NeuStar to Manage .US Registry

flatt writes: "The US Government picked NeuStar, the managers of the upcoming .biz registry, to manage the .us registry today. NeuStar has made a press release and there's an AP article over at Excite about it. Finally a country code that I'll register in." This has been brewing for a long time, and has been criticized as a giveaway.

Comments

Kewl!

[ekrout]

Now I can get my dream domain, VALinux.biz!

Re:Kewl!

[PyroMosh]

But... it's not VA Linux any more.

Re:Kewl!

[Anonymous Coward]

not as kewl and realistic as:

VALinux.bomb

VALinux.gone

and

VALinux.FC

Re:Kewl!

[ekrout]

Um, I know, dude. Believe it or not, I read Slashdot. Apparently, you didn't "get" my joke :-/

Wow amazing

[tomstdenis]

I wonder what new technology they had to implement to handle .US

Seriously people they are LINES IN A DATABASE. It's not like they had to re-invent the internet.

Let's see

browser => DNS => IP => browser => WORLD.

So what? Our DNS servers should be able to handle any extension.

This shouldn't be news!

crappy

[Anonymous Coward]

lame, so much for the possibility of a good .us domain

.us

[Anonymous Coward]

Good idea.

Re:.us

[Guillaume Ross]

They'll screw.us !

Changes We Are Seeing

[Renraku]

Money and business runs this country. Is it any coincidence that the company responsible for .biz is also responsible for .us? Is this a sign?

Re:Changes We Are Seeing

[Anonymous Coward]

Well, it may indeed be a giveaway, but at least it wasn't given to VeriSign, right?

Re:Changes We Are Seeing

[1010011010]

It's a sign that Network "Solutions" won't be fucking it up anymore. Which is to say, a good sign!

"The business of America is business."
--Calvin Coolidge, Thirtieth President, 1923-1929

... of course, right after his terms were up, the business of America was more along the lines of eating shoe lint and wallpapering the outhouse with stock certificates.

Re:Changes We Are Seeing

[tomstdenis]

[replying to your .sig]
I've used both kermit and x-modem. Personally I prefer Z-Modem since it can detect errors better [CRC32] and restart :-)

And stop trying to be cool because you used a computer in the 1990's. I'm 19 years old and I grew up sysop'ing two BBSes myself. I certainly don't think I'm a hackerz elitez or something because I know how to launch renegade [under DesqView no less]....

/rant

Re:Changes We Are Seeing

[Jon_E]

i'm sorry - did you ever study your internet history? it was Verisign's ever since Verisign bought Network Solutions.

Network Solutions was awarded a government grant and had sole responsibility over all domains until the government got a clue as to what people were complaining about and started doing their job of regulation (something that should have been done around oh say '92) - under that contract Network Solutions (transferred to Verisign who bought out NSI) had responsibility for all those domains until the contract expired in '99 (including the .US domain), and managed to sweet-talk their way into keeping control over what became the big moneymakers. DoC never got on the ball to figure out what to do with the .US domain since everything else was a mess, and so it sat .. Verisign put in a bid, but didn't really care for the control of it and had been looking to unload it since they realized they had to manage it.

.US has been the bastard child TLD of the internet trying desparately to hold on to the idea of orderly conduct,

Re:Changes We Are Seeing

[Anonymous Coward]

i'm sorry - did you ever study your internet history?

I'm sorry - did you bother to read and understand my post?

Network Solutions was awarded a government grant and had sole responsibility over all domains ... [blah blah blah I missed the point but let me karma whore anyway] ...

No shit, sherlock. I'd like to think that most people here are familiar with NSI's history as administrator of the DNS.

Verisign put in a bid, but didn't really care for the control of it ...

Which is precisely why I said "but at least it wasn't given to VeriSign, right?" That, combined with the fact that nobody has been happy with their service or policies. At least with NeuStar now in charge of .biz and .us, we have some competition here in the US.

.US has been the bastard child TLD of the internet trying desparately to hold on to the idea of orderly conduct,

So, what exactly is your point? Would you rather have VeriSign win the contract, or some other company, or what?

Re:Changes We Are Seeing

[Anonymous Coward]

You obviously haven't dealt with NeuStar at all.

They're laying off, and can't manage to pay their bills-in spite of a large sum of money in the bank.

Re:Changes We Are Seeing

[Arcanix]

Agreed, kermit and x-modem don't make you elite, you aren't elite unless you've typed LOAD"*",8,1 a few thousand times in your lifetime. I've been hacking supercomputers from my trusty C64 for the past 10 years...

Re:Changes We Are Seeing

[tomstdenis]

When I was five my parents owned a Vic-20 [loaded from tapes or cartridges].

I still don't consider that elite, although it is very nostalgic, brings me back to the days of being a little kid. I programmed quite a few "animated bird" thingies using \ and / in the vic-20 basic lang... :-)

Re:Changes We Are Seeing

[Jon_E]

um let me see here .. you're asking if i understand the part where you said
"at least they didn't give it Verisign?" and .. oh wait - i guess you really didn't have anything to say beyond that at all - did you?

my point which you obviously fail to see here is simply that if Network Solutions (aka Verisign aka Verisign GRS) really had wanted the .US domain - they have the influence with the gov't to take it - in the same way they've been able to extend control of the other "favorable" TLDs .. for over a year now they've essentially been doing the DoC a huge favor by hosting it beyond their contract extension, and making a hideously broken system limp along, but didn't want to spend any of their money making it better.

nobody at Verisign cared about .US!! and if they really did, they would have let the gov't know about 2 years ago when the DoC was trying to pawn it off to anybody who would take it (even the Post Office declined - going after a .COM address instead) - I know since I contracted there to bring up the .US TLD on their systems after they took it back from USC!! if you weren't happy with their service or policies that's simply because their mgmt didn't care about servicing the domain since it was just a resource sinkhole for them to maintain and they received no revenue for it.

and in response to your question - it doesn't matter who gets it! - the domain name system is obviously broken beyond repair from its original intentions, and in many cases is no more useful than the IP addresses it obfuscates. the .US TLD was the last bastion of order in a TLD naming structure trying desperately to hold onto the idea of distributed delegation and organization of names by uniform standards representing localities - (but of course - i assume everyone here is familiar with the RFC)

in response to your ignorant one-liner .. the .US TLD was Verisign's from the moment they bought Network Solutions and was given to them by the government! - it just wasn't worth the fight for them to keep it since they didn't know what to do with it or even how to do a noble deed and improve the management of it since there was nothing in it ($$wise) for them. to me that will always stick out in my mind from the ultimate internet trust company as a really bad move - the greedy company that limited the internet.

If it's not .com

[Anonymous Coward]

it's crap!

Excite article...

[CmdrTroll]

The excite link was slashdotted but here is a summary of what it said:

• The registry will go on-line on December 15th, 2001
• Neustar will be partially subsidized by the US government, and will charge users $5/domain/year for .us domains
• Neustar will be selling x.509 certificates (similar to what Verisign does) for .us domains for $75/domain/year. They have a deal with Thawte that allows them to use the Thawte certificates in most browsers today.
• Pre-registration starts November 30th, 2001, at www.neustar.us

-CT

Re:Excite article...

[1010011010]

What about us folks that are already registrars for .US domains?

It was understood in the past that delegations were to be free. How about now? I don't intend to charge for them in my "teeming metropolis" (cough), but what about others? What's the policy? Will I have my domain revoked? Will I be charged for it? Can I get myname.us?

Re:Excite article...

[DNS-and-BIND]

Well, you could be in a situation like mine, where the registrar for my locality is completely un-responsive to any email sent about registering a domain. In my case, this will be an improvement, as I will actually be able to register a domain. I also seem to recall other localities that charge outrageous rates ($500/yr) for registration, effectively preventing anyone from registering.

Re:Excite article...

[Anonymous Coward]

Couldn't agree more. The ISP I work at (and generally run DNS for) holds the .us domain in special loathing, because it's nearly impossible to get nameserver information for domains updated. We've got several legacy nameservers still in place that host just one or two .wi.us or .mi.us domains each because the registrars responsible for those zones are so terminally unresponsive we've yet to get anywhere after more than a year of trying to get domains moved.

To say it's a pain in the ass would be an understatement. While there are some good .us registrars out there, the system's generally a mess. The WHOIS server for the TLD has been dead for months, the list on nic.us of who domains are delegated to is way out of date, and in many cases the worthy idea of having local responsibility for regional .us domains has turned into something closer to feudalism.

Re:Excite article...

[scoove]

Exactly the case here. Verisign's rules specified that one could not use a community domain unless they were doing business in the community and were authorized.

We met both conditions and yet the squatter (that wasn't even within 300 miles of here and wanted extortion rates) who was never authorized by the community was both registered and extended grandfather rights in violation of Verisign policy by Verisign. We became quickly aware that Verisign simply wanted to destroy .us since it wasn't able to make money off of it.

What about complaints to Verisign? Try filing one... they take 6 weeks (no exaggeration) to respond, always with a form letter either with useless advice that doesn't apply, or statements of the obvious like "in order to register in this subdomain, please contact the subdomain administrator" - yea, call the squatters to complain about them squatting.

