Sometimes, Microsoft is Right...

We've run a number of stories about RealNames over the years. To our credit, Slashdot readers and editors have mostly thought that RealNames was a foolish and pointless money wasting exercise to create an alternate DNS system that is neither, well, alternative or compatible with the DNS protocols. But recently, due to some shrewd marketing on the Part of Keith Teare, the RealNames CEO, they've gotten undeserved sympathy by painting themselves as victims of Microsoft. It is my intention to cut this off before it goes any further, to engage in some review of RealNames business and why it was a good thing that they went out of business. If you are interested in reading my thoughts about this, read on... A quick review: RealNames (then Centraal) first showed up on the Slashdot radar in 1998 when they inked a sales deal with Pre-verisign Network Solutions in which NSI would sell RealNames along with their other stable of internet "products." RealNames were very much pioneers in doing ethically troubling things for money on the Internet. Specifically, they were the first company to make a business model around manipulating search results for money. They also were trying to replace Network Solutions then-monopolistic control of domain names (a laudable goal) with a monopoly of their own (not so laudable), with their RealNames "augmenting" the DNS system in the Internet Explorer Browser and within search engines with which they had inked sales deals.

Now many many users of Slashdot have expressed their dislike for search services that order results based on cash, and many of us don't use IE, so the question comes up: why should we care about RealNames at all? Why does the failure of some poorly managed, ill-conceived company warrant any space on Slashdot? Alternative root servers make for a better story, no doubt. I'm the first to agree that RealNames deserves very little of your time, but the story of RealNames has recently taken a turn that is both annoying to me personally, and worrying to me as a long time participant in the open source scene.

Keith Teare, CEO of RealNames, has tried to make it seem like it was Microsoft's monopoly power that made RealNames go out of business. Lets review: RealNames had a deal with Microsoft to provide the RealNames service to MSN and Internet Explorer, for which they paid Microsoft a fee, and in return they got to derive revenue from selling the RealNames to companies, so basically Microsoft was likely RealNames' sole source of income. Keith and his coworkers were very happy to tie their horse to Microsoft while Microsoft was willing to pull them.

I don't need to explain to the Slashdot reader why RealNames was a poor idea. It is something you feel in your gut. I mean, in the end if you're going to accept the consensus reality that is the domain name system, are you going to stick with the somewhat broken NSI/ICANN/Pick-Your-Favorite-DNS company structure? Or are you going to go to a completly left field, poor, expensive excuse for NSI like RealNames? If you are a company trying to establish a web presence, do you choose the system that everyone has agreed on and publicize your url "http://www.bobstigerrentals.com" ? Or do you put: "RealName: Bob's Tiger Rentals" in your ads?

To illustrate further: Back in the day, I bought the linux.com domain name for the then-VA Research (Now VA Software) from Fred van Kempen (And there was much publicity, huzzah). Four or five months after doing this, I got a call from James Ash at RealNames trying to sell me the Linux RealName. This was not unusual, as I'd get any number of calls trying to sell me anything from containers full of stuffed penguins to whole companies (I was the wrong guy for those calls ...) What shocked me was the price he thought we'd pay. My mind remembers it as a horrible inverted Ron Popiel style sale, with none of the charm of Ron's products. How much would you pay to control the "Linux" RealName for four years? You'll be all over MSN and IE! $19.95? $29.95? $39.95? Try 1 million dollars.

It was a lot of money then, it's a lot of money now. It was a lot of money for any business. I told him we'd get back if we were interested. I didn't get back to him.

This is the innovation that Mr. Teare claims Microsoft squished, his right to overcharge for a dubious product. While Caveat Emptor certainly applied in the case of RealNames, his claim that Microsoft, somehow, has some duty to continue to provide the RealNames "service" to their browser client rings false. And that is the point of relating this bit of personal history.

I have little interest in engaging in schadenfreude over broken companies and laid off workers, but I do take issue with Keith Teare's attempt to jump on the anti-trust complainants bandwagon. If it is his hope that by crying foul on Microsoft now he can derive some sympathy or some other unknown gain, he'll have to look somewhere else than here on Slashdot, especially considering those that have a valid complaint against the software giant. Even considering recent developments I can't find any sympathy for him or his company, a company that, in my mind, belongs in the same class as LinuxONE (the California, not the Korean, company) and Digital Convergence.

Comments

Thank you, thank you!

[Da VinMan]

I am sick to death of alarmist stories on /. that assume that the average /.er will believe in anything but Microsoft no matter what the story.

Hopefully, this is a sea change for /. and it's front page stories. Stories that are about so-and-so feeling screwed and wronged by Microsoft aren't automatically worthy of our attention. To me, that why the story of RealNames on /. is worthy of mention; because of /., not RealNames.

Thanks again....

On Alternates To DNS/ICANN

[xRizen]

RealNames wasn't exactly the best idea, I think we can all agree. But can anyone think of a system that is *seriously* better at everything DNS does than DNS? Even if someone could, who's to say that it would be adopted? IMO, DNS is far too entrenched to be pushed away at this point. Switching to another system would most likely be even more difficult than the switch to IPv6.

Beyond RealNames and other DNS-alternatives, it seems like once every year or two, a bunch of tech geeks get up on an anti-ICANN fit. They go off and create an alternate NIC, but about a year later, it's been mostly abandoned. It seems to me that until a large portion of the geeks (preferably those who control some of the lower-tier DNS servers) really unite and get serious, we may be stuck with ICANN, as sad as that may seem.

Re:On Alternates To DNS/ICANN

[NutscrapeSucks]

Somebody else said it first, but DNS was not supposed to be a keyword system.

But yet that's exactly how people have treated *.COM, and everytime we have a story about squatting or ICANN or CompanyReallySucks.com, slashdot gets up in arms and starts proposing reforms and reorgs and so on.

