What benefits do you get from being a Nominet member and accredited registrar?

[Siusaidh]

Mathematically, I can see that it would make financial sense for me to become a Nominet member and accredited registrar.

Apart from the registration prices, and ability to vote, what other benefits are there? Do you get any added access to the whois or ability to search by registrar etc? How useful is your own TAG?

I'm just curious to know if you get anything else except cheap domains? Thanks.

 

[dig bick]

You get a Christmas card

 

[martin-s]

"Ability to vote" lol

 

[Siusaidh]

Yeah, I get that the vote thing is putative and conceptual, rather than likely to be world changing. On the Christmas card thing, they wouldn't dare, because it would give offence to non-Christians.

Do you have to have front facing registrar services to get accreditation? I assume not. How easy is it to get accreditation as a registrar? Do I have to come grovelling to some of you guys to write me references or will my priest suffice if he says I am a respectable lady? Are there additional annual costs if you want to be a registrar as well as a Nominet member?

Are there ways of scouring through all the domains that have been registered, without typing names in one by one in the WHOIS? (Okay, the DBCatch bulk whois is brilliantly helpful, but can I get access to the whole data so I can scroll down through it all? Because what I'd find most helpful would be the capacity to search every single registered domain by key word. I'd also find it really helpful to be able to extract every domain that is registered to specific TAGs.

 

[bonusmedia]

+ Cheaper domains
+ Easier management
+ Any registrar problems, missed renewals etc are your own fault
+ Invitations to jollies to keep you sweet

No customer facing services required, unless you want to be an accredited channel partner.
We only have it for our own portfolio.
Simple to apply, no references etc.

£400 up front and £100 a year.

Incidentally, you do get a Christmas card, and a chocolate advent calendar too. No-one has ever been offended by Christmas, no-one has ever banned Christmas. It's bullshit whipped up by the tabloids, because apparently there are a lot of special snowflakes who are very keen to be offended by the idea of banning Christmas

 

[ian]

Just operate a self-managed tag/membership if you only plan on housing your own domains.

 

[starbird]

This a well time question, to become a registrar I heard a test of sorts was required, is this true. Looking to set up a tag to catch domains, I believe the option in those circumstances is around £1200ish. Looking at the registrar option but not a public registrar simply to get tag etc to use a drop catching solution.

 

[martin-s]

and a chocolate advent calendar too

That might just be you. I've certainly never had one.

 

[starbird]

There’s no test, just a detailed application form.

Appreciate the reply

 

[RobM]

Don't worry - their christmas cards say 'happy holidays' so as not to offend any snowflakes (except of course people who enjoy being miserable - ironically the people that get offended by a christmas card that says merry christmas).
The main benefits are: cheap reg, better security, ability to take part in dropcatching.
Also the costs are low:
£400 to join (one off fee then £100 per year)
If you want to dropcatch then another £25 per year for the DAC.
Certainly nowhere near £1200ish mentioned earlier - at least to nominet.

 

[Murray]

Are there ways of scouring through all the domains that have been registered, without typing names in one by one in the WHOIS? (Okay, the DBCatch bulk whois is brilliantly helpful, but can I get access to the whole data so I can scroll down through it all? Because what I'd find most helpful would be the capacity to search every single registered domain by key word. I'd also find it really helpful to be able to extract every domain that is registered to specific TAGs.

You can get a zone file of all .uk domains registered, not sure what that looks like or how easy it is to actually go through

Can also use dac or delayed dac to go through domains easier, doesn't do full whois, just domain, status, dates and tag

I had someone make me a tool using delayed dac so I can do 5000 domains every 24 hours with the basic lookup above

There’s no test, just a detailed application form.

I had to do a test in 2013, maybe they've changed it since; it was quite hard seeing as I know next to nothing about technical stuff

 

[Siusaidh]

Yeah, I'll give ICANN accreditation a miss this year...

 

[Siusaidh]

You can get a zone file of all .uk domains registered

I'm assuming it can be downloaded if you are a member. Does anyone know what format it comes in?

 

[Siusaidh]

Thank you

 

[stitchbob]

I'm assuming it can be downloaded if you are a member. Does anyone know what format it comes in?

It's literally a DNS zone file - here's a sample line of one of my domains:

impos.uk. 172800 IN NS ns1.digitalocean.com.​

Presumably, domains which don't have DNS servers set aren't listed.

 

[Siusaidh]

Thanks to everyone for your info on this thread.

I'm a bit preoccupied with a house move right now, but I plan to apply for membership in October.

A few remaining questions and polite request:

1. To be able to buy .uk / .co.uk / .org.uk domains at the discounted rate, I assume I have to become a registrar and not simply a member. Is that correct?

2. Does it cost me anything to transfer all my domains at other registrars (mainly Fasthosts) to my own TAG, or do I just change the TAG and that's it.

3. Any advice on which kind of tag to get?

4. I gather in my application I may need some kind of reference/endorsement. Is that correct, and if so, is there anyone here who would be willing to support my application?

That's all. Thanks for any advice!

 

[stitchbob]

1. Correct, you need to be both a member and a registrar for discounted domains

2. It shouldn't cost anything to change tag, however, if you're a self managed tag you only get 5 linked names - if the contacts don't match, assume it will cost you £12 (total, not per domain) to transfer everything to a single contact.

3. Unless you're planning to allow public registration, a self managed tag is fine.

4. No endorsement needed. If you want an accredited tag, you need things like privacy policy and T&C's to be publicly listed somewhere, but nothing for a self managed tag. Related tip: you'll be asked about these things as part of the application anyway - if you're going self managed, just type "N/A - Self managed tag" into all of them.

 

[Siusaidh]

Really helpful - thank you!

Is it best to simply apply for Membership first, and then apply to become a Registrar afterwards?

 

[stitchbob]

That's what I did. The complexity of the application process is massively overrated on Nominet's documentation. It can basically be boiled down to: "Q1: Will you pay us money to become a registrar? A1: Yes"