I'm confident there are thousands of others like us that were willing to handle subdomain registration at no expense (same as running primary & secondary dns for folks), but because Verisign hozed it up, we'll have another landrush feeding a government-granted monopoly.

It's little different than granting the railroads land to sell in Wyoming, Nebraska, Utah, etc., except after they were inhabited...

*scoove*

p.s. If you're not happy with the situation, be sure to add Verisign to your "banned vendor" list and make the Internet a better place.

Re:Excite article...

[Myuu]

I remember that when i was going to do a tech site, I was going to register in the Italian gTLD(.it as in Information Technology =/), however, the Italian government restricted the domains to only companies with offices in the country. Do you know of any similiar restictions? Also, is there any evidence of this coming out so soon being related to the recent events and furthermore the mad rush of patriotism? ~Myuu

Re:Excite article...

[Anonymous Coward]

use the whois server (nic.us port 43) and use a wildcard to pull down all the records .. of course this is useless since verisign doesn't update it tho :P

Cool

[_typo]

Based in Washington DC, NeuStar operates the authoritative registry of all North American telephone numbers and administers the database, which all North American carriers rely upon to route billions of telephone calls daily.

These guys are cool!

What kind of hardware is this? Someone here know anything about these things?

Re:Cool

[Anonymous Coward]

Uh, no. Having once worked at a similar place, I can assure you that they are most assuredly not cool.

Re:Cool

[scoove]

oh geez... pray that NeuStar (such a proud dot-com name) isn't the spinoff of Bellcore and the ever-so-evil LERG database.

lemme see... neustar.com, typical yucky canned art in ever-so-lucent style, nice ethnic balance in people-focused pictures, blurbs about the ceo-vision-speaking guy blathering on cnn, speaking at some suit summit, featured on businessnow, and a company profile that'd win you a buzzword bingo challenge in 6 seconds flat (first paragraph keywords: rampant, globalization, ensuring, interoperability, networks, ubiquity, internet, packet... and so on. Print this site off and try it on your friends! Makes a great party game!)

Aha... came from Lockheed Martin.

Airplanes, TLD's, what's the difference? It's all marketing. Looks like these guys took a few pages from The Corporation's website.

*scoove*

Re:Cool

[Anonymous Coward]

Suprised no one has mentioned the other .biz TLD (there may be more). Not that they were all that serious a challenge or anything, but they were there first, etc.

...since .US and .BIZ come from the same place now, though; "holding out" for the old .biz is going to be rough.

These folks know the legal system better than we do, and they can, will, and have changed the rules to suit them whenever we manage to threaten to have some input. They do not know jack about the technical realities, and that's the vulnerability.

Don't like ICANN's new TLDs? Filter the fuckers. Declare your own roots, forward to whomever you think has the best plan for managing "the namespace". We'll vote with our feet.

These folks can't take over "our" net; they're clue-proofed. They're really close to having us give it to them ourselves, though.

Re:Cool

[ndixon]

And there's a aplit infinitive in para 3: "... solutions to fundamentally solve these challenges"
should of course read: "solutions fundamentally to solve these challenges". Tut tut.

In fact, in the current political climate it might be a good idea to excise the word "fundamentally".

It might also be worth replacing a few words with these, which emerged from dissociated-press:
proliferampant
billinghouse
administernet

neustar?

[Anonymous Coward]

the managers of the upcoming .biz registry, to manage the .us registry today

you sure about that? i thought it was neulevel that was blundering, i mean managing, .biz

or maybe that's another .biz management company with a very similar name down the street. hmm

Re:neustar?

[Anonymous Coward]

n/m ... i should have read a little more about the company. neulevel is a holding of neustar inc

.info

[slug359]

Let's just pray that this lot do one hell of a lot better than .info did. What a joke, took me over a month to get a few domains registered.

Re:.info

[Jae]

hahahah - you think it was a nightmare for you? i work for a registrar and i can't even begin to tell you the horrors that i experienced.

Re:.info

[Anonymous Coward]

I guess its even better that YOU did not implement the registry or it would have taken years to see the finished product. I saw that there are now 500,000 domains registered in only 90days somehow your math seems a bit odd ?

Hate to be a karma whore...

[CtrlPhreak]

But people are already complaining about it being slashdotted. So here's the excite AP story.

NEW YORK (AP) - Patriotism is about to get easier online.
The Commerce Department selected NeuStar Inc. on Monday to run
domain names ending in ".us." With the announcement comes the
ability to get non-geographic addresses such as
"clothingstore.us," rather than the more cumbersome
"clothingstore.los-angeles.ca.us."
The new rules, expected to take effect early next year, are
designed to get more use out of ".us." Country code suffixes such as ".fr" for France have been sources of national pride
worldwide, but in the United States it is the forgotten stepchild compared with ".com."
NeuStar officials are hoping to change that attitude and said
recent terrorism events may give ".us" even more of a boost.
"The fact is right now, ... American identification is of
increased importance," said Jeff Ganek, NeuStar's chairman and
chief executive.
Also Monday, the department announced a five-year agreement with
Educause, a nonprofit consortium, to run the ".edu" suffix.
Community colleges will be able to claim ".edu" names
beginning Nov. 12. In the past, ".edu" was limited primarily to four-year colleges and universities in the United States.
The ".us" domain name will be restricted to U.S. residents and
companies or organizations that operate in the United States,
though the system will rely partly on self-certification and isn't
foolproof.
Many details also remain unresolved.
Public-interest groups worry that ".us" - historically the
domain of state or local governments, nonprofit organizations and schools - will become yet another frontier dominated by commercial
interests.
"A lot of people are very supportive of opening `.us' for more
commercial, small business and individual use," said Alan Davidson, associate director for the Center for Democracy and
Technology. "What's tricky is how you make sure the policies ...
are fair and equitable."
NeuStar officials said existing ".us" users will get to keep
their names, and local entities that now assign geographically oriented names like "anyname.los-angeles.ca.us" can continue
doing so.
In addition, a number of names have been set aside, including
"kids.us" as a possible children's channel and "parks.us" as a
central resource for parks in the United States.
The company will establish a policy advisory council to address
usage issues, said James Casey, NeuStar's director of policy and
business development. The council's composition and other details
are still pending.
In the past, ".us" policy was handled by the University of
Southern California's Information Sciences Institute, which delegated assignments of specific names to some 800 individuals and
organizations.
To accommodate the distributed assignments, names became long
and cumbersome. It was also difficult to figure out where to go to
get them. Though businesses were allowed to claim ".us" names,
few did.
The change in ".us" is separate from last year's decision by
the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers to create
seven Internet suffixes to relieve overcrowding in ".com."
A NeuStar subsidiary, NeuLevel Inc., is the operator of
".biz," one of the new suffixes. NeuStar's ".us" database will
share some of the security and technical developments being used in
".biz."
NeuStar, based in Washington, D.C., also runs databases of area
codes and telephone prefixes for the nation's phone system.
The Commerce contract with NeuStar will run four years, with
options for two one-year extensions

Re:Hate to be a karma whore...

[unitron]

Almost 2 hours later it's still unavailable, so thanks. Since some moderator considers the story being discussed to be offtopic I'm re-posting your post below. Maybe a few more people will get to see it before I get modded down.

Hate to be a karma whore... (Score:0, Offtopic)
by CtrlPhreak on 08:01 PM October 30th, 2001 (#2500364)
(User #226872 Info | http://ist05.ma.psu.edu/~bld168 | Last Journal: 11:53 PM October 1st, 2001)
But people are already complaining about it being slashdotted. So here's the excite AP story.

