WIPO Pushes for More Domain Restrictions

Delphis writes "CNN has an article regarding domain names world wide 'Francis Gurry, the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) assistant director-general, told a news conference the effort was aimed at preventing people using different country codes, or ccTLDs, to corner sites, often of prominent figures or businesses. ' .. Could be interesting to see a reform of the current DNS system. How many people will be the winners and losers of this though I wonder?"

Comments

Re:Get rid of domain names

[Anonymous Coward]

So why do you give your e-mail address as gmurray@webwayone.co.uk and not as gmurray@194.217.242.35 ?

Same goes for your URL; why use http://www.webwayone.co.uk/ when you can just put http://194.159.133.89/ in your Slashdot user prefs ?

The reason is because:

a:) It is fucking lame!

b:) Most ISPs use name-based hosting where a webserver and mailserver will handle web/mail traffic for multiple domains... the reason ?

There is a global shortage of IPv4 addresses; and if you actually read the history and evolution of why we actually use DNS on the Internet then maybe you would get a clue... the abuse of the current namespace is a result of the monopoly caused by Network Solutions.

The original .net/.org/.com TLDs were created for a specific purpose and just because one company wanted to make tons of money, they just sold them to whoever regardless of their intended purpose...

Anyway, you use the analogy of a phone book to translate names to numbers... what the fuck do you think DNS is for !?!?! - translating hostnames to IP numbers ?

There is nothing wrong with DNS and no, it should be killed off. The problem is the people who look after it like ICANN, WIPO (for their idiotic decisions and ass-kissing of celebrities), and of course, let's not forget Network Solutions who screwed the Internet-using public for years before the other registrars got a chance to offer better and cheaper service!

Anonymous Coward - "No SHIT!!"

Get rid of domain names

[grahamm]

Maybe one solution to the problem of domain names vs trademarks etc. is to get rid of the domain name system as we know it. The telephone system does not have the same problem as it uses numbers. So why not go back to using IP addresses (for IP4 this is only 8 hex characters, so should not be any more difficult to remember than a phone number) to access sites on the web. Then also provide a white pages service, similar to a phone book, where you can look up a company or individual name and find their IP address. Companies and individuals could then use their own local "address book" to keep track of sites they commonly access and could make whatever local name association they choose.

Re:Get rid of domain names

[DarkKnightRadick]

Agreed, but as for telephone numbers, it's still just numbers. It doesn't matter what the letters stand for as you have to dial in numbers. I think the idea of using IP addresses to access sites and/or using TLD's such as .sun and .ibm would be a grand idea. That way The corp's who own them would be totally identifable. A case that I believe similiar to this has to do with the owner of http://www.neirp.com (CNN is suing him for supposed defamation of both their website for CNN Finacial (recently renamed CNN MOney) and for defamtion of the CNN logo. The site in question was cnndn.com (taken down due to court order). Pretty sad to see a company act that way, especially since it's most likely the lawyers who are suggesting the lawsuit (in the end, they still make their dollars no matter who wins).

Re:Get rid of domain names

[mat catastrophe]

This is a nice idea, but keep in mind that just about every biz in the States has a cute 800 number that spells out some amalgamation of their company name.

The solution might be to just tell WIPO to shove it or tell companies to stop acting like nineteenth century assholes.

:) it's friday.

Re:We need corporate TLD's

[autocracy]

Sounds fun, but it won't happen. WIPO trolls refuse to do anything like that, and frankly for once they'd be right. However, I think that the TLDs should be split, different people should run the TLDs, and blah, blah, blah...

The problem with capped Karma is it only goes down...

Could get ugly

[puckhead]

The webmaster at wallflower.nuhas had nasty emails from the fans of some lame band.

TLDs

[Weezul]

"Registering" TLDs will not help since companies will still want to control anything including their name. Actually, it would just add one more place where the current fight can continue.

We need a system where the companies can not hope to control their name for all TLDs. Specifically, we need an "anarchy" based system for TLDs where anyone can create their own TLD "server," but there will be no "registration."

Example: I could create my own .com but people are unlikely to use it since they will expect the current .com. Now, if I provided all the current .com sites, but made microshit.com point to the propper site (i.e. not a site owned my microsoft) then I would probable get many "subscribers."

This will kinda happen with alternative root servers, but we need a bigger push to make these amusing and popular.

We need corporate TLD's

[Flabdabb Hubbard]

Most of these arguments could be stopped if we allowed corporations to register their own TLDs. It makes no sense for sun to be www.sun.com, and ibm to be www.ibm.com. The ".com" is redundant. It also causes more centralisation in the DNS database than is strictly needed. What would make sense is to drop the .com, and make .ibm and .sun etc etc into TLDs.

While we are at it, bind should be updated to support unicode, and someone really ought to port it to NT. (even though I hate Microsoft, and everything they stand for, as an MCSE I am always being asked to get standard Unix/Linux stuff to work on NT. Ususally I just stick a 'secret' Liunx box in there, and everyone is happy in their ignorance, but some of the moronic places I work demand an 'All Microsoft' environment.

Morons!!!

Re:We need corporate TLD's

[L. J. Beauregard]

Much of the problem with the present system is that it allows only one firm to own a given 2LD. www.delta.com, for instance, is Delta Airlines. But what if you're looking for Delta Faucet?

So let the various registrars control 2LDs under .com, referring to various business areas, and a business could register its name as a 3LD. Delta Airlines might be something like delta.airlines.com and Delta Faucet might be something like delta.plumbing.com.

One problem, of course, is that not everyone speaks English.

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