Battle For Control Of .au Domain

batty writes: "The Sydney Morning Herald has this article about how Robert Elz, the bloke who connected Australia to the internet in 1984, is refusing to hand domain name authority over to auDomain Administration, the body set up by the politician who introduced Internet censorship to Australia. They're not complaining that Mr. Elz is refusing to hand over control, they just can't handle him refusing to even give them an answer. That's a pretty loud 'Bugger Off' in my book. It is largely due to Mr. Elz's work that Australia doesn't have a 'cybersquatting' problem. I'm not entirely sure what to make of this quote: 'There is almost no litigation in that area ... But we feel the time has come to move on .'"

Comments

I've met the guy

[Anonymous Coward]

He's one of those Old School bearded sandal wearing Unix dudes from way back. He wrote the Unix quota code, for example. I expect he thinks the Internet should be useful and structured, like it was 15 years ago.

He is the sole reason the .au namespace has any coherency. He has been quite passionate about a logical name space. For this reason, all the illogical losers who couldn't handle his rules colonised the .com domain, which was/is run on a pure "cash for crap" basis. I wish he ran the entire Internet!

He could have sold out ages ago for heaps of cash, but hasn't. He is confounding the "greed is good" people. I think it's a hoot!

But I don't expect it to last. In times like these the politicians (bless their black wizened hearts) will find some way to take .au off him. Then the last defender of sanity will be gone, and the .au part of the Internet can be pillaged, just like the rest of it.

Re:So *he's* the guy! Yes, move on...

[jbrw]

As someone else pointed out, assuming you live in Australia, you qualify for a free id.au domain.

It may not be particularly sexy, but that's where you fit in to the .au namespace.

...j

Re:Guardian

[Mithrandir]

Disagree completely. Have you ever had to deal with the jerk? Waaaay back in the very early 90's (ie when the prevailing domain was always .oz.au) when we had a company that wanted to be on the net the guy just flat out refused to give us a domain name at all. Just would not listen. If you weren't a university or from the government then he just didn't want to know you. Took us a couple of years and the explosion of the US based internet before he would even consider it.

While I agree with the basic policies, I really do not like the guy at all. Strikes me as a one of those old sniveling monarchs who would cut peoples heads off if they brought him bad news or looked at him the wrong way. I certainly agree that he should have the authority taken off him because he is not worthy of it.

Stick in the mud

[Michael Snoswell]

Well I've read articles for and against Mr Elz. What I can say is that the Internet untill faily recently in Australia, was firmly controlled by the universities. I remember applying for a .au domain name about 6 years ago - I don't know if it was Mr Elz that I spoke to, but some guy whom I was told handled all .au registrations at the time said (after 3 months trying to track him down) "I'm not going to give your company a domain name as we believe the Internet is for academics and research not for commercial use, so I will never approve your application."!!!

This attitude realy sucked and definitely held back Australia's entry into the commercial domain on the internet, ultimately hurting the development of that type of business here.

On a side issue I notice the govt has decided to ban internet gambling here - except horse races (as they have a mechanism for taxing that). The funny thing was many pokies machines use the internet for monitoring them and the wording of the draft legislation would then ban most pokies machines in Oz which via tax are a big revenue earner for the govt!!! The Prime Minister was heard to quickly assure the gambling industry (non internet!) that the draft would be ammended! He said something about "unforseen loophole" - only he meant they *wanted* a loophole and had not forseen to add it. :-)

my 2 cents worth

Do u have any idea how long it takes to get a .au?

[dustpuppy]

Are you kidding me? I'd rather the Government look after domain names if it means that they get allocated faster.

Previously Elz handled all .au domain names and it took around 9 months (yes nine months) to get a domain name. Then Melbourne IT took over and the wait time dropped to 24 hours (premium service) or a couple of days (standard service).

Meanwhile, Elz still looks after the .org.au service and you can still expect months of delays before you get (if you get) allocated a .org.au.

So frankly, while Elz admirably served a purpose at the start, he is well past his use-by date and the sooner he is ditched (since he doesn't seem to want to go voluntarily) the better for the Australian IT industry.

Some facts

[kimba]

Firstly, I am a board member of .au Domain Administration (auDA), speaking for myself.

auDA was not set up by the politician that created Australia's Internet censorship laws. It was setup by the Australian Internet community. It is a non-profit industry association, not a government department. All of our members are people who are interested in the .au domain, and we are all working toward moving .au forward.

auDA does however work with the government to ensure they are happy with what we are doing. Under the Telecommunications Act in Australia which governs the DNS in Australia, the government can forcefully take control of running .au, which would not be ideal. I would rather have an Internet respresentative group running .au than the government. Therefore it is essential that auDA liaise with the government to ensure there are satisfied that they don't need to invoke this power.

This is the culmination of over five years of ongoing dialogue within the Internet industry. It has the support of all the organisations that run 2LDs under .au (.com.au, .net.au etc.), the Australian government, and most stakeholders.