NEW YORK (AP) - Patriotism is about to get easier online.
The Commerce Department selected NeuStar Inc. on Monday to run
domain names ending in ".us." With the announcement comes the
ability to get non-geographic addresses such as
"clothingstore.us," rather than the more cumbersome
"clothingstore.los-angeles.ca.us."
The new rules, expected to take effect early next year, are
designed to get more use out of ".us." Country code suffixes such as ".fr" for France have been sources of national pride
worldwide, but in the United States it is the forgotten stepchild compared with ".com."
NeuStar officials are hoping to change that attitude and said
recent terrorism events may give ".us" even more of a boost.
"The fact is right now, ... American identification is of
increased importance," said Jeff Ganek, NeuStar's chairman and
chief executive.
Also Monday, the department announced a five-year agreement with
Educause, a nonprofit consortium, to run the ".edu" suffix.
Community colleges will be able to claim ".edu" names
beginning Nov. 12. In the past, ".edu" was limited primarily to four-year colleges and universities in the United States.
The ".us" domain name will be restricted to U.S. residents and
companies or organizations that operate in the United States,
though the system will rely partly on self-certification and isn't
foolproof.
Many details also remain unresolved.
Public-interest groups worry that ".us" - historically the
domain of state or local governments, nonprofit organizations and schools - will become yet another frontier dominated by commercial
interests.
"A lot of people are very supportive of opening `.us' for more
commercial, small business and individual use," said Alan Davidson, associate director for the Center for Democracy and
Technology. "What's tricky is how you make sure the policies ...
are fair and equitable."
NeuStar officials said existing ".us" users will get to keep
their names, and local entities that now assign geographically oriented names like "anyname.los-angeles.ca.us" can continue
doing so.
In addition, a number of names have been set aside, including
"kids.us" as a possible children's channel and "parks.us" as a
central resource for parks in the United States.
The company will establish a policy advisory council to address
usage issues, said James Casey, NeuStar's director of policy and
business development. The council's composition and other details
are still pending.
In the past, ".us" policy was handled by the University of
Southern California's Information Sciences Institute, which delegated assignments of specific names to some 800 individuals and
organizations.
To accommodate the distributed assignments, names became long
and cumbersome. It was also difficult to figure out where to go to
get them. Though businesses were allowed to claim ".us" names,
few did.
The change in ".us" is separate from last year's decision by
the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers to create
seven Internet suffixes to relieve overcrowding in ".com."
A NeuStar subsidiary, NeuLevel Inc., is the operator of
".biz," one of the new suffixes. NeuStar's ".us" database will
share some of the security and technical developments being used in
".biz."
NeuStar, based in Washington, D.C., also runs databases of area
codes and telephone prefixes for the nation's phone system.
The Commerce contract with NeuStar will run four years, with
options for two one-year extensions

-----
$ rm -rf /bin/laden
[ Reply to This | Parent ]

Note to moderators: This *is* ontopic, because it *is* the topic (despite the Slashdot tendency to post with reading the story first) and I've got enough karma left to lather, rinse, repeat a bunch of times.

Re:Hate to be a karma whore...

[CtrlPhreak]

Always liked you unitron...

Re:Hate to be a karma whore...

[unitron]

The original gets modded down to 0, so I repost at +2 so that it's visible to those who browse higher, so somebody mods it down as redundant, thus lowering its visibility and rendering it redundant when it wasn't redundant before it was modded down. Sheeesh!

Okay, perhaps now that the original Excite-AP page is finally available it's redundant, but I really wonder about people who go through stories several hours or more old looking for something to mod down. Wonder if they ever go to that much trouble looking for stuff that deserves modding up?

Now! Register your domains!

[afree87]

http://dont.slashdot.us/

http://please.kug.us/

h ttp://nimda.vir.us/

Re:Now! Register your domains!

[TeknoHog]

all.your.base.are.belong.to.us

(no http:// coz I fail to understand what it has to do with domain names)

Re:Now! Register your domains!

[TeknoHog]

Hi, I'm a pretentious cock who will make some gay comment about ignoring AC posts here.

*Homer J. Simpson pronouncing 'Uruguay'*

Re:Now! Register your domains!

[Anonymous Coward]

wtf happened to tricosm?

new TLD's

[rossdee]

"The US Government picked NeuStar, the managers of the upcoming .biz registry, to manage the .us registry today."

So will there also be a .them TLD ?

Re:new TLD's

[Bios_Hakr]

Well, there IS a .it domain. seems like you could have a lot of fun there. Any other pronoun TLDs out there?

BTW, what are the rules behind grabbing a domain in a country that isn't yours? It seems to me that if your physical server is outside of the USA, you should not be able to reg a .us.

Of course, that opens up questions about load-balancing techniques and back-end servers, but my guess it that every porn site in the Cayman Islands will have a "cum.c.us" as soon as possible.

Re:new TLD's

[Some Dumbass...]

.us vs .them . What a typically American attitude ;)

Re:new TLD's

[Anonymous Coward]

It has nothing to do with the server location. Hasn't the Internet taught you anything yet? It's about where your offices are.

Re:new TLD's

[Zocalo]

There are a *lot* of ccTLDs that are also words (.TO), abbreviations (.IQ), or short-hand (.CU), it really depends on your imagintion. You could also potentially use foreign language words if that would appeal to your target audience. Of course, just because a ccTLD is available doesn't mean a foreign national can register a domain with-in it.

IANA has a complete list if you want a perusal.

Re:new TLD's

[kiwaiti]

Actually, it's about where people are likely to look for you.

interNIC? .net
WWF? .org
whitehouse? .us (errrm...)

Kiwaiti

only us residents

[Psychopax]

Again a ccTLD which is only of use for residents of this country. That's not fair - why is my country then giving away it's domain to people all around the world?
In my opinion this should be standarized. So that all ccTLDs are open for everybody.
j.

Re:only us residents

[rfc1394]

Again a ccTLD which is only of use for residents of this country.

As the actual owner of a .US domain for more than two years now, that's not my understanding, I believe that .US has always been open to anyone who wants to register a compliant address. (Compliant means it has to be under a 2-character state and a specific city in that state). In fact, you don't even have to be where the domain is named; for example, my domain is listed as Washington, DC, but I do not live there (I live about 5 miles from Washington in another state). When I filled out the application with the nic for .US, which then was ISI at the University of Southern California (USC-ISI), I put down my address in Virginia and was issued the domain name the next day.

That's not fair - why is my country then giving away it's domain to people all around the world?

Doubtful that there are very many people outside of the US would want to bother with a .US address. I only got it because they're free, and basically about the only ones getting them are organizations tied to a specific city and state (local governments) and people or companies who are (to put it bluntly), cheapskates like me. The price of "free" was a lot more affordable for me when I wasn't working, as opposed to the (then exorbitant) $35 a year for a .COM or other TLD address.

In my opinion this should be standarized. So that all ccTLDs are open for everybody.

A country code TLD is subject to whatever rules that the country code agency of that country decides. You can't get a ham radio license in a particular country unless you follow its rules and there's no reason that whomever runs a particular TLD can't set rules on who can apply or what they can get.

Since most countries are charging for domains in their TLD the domain operator usually sees it as a profit center, and with the exception of the few remaining communist countries - and maybe some of them, too - I suspect you can get a registration in just about any country's tld whether or not you live there.

Paul Robinson <Postmaster@paul.washington.dc.us>

Re:only us residents

[Schoinobates Volans]

with the exception of the few remaining communist countries I suspect you can get a registration in just about any country's tld whether or not you live there.

One notable exception: France. In France, to get a second-level, you must be french company and take your name, or have a registered trademark, and take that trademark.

There is a second-level reserved for persons, and then you can get as third-level: your_real_name-[you_choose_it_but_non_empty]

Re:only us residents

[RedHat Rocky]

I find the whole concept of domain name "ownership" laughable. You don't own the domain, you're renting it!

The analogy to landrushes in the past is right on target here.

Re:only us residents

[Psychopax]

The article said it is for "U.S. residents" only. But I'll look into it again.
I think there would be many people outside of the US who would like to have a domain under the the new US TLDs (As far as I understood it this state-scheme won't apply to the new domains)
I can tell you that there are amazingly many countries who reserve their domains for their citiziens only. Look through the IANA ccTLD list and go to some of the registration services websites. Many many of these ccTLDs (some of which are very nice) are open for their citiziens only.
btw, are you a ham?
Nice day,
J.

Hey, I've got an idea!

[Anml4ixoye]

Let's just open up every single TLD to whoever wants to take it! No reason .edu should mean that it is a university, or that .org should be an organization, or that any of the TLDs should stay what they were meant for!

I can see it now. We are already having to fight over two TLD's (one that was squatted (.com) and one that was given to the wrong people (.co.hillsborough.fl.us). Now we are going to have to buy and maintain 17 seperate web addresses just to point them all to one server so that people can find us. Great! Can't wait!

I know this has been mentioned before, but what is the point of opening up the TLDs? Companies are just going to have to buy the ones (or sue to steal them back) that infringe upon them. So why not leave them alone?

Re:Hey, I've got an idea!

[Doomdark]

Why would anyone have to register 17 domains? IP-names are not search mechanism; they are not meant to be all-encompassing taxonomy for web sites. If you want to get to a company's web page, you shouldn't have to resort to guessing dns - spelling, nor domain. Search using Google, go to Yahoo, check it out company's/organization's ads, whatever.

Relying on DNS to act as your portal is stupid. It would be best for all if TLDs were completely open, but there would be suggestions (by W3C or IETF) for 'official' ones. Some people really just love the idea of artificial scarcity of technically unlimited resources, like domain names.

Re:Hey, I've got an idea!

[tsprad]

> what is the point of opening up the TLDs?
> Companies are just going to have to buy the
> ones (or sue to steal them back) that infringe
> upon them.

You can keep creating top level domains 'til you're blue in the face, the guys with money and lawyers will keep grabbing 'em.

How about TLDs for the various stock exchanges, like .NYSE, .NASDAQ, .Nikkei? The second level domains *must* be the registered stock symbols of the officially registered stocks on each exchange, and the holders of those 2nd level domains must *not* be allowed to register under any other domain. Then one or a few TLDs (.unregistered?) for all the rest of us, where stock corporations are *not* allowed to register at all.

Re:Hey, I've got an idea!

