Master Of Your Domain 271
ICANN has been in the news quite a bit recently. Although new TLD's have been in the works for more than five years now, ICANN has given in to the lobbying of its patron mega-corps and stated that no new TLD's would be created unless trademark holders got first dibs on them. So much for a personal TLD exempt from trademark considerations... ICANN is currently pushing its At-Large Membership, which everyone should join, even though the system has been carefully rigged so that the public cannot make meaningful changes in the composition of ICANN's Board. All these and more will be discussed in their Cairo meeting, which will be Webcast starting 2 a.m. EST on March 8.
Re:Finally, some common sense. (Score:1)
How to add TLDs to a root server yourself (Score:1)
Who needs those ICANN controlled root servers, anyway?
You can actually run your own root server. Then you have total control over what TLDs will be present and which registry supplies the zone data. All that is needed is for you know how the name servers to point to for the traditional and national TLDs, if you even want to carry them.
A couple years ago I created a concept I called Grass Roots Servers [ipal.net] . The idea was that the root servers would really be run as described above. I came up with this idea because of the issue of deciding who would be the one to supply zone data for a new TLD. Since I didn't want political cronies or mega corporations making the decision for everyone, and I didn't want to be making that decision, either (as if I could), I figured the best place to decide was as close to each user as possible. One interesting thing about this is the fact that nothing has to be done by any sort of political or corporate power to enable it.
The difficulty in such a thing is that most people don't want to deal with the complexity of dealing with finding all the TLD name servers, and building the appropriate zone data file. That's where I came up with the web site Grass Roots Servers [ipal.net] which would be a way to select the TLDs you want to have, or don't want to have, and have a zone file built for you. If the idea caught on, surely more tools would be created that just my first attempt, of which source can be downloaded if you want. Keep in mind I did this a couple years ago and have not updated it. The data is kind of old, but some of it may work.
So, do you want them to control your view of the domain name system, or do you want to control it yourself?
The Bill of *what*?! (Score:1)
> The right of free assocation shall not be infringed.
Not in Il Duce Giuliani's New York! Go to Central Park [washlaw.edu] and attempt to address more than twenty of your fellow citizens. If the tenor of your discussion pleases Il Duce, then you'll be all right, no official will lift a finger to infringe upon that "right" of yours; on the other hand, if you are so injudicious as to displease his majesty he cries out to his Brown Shirts, "Avanti!" and it's a vigorous thrashing with nightsticks and then off to the Tombs for you, you anarchist scum!
Or, for a few years there in Chicago [cornell.edu], you retained the right to free association, unless you happened to be young, male and black; then you and your four-or-more friends became, by definition, a "street gang" and were thus subject to immediate arrest and incarceration. As it happens, thanks to those wildeyed radicals at the ACLU [aclu.org] that law got invalidated.
Yours WKiernan@concentric.net
Re:Whats the Problem (Score:1)
What would probably happen is that it would just be driven underground more. Instead of buying the domain, you give them money in order to "encourage" them to give it up (thus leaving it open for you).
Plus, you get into issues of international law. ICANN can say that domain names can't be sold, but they don't have the authority to enact a law. I suppose that where they do control who the registrars are, that they could "blacklist" non-compliant registrars. And, they do have ultimate authority in a domain dispute don't they? Would they have the authority to require that a registrar revoke the domains of a squatter? Perhaps this could work.
Nodens
TLD charters are an unnecessary restriction (Score:1)
Verisign buys NSI for $21B (Score:2)
Here's the c|net story [cnet.com] on the Verisign/NSI deal.
An Open Source Response to ICANN (Score:4)
We have the power and the technical expertise to free ourselves, so why not do it?
Re:Fork the namespace (Score:3)
Absolutely! Have a look at Open Root Server Confederation [open-rsc.org] for one example. I have had my local DNS daemon configured to point to ORSC's namespace for a good while, and I have found it to work quite well. Just to add to the fun, my DNS also has .localnet for anything behind my firewall.
I have looked all over the various RFCs and found that the current root DNS servers ARE the root servers only because Jon Postal said so. That was before all of the NetSol/ICANN debacle. As it stands, neither NetSol nor ICANN even own the root servers or the networks they reside on.
