Update On Efforts To Block .us Giveaway

Froomkin writes: "ICANNWatch carries an update on efforts to block the .us giveaway, which include letters to the US Dept. of Commerce from Senators, from Rep. Markey, and from the US-ACM Public Policy Committee." The update also mentions this LA Times editorial drawing attention to the move.

Comments

Update to the update

[Froomkin]

Meanwhile, we have a brief even more recent update at ICANNWatch: the Dept. of Commerce reiterates that the RFQ on .us will close this Friday at 5pm eastern. Take that, Senators!

There's also a story over at The Boston Globe but it doesn't add much if you've been following along.

You know you read too much slashdot when...

[quartz]

You open up the LA Times editorial and read "All you dot-US are belong to us" instead of "Dot-US belongs to all of us". Damn...

Well...

[11thangel]

Not that I'm opposed to having someone selling .us domains, but has anyone else here heard of this little thing called the "national debt"? Can't Uncle Sam try to count 'ol W's tax-cut with this? At least a little? Why give it away when you can sell it?

Re:History is made by those who show up

[gilroy]

Blockquoth the poster:

We can bitch, we can moan, we can hang politicians by their ankles, but we can't prevent this from happening.

We can prevent this from happening. Well, maybe not the small "this" of the .us giveaway (that seems to be on the express track to Hell) but the larger "this" of laws, courts, and politicians bought and sold by monied interests quite contrary to the public interest they are sworn to uphold...

And part of it is the bitching and moaning. But the biggest thing we can do is the one thing most won't: Get off your lazy behinds and vote! It's a bit amusing and a bit sad to see everyone whining about how "they" are taking away our rights, yet half the people in the nation don't even bother to vote in presidential elections.

The system stinks? The people in power don't listen? Make them listen. Better yet, run for office and become a person in power. Democracy ain't easy.

And it sure as heck isn't served by pre-defeatism.

But what about .EDU?

[roozbeh]

I wonder what will happen to .edu: As outlined in the RFC 1591, the TLD belongs to the global community of educational insitutes, and not only Americans:

EDU - This domain was originally intended for all educational institutions. Many Universities, colleges, schools, educational service organizations, and educational consortia have registered here. More recently a decision has been taken to limit further registrations to 4 year colleges and universities. Schools and 2-year colleges will be registered in the country domains (see US Domain, especially K12 and CC, below).

But according to this Slashdot article, the US Department of Commerce gave it away to something named EDUCAUSE, that doesn't let universities outside USA to get a .EDU.

As a user of a .edu here in Iran, that really aches...

--

No Surprise

[nanojath]

Why should anyone be surprised by this after the massive free giveaway of the digital television spectrum to a handful of media superconglomerates? It's faurly obvious that anyone with a few bucks to throw around can secure valuable public resources without the expense and hassle of paying the American public a dime for the privilege (see, for example, http://www.radiodiversity.com/hiwayrobbery.html for more details on the digital TV scam).

I know there's a lot of support for the "free market" on Slashdot, but somehow I don't think this is what y'all mean. When are people going to stop bickering over meaningless partisan differences and start realizing that most politicians on both sides of the fence are interested in their own political careers and accumulation of power above all else, and are more than willing to sell our interests out for relatively paltry sums? For crying out load, vote for someone that takes a credible stand on campaign finance reform! (Hint: if the phrase "one of the costliest campaigns in history" or something similar shows up nest to their name on a regular basis, then their stand is not credible).

History will be the judge

[Zen Mastuh]

The .us giveaway doesn't differ much from the American tradition of irrevocably giving blocks of broadcast frequences to commercial entities. The average American is screwed in the process, and the rich get richer. With their extra money, they can buy more politicians^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H donate more money to political campaigns and continue to dictate our national policy

We can bitch, we can moan, we can hang politicians by their ankles, but we can't prevent this from happening. History, however, will judge this as it really is.

There will be no .us giveaway

[Angel of Mirana]

Because Verisign is in bed with ICANN over it, or so the CNN article seems to hint.

It's really sad. All we US citizens get slammed for buying up .coms .nets and .orgs. I wouldn't mind being able to get the .us of my choice; just as I can get a .com or another TLD.

I don't really see that happening, though. The suits in DC like the control they can wield over the .us TLD and they are notrious for NOT handing over their power to the people.

It's sad, really. Europe has a much better approach to country TLDs. But; in the States, Verisign will probably get the deal for the .us sales and the big corporations will get their pick; leaving the rest of us with the carrion.

But...imagine the RIAA's new URL:

www.all.your.music.are.belong.to.us

Or DC's new website:

www.all.your.freedoms.are.belong.to.us

Phoenix