.UK Announced

[Stephen]

Ofcom?

To their credit Sedo did email us asking for our views on direct.uk in a survey - which is more than nominet did. However I would like to have seen them be a little more supportive of all the customers that have purchased .co.uk domains through them over the years. Those customers must have spent millions over the years on a domain they believe to be a 'trusted country level domain'.

Interesting bit I have not come across before which is mentioned in the article:

The continued growth of an internet economy to the UK is so important that it has drawn the attention of the regulator Ofcom who is keen to see changes in how domain names are regulated and to create a more trusted and safer commercial environment.

Is their government pressure on Nominet via Ofcom?

 

[Nigel]

If ofcom are getting involved then they'll need to justify the cost of a direct.uk domain costing £20 per annum i.e. an increase of 800%. People complain about energy bills rising less than 10% (with good reason) but nominet's proposed increase is beyond anything british businesses have ever seen.

 

[Stephen]

.uk Policy Stakeholder Committee

From the Sedo article in The Guardian I noticed that Dave Thomas is head of UK at Sedo and member of the Nominet stakeholder committee.

I have not heard so far what the Nominet Stakeholder committee thinks about .uk?

You can contact them at :
http://www.nominet.org.uk/how-participate/policy-development/how-uk-policy-process-works/contact-uk-policy-stakeholder

I have sent a request for their position on .uk!

RESPONSE FROM NOMINET :

To clarify, the .uk Policy Stakeholder Committee does not advise on nor decide policy for .uk. The Committee’s role is to support and enable the .uk policy process.

Plus on request Nominet kindly supplied me with a link to the list of committee members:
http://www.nominet.org.uk/how-participate/policy-development/how-uk-policy-process-works/committee-members

 

[Stephen]

No early peek!

Nominet have just replied about the timming of the release of the summary report from the .uk consultation:

It is our intention to publish the summary at the same time that we publish the outcome of the Board deliberations on the summary.

So no news until after Nominet Board meeting on 26th February 2013 communique is provided, which could be 2 weeks after that date?
(last communique meeting held 29th November 2012 published on Nominet website 12th December 2012 - pointed out by Edwin)

Have requested a speedier update and Nominet are looking into the matter.

 

[markb]

I would like an explantion from nominet as to what the proposed direct.uk domains use will be for, i.e. businesses, organisations etc...

If the use is intended for businesses, I would suggest the new domains are offered to existing .co.uk domain owners before anyone including before .org.uk owners or trademark holders.

If there is no defined use for them or they can be used by anyone for anything, then this is just causing confusion if they where to be introduced, so I would advise against it. It would be a better solution for nominet to introduce security measures to existing domain extensions, including making sure existing domain owners have a UK address.

Edited : Nominet mentioned the new domains would increase security. I know there is a problem with a lot of existing .co.uk domains having dodgy websites on them trying to scam people with fake online shops etc... But by introducing the new .uk extension, its not going to help at all with all the existing .co.uk and .org.uk domains. The only solution to this is for nominet to make the security upgrades to all existing uk domains and make sure all existing uk domain owners are owned by valid uk businesses and organisations.

 

[Nigel]

I don't know if anyone has DNSSEC on their existing .co.uk domains? I just had a look to see if I could work it out. Costs a huge 50p for two years from January!
http://registrars.nominet.org.uk/re...management/dns/dnssec-signing-service/pricing

Is there any information from nominet as to the number of these sold at 50p each? Quite important as they are using the security features as a smokescreen in an attempt to introduce direct.uk with an exhorbitant annual fee. If hardly any have been sold then I think shows that UK businesses do not want, or need, these extra security features from nominet.

 

[GreyWing]

Is there any information from nominet as to the number of these sold at 50p each? Quite important as they are using the security features as a smokescreen in an attempt to introduce direct.uk with an exhorbitant annual fee. If hardly any have been sold then I think shows that UK businesses do not want, or need, these extra security features from nominet.

I think I heard it is less than 500, even Nom don't use it.

 

[tifosi]

Of course the clever 'naughty' phishing sites will easily circumvent the 'malware' site searches. They'll know the ip blocks that nominet will use and either wait for the daily check to then swap/activate the content.

Or will more likely just redirect them to 'clean' sites.