The trick to making an alternate root DNS become commonly available is customer demand. If there are 'cool' sites that can only be accessed by the alternate root (or IP address), people will want that tld to resolve. If a less cool but informative site on .org tells them that their ISP can easily make it resolvable, they will pester them to do so. It costs the ISP nothing but a few minutes to do it, so why not?
Perhaps if we had a TLD server for .geek to get things started? Perhaps a colo in the Caribbean
If desired, all .geek sites COULD be mapped by the root server to .geek.org for the 'uncool' people still using the lame ICANN TLDs. :-)
IANL, but couldn't such a server/service maintain that all trademark disputes are a matter between the two parties and that the service will do nothing about it unless/until compelled to do so by court order? Could someone who IS a lawyer comment?
I have also considered a scheme where the records get updated throughe a protocol based on the dining cryptographers problem so that the admin/owners can honestly say they have NO IDEA who registered the domain.
Re:I've said it before... (Score:2)
As the other poster who replied said, you're making assumptions: "The Net is nothing but the Web, and the Web is nothing but companies."
A proper URN system will do this properly. Maybe for US people typing in "McDonalds" alone will find the fast food chain, but maybe in the UK it will prompt so you can choose the family group (clan?) instead. A proper system will have to avoid simply creating another monopoly space where only big businesses show up.
By the way, the IETF URN Working Group [ietf.org] might help explain some of the issues.
Re:The whole damn thing needs a reorg... (Score:1)
The problem with the catagories that you suggest in addition to the existing top level domains is that there is something of an overlap between the two. I would argue that your .art in most cases would fall under commercial, and in most cases so would your .log... I'd say that the vast majority of news sites are most definately comercial in nature. Frankly I don't think .act differs substatially enough from .org to warrent the distinction... and to be honest, its unlikely that even if there were very distinct groups, its unlikely that you'ld run into much name conflict there.
In reality what you are proposing is some sort of combination between the classifying by the nature of the organization (I wanna make money, I wanna change the world) and the specific thing that they produce (I sell cars, I want to save the whales). This is going to cause a lot of overlaps. Probably what you were heading more towards is classifying things by the topic (ie. news, activism) which would also elimate the .coms and .orgs. This actually looks more like a step back to orginal news hierarchy.
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Re:We Are Heading To A Crisis In Trademark Law (Score:1)
Re:There's another way to look at it (Score:1)
I don't know, I'm still not overly fond of the idea of having sites that could easily fall in to more than one catagory.
Maybe an alternative would be to have two levels (I know, I know, we wanted this simple, but it still doesn't carry as much useless information as the current country/state/city crap we have in the us). You would have your catch alls as top levels. Then the more the specific things as one level down. Finally people would register domains at the second level. It keeps more information in the site/url (but not too much), gets rid of a number of different conflicts, and doesn't tie your company to a geographic location.
Just a thought.
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Re:What utter foolishness. (Score:1)
Icann membership question (ot) (Score:1)
_________________
Re:What problem will new TLDs solve? (Score:1)
Re:Those "inflexible minds" were born to rule. (Score:1)
Re:TM/IP protection and ICANN (Score:2)
As a trademark (or other intellectual property) owner, you are required by US and International law to protect your TM/IP, or lose it. The law clearly and firmly places the burden of policing possible infringements on the TM owner.
If they would just start using the TLDs properly, they wouldn't have to do nearly the policing that they do now. If only commercial interests could use .com domains, then Microsoft.org could not possibly be related to the Microsoft Corporation, and would therefore not be infringing on Microsoft's trademark.
As for them passing the burden of guarding trademarks on to the registrars, I have to agree with you that it should be stopped. I think it would (and already does, really) make the current (flawed) registration system quite unfair to the little guys. But again, if they would start using the TLDs correctly, we wouldn't have this problem.
Re:Finally, some common sense. (Score:1)
I think the word you are looking for is 'insightful'.
Now I'm getting all weepy eyed about NSI (Score:2)
Who would have ever thought that one day we'd be cursing the name 'Dyson'?
