and this client had competitors who were dying to get their grubby little paws on his domain name. If that name had been released into the wild again right after it expired, there could have been a hell of a mess for us to clean up. So a reasonable delay, then, is good. Holding a domain name for a year or more is ridiculous. If Joe Domain hasn't renewed his name by then, NetSol oughta realize that he probably never will.
This is a Chao. A Chao says "Mu."
This may sound like lame, uninformed flame-bait, but why do we even need domain names?
What about a distributed search engine type of approach? There's got to be some way of avoiding this kind of centralization and still manage the anarchy.
Any Ideas?
http://www.masturbateforpeace.com/
*sigh*...this is just another example of nsi acting irresponsibly without regard to the public they are (should be) serving.
Back when I used them, I found that changing an IP for a name server was much harder than it should be (their systems will respond months later, sometimes never, even when simply responding that there has been an error in the 'automated' processing). Trying to find a phone number to call was quite hellish, and it took much searching through their site (cleverly designed not to let people find their number easily). Oh, yes, and it wasn't an 800 number either. Calling it, I'm immediatly put on hold for 45 minutes, only to talk to someone who claims 'I cannot help you, please call this number....'). I ask to speak to the supervisor, and here's what I find amazing -- he refuses! I ask him for his name - he refuses again, this time claiming he already told it to me!
Amazing...just...amazing....
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grep "xercist"
"The expiration date appears in the WHOIS database so that the registrant may be able to verify how long they have locked in there domain name registration."
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grep "xercist"
They're probably just trying to avoid ugly situations that might occur if someone misses the bills on BigAssSite.com and some squatter jumps on it faster than you can say Yet Another Precedent Setting Domain Name Related Lawsuit. Imagine if that domain that microsoft forgot to pay the bills for last christmas was snatched up by someone else. It doesn't make it right, but it could get really ugly if some high profile site let their domain slip and lost it to some idiot squatter.
Dude, shush!
Don't try to talk people out of this, I want my damned impeniterable DNA-altering friggin' nannites! ;)
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seumas.com
When in doubt use a different register? Several of the alt's are cheaper anyway. You can't force their hand but you can ask about policies such as this before picking who to register through.
:) A good admin would update BEFORE the time limit was up anyway. The grace period would be just 'it got lost in the mail' forgiveness. The owner should be able to reregister through any of the competition also though.
I could see a well documented and short waiting period after a domain expires before it was open to the public but anything over a month would be extreme I think. If someone hasn't noticed it's down by then well then I guess their site isn't very important to them.
At what price learning? At what cost wisdom? The price is a man's peace of mind, and the cost is his life.
Well, as the article indicates 'has elapsed for three months'. Well, as far as I understand, NSI bills in yearly increments. So, would it not be safe to conclude that the end of a billing cycle would be one year from the date that registration expired?
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seumas.com
Not quite. When the domain name expires, it ceases to function (as we found out during that nice little incident with the nameless hosting company). But it doesn't go back up for grabs right then (if ever). They still technically own it; they just can't use it.
This is a Chao. A Chao says "Mu."
I thought trademarks were only valid while they were actually being used to sell something. You could always start selling Garblefizz(TM) bottled water or something else that was simple to do.
Mea navis aericumbens anguillis abundat
slashdot.org cookie: anon=-1-TxAA6zKVJn Allow? (Y/N/Always/neVer)
So, out of curiosity, I take a peek around the source of this very page I'm posting a comment from, and what's this?
<IMG SRC="http://images2.slashdot.org/Slashdot/pc.gif?/ comments.pl,963044601" WIDTH=1 HEIGHT=1>m ments.pl,963044601" WIDTH=1 HEIGHT=1>
<IMG SRC="http://images.slashdot.org/pagecount.gif?/co
Does anyone else see anything wrong with this? I'm glad that I can use JunkBuster to filter images*.slashdot.org. I guess Rob will have to wait a bit until I start loading the banners again! Is this in the Slashcode tarball? If so, what does it do? If it isn't, why not? Could someone familiar with Slash please clarify this?
Watch me get bitchslapped...
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However this does not fully explain the results from this question. This policy above has only happened within the last month, but as others have pointed out on the thread, there are domains expired as far back as Feb.
IANAL, but there's an interesting case here to watch for that could bring contract violation charges onto NSI. If, as suggested, they take those domains into their public auction but AFTER they changed the contract, would this not be violating that? It's understandable if you fall a day or two behind, but NSI is claiming they're months behind. If they are that far behind then they are being inefficient adn should lose their gov't contract by the same point. (And from my recent experience with other registers, the case appears isolated at NSI).