 

[Nigel]

I think I heard it is less than 500, even Nom don't use it.

Thanks - 500 from 10m domains is hardly an impressive statistic.

 

[anthony]

...then why are they just given away £6m to the trust instead of making the network more secure...

The Nominet Trust was always going to be the perfect method to re-assign profits whilst at the same time blunting members ability to criticise it, simply due the its 'charitable' perceptions. A master stroke by Nominet, irrespective of the good it is said to have done.

 

[Nigel]

The guy who has been a driving force behind DNSSEC is also one of the board members who will decide whether to introduce direct.uk with all these wonderful security features and the whopping cost of £20 per annum. Don't suppose the £250 raised from just 500 subscriptions is going far in paying for all the development costs. Simon McCalla IT director explains DNSSEC to computerweekly in this article over two years ago:

http://www.computerweekly.com/news/...t-DNSSEC-extensions-for-94-million-uk-domains

 

[Nigel]

Board Members

There is a list of the board members here. I expect that I will be writing to each one of them soon to object at the way this consultation has been carried out and their decision to not inform existing registrants of the consultation by email. I am hoping that Eleanor Bradley responds to my email on this subject soon but if not then I will ask them whether this decision was made at Board level. I'm hoping that a few of them may see the injustice of this but I think we've really got our work cut out.

http://www.nominet.org.uk/whoweare/structure/board

 

[Stephen]

2,500

Is there any information from nominet as to the number of these sold at 50p each? Quite important as they are using the security features as a smokescreen in an attempt to introduce direct.uk with an exhorbitant annual fee. If hardly any have been sold then I think shows that UK businesses do not want, or need, these extra security features from nominet.

The number quoted in the Nominet London roundtable meeting was 2,500 UK domains had taken up DNSSEC, a lot more than the 500 quoted before but it doesn't change the decimal point compared to the 10,000,000 + UK domains that could take up Nominet's offer!

Note that number does not include Nominet itself or the UK's major banks using .co.uk who don't seem to think it is worth the effort.

 

[Stephen]

Nominet email addresses?

There is a list of the board members here. I expect that I will be writing to each one of them soon to object at the way this consultation has been carried out and their decision to not inform existing registrants of the consultation by email. I am hoping that Eleanor Bradley responds to my email on this subject soon but if not then I will ask them whether this decision was made at Board level. I'm hoping that a few of them may see the injustice of this but I think we've really got our work cut out.

http://www.nominet.org.uk/whoweare/structure/board

It's a pity the Board members Nominet email addresses are not made public!

p.s Eleanor Bradley is not on the Nominet page of directors but was appointed to the Nominet Board per the 29th November 2012 minutes.

 

[GreyWing]

It's a pity the Board members Nominet email addresses are not made public!

I have them if needed Stephen, as do I have their private ones they use for off board stuff, i.e won't show up on Nominet data protection subject access requests. I don't think it does much good to publish them here but if you want them to complete your goals let me know.

 

[Nigel]

It's a pity the Board members Nominet email addresses are not made public!

Yes I agree - what's the best way to get them? phone nominet?

 

[Murray]

Here's a question.

Nominet, knowing that just proposing direct.uk and having consultations would weaken co.uk; would they do it unless they were 100% going to push it through regardless of what came out of the consultations? to me it doesn't seem likely.

 

[Stephen]

Here's a question.

Nominet, knowing that just proposing direct.uk and having consultations would weaken co.uk; would they do it unless they were 100% going to push it through regardless of what came out of the consultations? to me it doesn't seem likely.

Sorry could you elabarate on the point being made?

 

[Murray]

Sorry could you elabarate on the point being made?

My point being that they knew suggesting it would hurt the co.uk.. and I don't think they would hurt the co.uk unless they were 100% going to release direct.uk what ever happened.

 

[Stephen]

My point being that they knew suggesting it would hurt the co.uk.. and I don't think they would hurt the co.uk unless they were 100% going to release direct.uk what ever happened.

Only if they saw that their vision of a new start under .uk for UK business and the hundreds of trade mark holders that would gain the .uk that they craved would offset the collateral damage caused to .co.uk.

I don't like to think the worst of people, so I don't think Nominet thought it through fully!