To suggest "there is nothing wrong with .au so why change" is not true. Firstly, one of the most important things that auDA wants to introduce but can't is competition. The domains in Australia are currently held by monopolies in much the same way Network Solutions held for top level domains until a few years ago. auDA seeks control so it can introduce competition and lower prices for .au domains. auDA also seeks to be able to introduce new policies for domain eligibility. Whilst the rules have served well, there are changes to be made, loopholes to be closed. One example, currently generic domain names are banned (i.e. cars.com.au) yet many get through (news.com.au) which many people want addressed. Also, service levels need to be implemented. One bugbear with the Australian Internet community is the level of service for ".org.au" domains. These are administered by Robert Elz himself. It can take months for applications to be accepted or rejected, or for updates to be made. Sometimes you may never receive a response at all - your request remaining in permanent limbo.

Finally, auDA maintains an ongoing dialogue with Robert Elz and to suggest otherwise is wrong. In fact, last year he signed another 2LD he was responsible for - com.au - over to auDA. auDA's approach to ICANN/IANA is just part of the procedure to move forward.

Oh.. another way to look at it.

[mindstrm]

having a .com.au implies you are an australian company, to the erst of the world. Isn't it somewhat misleading if you aren't? Is it wrong to insist that they check to see, in fact, that you ARE a company? This is one problem with .com... they never verified anything.
Having a .net.au implies you are a network provider by definition. Why should you have a .net.au if you aren't?
Nobody argues .gov is only for government, or .edu for educational...
And as others pointed out, .au has .id.au for individuals.

You aussies should be *happy* your domain name system hasn't been cast to the wolves. It's one of the few run the way it should be.

Give 'em .au

[AtrN]

And let us be .oz (again)

Has somebody remembered to check ...

[Aceticon]

... if Mr Elz is still alive?

After all, the guy isn't answering anybody's questions, 1984-2001 is a long time (at least 170 Internet years) and the ones currently selling namespaces in the .au domain are the Melbourne University ...

<CONSPIRACY_THEORY>Maybe the guy died and the Melbourne University has covered it up to keep selling .au domains</CONSPIRACY_THEORY>

Start digging up the Univerity's Campus, there must be a corpse in there somewhere ...

Remember the Homestead Act?

[The Monster]

The idea was that if you cleared the brush, plowed the land, tended to your flock/herd etc., building something productive out of the wilderness, you earned the right to control what you'd built.

Elz built .au; it's only right that he continue to control it. His silence speaks volumes:

I don't recognize your .authority. You think you have the right to the domain; take it. You don't think you need my permission, so there's nothing to talk about.

By remaining silent, he grants no legitimacy to the land grab.

By way of analogy, imagine a government deciding that it's just too dangerous for something as important as, say, Linux to remain under the control of a private individual, rather than a duly-appointed government contractor. Then imagine the sorts of quotes you'd see from the contractor:

How dare Linus Torvalds refuse to even talk to us about turning over control of Linux to the proper authority. I mean, who does he think he is? What right does he have to control Linux? Nobody elected or appointed him!

Sounds ridiculous, right?

Here's an idea: Let the government ask for a whole new domain, called .oz (but there's some folks in Kansas that might have their eyes on that one) that they can administer according to their whims, and leave well enough alone.

"Bugger Off" from me as well!!

[benspionage]

Okay, most Americans probably aren't aware of this but two key attitudes that Australians like myself like to have are:

a) A HATE of arrogance. Americans encourage the NFL type of attitude, your brought up on it "Im da man", "I am the greatest", "You can't play me" etc.

We in Australia really don't give a shit how good you think you are, coming across as one of us, a mate as such, is much more important. This means we draw a fine line between confidence and arrogance.

2) A desire to back the underdog (backing the "team" given the least chance to "win") and a attitude of general dislike to positions of authority. Basically, we really get the shits when corporations / big companies try to show their muscle on the little guy.

Note that Im not saying these traits are unique or consistent to just Australians but that are something we claim as part of our identity (well the white mans identity anyway ....)

So what has this got to do with the the story I hear you ask????

Well the government is in a pickle here. They can't just demand that Mr Elz hand over his control of the .au domains because that would cause a HUGE public backlash. It would violate both attitudes above.

In a news bulletin I just watched an hour ago, Pizza hut has just realised how dangerous it is to take patriotic type issues to the court (they are fighting against an Aussie pizza company). I'm sure the government is also fully aware of the implications of getting on the wrong side of the public (admittedly the media plays a big role here).

Mr Elz is considered somewhat of a hero for refusing to create the cyber squatting nightmares some countries have. Sure this has also made .au domain names difficult to obtain sometimes (i.e. you have to actually show you're a legit company, want to use the domain for good reasons - shock horror).

Don't bank on the addressing system changing for a while either, if for no other reason than the mess the government would create if it forced the issue (our elections are coming up this year). I for one don't mind Mr Elz controlling the country's system instead the "regulatory" bodies who have done so (*cough*) well overseas.