"Pinky, you've left the lens cap of your mind on again." - P&TB
"I can see my house from here!" - ST:
Could it be, that by arbitrarily defining their "billing cycle" NSI is able to hold on to domains that have been expired for years.
No, it's just people writing Slashdot stories without taking 2 minutes to research the question. Why bother to do that when you can make a conspiracy out of it, eh?
The billing cycle is a year of course, as anyone who's ever registered a domain or bothered to read the payment policy should know. Duh.
The revolution will NOT be televised.
My domain name was near expiration lately, and so I went to renew it another registar (totalnic.net)
I waited, and waited. 3 weeks later my domain expired, and NSI *LOCKED THE DOMAIN*. I emailed totalnic asking why my renewal had not gone through, and I was told that NSI had not approved the move to a CORE registar yet. So, NSI has my domain on hold, and I could not get it transferred to another registar. So I paid NSI their f***ing money.
About Network Solutions... they're anything but even handed or consistant. Of course, in the past, they HAVE let expired domains go back into the public pool and be re-registered by another person. (Take "police.net"... that was a customer at an ISP I worked for that let their domain name drop.) I know of many others. I also remember years ago they're harassing us and denying us a registration for "bingo.net", even though it was not taken at all! They would not let us register it!
Anyone who has had a great number of dealing with NetSol will have some war stories. This is definately a case where I'm going to vote with my dollars. I encourage others to do the same.
You could rewrite a few magic functions in the C library (man gethostbyname should give you most of the functions you'd want to replace) and replace DNS with a protocol of your own choosing. LDAP maybe? Or some anarchistic communal scheme. Though not many people would use it at first, I have a feeling more and more people will become disenchanted with the ICANN and the current registrars. Already having a different solution in place and well tested at that point could be quite worthwhile...
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
Is it possible that we might need actual laws regulating the behavior, rights, etc of domain name holders, registrants and registrars? As often as I hear complaints about NSI and see for myself the shoddy, greedy business practices they pursue I wonder if maybe there shouldn't be some law(s) providing a framework for how domain name and registrar conflicts should be adjudicated.
.com, .net, and .org are somewhat global in scope and that what I'm suggesting would be US-only in scope but as these are "supposed to be" US-only, applying US laws to these domains & registrars thereof only makes sense. Having the same system for non-US TLDs isn't totally out of whack.
I know that federal laws are seldom the "solution" to anything, but the existing "watchdog" group ICANN seems powerless or unwilling to force NSI to change its business practices, and the alternative, the civil court process is expensive and doesn't provide a particularly just outcome, especially in light of the way NSI continually tweaks their user agreement the way Voyager rotates sheild harmonics to their own advantage.
What I envision is a framework for domain names that spells out rights for owners, obligations for registrars, and overall rules (to combat squatting or other abuse), as well as "penalties" for violation -- which could include cash fines for registrars up to an including loss of registrar certification for repeated violation.
It would be nice to have a due process system as well, although I'm wondering if it wouldn't make sense to instead encourage adjudication of disputes through binding arbitration with perhaps an e-arbitration system that would allow written submission of arguments to an arbitrator for timely and inexpensive adjudication.
Does this solve more problems than it creates, or have I been spending too much time in good-government land lately? How the framework rules are established is entirely unstated -- since it would be federal law, I'd think that a panel of community experts could draft the initial set with debate/modification by congress. It's far from perfect, but giving so much power to NSI and then expecting market forces to straighten it all out is rather naive IMHO.
I know that
I too have had numerous problems with NSI. More than I care to mention here. I've recently started migrating all of my domains to another registrar. It turns out the process is much easier than I anticipated. I chose register.com as my new registrar because I like their management system (being able to see and configure all my domains via a web interface). I called their "transfer of registrar" 800 number at 10:00 on a week night. In two rings I got a live person on the phone. I told him what I wanted to do and he informed me that I would be incur a charge of $35, but that this would extend my domain registration by one year.
While I was on the phone, he initiated the transfer. An email was sent to the registered point of contact listed in whois. It contained a link, which I clicked on. The link brought up a transfer agreement at a form in which I typed "I agree to the transfer" and clicked submit.
Five days later, I got a notice from NSI that they had approved my transfer. A day later the domain showed up in register.com and no more NSI.
Bottom line, there are alternatives, and as consumers, we can speak with our $. It also gives me great personal pleasure to diminish NSI's revenue stream, because they have put me through hell many times in the past few years.
Matt
Well, technically NSI is no longer a monopoly...