What's wrong with giving TM holders first dibs? (Score:2)
That's what I said... (Score:2)
And the problem is, sites will always overlap categories. The idea is to arrange domains in such a manner that at the highest level a site fits into at all, it only fits one of the TLD's. That one TLD becomes the one the site must use.
Let's take news sites. At the lowest level, a given news site might fit into
Absurd. (Score:2)
Call it earning a place at the table before you get to sit down. We would get rid of "Naked Petrified Grits" imbeciles and Stallmanist collectivists by ramping up access costs, and we would get rid of cheap fly-by-night web garbage by seriously increasing the cost of a domain name.
Sheer idiocy.
You are completely ignoring the egalitarian nature of the Internet, which is what made it as popular as it is in the first place.
If anything, the cost of entry is too high, as decent broadband is still expensive and limited in coverage.
New XFMail home page [slappy.org]
/bin/tcsh: Try it; you'll like it.
Finally, some common sense. (Score:5)
What I'm about to say is heretical, so it'll surely be moderated into oblivion. Oh, well. People have a right to hear the truth anyway, even if they don't like how it sounds.
Yes, we all know the government created the Net. Fine, I'm glad. But so what? If the Internet had not been "exploited" and "taken over" by businesses, it would still be a useless boondoggle. I'm sorry, but there's no justification for spending tax dollars to provide scientific researchers and college undergraduates with alt.flame. As it turns out, the Net could grow into a lot more than that, and we have far-sighted civil servants like Larry Taylor at ARPA in the 1960's (and many others since that time) to thank for keeping it alive until it could pay for itself.
But now it can pay for itself. This boom we're in may have been planted by ARPA, but it was watered and cared for by businesses, and big ones at that. It's them we have to thank for the fact that the Internet is not a useless parasitic drain on public funds. They didn't create the Net, but without them we wouldn't want the Net.
So should they now get special consideration? Should we pause just for a moment and question our compulsion to bite the hand that feeds us? All those who work for a living, raise your hands. Thank you.
Trademark holders go first. You can register www.microsoft.goatse.cx afterwards.
Country codes? (Score:2)
Why should I have to know in which country an organization is based in order to guess their URL? Should we then go down to individual states and provinces? Then instead of the clear, unambiguous slashdot.org, you get the silly slashdot.org.somestate.us. And what if they move? I'm rambling now, but my point is that the internet has the potential to seperate us from awkward physical boundaries, and you are advocating adopting those same boundaries.
Much preferrable would be your first suggestion -- a name heirarchy based on purpose or industry of the registering entity.
--Chouser
Re:We Are Heading To A Crisis In Trademark Law (Score:1)
Re:Whats the Problem (Score:1)
Re:Republic vs Democracy (Score:1)
Re:Whats the Problem (Score:1)
What would probably happen is that it would just be driven underground more
I thought of this, and perhaps it was naive of me to think that most companies would not feel comfortable offering under-the-table bribes to people for their domains. Even so, a policy could be created (not a law) that forces a domain holder to give up the domain as soon as they offer to do so in exchange for money. A company could then go to ICANN and say that the person attempted to sell them the domain, and presto, no more domain ownership (and perhaps no refund either). This causes a problem with false accusations though, which means that more complicated rules are needed to prevent this from happening. Basically to defend from an accusation like this would mean that you could not get rid of your domain (to do so would be to admit guilt).
Alternatively, it could be made a point of policy not to award domains to entities who paid for their release from scalpers. This would mean that companies could not buy domains from people and the trade would dry up. While fly-by-night domain scalpers don't care about under-the-table deals being hidden from view, don't companies have to make their accounts public to some degree? Here's my naivete again, I have no idea.
These arguments are based on the assumption that companies wouldn't want a back-room deal to smear their public image and that the risk of doing so would keep them from doing truly shady deals for a domain. Of course, having some law passed might make this easier, just like ticket scalping.
I suppose that where they do control who the registrars are, that they could "blacklist" non-compliant registrars.