[Anonymous Coward]

Jon Postel .. oh how we miss order

amazing what happens when you combine greed and political ignorance of technology

Re:Hey, I've got an idea!

[mpe]

You can keep creating top level domains 'til you're blue in the face, the guys with money and lawyers will keep grabbing 'em.

Consider where the money is going though...
By the sound of things we have just seen the creation of yet another .misc Which will simply result in the creation of a few million www.somejunk.whatever.
But as this is in the direct financial interests of the people creating the problem dosn't expect anything to be done about it soon.

word docs

[dirtyeye]

It seems a bit strange that a goverment agency, on the subject of combining all americans under one roof, would require that they all be running ms word to fully understand what they have to say - doesn't it?

Re:word docs

[thelenm]

Strange but true, I know of another certain large organization that would like to combine all Americans under one roof, and would require them to be running MS Word as well.

An International Internet

[Embedded Geek]

So, is this (the use of .US domains) going to be a step towards a more international Internet, even a baby step?

I know that people (esp in the mainstream press) marvel at how global the Internet is, but the fact is that it is inherently biased towards people in the US. Personally, unless I have reason to think otherwise (e.g. oxford.edu, moscowballet.org, airfrance.com, etc) I (incorrectly) tend to assume that a domain is on my side of the pond (or Pacific, or Canadian or Mexican border). It strikes me as unfair that a business running in the UK realistcally has to grab both .co.uk and .com domains to be sure that they reach their (UK) customers while I could simply buy eds-taco-palace.com and everyone knows it's in the States.

On the gripping hand... if we are entering an era of U.S. hedgmony, perhaps this skewed view is appropriate. After all, if the Romans had the Internet, would they have confided themselves to a ".rmn" country code?

PS - Random thought - imagine IP addresses in Rome: ccv.xcv.xxx.ii. But then they'd have had to cross the Atlantic and conquer the Aztecs to get zero and make it work...

Re:An International Internet

[devphil]

while I could simply buy eds-taco-palace.com and everyone knows it's in the States.

That's because only we Americans have lousy enough taste to both:

• Name a business "Ed's Taco Palace," and
• Register a globally-visible domain for something so inherently local.

:-)

Re:An International Internet

[nsample]

Thank gawd the Romans were smart enough to know that the Hindus had zero... and lived a lot closer.

Re:An International Internet

[dachshund]

It strikes me as unfair that a business running in the UK realistcally has to grab both .co.uk and .com domains to be sure that they reach their (UK) customers while I could simply buy eds-taco-palace.com and everyone knows it's in the States.

I think the unfairness cuts the other way. A UK business could at least buy a .co.uk address, and be sure they weren't competing with the whole world for it. American businesses, on the other hand, have had to compete with everyone on the planet to secure a .com.

Having said that, I don't imagine that too many people have cried themselves to sleep over these issues.

Re:An International Internet

[kimihia]

Good post.

The reason for choosing an international domain over a local domain has two reasons:

• People are too dumb to remember the ccTLD. When I say my website is at "kimihia.org.nz", most people take that to mean my website is at "kimihia.org". I did register the .org TLD version for one of my websites because that was where a large portion of my visitors were arriving from.
• People are too dumb to realise the net is international. How many times do you have to explain that yes, anybody anywhere (*) can host a .nz domain, and anybody anywhere can access a .nz domain? It isn't just limited (like most consumer's minds) to one country!

* Unless you are unable to get a 'net connection from where you are. :-)

Re:An International Internet

[Embedded Geek]

Dho! 'Guess this is why American schooling gets such a bad rap. Not that my High School gave me incorrect information, but that I slipped through quality control able to forget about the Hindus. ;)

PS - After writting the above, I noticed another "US-ism." Specifically, the use of "American" for "relating to the United States," as opposed to the many other residents of North and South America. In defense, I'm tempted to point out the use of the term "Norteamericano" in Mexico for refering to us gringos (even though Mexico is in North America), but I'm scared because I leaned that in High School, as well.

Re:An International Internet

[Anonymous Coward]

You slipped another one in there.

Mexico is in Central America. ;-)

Re:An International Internet

[ergo98]

Hehe, I believe that technically Mexico is a part of North America (i.e. NAFTA includes Mexico. . Many people separate it from the US & Canada not because of geographical reasons, but rather economic reasons: It's easier to say North America and mean the US & Canada.

Re:An International Internet

[John Marshall]

So, is this (the use of .US domains) going to be a step towards a more international Internet, even a baby step? [...]inherently biased towards people in the US [... X.edu, Y.org, Z.com ...]

Those aren't so bad.

What's really offensive is whitehouse.gov and the like. If there's anything that ought to be under .us, isn't it that country's government?

They're not the world government yet!

Re:An International Internet

[Anonymous Coward]

"Gringo" is a racist insult, the same as "spick" or "wetback".

Americans call themselves "Americans", and that's good enough. One should be respectful of such things.

Re:An International Internet

[charon_on_acheron]

"Register a globally-visible domain for something so inherently local"

This reason is why I never bothered to register a domain when I was running my own home-based computer repair business. I have the state tax license and the business checking account, but no web-page. People would ask me about it, and I would generally tell them I don't see the need to let the whole world read about my business on the web, when only people in my immediate area are going to be calling me.

This new scheme with .us seems to be much better. I would gladly pay $5 for my_company.my_city.st.us.
It makes a lot more sense than $75 for my_company.com. And another $75 for my_company.net. And another $75 for my_compnay.com. And another $75 for my_compnay.net. And another $75 for mycompany.com. And another $75 for mycompany.net....

Re:An International Internet

[istartedi]

Random thought - imagine IP addresses in Rome: ccv.xcv.xxx.ii.

/me shudders thinking of how they would have represented approximations to PI.

Another reason to switch to linux. . .

[havardi]

The Government actually has to hire a company to restore damaged registry files. That makes me want to *puke*

At last !! (???)

[Anonymous Coward]

".US will play a key role in America's 21st century communication infrastructure. A great opportunity exists to unlock the potential of the .US domain to the benefit of the American people."

Wow! at last, all americans will get a normal life. How would be the next century without this remarkable human and technological accomplishment...

Says it all, doesn't it...

[Valdrax]

I think this says it all:

The new rules, expected to take effect early next year, are designed to get more use out of ".us." Country code suffixes such as ".fr" for France have been sources of national pride worldwide, but in the United States it is the forgotten stepchild compared with ".com."

"Dot-US" and XRP/BEEP data point

[Kris Magnusson]

Note that the article stated that the NeuLevel subsidiary will share some of the security and technical developments used in ".biz."

Hopefully one of these shared technical developments will be the reuse of the eXtensible Registry Protocol (XRP), which is defined as a profile for the Internet-standard BEEP framework. NeuStar used hardened implementations of the BEEP framework, called "Beepcore," that my former employer Invisible Worlds developed under contract.

I don't know of any open source implementations for XRP, but these Beepcore implementations are available as free software under a BSD-style license at Beepcore.org.

............ kris

Kris Magnusson
(formerly marketing and developer relations manager for Invisible Worlds)

Re:"Dot-US" and XRP/BEEP data point

[SAH]

I don't believe there's any public document that describes a BEEP profile for what NeuStar is calling XRP, but there _is_ one for the Extensible Provisioning Protocol (EPP), a work item of the IETF's provreg working group:

EPP BEEP Transport

It may be that NeuStar is using XRP as a brand name for their implementation of EPP. FWIW there is an open source implementation of EPP available on SourceForge:

EPP on SourceForge

Everyone's got a way to take advantage of 9-11

[filrock]

NeuStar officials are hoping to change that attitude and said recent terrorism events may give ".us" even more of a boost.

"The fact is right now, ... American identification is of increased importance," said Jeff Ganek, NeuStar's chairman and chief executive.

Be patriotic! Get your .us domain now! You're not in with Osama are you? Then you better make sure everyone that looks at your URL can tell you're american!

.us domain

[Anonymous Coward]

The main reasons I've really liked the .us domain is 1) it's free; and 2) assignment of domain names is completely local and decentralized. The guy in charge of administering my records lives here in the same town as I, and has been real quick about changin ip associations when I've needed to do so (like 2-hour turnaround). I've been using my domain (bullcreek.austin.tx.us -- i'm not an anonymous coward, I just don't like registering) for many years now. Not sure I like the idea of paying 5 bucks for what has been free, and turning over admin to some faceless corporation that's *very* likely to be less responsive than what I've been used to.

Re:.us domain

[mpe]

The main reasons I've really liked the .us domain is 1) it's free; and 2) assignment of domain names is completely local and decentralized

Which is really how the entire thing should work. One side effect is making cybersquatting difficult because identity checking is easier

The guy in charge of administering my records lives here in the same town as I, and has been real quick about changin ip associations when I've needed to do so (like 2-hour turnaround).

The problem is that, as with any system, there are good people and bad people. The solution is deal with the bad.
Effectivly this action is almost analagous to the US repealing the 10th ammendment on the basis that officials in some small towns didn't do a good job...

Not sure I like the idea of paying 5 bucks for what has been free, and turning over admin to some faceless corporation that's *very* likely to be less responsive than what I've been used to.

