Domaining, dropcatching and the secondary market

[Nigel]

This is to be the subject of a discussion at the next PAB meeting on 9 May. Acorn members should read the paper which has been posted today on the Nominet website. Author of the report is ***** Taylor of Nominet and she says her report has been produced 'at a PAB member's request' although she does not name that member. The report finishes with the following questions:


1. "One question is the role of these "professional registrants" in the community. Do they hurt "user registrants" and their ability to receive domain names that they would like? Another question is whether registrars should be limited in their ability to participate in this business."
(Source http://www.icannwiki.org/Domain_Parking)

2. What should be the scope of the policy debate as it relates to .uk?

3. What issues are relevant to our discussions?

4. How should we structure the debate? For example, would it be helpful to have presentation(s) on dropcatching, domaining and the secondary market? If so, from whom?

5. Are there any other issues we should discuss?

The report can be read here

http://www.nominet.org.uk/digitalAssets/18138_Domaining_May_07.pdf

NB: Not sure why the forum has asterixed the Nominet employees name - but it is shown on the report.

 

[retired_member11]

Tosh.

I'd like to receive internet.co.uk and is it helpful that Nominet hold on to that registration? It hurts me!!!

Should Nominet be allowed to hold such registrations?

A PAB paper on that?

 

[Edwin]

While I don't agree on the parts of the document relating to drop catching, it's still refreshingly "balanced" compared to a lot of recent stuff published in the .com space, where vigourous attempts have been made to tar domainers, cybersquatters and others with the same "they're all criminals" brush.

I applaud the careful distinctions drawn in the document referenced on this thread.

 

[Whois-Search]

I would be interested to hear what people think about this or if you have any ideas on the paper.

I also welcome the debate on domaining and the carefully written document e.g. "professional registrants". I think it was James Conaghan who pushed for both of these (see PAB reports).

As for "presentations" I would like to see Nominet ask the ones funding domaining to attend i.e. Google and Yahoo.
http://technology.guardian.co.uk/news/story/0,,2069650,00.html

I am also aware I have to have a impartial and balanced view on it when I go to the meeting on the 9th May.

 

[Jay Daley]

I'd like to receive internet.co.uk and is it helpful that Nominet hold on to that registration? It hurts me!!!

Should Nominet be allowed to hold such registrations?

A PAB paper on that?

internet.co.uk is our equivalent of example.com. It was originally one of the 'neutral third level' domains but they stopped being used for that ages ago.

No we are not intending to let it drop, ever. Anyway, why can't we hold on to it?

 

[retired_member12]

^ "Internet.co.uk is our equivalent of example.com. It was originally one of the 'neutral third level' domains but they stopped being used for that ages ago.."

So, was it never a prenom in it's own right before Nominet came into existance?
Or was it designated for the use you have stated, before Nominet's time?

 

[Jay Daley]

So, was it never a prenom in it's own right before Nominet came into existance?

I have no idea. I will see if I can find someone who does.

Or was it designated for the use you have stated, before Nominet's time?

No this is a more recent usage.

 

[retired_member12]

Cheers Jay. It just strikes me as remarkable that it wasn't registered as an early prenom, given it's obvious potential.

 

[seb]

While I don't agree on the parts of the document relating to drop catching, it's still refreshingly "balanced" compared to a lot of recent stuff published in the .com space, where vigourous attempts have been made to tar domainers, cybersquatters and others with the same "they're all criminals" brush.

There's at two ways of looking at domainers which explains this thinking:

1. Domainers are speculators who use up resources for their personal profit which reduces the availability of options for other registrants, and the 'greater good' should prevail.

2. Domainers are clever people who spotted an opportunity and are exploiting it for their personal financial gain and "making more money than I do and it's unfair they can make money because they thought of the idea first"


No matter what your view on domaining.. it does cause the above effects. I have very little sympathy for the latter (it exists in every industry) although the former has some 'moral' ground for complaining.

Some people will make a political argument that too many resources should not be in the hands of the few.. not in domains but more generally in the world.

I've yet to see a good solution to this 'problem'.. I'm not sure opening up new TLDs/SLDs on the same rules is going to solve it (as some people argue).. I'm not sure of the effectiveness of restricting registrations per individual.. I think it may help.. I'm not sure raising the price of domains (say from £5 to £50) will fix it either because a valuable domain is worth more than £50..