So some company comes along and tries to make a keyword system apart from DNS, and what's Slashdot's reaction. Well, they suck too, the leeching bastards. I don't get it.

Alternate NICs are not a solution the abuse of DNS -- they do nothing more than attempt to extend the misuse of the system.

Keywords and Search are the solution, and RealNames was not a bad idea. Lets put the stupid squatting and trademark junk in their database instead of our DNS system. Let them worry about the problem of how to find "Something" on the internet without resorting to "Something.com".

Having RealNames punted by MS is a good thing in this respect. Hopefully browser developers will come up with a system where you can plug in as many Keyword Systems as you'd like (just like you can with search engines). I wouldn't mind an automatic Google Are You Feeling Lucky? feature in my address bar.

Bad Idea from the start

[al_d]

I remember reading about the 'success story' of RealNames soon after it had started; how this entrepreneur was 'revolutionising' the internet. What a leap backword, to go from heirachical domain names, to the equivalent of the AOL Keyword (nowadays they would have patented it of course...).

It seemed like such a bad idea from the start; a similar effect easily achievable (although not necessarily of any use) in the browser itself, like that thoroughly annoying MSN Search junk that appears if you misspell a URL in Internet Explorer (Obviously both this and opennic are slightly different to RealNames, but I still don't feel that RealNames was any more useful).

Missing the point

[kteare]

Chris you are missing the point. Any reading of my WebLog at teare.com must lead you to the conclusion that the inability of DNS to support multi-lingual characters requires fixing, and that right now ONLY RealNames fixes this natively in the browser that is on 90% + desktops. Microsoft are now about to hard code the browser to Microsoft's OWN middleware - the MSN Search Engine. If you type "IBM Thinkpad" into the browser you will get an MSN Search result. Even if you do not like RealNames (its a free world) you have to acknowledge that ending up on the ThinkPad page at ibm.com is the right outcome. How you can support Microsoft tying the browser to exclusively Microsoft controlled middleware - and by so doing disable every language except English (7 bit ASCII actually) is baffling to me. Incidentally the business model you describe was abandoned many years ago. Keywords were $50 per year flat fee or $500 if it was a top brand with high traffic. Keith Teare Former CEO RealNames Corporation

Re:He is missing the whole point

[DietFluffy]

I see this becoming an issue when someone will be typing " web browser" in the adress bar and Microsoft redirecting them to IE (or pick your own example where microsoft decides where you will end up)

You know what's funny? Typing "web browser" in the address bar DOES bring you to a Internet Explorer download page.

Try a new method!

[E-Rock]

Write a browser plugin. Now you no longer need MS and if you're crafty you can write something that works in Netscape, Opera, etc.

I bet if you wanted you could tell people how to build a custom search in the QuickSearch.exe that's part of the IE powertools! I built a custom search so 'gg term' searches google and 'dict word' brings up the dictionary.com page. Wouldn't be hard to build a 'RN whatever' to go to your site and redirect. All this from the address bar.

Stop whining that the powers that be destroyed your horrible business model (all eggs one basket) and be creative and do something else.

Re:Feature-Writing 101: Don't Insult the Readers

[chrisd]

I didn't perceive that as bullying, I can see how one might though. I was trying to get across that my read on slashdotters reaction to realnames in previous /. stories on the company.

It wasn't my intention to sound bullying though.

Chris

[OT] Other handy Mozilla bookmarks...

[follower-fillet]

http://translate.google.com/translate?u=%s
http:/ /www.google.com/search?q=cache:%s
http://groups.g oogle.com/groups?q=%s
http://www.google.com/searc h?q=%s

I have them as the following keywords: ggt, ggc, ggg and gg.

(You can also do a similar thing in IE.)

Far east DNS troubles

[nagora]

There is a lot of talk about how RealNames were actually providing a useful service in countries with non-latin character sets as the DNS does not support them.

How true is this and does anyone have an alternative solution that has any chance of catching on?

TWW

Re:Sorry for him, but...

[dcavanaugh]

Mistake #1: Relying on a single customer
Mistake #2: The single customer is Microsoft
Mistake #3: Relying on the monopoly of M$ and IE
Mistake #4: Creating an AOL-keyword knockoff and thinking it would somehow generate revenue
Mistake #5: Failing to realize that the keyword concept would either die on its own or be emulated by others -- no profit either way!

So RealNames is in the Internet cemetary -- buried next to the Cue Cats.

One Language

[Vortran]

I disagree strongly on the issue of language and multi-national characters. If the French want to have their own private Internet, fine. Same for the Spaniards or the Russians or anyone else. This is not a troll.. hear me out.

My feeling is that the Internet is best served by standards that all (or most) people can use and understand. Having multi-language support is antithetical to this goal.

Please don't call me an English-only bigot. I freely admit that I know no other written/verbal language. However, I truly wouldn't care what language was used, as long as it was the univerally understood standard. If Swahili was the standard language of the Internet, I'd have learned Swahili so I could use the Internet.

Perhaps one language is too few.. maybe 3 or 4 languages would be better... IF everybody (or most everybody) could use them. I don't want the Internet to become segregated.

Find a standard language, ANY language... Use it exclusively in a global medium. This promotes global communication and prevents people from having their own little private "Internets" where the rest of the world can't understand a thing they're saying, much less search and browse through their "private world".

Right now, English is the standard, right or wrong, for better or for worse. Whether or not English should be the standard is a different debate to me. My point is that we should have a standard language and maintain it in order to keep the whole thing all together and on the same (web) page.

If you want to reach out and communicate with people across the globe, you have to have common ground. On the Internet, that's langauge. So, on the Internet, España is "Spain".

Vortran out