... rigister.com, joker.com, etc., that registrar has to pay NSI a fee to put you in the central registry.
Actually, they are. NSI is still the monopoly on the Central Registry. No matter who you register through
Frankly, I think this runs counter to the concept of independent registries. I'd even go so far as to say that the central registry owner should not be allowed to compete with other registrars by selling names directly to the end user.
They act like a monopoly, too. Remember when their (monopoly) contract was taken away by the same US Department of Commerse that granted it? The Govt had to allow allow extension after extension. Then they similarly 'negotiated' with ICANN, when ICANN is supposed to regulate them.
Fundamentally NSI is holding DNS hostage. They can do (or more specifically, 'allow' through pretend negligence during a handover) enormous damage to the integrity of the system and nobody wants that. I'd almost be tempted to say we should take the hit now (i.e it will only get worse with time) but too many people are hoping to avoid 'the great DNS blackout of 200X' altogether.
"But, it is well known, what strikes the capricious mind of the poet is not always what affects the mass of readers." -
Don't think it's so easy to 'do business with others' if you already have a domain (I have domains going back 5 years)
1) your registrar still has to pay NSI a fee.
2) they can and will refuse to acknowledge the transfer on any minor technicality. And if that technicality is an error in their customer data -- as it often is, you'll have the devil's time getting it corrected (in my experience)
3) The dirty secret of their 'auction' is that it really hides the fact that it guarantees that any NSI-registered domain is registered via NSI by the new owner.
4) NSI expressed doubts as to my 'validity' and refused to honor a transfer of one of my domains last year (I'd have been okay if my ISP had cooperated, but they seemed frightened of having to learn to learnother registrars, or registrar transfers, and actually chastised me for trying to leave NSI) So, since it was a minor domain, I let it expire, figuring I could probably pick it up via another registrar in a few weeks/months. No dice. I ended up re-registering the expired domain via NSI (with a check, hoping that I could use the correct info on the check as proof). They took my money but still refuse to correct my info (even though the e-mail address and phone number they had for me are both dead now)
"But, it is well known, what strikes the capricious mind of the poet is not always what affects the mass of readers." -
I went to NSI's website about a month ago and paid the renewal fee. I was three days late, which appears not to be a problem. The charge went through on my credit card, but the whois entry still shows it expired 8 June. Emails have gone unanswered.
I'm going to register.com. They even offer free DNS service.
I was fairly shocked to go to the site after it had expired, and find that a company had taken the name and was squatting on it.
Struck me as an extremely slimey, underhanded thing to do. (note: this name was one that was very unique, the name of the software company, and couldn't possibly be of any use to anyone else)
I can't imagine any purpose for grabbing a domain, and sitting on it, other than to try to extort money from the previous owner if they forget to pay the bill. I'd imagine there are companies with scripts that scan the available names every few minutes, and grab any which become available.
Imagine if the whole microsoft / hotmail thing had happened now, if domains can be grabbed once they expire.
________
1995: Microsoft - "Resistance is futile"
Personally, I use gandi.net. Twelve Euro's (~ $12, US) is pretty good for a domain. But if you want to do your own research, check out the Domain Name Buyers Guide. They rate registrars by price, leagal contract, and best overall. It's well worth a look.
I like the system Canada is using. If you are publishing a personal web page, your address is www.[whatever].city.province.ca.
The only way you get provincial or national domains is if you are a registered business. National domains go to businesses that are federally registered (do business in more than one province).
There can not be name collisions with this system. If a company has a federal registration, no other business can register the same name. A smart company will also trademark their name, offering further protection against infringement.
As well, owners of a national domain own all the provincial domains as well. There will never be a www.[whatever].ca and www.[whatever].bc.ca. I suspect provincial owners also own all the city domains.
The result is that for a person/company in BC: a) for the personal webpage "goatsluts," your domain will be www.goatsluts.mytown.bc.ca. b) for a business offering goatslut services as a BC-registered company, it'll be www.goatsluts.bc.ca. c) for a national goatsluts business, it'll be www.goatsluts.ca.
The only flaw in this system so far is that those people who own web pages that use a company tradename may risk losing their domain if the company registers its domain (national > provincial > city).
MY PROPOSAL:
The .com TLD goes to multinational companies, and can only be registered for their tradename and trademarks. They can not register generic domains (www.loseweight.com), only domains for products (www.slimfast.com), trademarks (www.therealthing.com) and tradenames (www.exxon.com).
The country code TLDs go to big businesses with national registration. Same rules apply as for the .com domain.
The state/province domains go to small businesses, ones that are not nationally registered. Same rules as above.