If you look at how RIPE distributes IP address space, the goal is to give addresses according to NEED.. it's not something you can simply buy.. which is a typical European approach in many ways.. This was how the naming committee worked before Nominet was created. I can just imagine how that would work (not!) now

There will always be those who exploit business opportunities.

Can someone be 'addicted' to domains?

seb

 

[rob]

1. Domainers are speculators who use up resources for their personal profit which reduces the availability of options for other registrants, and the 'greater good' should prevail.

I do not agree with that view of things.

People could say if you own the domain Internet.co.uk and are making £££ from it via PPC or the like it is blocking their name, stopping others making a useful website etc.

They could register eInternet.co.uk or 1234Internet.co.uk and achieve the same results.

The reason they want Internet.co.uk is that it is a matter of perception on 'nicer' names.

 

[seb]

I do not agree with that view of things.

People could say if you own the domain Internet.co.uk and are making £££ from it via PPC or the like it is blocking their name, stopping others making a useful website etc.

They could register eInternet.co.uk or 1234Internet.co.uk and achieve the same results.

The reason they want Internet.co.uk is that it is a matter of perception on 'nicer' names.

You may not agree with it (most domainers probably wouldn't) but you should see the views some registrants come up with in frustration of getting a decent domain..

Of course they want a 'nicer' name.. The argument is that few people hold 'nice' names which is 'bad for society'.

(I'm not proposing or driving any agenda here other than to try and get you to understand the reasons some hostility exists, whether logical or not, and whether you agree with the theory or not ).

seb

 

[rob]

You may not agree with it (most domainers probably wouldn't) but you should see the views some registrants come up with in frustration of getting a decent domain..

Of course they want a 'nicer' name.. The argument is that few people hold 'nice' names which is 'bad for society'.

(I'm not proposing or driving any agenda here other than to try and get you to understand the reasons some hostility exists, whether logical or not, and whether you agree with the theory or not ).

I do see the point, and if someone typed in kids.co.uk and was redirected to porn it is 'wrong' and there is responsibility in owning domains from that point of view.

The bit I object to is people coming along in 2007 thinking that this internet thing could be a good jape and make their company a few quid so someone else having Name.co.uk registered seven years earlier is reprehensible.

I think it is bad for society that the UK has such poor IT departments without any foresight

 

[seb]

The bit I object to is people coming along in 2007 thinking that this internet thing could be a good jape and make their company a few quid so someone else having Name.co.uk registered seven years earlier is reprehensible.

I think it is bad for society that the UK has such poor IT departments without any foresight

Quite.. and in most individual cases you can name, there's nothing wrong.. but when you look at it "in the bigger picture" finding a domain name which is good is difficult.. This isn't just a generics issue.. The fact is it's a lot easier to register a good limited company name than a domain name.. That's why it's an issue

seb

 

[Whois-Search]

Seb,

Anything which has a limited supply will run out.

Even telephone numbers went through the "big number change":
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Number_Change
Better remember that for ENUM.

As for ip addresses why is there now IPv6?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IPv6

Therefore why don't we create more .uk addresses? .scot.uk .cym.uk ? or promote .ltd.uk ?

Even if we got rid of the DAC, had a less warehousing policy like Norway http://www.norid.no/regelverk/rammer/kvoteanalyse.en.html , and set whois lookups to 4 every minute like .org people would still find a way round it.

I could get the whole of my extended family to register 10 names each for example and you have to have some basic system to tell me if a name is available.

Also what do you do about the people that have thousands of names already? Try explaining to Rob he has to give up music.co.uk Also if you limit the supply even more their names will only treble in value.

The only way would be to go back to the old UK naming committee and vet applications - can you really see that happening?

If people are stupid enough to script the XML gateway of companies house and then register all the names: http://xmlgw.companieshouse.gov.uk

Then let the DRS/courts deal with them:
http://www.nominet.org.uk/disputes/caselaw/index/million/

As for internet.co.uk Nominet can reserve what it likes and is apparently immune from DRS. Angus for example has automaton.co.uk while Nominet has automaton-example.co.uk:
http://webwhois.nic.uk/cgi-bin/whois.cgi?query=automaton-example.co.uk

Andrew

 

[paul]

finding a domain name which is good is difficult..

Not quite the whole picture, finding a good domain name, that is free to register with Nominet for £5, is difficult.

If companies want a nice name, then in most cases the people who bought these names 10 years ago could probably be convinced to sell.