It's quite possible that the worst operators of the existing system are corporates anyway.

Re:.us domain

[tarp]

A couple years ago, I tried registering a domain in my local town .centreville.va.us and a week later I got a bill in the mail for $125 from some network services company in Hagerstown, MD. I called them and asked them what this was for and they said it was the yearly registration fee (!). The hell with those jerks.

The point of country TLD's

[Kallahar]

I was always under the impression that the country TLD's were meant to be used for sites that had geography-specific information. Such as city government sites, or a store that is in one city. The example "clothingstore.los-angeles.ca.us" given was a good example, but now they want to make it "clothingstore.us"? Doesn't that pretty much defeat the point?

Another point to consider is who can buy these. Will it be US people only or will it be like cc, tv, to, etc which will sell to anyone?

On a third note, do I care? I already have a couple .com's :)

Re:The point of country TLD's

[Doomdark]

I was always under the impression that the country TLD's were meant to be used for sites that had geography-specific information

I don't know if that was the original intention, but it certainly hasn't been the practice. Outside of .us - domain (esp. before .com became 'hot') companies and universities did use country TLDs, many still do. Sometimes multi-national co's have localized sites (www.company.com for 'main page', www.company.fr for french version etc) using these too.

Re:The point of country TLD's

[mpe]

I was always under the impression that the country TLD's were meant to be used for sites that had geography-specific information. Such as city government sites, or a store that is in one city.

The vast majority of business is geographically (according to either physical or political geography) based. Though the scale of course varies..

The example "clothingstore.los-angeles.ca.us" given was a good example, but now they want to make it "clothingstore.us"? Doesn't that pretty much defeat the point?

The point has already been defeated, by "mom and pops" winding up with .coms. Problem is that the people doing this are those handling the registration.

in other news...

[Malachite]

...the number of stupid webpages sporting american flags and those silly "osama bin laden: wanted dead or alive" posters is expected to skyrocket.

Too little too late...

[Mustang Matt]

What good is .us going to do now?

The only purposes I can see are these...
1. International companies can now add more seperation to their domain names. For instance, sony.com.us vs. sony.com.jp.
2. Cybersquatters can now go and grab domains like microsoft.com.us and send out porn spam trying to fool the clueless into clicking on the link.

Am I missing something?

I really don't see any great advantage to them releasing .us, if they're going to do .us, they should let us use .'anything'

My DNS servers are ready, how about yours?

Re:Too little too late...

[Anonymous Coward]

only missing one thing. its ".co.jp". ".com.jp" doesnt exist.

my 3 second comment.

Article title

[Syberghost]

My submission (early yesterday) had a better title:

All Your Domain Are Belong to .US

Re:Article title

[Anonymous Coward]

What do you want, a cookie?

Re:Article title

[nbvb]

He doesn't need a cookie. The OSDN crapola on Slushdot took care of that already.

All you .us are belong to base!

[Anonymous Coward]

Sorry, couldn't help.

Scrap .com, all use contry codes.

[Mike McTernan]

Country code suffixes such as ".fr" for France have been sources of national pride worldwide, but in the United States it is the forgotten stepchild compared with ".com."

It's always annoyed me how the world seems to use country codes for it's TLD's, and then the US has some other TLDs that is just uses.

For example, when shopping online I want to know if a company will ship to the UK. If it is a .co.uk company I can be sure it will. If it is a .com, it might or might not.

Essentially it seems logical for organisations to just register the TLDs for the countries in which they operate/are registered, and for the .com TLD to be scrapped (Although this would never happen).

Oh, I'd scrap .edu too. .ac.us would be a fine replacement.

Re:Scrap .com, all use contry codes.

[droleary]

It's always annoyed me how the world seems to use country codes for it's TLD's, and then the US has some other TLDs that is just uses.

Bastards! What, do they think they invented the Internet or something?

For example, when shopping online I want to know if a company will ship to the UK. If it is a .co.uk company I can be sure it will. If it is a .com, it might or might not.

So why not just stick to .co.uk companies? How will using the .us TLD help you here, since it is quite possible for a company in the States to ship to the UK? Your real complaint seems to be that there are some companies using purportedly international domain like .com (although, really, .int is the OTID) without having a certain level of international support. Just as the new TLDs don't solve any real problems, increased usage of the .us TLD doesn't solve your real problem.

Essentially it seems logical for organisations to just register the TLDs for the countries in which they operate/are registered, and for the .com TLD to be scrapped (Although this would never happen).

And what is the "logical" solution to country neutral organizations? Should I really care where in the world Slashdot or The Onion is? You're taking outdated geographical notions and superimposing them on the Internet, which goes beyond illogical to simply unreasonable. There's more to the Internet than bloody shopping.

Re:Scrap .com, all use contry codes.

[Mike McTernan]

Bastards! What, do they think they invented the Internet or something?

It seems odd that someone would invent one system for themself, and a completely different one for all others... although this mess probably evolved, as mess does.

So why not just stick to .co.uk companies

Lots of .co.uk companies think it is cool to be a .com! Depending on what you are looking for, you can be limited by adding .co.uk as a constraint - esp if bargain hunting.

It is true that lots of US companies will ship, as will companies from all around the world, but there isn't a term you can easily put into Google to differentiate such companies. Putting in site:.co.uk should do a good job, but doesn't for reasons given.

You're taking outdated geographical notions and superimposing them on the Internet, which goes beyond illogical to simply unreasonable

I'm not sure I agree with the whole Internet as a different place concept. It is very firmly rooted in the real world. Companies, be them .com's or whatever will have some registered trading address that ties them to some place on Earth. Some may have a number of addresses, in which case they can take a number of country codes.

In fact, if you think about it, a limited company is a legal entity, so it must be tied to laws of at least one country.

Slashdot or The Onion is

Slashdot is .us because of it's US biased content. The Onion is .us too, since at calls itself 'America's Finest News Source' (go there and look at the title bar of your browser yourself).

Oh, and I'd keep .org for global organisations such as Amnesty International.

Re:Scrap .com, all use contry codes.

[Anonymous Coward]

So, you want to change the domain name of 75% of the hosts on the Internet. I don't know if that's audacious or just plain stupid. Scratch that, yes I do. I bet it really gets under your skin that we don't have metric time either.

Re:Scrap .com, all use contry codes.

[Jon_E]

hey - while we're at it - why don't we scrap letters and words and use icons .. it's just as random if you think about how silly it all it - it's already too late for anything resembling order in the domain namespace game anyhow, and the multilingual namespace is a joke (albeit an expensive one)

the new TLD will be known as <img src=foo.gif> "the domain formerly known as .us" </img>

Re:Scrap .com, all use contry codes.

[mpe]

Essentially it seems logical for organisations to just register the TLDs for the countries in which they operate/are registered, and for the .com TLD to be scrapped (Although this would never happen).

Problem is that this needed to have happened before the ".com bubble".
Problem is that DNS names have been treated as arbitary strings, rather than postal addresses or telephone numbers. (Indeed maybe you could make a rule such that as a precondition for any .uk you must have a +44 telephone number and an address in the UK, similarly +33 and in France for .fr. If you want a .com then you must provide a +800 number. Problem is that this won't work for the US/Canada/etc because they don't have a proper country code.)

Re:Scrap .com, all use contry codes.

[mpe]

I'm not sure I agree with the whole Internet as a different place concept. It is very firmly rooted in the real world.

It's actually a little more complex than that. A company selling a physical product is certainly tied very much to geography. One which sells something which can be sent over the Internet (some kind of service or IP) could be less tied. Especially if they allow use of many currencies. The issue of where they actually are occurs when something goes wrong or there are other issues of legality.

Companies, be them .com's or whatever will have some registered trading address that ties them to some place on Earth. Some may have a number of addresses, in which case they can take a number of country codes.

If you want a special address you tend to have to be big. A closer analogy would be with telephone numbers, if you want anything other than a standard geographic number you have to specifically ask and probably pay. (Quite likely you still have the standard number anyway.)

Re:Scrap .com, all use contry codes.

[benb]

> If you want a .com then you must provide a +800
> number.

Why should I have an internationally tollfree number to register a .com domain?

> Problem is that this won't work for the
> US/Canada/etc because they don't have a proper
> country code.)

They have : Both +1.

E.g. from Germany, you dial 001-976-555-4678, just like you would dial 0033-1-12345678 for a phone in Paris (IIRC).

Re:Scrap .com, all use contry codes.

[purplemonkeydan]

hey - while we're at it - why don't we scrap letters and words and use icons .. it's just as random if you think about how silly it all it - it's already too late for anything resembling order in the domain namespace game anyhow, and the multilingual namespace is a joke (albeit an expensive one)

That's not that far away.

http://ml.register.com/index-ss.cgi?6309|269358514 4

Welcome to hell, folks.

Re:Scrap .com, all use contry codes.

[droleary]

It seems odd that someone would invent one system for themself, and a completely different one for all others... although this mess probably evolved, as mess does.