City/county-specific domains go to businesses as well. This allows franchises and such to deal with their local community.
New TLDs are created for other uses.
A .xxx/.sex domain is needed, without a doubt. It's open for businesses and people, with no rules about names: you can register phrases, words, tradenames, trademarks, what-have-you. No country/state/city codes are mandated. If you want them, you can have them (allowing www.goatsluts.mytown.bc.ca to list prices for the locals).
The .org domain goes to registered non-profits. The big user groups and so on will have to get a bit more formal. Non-profits that operate as a business (Oxfam & such) will probably also want to register their .com/.cc domain.
International non-profits get a plain .org; national/state/provincial ones will be in the appropriate form of www.goatsluts.city.state.cc.
The naming rules of the .coms applies to .orgs.
Note that a lot of community groups (ARSTechnica, PlanetNameYourGame) are profitable ventures and would be registered as .com/.cc entities. If they want to the TLD entry, they'll have to provide proof of international business registrations!
Where do personal pages fit in? As sub-domains of a country code. I suggest www.goatsluts.personal.cc. There are no naming rules: you can use tradenames, trademarks, phrases, words, whatever. And, no, companies can't shut you down for using a trademark or tradename: the "personal" subdomain makes it very clear that this is *not* a business page.
I'm not stuck on naming it "personal," but it does have to make it clear that the page isn't a business-authorized one. An internationally-recognized word would be good.
ISPs will be responsible for not allowing business to be conducted on personal pages. No ad banners, no shopping carts, no promoting one's business.
The enforcement rule: if someone wants your domain name and discovers that you're doing business, they'll report you to your ISP, and you'll lose your domain. Ergo, you *can* sneakily do business on a .personal.cc page, but you're at risk of losing it if you're successful. 'cause if you're successful, you should be a registered business (otherwise you take the far greater risk of having your ass nailed to the wall for tax evasion!)
Most registrations will be handled by the country represented by the .cc TLD, however they see fit (could be a government service; could be privatized; could be contracted to NSI, even). The international domains will be handled by NSI. The key advantage to all this is that it opens up the domain name space.
It sensibly restricts what names businesses can use, while opening up all possibilities for private users.
It eliminates camping: businesses own their trademarks/tradenames, and .personal users aren't going to cough up big bucks.
It recognizes that non-competing businesses (ie. businesses in different states/countries) may want to register the same name (and differentiates them by the .state.cc postfix).
It recognizes that big businesses own their names/marks, and that little businesses don't get to name themselves after a national/international business.
In short, it seems to work very well, and for that reason alone will probably never come to pass...
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Don't like it? Respond with words, not karma.
This will have a few cool effects:
Failing that, how about someone collect a summary of peoples' experiences trying to change registrars?
If I believed it would work, I'd change all of my domains away from NSI, but I don't want to risk losing any of them, so I'm not gonna be the guinea pig...
As shown in a previous message, "icy.hot" is one of the domain names that have expired back in February, yet is still unavailable for re-registration. Here are the revelant parts of the WHOIS information:
Domain Name: ICY.COM
Record last updated on 08-Mar-1999.
Record expires on 15-Feb-2000.
Record created on 14-Feb-1996.
Database last updated on 7-Jul-2000 16:34:07 EDT.
Go to Network Solution's Home Page and try to register "icy.com". You can't. Netsol says "Sorry, icy.com is not available.". Fair enough. So, I've decided that on behalf of the owner of icy.com, I'm going to pay his bill. So I go to the NSI Online Payment System. I enter "icy.com" as the domain I want to make a payment on. Here's the response I get:
Related information could not be retrieved for the domain. This could be because:
1.The top level domain is not a com, net, or org.
2.An invoice number could not be created for this domain.
3. The invoice number given does not match with that in the database.
Well, it isn't #1, and it isn't #2. It certainly isn't #3 because I did a lookup by the domain name, not the invoice number. And if I enter a domain name that completely doesn't exist, I get a different error:
Related information could not be retrieved for the domain. This could be because:
1.The domain information has not yet been processed or updated into the database.
2.You entered an incorrect domain name.
So, the domain name can't be registered. Okay. The domain name can't be renewed either. (Netsol *might* try to claim that they can do it with an invoice number -- but COME ON. Why would it be blocked in their automated payment system? I'm sure they'll have a good lie for this one.)
Network Solutions is making up the rules as they go along, and they need to have their feet held to the fire and be accountable for their actions. Someone ought to sue them over this.