This is no different to any other industry. If, for instance, I want to buy a plot of land to build a house, it would be hard to find the right plot but if I had the money I could, no doubt, find something. There would be no point in me complaining that in 1977 I could have bought that land for £500-1000, because the fact is I didn't and I can not expect it to have lay unsold for 30 years while house prices shot up. Yes in an ideal world it would be nice but in reality it would never happen so why waste time arguing about it

 

[seb]

Anything which has a limited supply will run out.

Indeed. However policies can control the speed at which it will run out.. IPv4 is a classing example of how control can help.

Therefore why don't we create more .uk addresses? .scot.uk .cym.uk ? or promote .ltd.uk ?

We don't "create" .scot.uk and .cym.uk because there is a policy that was put into place about how they are done.. so it's not a simple issue. I also suspect Scottish and Welsh users probably want .scot and .cym rather than a .uk suffix (I may be wrong).. I personally have no problems with those two SLDs and if there is support for them I would be delighted to see them in the UK namespace.

There is a real problem where everyone assumes a .uk domain is a ".co.uk" domain.. We definitely need better understanding that .com and .co.uk aren't the only suffixes.

I think it's also important to separate .scot.uk from say .biz.uk - The former actually provides something meaningful whilst the latter is just a .co.uk v.2. I've discussed .law.uk and .isp.uk before too.

Even if we got rid of the DAC, had a less warehousing policy like Norway http://www.norid.no/regelverk/rammer/kvoteanalyse.en.html , and set whois lookups to 4 every minute like .org people would still find a way round it.

Indeed.

Also what do you do about the people that have thousands of names already? Try explaining to Rob he has to give up music.co.uk Also if you limit the supply even more their names will only treble in value.

Your reply makes it sound like I'm proposing we take away domains from people which is not the case.. I was trying to get domainers to understand why they are viewed as anti-social by some people.

The only way would be to go back to the old UK naming committee and vet applications - can you really see that happening?

No.

If people are stupid enough to script the XML gateway of companies house and then register all the names:

Maybe the domaining-type problems in company names needs dealing with too.. That's not a Nominet issue though.

As for internet.co.uk Nominet can reserve what it likes and is apparently immune from DRS.

Out of curiosity what basis is it immune from DRS? (I'm not arguing you're wrong.. I'm just curious as to where this originates from? DRS P&P?)

seb

 

[seb]

Not quite the whole picture, finding a good domain name, that is free to register with Nominet for £5, is difficult.

Ok.. so some people argue "why should these people create profit from purely speculating.. adding no value.. to a name..?"

I suspect domainers would argue they do add value by developing traffic to the sites, etc.. but that's the view many people have.

It's a bit like a new country.. and a small number of individuals go around sticking flags in different areas claiming ownership.. Suddenly the land of the country is owned by very few people. The remaining 99.99% of society may not think that's fair.

This is no different to any other industry. If, for instance, I want to buy a plot of land to build a house, it would be hard to find the right plot but if I had the money I could, no doubt, find something. There would be no point in me complaining that in 1977 I could have bought that land for £500-1000, because the fact is I didn't and I can not expect it to have lay unsold for 30 years while house prices shot up. Yes in an ideal world it would be nice but in reality it would never happen so why waste time arguing about it

Your argument is a very valid one. I'll have to use that one next time someone asks me about domainers


seb

 

[retired_member6]

internet.co.uk is our equivalent of example.com. It was originally one of the 'neutral third level' domains but they stopped being used for that ages ago.

No we are not intending to let it drop, ever. Anyway, why can't we hold on to it?

Do you pick and choose what you hold on to, do you? Hmmm not good.

 

[retired_member11]

Does the Land Registry (a not for profit) own land?
Does the Passport Office (a not for profit) own airports?
Does Nominet (a not for profit) 'own' domain registrations?

 

[Whois-Search]

We don't "create" .scot.uk and .cym.uk because there is a policy that was put into place about how they are done.. so it's not a simple issue. I also suspect Scottish and Welsh users probably want .scot and .cym rather than a .uk suffix (I may be wrong).. I personally have no problems with those two SLDs and if there is support for them I would be delighted to see them in the UK namespace.

Seb,

Well since the council elections this week and now the SNP have control (unless there is a recount) i'd say Scotland is heading towards .scot

All that needs to happen is for http://www.dotscot.org to turn in to http://www.dotcym.org and then cough up the $50k: http://www.icann.org/tlds/application-process-03aug00.htm#2

Then they can by-pass http://www.nic.uk/policy/newslds/ ?

Andrew