Berners-Lee on the TLD Explosion

kmccammon writes "Tim Berners-Lee recently released a white paper outlining a number of justifications for stalling (at least temporarily) the expansion of the top-level domains. Among the reasons cited: bad economics. As evidenced by the .biz and .info debacle, more top-levels does not necessarily mean more domain name availability. All it really means is that every .com/.net owner now needs to rush out and buy the same name under each new TLD. Thus, the 'value of one's original registration drops. At the same time, the cost of protecting one's brand goes up.'"

Comments

But...

[Anonymous Coward]

I want to register microsoft.sucks

Use IP Addressing again?

[beatleadam]

Screw it all...I want my IP Address to be used again!

If you want to find me I can be reached at 127.0.0.1 - How is that for "protecting my brand" ?

Re:Use IP Addressing again?

[Kaimelar]

If you want to find me I can be reached at 127.0.0.1 - How is that for "protecting my brand" ?

Wait, 127.0.0.1 points to my machine! You're not protecting your brand, you're trying to hijack mine! Just wait until my lawyer hears about this! ;-)

Re:Use IP Addressing again?

[aoteoroa]

Wait, 127.0.0.1 points to my machine! You're not protecting your brand, you're trying to hijack mine! Just wait until my lawyer hears about this! ;-)

And by posting your address on Slashdot the GP poster is probably planning to DDOS your connection.

You should install An Anti-DoS Tool That Returns Fire that will automatically launch a counter attack for you.

Re:Use IP Addressing again?

[Tony Hoyle]

Umm.. they is it 'useful if your DNS servers go down'.

I'd stop at step 2. Steps 3,4,5 an 6 are just wasting good drinking time.

The only IP you really need of course is the one your DNS server is on - so you can bring it back up again :)

Re:Sir Timothy John Berners-Lee

[Timesprout]

You cheeky bastard.

I invented the Internet.

Yours etc
Al Gore

Re:Sir Timothy John Berners-Lee

[MisterFancypants]

This is nothing but FUD. The World Wide Web was created by Microsoft. That is why the Internet Explorer is an integrated part of the Windows Operating System. All this Berners-Lee fellow did was make an Open Source clone of Internet Explorer called 'www', and as with other Open Source clones, it has a crappy UI and hardly no features. It is all in text, for christ's sake.

Re:Relative failure of new TLD's

[Anonymous Coward]

LOL? Fuck off... Saying shit like that makes me want to kick your mom in the nuts.

Re:The problem with new tlds is

[grahamsz]

Tell me about it...

I've got an email address that ends in .ms and it's a pain in the ass giving to anyone - even computer literate people do a double take.

On the upside i get comparatively little spam to that address - i wonder if the spam tools filter out unlikely domains?

Re:There are only a few that matter

[justforaday]

.com .net and .org are really all that matter.

yeah, we don't need those silly .edu, .gov, and .mil ones either. after all, what have they ever done for the internet?

Re:There are only a few that matter

[DrEldarion]

Don't forget .gov. People who mix up whitehouse.gov with whitehouse.com are in for quite a surprise.

TLD explosion?

[MemoryAid]

Am I the only one whose first thought was that some hapless nuclear worker's thermoluminescent dosimeter exploded? I imagine it happened while reading it, so it probably didn't injure anybody, but still, nuclear safety and monitoring devices should be safe, at the very least.

And what's with all the comments about IP addresses?

Interesting

[Pan T. Hose]

This is very interesting. I have read Secrets & Lies: Digital Security in a Networked World by Bruce Schneier and now I am reading New Top Level Domains Considered Harmful by Timothy John Berners-Lee and the later seems to be quite interestingly related to the former. According to Berners-Lee, "The Internet is a net, and the WWW is a Web, but WWW and email use DNS which is a tree, which has a single root." But according to Schneier I also know that security product is a process layered like an onion which is a chain only as secure as the weakest link. Now, I am starting to wonder what would be the weakest link in the chain of onion layers which are the branches of a tree in the web of our network and how could it be related to the "single root" compromise universal vulnerability and if my conclusions are correct then securing the Interweb network is impossible.

Re:There are only a few that matter

[cgenman]

Don't forget .gov. People who mix up whitehouse.gov with whitehouse.com are in for quite a surprise.

Yeah, one prints made-up stories, the other is a... Jesus Christ! I thought you said whitehouse.org! Oh my eyes! My pure Christian Eyes!

Genuinely useful TLD's

[cgenman]

.spam - all spam must originate from a .spam address. It also must go to a .spam address, as a form of opting in.

.xxx - I hate having to wade through all of those medical sites looking for real naughty bits.

.gog - why go to the site when you can go to google's cache of the site?

.sucks - Want to know the other side of the story? For that matter, want to pay a cybersquatter to make sure that nobody else does?

.con - Make it far easier to scam unwitting illiterate computer users. Only compatible with Outlook.

.© - Hide your most valuable works behind an impenetrable shield of people's incompetence with a keyboard.