Bah. I don't believe the Domain Name Buyers' Guide one bit. Not only does their information appear out of date, but they seem *way* too biased as well. The Domain Registration system is screwed up enough as it is, we don't need people like that spreading misleading information around.
There is a company in California with a company name and domain name that is the name of a piece of software that my company designs. The CEO asked me to register the domain since he tried to browse to it and it didn't come up. Well, this was true but the whois information says:
Record expires on 07-Jun-2000.
Record created on 06-Jun-1995.
Database last updated on 8-Jul-2000 18:43:43 EDT.
I tried to register it on the 8th of June thinking that an expiration date meant that the registration expires on that day, but no. So I called Network Solutions.
Apparantly the expiration date means nothing. It's not accurate and is designed to make it so that technical people that know to check whois information for expiration dates don't have "an unfair advantage over non-technical people in the battle to get the rights to a domain." This is honestly what they told me.
Personally I'm sick and tired of their shit. I think it's high time we do something about it. Now, I'm not exactly a major activist or anything, but I'm going to write a letter to them listing domains that are not released and the names of people that are complaining. I hope I don't crash my ISPs mail server with a /. effect, but if you want me to add your name and/or a domain that isn't released e-mail me. Hell, I'm doing this for work anyway, so why not get a group effort behind it.
Dissenter
Dissenter
"There is no knowledge that is not power."
The bad news is that first Net Sol sends you a threatening 'late reminder' bill, addressed to the billing contact. Not much real threat there. Then a couple weeks later they send a threatening bill to the "CEO/President" of the registrant, announcing that the billing contact, who is named, has failed in renewing the domain, and that you better get your ass in gear and send 'em their 35 bucks or you're sold down the river. Now, this even happens after, in response to the first billing, you e-mailed them and - wow! - actually got an answer back that sure things were cool. They're just gonna try to bill your boss anyhow and get your ass in the fire.
"with their freedom lost all virtue lose" - Milton
On a side note, I would like to comment on the fact that NSI now seams to be offering domain names for free for 90 days. The deal is, you register a domain name and you get to use it for free for 90 days. At the end of 90 days, the registrant can either pay to continue using the domain, or they can lose it.
.. well ... As it stands now:
.. my question once again is:
I read through NSI's FAQ on the subject, but I didn't see where they said what really happens to domain names that aren't paid for after 90 days. I am seriously concerned that they might not be imediately released as they should be. If you look at all of the 'interesting' things that NSI has been doing and tie them all together
1. Joe Schmoe can register a domain name for 90 days for free. Considering how cheap most people are, guess who's going to take a lot of business away from the other registrars. The fact that someone feels they need to 'try out' a domain name for 90 days hints that these people aren't serious about owning the domain name and, more likely than not, will let it 'expire' after the 90 days. This will also be a very popular with domain speculators who won't pay for the domain if it doesn't sell within the 90 days.
2. NetSol doesn't say exactly what happens to those free domains that exire after 90 days.
3. NetSol doesn't say exactly how long names are expired before they are released back to the domain pool.
4. NetSol has a new 'service'where they have decided to auction off expired domains to the highest bidder rather than release them back into the pool like they should.
Does everyone see where I am going with this? This isn't exactly normal merchandise now. Either you need/want the name or you don't. You'll have to pay for it sooner or later and if you can't cough up $12 for it sonner, then you obviously really don't need/want it. I forsee many, many people registering a free domain just because they can and have no intention of really keeping it. Then when the names expire and aren't paid for, NSI puts them on the auction block to 'recoup their costs' and to do whatever else with the extra money. It all sounds a little too well timed and convenient if you ask me. They are just flat out abusing their past, total monopoly and current, practical monopoly. This is just another example of why I support a floating DNS-root, but that's another rant for another time.
So
1. What exactly are they doing?
2. Better yet, what is ICANN going to do about it, if anything?
My answers to these questions are:
1. I think I spelled it out prettly clearly
2. Nothing, except maybe take a cut behind their closed doors.
----- I was not elected to watch my IP packets fragment and collide while you discuss this routing policy in a committe
Why the hell is the dns system privatized anyway? I mean, the internet is at *least* part of national infrastructure, and more logical international. Why doesn't some UN department run this? Why is the internet, almost a public service, in the hands of a couple corporations in the first place? Shouldn't NATIONS be the ones voting for TLDs for their country, etc?
It's 10 PM. Do you know if you're un-American?
A judge ruled that domain names aren't property and therefore...
I don't mean to be flippant, but a judge with jurisdiction over what area? If a French company says its my property when I buy it from them, can a judge over a completely different part of the US have any weight on the contract?