Probably evolved? There was no "all other" when everything began. I imagine a hopefully not too distant future when there is a colony on the moon and people there are bitching because they've been assigned the .moon TLD but we're still using .com down here instead of "planet codes". Look at it this way: there was already enough momentum for the existing TLDs when country codes came into the picture that essentially nobody switched; can you really expect anyone to switch now?

Lots of .co.uk companies think it is cool to be a .com! Depending on what you are looking for, you can be limited by adding .co.uk as a constraint - esp if bargain hunting.

You support my point. Geography matter for some things, but for the vast majority of things on the Internet, the content goes beyond a single country. Trying to assign that content to a single country is a huge mistake.

In fact, if you think about it, a limited company is a legal entity, so it must be tied to laws of at least one country.

Why? And even if that legal tangle exists, what does it have to do with the domain name of a company? If VA drops Slashdot and the crew moves to Zimbabwe, what do I care? Why should it suddenly become necessary to start using .slashdot.org.zw?

Slashdot is .us because of it's US biased content. The Onion is .us too, since at calls itself 'America's Finest News Source' (go there and look at the title bar of your browser yourself).

You're completely missing the point. Just because their origins are the US doesn't say jack about their audience/customers. I think it makes some sense for companies like Yahoo that provide localized content to have a presence within a country code, but I don't think it's a good idea to force sites like Slashdot, or anyone wanting to deal with an international audience, to be country specific. Don't you realize the absolute mess that will cause? You think domain disputes got ugly with just the highest level domains, and now you want to bring in country level disputes and open the can on international claims on country codes?

For a lot of things on the Internet, country codes simply don't make sense. They do help for some things, but let's not make the mistake of trying to jam everything into neat little country containers.

Re:Scrap .com, all use contry codes.

[Anonymous Coward]

They do help for some things, but let's not make the mistake of trying to jam everything into neat little country containers.

And lets try to avail the mistake of jamming everything into .com or whatever the latest 'trendy' TLD is...

Re:Scrap .com, all use contry codes.

[mpe]

> If you want a .com then you must provide a +800 > number.
Why should I have an internationally tollfree number to register a .com domain?

Because the only way you will get one of these is by operating in more than one country. Also it's an additional barrier to any entity not an international company being able to get a .com SLD.

> Problem is that this won't work for the > US/Canada/etc because they don't have a proper > country code.)
They have : Both +1.

No they don't the whole of the NANP is under +1, with no easy way to work out which of the nearly 20 odd countries a number applies to.

Not at all!

[Anonymous Coward]

what is the point of opening up the TLDs? Companies are just going to have to buy the ones (or sue to steal them back) that infringe upon them. So why not leave them alone?

I don't know what you're talking about. I, personally, am thrilled that I can finally buy BurgerKing.us, Starbucks.us and Citibank.us. An end to the coporate stranglehold!

Missing the whole point of domains

[kawaichan]

the whole and the sole purpose of domain names is for people to REMEMBER the domain name, it's already hard to remember with .com .net .org but now we've got .biz, .pro, .us .whatever. How am I gonna remember anything know Domain name is suppose to be EASIER, ip seems to be a much better deal right now, it's free and there is only 12 digits to remember. and btw, when the new mod system are gonna be in place, I am sick of reading goatsex crap.

Re:Missing the whole point of domains

[Jon_E]

*brrp* wrong - thanks for playing

the purpose of domain names was for the identification and organization of entities. In the original scheme they had accounted for commercial, educational, network,and nonprofit entities that were globally based, and things that were to be regionally and locationally based represented by the .US TLD and the other ccTLDs .. but guess what happened when NSI compromised the standards because of their greed? unregulation in the .com space crept into .net and .org and the whole thing fell apart. Until his death, Postel was relegated to working out silly squabbles in the .US domain (which NSI literally forgot about), and the .US domain seemed too regulated and became underutilized as it seemed almost everyone was seeking to make their fortune for doing nothing.

now guess what people are discovering - locational identification of entities are important and virtually impossible to do in the current scheme. we screwed the system up ourselves!! and in the process alienated some of the greatest minds and contributors.

Might as well...

[kindbud]

We gave the country away to John Ashcroft, might as well give the TLD away to NeuLevel.

Are you sure?

[bagel]

but the fact is that it is inherently biased towards people in the US. Personally, unless I have reason to think otherwise (e.g. oxford.edu, moscowballet.org, airfrance.com, etc) I (incorrectly) tend to assume that a domain is on my side of the pond

Or maybe this is just another example of how americans think they're the centre of the internet. Do you know the rest of the world loves getting the .coms as well? For example, almost all hong kong's (where my parents live) sites are .com except for governments and universities. This is an indication how hkers aren't really that patriotic. Can you tell me that these are american sites

www.she.com
www.tom.com
www.singtao.com
www.mingpao.com

Even new zealand is getting its dose of local .com sites now, eg www.nzoom.com

How does .us differ?

[RedX]

How is this "new" domain extension registry going to differ from all the rest? Are trademark holders once again going to get first shot? Are we private citizens going to be subject to litigation by the corporate types that want to snatch our domain names away from us? I happen to share a surname with a very large brokerage house that has seen fit to register just about every iteration of the name I can think of without stretching it to an ungodly number of characters. Is this just going to be another domain extension where they'll snap up all the useful variations of our name?

Re:I win!

[vishitrollxp]

McDonnald's: Breakfast of Champions.

you mean .crap

[fenix down]

BA-DUM KISHHH!!!

Ahh, forget it.

Re:BULLSHIT! noone was complaining, karma whore!!

[The Pi-Guy]

Or so says the AC. Hah. --joshua *waits 20 seconds*

Quick, someone snatch up "dontfuckwith.us"

[Anonymous Coward]

That's all, thanks.

toysr.us

[Goose In Orbit]

I take it this is already registered...

prospect.us

[Anonymous Coward]

I am furio.us at the ambiguo.us and dangero.us

loc.us of this so called surpl.us. The general consens.us is that the autonomo.us apparat.us be given to the corp.us not the ambitio.us chor.us.

Lawsuit bait... register r.us

[weave]

Register r.us as a domain and taunt the evil ones!

geeks.r.us
babes.r.us
trolls.r.us
lawsuits.r.us

etc...

Re:Lawsuit bait... register r.us

[spooge21]

I can almost guarantee that one letter and two letter second level domains will be forbidden, as described in the Proposed Unsponsored TLD Agreement: Appendix K.

Re:Lawsuit bait... register r.us

[weave]

I can almost guarantee that one letter and two letter second level domains will be forbidden

Oh you of little humor! :-)

But on that topic, I always wondered how x.com got registered (now owned by paypal, was a paypal competitor in the beginning).

Re:Lawsuit bait... register r.us

[Anonymous Coward]

IIRC, x.com was register through a glitch in the DNS system, after .com registration was opened to companies other than NetSol (interestingly enough, a glitch in x.com itself allowed you to transfer money from any US bank account without authorization...). There were other glitches - for example, people registered invalid domains such as "xyz-.com" (domains can't start or end with '-'), but I think those domains were later deleted. For some reason, x.com was not. Maybe nobody noticed soon enough.

BTW, x.org was registered before single-character domains were banned. And after the x.com incident, IANA registered all the remaining single-character .com, .org, and .net domains to itself.

Re:Lawsuit bait... register r.us

[pne]

Register r.us as a domain and taunt the evil ones!

geeks.r.us
babes.r.us
trolls.r.us
lawsuits.r.us

If you want to go the lawsuit route, you should go straight for toys.r.us.

Re:Lawsuit bait... register r.us

[wemmick]

Aren't most second level domains under .us already (exactly) two characters?

www.state.pa.us
www.state.va.us
www.state.co.us

Re:Lawsuit bait... register r.us

[spooge21]

I probably should qualify my original statement by saying that no "new" 2 letter second level domains will be allowed. Of course that is just a guess based on previous TLDs.

Be the first defense contractor on your block!

[scoove]

Looks like Lockheed Martin won more than the joint strike fighter. They're the latest defense contractor to have - yes - their very own top level domain!

You have to admit. Owning a TLD is cooler than being a HoJo's on the Ohio Turnpike complete with pay toilets. Not only do you sell things that cost you nothing to make (more profitable than selling slightly used and still glowing land in Nevada), but it gives you that Intellectual Property high that makes you the rage at all the beltway cocktail parties.

Imagine all the hookups and special deals Jeff Ganek will be doing for his corporate friends - couldn't get mycompany.com because some little squat company beat you to the Internet? No problem... we'll yank their .us registration and give it to ya!

So congratulations to our ever-so-savvy beltway lobbyists. Let's give the boys at Neustar a motto that reflects their vision:

Neustar: The Internet's Pay Toilet.

Re:Be the first defense contractor on your block!

[syrinx]

Owning a TLD is cooler than being a HoJo's on the Ohio Turnpike complete with pay toilets.

Possibly irrelevant, but not only are the toilets along the Ohio Turnpike free, but there are no HoJo's there either.

Of course, your tolls for driving on the Turnpike at all pay for the toilets. So maybe they are indirectly pay toilets.

