NSI Claims whois Database is Proprietary

phred writes "In yet another sign of advanced corporate megalomania, Chris Clough, a spokesman for Network Solutions, Inc., is quoted in an ABC News online story as claiming that the whois database is a proprietary product of NSI and is being provided to the net as a "community service." (This item first noted Tomalak's Realm)." And I for one am oh-so-pleased that NSI is using their property to Spam us with commercials about NSI so that they can protect their butts when they lose their monopoly.

Comments

NSI is pushing their luck

[Rocky Mudbutt]

Is it time to start an FSF/Opensource NIC? The technology is not difficult, it is the support of the vast hordes of non-technical (clue-impaired) users requesting their "stupidname.com" which are providing NSI with their windfall, headaches, and raison d'etre. Supporting the technically competent, with their corresponding lower support costs; might make a viable non-profit company.

Of course, there is always the renegade DNS route. To make it take off and stick, one would need superior technology, a strategy that would embrace and superceed the BIND cartels jugular embrace of the Internet name space, and a desire for an alternative which can provide both alternate and backward compatible name space.

I would think the non-North American entities who are at the mercy of NSI for Global Top Level Domain Names could agree on an LDAP name system that makes NSI obsolete, and removes the North American legal system and copyright law from what is clearly a Universal Name Registrar.

This is not a new debate. The control of the Internet has long been a US Government/Academia/Military/Commercial playground. What is needed in the 21st century will be an abstraction away from the cultural straightjacket that has been so widely forcefed to the world as "technology". I would hope to hear that the other 90% of the world's population have a say in how names are fairly allocated, and we would all benefit from a broader perspective.

Freely available to all

[gordoni]

Under the terms of the original contract between the NSF and Network Solutions (Awardee's Proposal Q.1):

"the information we collect and dispense will be freely available to all."

That said, the complete legal situation is faily complicated. My understanding of it is as follows. The registration database is probably capable of being copyrighted, however such a copyright would be a thin copyright that would not prevent others constructing a new database from facts contained in the original database. If this is the case, Network Solutions probably owns this copyright, but has failed in its contractual duty to inform the NSF of its claim of copyright in it's annual report (I discovered this by filing a FOIA request). To keep ownership of the database copyright upon termination of the contract, Network Solutions would have to pay 1-3% of the databases fair market value to the government. For the duration of the contract, Network Solutions is required to make the database freely available. The NSF can also obtain a copy of the database including on termination of the contract, but has not made such a request.