Re:Be the first defense contractor on your block!

[scoove]

true today... from fond memories of years past.

apparently hojos learned something that our new .us registrar hasn't? then again, hojos isn't quite the household name it once was...

*scoove*

Re:I win!

[Anonymous Coward]

Pepto-Bismol: Did somebody say McDonald's?

So does this mean...

[thesolo]

That I'll now be getting hundreds of "Register your .US name now! The good domains are going FAST!!" spam mails, on top of the .biz and .info spam I already get??

censorship

[White Shade]

if i tried to register i-hate-the.us would i have mailbombs sent to me by hoards of kneejerk patriots who decided that its bad to speak your mind?

i wouldn't be surprised...It's a perfectly legitimate statement, but when did that ever stop anyone?

whereis the .GNUs?

[Anonymous Coward]

We don't have any .us .coms, but know matter, we're plotting to give away the .com/net/org issues of this descriptive URL.

fud is dead (.fud?), long live the good GNUs. We could use a little help with this outfit, but we're not expecting any. hang in there j., the deceptive greed/fear based bs is bound to thin out, eventually?

NeuStar and NeuLevel are the same company

[Software]

Actually NeuLevel is a subsidiary of NeuStar. Or the other way around. The print edition of the NY Times mentioned this. The short online version here does not.

Maybe I missed the point...

[Marsfire]

I thought that there was no .us for the same reason that British postage stamps don't mention the UK anywhere... When you're the first to do something, you don't have to identify yourself.

Re:Maybe I missed the point...

[zdarnell]

Theres been a .us for as long as i can remember using this overblown WAN. It just was overshadowed by .com,.net,.org,.gov,.edu,. and .mil as the TLD's for American websites.

Redundant?

[Anonymous Coward]

Where else was this information posted? I'd really like to know.

Re:Why does the US get its own Top Level domain?

[Phroggy]

In theory, com/net/org/edu/info/biz are generic TLDs not reserved for the US or any other country. There are .com registrars in other countries. As far as I know, .gov and .mil are reserved for the US government and military, and .int is only for organizations established by international treaty.

Why does the US get its own Top Level Domain? We do; .us is it. It's a country code TLD just like .fr or .au, and each country is free to subdivide however they please.

I don't think NeuStar manages .biz!

[twistah]

Correct me if I am wrong, but .biz is managed by NeuLevel, whereas .us, by NeuStar. Or are they one in the same?

Re:I don't think NeuStar manages .biz!

[SAH]

NeuLevel is a partnership between NeuStar and Melbourne IT of Australia, with NeuStar owning the majority share of the partnership.

I have to pay yet another fee?

[NetSettler]

Ugh. Anyone who already owns Acme.com and is serious about protecting Acme as a trade name is going to now have to buy Acme.us and Acme.com.us, just like they have to buy Acme.info, Acme.biz, and Acme.pro. Then there will be Acme.store, Acme.brand, Acme.workplace, Acme.services, Acme.product, Acme.ICANNkickback, Acme.RegistryChristmasPartyFund, and on and on as they add more and more gtld's without any apparent bound.

Every one of these increases the yearly tax on businesses, making it more likely that only big businesses can keep up and that little businesses won't be able to. Now it's not $35/yr for a domain, but $35*6 or *8 or *10 to keep even one point of contact maintained. And it's even worse if you have a multi-word name because you need twice as much money for my-acme.com, myacme.com, my-acme.us, myacme.us, my-acme.com.us, myacme.com.us, and so on.

I don't know about anyone else, but I am fed up with new TLDs. It may be useful to those who haven't invested yet, but anyone who hasn't invested yet isn't in it for business. To those of us who have bought in, it's a constant scramble to keep up and extraordinarily painful.

ICANN seems to me an out-of-control organization with no apparent checks and balances to its exercising its capricious whims. I am quite upset about this, but have no idea who to complain to. I suspect the answer is: there is no one. If someone knows otherwise, I'd be interested.

Re:I have to pay yet another fee?

[moncyb]

Ugh. Anyone who already owns Acme.com and is serious about protecting Acme as a trade name is going to now have to buy Acme.us and Acme.com.us, just like they have to buy Acme.info, Acme.biz...

You can't be serious! That's like saying if the company's name is Jones, they have to buy every address with the word "jones" in it. What about people who have the last name "Jones" or have some other legitimate reason for wanting a site named "Jones" or "Acme"??? (Or even ihateacme.com--what, are people who have a reason to hate a company not allowed to speak?)

The only way companies need to protect their names on the internet is if someone is attempting to misrepresent themselves as being the company or agents of the company. That is the reason tradmarks were created. If a company's site is acme.com, and someone else owns acme.us or acme.org, the Acme company still doesn't have a real reason to be threated by those websites unless they claim to be part of the Acme company!

Re:I have to pay yet another fee?

[NetSettler]

I'm not talking about the i-hate-acme.com issue. I have no problem with someone taking that name.

But the case of toplevel domains is different. Suppose someone else had slashdot.com than slashdot.org. A lot of people would traffic to the wrong site, confusing the notion of who was the real "slashdot" and getting lots of free advertising. That's simply not reasonable in my book. I don't mind someone making an anti-slashdot.com or a ban-slashdot.com but I think slashdot or whatever is entitled to the use of its unadorned name.

You may not have much sympathy for coke.com having to also buy coke.ws and coke.info, but they can afford it because they are big. This doesn't work against big guys because they already have more money than God. But little companies just trying to secure a place in the world have much more trouble keeping pace, and the introduction of new TLDs waters down their little stake. And that works against them ever really becoming big or ever competing against the big guys. And that's sad.

Uh, because WE INVENTED THE INTERNET.

[Anonymous Coward]

There were no country codes when .com, .edu, and .org (and .mil and .gov) were invented...because the Internet was not global. It was created in the US, for US government and academic use.

Re:Uh, because WE INVENTED THE INTERNET.

[rh2600]

Yeah, no shit...

I'm not talking about .com .edu .org... they are defacto international now... they don't mean US.

But what I am asking is why is .US going to be a *top level* domain... shouldn't the US be like the others, and get .co.us, .org.us and .net.us?

Re:Uh, because WE INVENTED THE INTERNET.

[Phroggy]

But what I am asking is why is .US going to be a *top level* domain... shouldn't the US be like the others, and get .co.us, .org.us and .net.us?

It's up to each country what to do with their TLD. Until now, .us domains were almost entirely divided into states, and further divided for schools, government agencies, libraries, etc. Example: gladstone.k12.or.us is my school district, and clackamas.cc.or.us is the local community college, and linas.lincc.lib.or.us is the county library system's online card catalog (with telnet access, w00t). Try going to http://www.state.XX.us/ where XX is any state's two-letter postal code.

The US Department of Commerce (the agency responsible for the .us domain) has decided to open up the domain to additional registrations, and it looks like they're not going to require .com.us, .org.us etc. Personally, I'd rather they did, but it's up to them.

By the way, most countries don't require .co.uk or .co.jp - take a look at the .to, .tv, .nu and .cx domains for a few examples.

At last, the truth revealed.

[Doktor Memory]

So this is why it took 18 months for the new verison of leisuretown to get finished. Trolling on slashdot. For shame, Mr. Farnon.

Q: Who managed it before them?

[dready24]

My first email address's domain was linknet.kitsap.lib.wa.us ... And that was over 7 years ago. So I know that .us domains have been around for a while. So whats the story? Who stopped mainting them, and why do we need somebody else to maintain them?

Re:Why does the US get its own Top Level domain?

[ShaunC]

>I think it is a bit unfair that the US gets its own top level
>domain. All other countries have .co.xx or other than Australia
>who made theirs .com.au

Ah yes, Australia, who made theirs .com.au. The Brits could have made theirs .hmw.uk (Her Majesty's Web, of course). The Aussies could have made theirs .oz.au, or the Africans could have made theirs .kwan.za if they'd liked. It's up to whomever controls the TLD; namely, some branch of the country's government. Most of them went down the .co.cc, .gov.cc, .[edu|uni].cc path, probably because it made for good hierarchical organization.

If you don't like your country's ccTLD allotments, complain to your government, don't complain about mine!

Shaun

Its in both

[DABANSHEE]

It's an overlaping sort of thing

.US rules are only in Adobe?

[Jim Efaw]

So, it appears that the public not allowed to see the rules for the .US domain unless it helps spread Adobe software to other computers while Adobe actively attempts to ruin lives. Adobe still has not even bailed Dimitry Sklyarov out after screwing him over. Meanwhile, at least as of October 31, the U.S. Department of Commerce only converted the press release to a normal format, but doesn't have the real information for free in a normal format.

Has anyone converted these nonstandard documents into an standard Internet format (like plain text or HTML) so that free society can see them? If so, please post a URL. Thanks!

P.S. for anyone who cares: At the bottom of that page is contact information for "further assistance".

Re:.US rules are only in Adobe?

[zangdesign]

Gee, who peed in your wheaties this A.M.? If you're so pissed off about Adobe, there are several alternative PDF readers available for Linux.

State Gubmints Can't Get It Right...

[PingXao]

The State of Connecticut...

TLD's are bastardized beyond belief. What do you think about the Department of Motor Vehicles in Connecticut having a .org domain? I mean really, should a duly authorized state agency have a .org domain? Chek it out for yourself - it's right here.

How did this happen, and since it did, is there any rhyme or reason to any domain naming? (Apologies to non-US readers)

75% minority

[fantomas]

"I bet it really gets under your skin that we don't have metric time either."

No, but it makes us laugh that you still launch your spaceships using imperial measurement units...times change.....

I wouldn't want to be without it...

[LewK2]

Having used the net for many years, I have met a few Americans that have asked me what it is like to use online store, look for information (cinema times, etc) on the global internet. I forget that a lot of stuff is in the states. The simple mechanism that let me forget this is the .co.uk extension used by all companies in the UK. If I reach a website with a .co.uk everything is instantly clear.
I would not ever want to be without the .co.uk extension that marks a website I visit as being in the uk. I don't know how you have managed over there so long without it, having to compete for .com with the rest of the world. I have often wanted to go a page in the US, and never been entirely sure that I got to one that was there. I think the quicker companies adopt a .us extension, the better for you.

Embrace the country you live in! Send it forth on your email addresses and webpages. Shout it loud and be proud.

Re:I wouldn't want to be without it...

[swv3752]

You have it backawards. When I visit a .com .org .net I assume it is a US site unless specified otherwise.

.us for a better society? profiteering?

[quick_dry_3]

"The fact is right now, ... American identification is of increased importance,"

so people are just going to register for .us domains and the country becomes unified and stronger?

or will pepolpe be registering .us because they're patriotic and this is a nice way to profit from that?

Re:Scrap .com, all use country codes.

[Richard_at_work]

Firstly i wont comment on the spelling...... ;) Next i agree with you, when i want stuff that i have a feeling wont be available to me in the uk, i go to the .com tld, but find many companies not willing to ship to the uk. A lot of the responses to your post were along the lines of "well then stick to your own domain then" but why should we? the .com .net etc are supposed to be international, and i reckon companies that take a .com should be made to at least make a effort to ship internationally. Yes the americans may be the leading force behind the internet, but does that mean they can bulldoze us all out of the way?

Can we please have .com.us?

[Midnight Thunder]

I have mentioned this before, but I feel strongly that the .us domain needs to provide the common TLDs at the US level, so people use it instead of being intemidated by the extra long addresses.

I would love to see .com.us, .org.us, .edu.us, .gov.us and .mil.us. BTW the three letters are important ino order to make the distinction between the states that all use two letters. This is probably a pipe-dream, but here's hoping :)

existing?

[yournic]

what does this mean for those people that have already been using .us domains for so long? like my school district (and their lame site, with nt server) www.slc.k12.ut.us?

NeuStar

[Neck_of_the_Woods]

Take the time to look behind what is going on here. The government has given away this to one of it's biggest supporters or vendors if you want to call it that. NeuStar, is NeuStar Inc. which is just a sub-sid of Lockheed Martin. Talk about having control. So let me see if I understand this, please correct me if I am wrong. It happends all the time. The .biz, and .us is now under the control of a "neurtral" thrid party...right.

re: link doesnt work

[Anonymous Coward]

see subject, sorry man.

a taking of property

[Anonymous Coward]

The TOC of the current .US domain states that the managers of the subdelegated domains are allowed to charge a fee. So, there are some .US subdomains that are losing a source of income. Do they have a basis to sue for damages, or sue to keep their subdomain?

And everyone else who isn't currently charging may have plans to, they're losing a source of potential income.

.US subdomain delegates, rise up and form a class action suit- maintain your authority, and make a few bucks for the lawyers...

Good thing they didn't give it to a monopoly

[GuNgA-DiN]

Wow! I'm glad they didn't give .us to a big monopoly like Network Solutions. Lockheed Martin is a much better choice! They aren't insiders or anything.

Regionalization and the Internet

[caudron]

Computers don't care where they are, and geographic domain suffixes are meaningless if localization isn't enforced. When anyone in the world can buy a .us or .tv or .rs domain, what does it mean to have a .us or .tv or .rm domain?

In an age when we are becoming increasing less concerned with geography, does it really make sense to perpetuate an artificially geographic-based Internet substructure?

Americans ashamed of their own country

[drsquare]

American business don't have to compete, they can get themselves a .us. Oh sorry, I forgot, Americans are too ashamed of their own country to show it in their domain name

Re:Americans ashamed of their own country

[Anonymous Coward]

Nah... Americans just never expected all of those foreigners to hook themselves up to our internet. So there.

Phthbtbtbt.

Polluting the namespace (was Re:I have to pay...)

[moncyb]

What if some guy's nickname was "slashdot" all his life? So that means he isn't allowed to have a domain name that reflects a nickname he's had his entire life (long before this site was even conceived of) because someone might confuse it with this site?

An ip address is just like a telephone number, and the domain name is similar to the lettered version of the telephone number. This situation is just like if some company has 1(800) 555-ACME as their number, and they think they have to get 555-ACME on every interchange--like (801)555-ACME, (201)555-ACME, &etc--because someone might accidently dial the wrong number. What about private individuals or companies that happen to have the number 555-2263 (spelling a c m e) should they be forced to give up their number? And what will happen when these stupid companies take all the numbers in every interchange? Will the telephone companies then have to expand the number base? Ahh, but then you will have the exact same problem. 1(801)4555-ACME will turn up and Acme just has to have that number right? It's the same way with domain names--if all companies claim the exclusive rights to specific letter sequences, then all possible combinations of domain names will be taken, and no one else will be allowed to have one.

DNS is just a system to make it easier to enter the address of a particular computer on the internet. So that instead of having to remember and type 127.245.76.138, you can just type www.acme.com to get their website. There is nothing special about it. It is not real estate, just a system to make network addresses easier to handle, and registering a name under every TLD is just namespace pollution, and unnessesarily increases load on DNS servers. (They have to retrieve and keep track of every name their users will look up--even multiple entries for the same place.)

Maybe it should be banned for an individual/organization to have more than one domain name. Then it'll stop the spamming of the DNS system with way to many silly domain names. I mean it's just absurd to have hundreds of names for just one company... Hollywood is one of the worst. They'll make a domain name for every movie. They should be doing moviecompany.com/themoviename instead of themoviename.com. That is one reason why some ISPs DNS systems are so slow. All those extra names are a drain on the server's resources. Not to mention it results in bigger domain names because all the small ones are taken, eventually it may get to the point of being eaiser just to type the IP address.

Re:Why does the US get its own Top Level domain?

[rh2600]

I'm not complaining about mine (.co.nz).

I am just pointing out that it is about time that the US got some two tier domains like .co.us. Or .ourholierthanthou.us what ever takes your fancy - there's not point hoping you might conform to some sort of defacto standard.

Re:Why does the US get its own Top Level domain?

[rh2600]

So this new .us tld can be preceded by .org and .net etc? so you can get .org.us?

If so then that is great... :-)

I am just hoping for tld's to one day be uniform. I am personally all for .com's because they are global tld's which are great. I just think that seening all other countries have variations on co.cc that it would be good for the US to come to the party.

Re:Why does the US get its own Top Level domain?

[zangdesign]

We've got them within the .US domain. It's just that they're not very convenient to remember, .cc.tx.us for community colleges in Texas, and so on.

Frankly, this whole discussion is a non-issue. Amazing how much commentary it's created.

Re:Polluting the namespace (was Re:I have to pay..

[NetSettler]

First, I didn't mean to say anything about the .name domain, which doesn't invite businesses. I don't have an aggressive need to take over domains not meant for business, only to protect those whose purpose is business from imposters and accidental lookalikes.

If they want to administer a TLD in a way that is fair to multiple nameholders, the way .US is now (before the changeover) seems more fair since it's geographical. Yes, there's a chance that Bill Jones and Sam Jones want to use Jones.us, but there's at least a lot less chance that they want to both use jones.atlanta.ga.us. But absent some sort of partitioning, whether by business area or by geography, there's a certain sparring to be done, and every new TLD increases the cost of even trying.

The problem about trademarks is that you don't just walk in and register one like a domain and walk away with it ready to use. As I understand the process anyway, and I'm only just about to try it so I'll know better soon, you first assert the trademark and zealously defend it in parallel with applying for it. If someone else claims you've been not serious about defending your exclusive claim on it, my understanding is that you might lose it. So that makes it problematic to leave an unclaimed foo.biztld available.

I don't mind if they add foo.parody, foo.joke, foo.fanclub, foo.alumni, etc. Those aren't going to get confused with my business. But foo.tld-a-business-can-use is what I'd like to see no more of.

None of this is in the article...

[Rob Parkhill]

Not one of those four points is even in the Excite article. And this get's mod'ed up to a 5? Yeesh!

All the article says is that NueStar will be running the .us registry. No mention of pricing, timelines, or partnerships are even mentioned.