True, they don't control all the geographical domains like
You're not quite right. (Score:1)
Anyway, that aside...the way this whole thing is new was something you just glossed over...this is a new realm. Business and personal stuff are intermingled...trademarks for a strictly business world don't apply. This new world does away with old borders, as well...who's entitled to IBM.com, if some guy in Japan registers it first for his company? Treat the net as if it were a new country, because that's basically what it is...in the new country, trademarks go to whoever gets there first.
I guarantee that someone with a legitimately large business would yell til he's red in the face at you if you told him he had to give up rights to his domain name because it was stealing legitimate business from a bigger company. I'm positive he's not going to view his taking a domain name that incorporates a "contested" name as stealing their business...won't they be stealing HIS business if it were the oter way around?
There's only one real way to settle this for right now...until all the other TLD's are handed out...and if the current proposed system is enacted...it won't actually solve ANYTHING. The only way is to let whoever gets there first with a legit interest gets it first. Other people should then have the rights to search engine rights to properly direct people to their sites, and a link on the "offending" page.
You haven't answered why this is fraud if ther are international cases with involve simlar names. Why should a UK company get strapped with a
Re:That's what I said... (Score:1)
Actually thats not quite what I meant. I was thinking something more on the lines of:
Whoa... now that I actually type that out, I don't really like that idea at all ;)
--
Re:Who controls the media? *We* control the media. (Score:2)
Since you didn't clarify, I'll assume this is part of the alien joke.
[Me:] If people want to create and read Web pages, the system would adjust to accommodate them, distributing its load as needed.
[You:] That sounds like a free market to me. But who pays for it? The taxpayers, I suppose. If these services you so much enjoy were really worth having, wouldn't people have paid for them willingly? Of course they would. But they didn't. Government picked up the tab. Had they not, the Internet never would have been born because it offered nothing of value to anybody capable of paying his own way.
You're trying to predict a priori what the Internet was like from a set of theories, but your conclusions don't match the reality of what it was. Therefore, either your theories or your logical framework is flawed.
In this case, you're relying on a basic flaw of many free market arguments-- the notion that if a product is worth something, people will pay money for it. However, there are many counterexamples. Are you saying that food is worthless to a starving man if he can't pay for it? You allude to this with your phrase "to anybody capable of paying his own way". But the repugnant conclusion is the idea that only the well-being of moneyed people matters. Few people truly consciously believe this; do you?
Regarding the Internet then, it was worth a great deal to students, but how many students could have afforded to pay for the infrastructure? There's such a thing as investment in a society's future. Many of the "no tax" crowd don't seem to realize this. (They also don't seem to notice the benefits they themselves have reaped from various tax-funded projects, but that's a bigger topic.)
Another totally different counterexample: Loving physical intimacy (including sex) is worth a lot, but how can you pay money for it? Some things by their nature can't be bought and don't fit into the free market framework.
Another flaw in your argument is that people would have paid for all this, except the framework was already in place so they didn't have to. And in fact, they pay today with their ISP bill. And they were doing so for years before the Net was overrun with businesses.
Note that there was a huge active network of BBS's for years, complete with image-oriented pages, that had functions similar to the Internet. It was operated and funded entirely by the individuals involved.
Re:You are not rational. (Score:2)
Ha! Who are you trying to kid? Corporations are the biggest welfare recipients in the country! They're always looking for a handout. Unfair taxation? What the hell are you talking about? We're all subject to arbitrary and irresponsible taxation. What makes them so special that they should be above it? They aren't hoping for a small return. They wouldn't be in the internet business if they were hoping for a small return. They want to achieve monopoly status and consumer lock-in. That's where the big bucks are. That's what corporations shoot for. They don't like competition. They don't make astronomical profits when competition exists. The system wasn't set up to give corporations full reign to do as they please in this country. It was set up to benefit the people as a whole. Where the interests of the general population conflict with that of corporations, the interests of the general population should prevail.
Re:If attempted murder fails . . . (Score:1)
Two companies - one called ATI, the other called ATI.
Who gets ATI.com?
If ATItech wanted it, they should have gotten it first. Some other ATI beat them to it.
No crime.
Re:The whole damn thing needs a reorg... (Score:1)
Re:That's what I said... (Score:2)
Somehow, I figured that would be the case.
To give you an idea, under my system the three URL's you gave would instead be:
There's the difference. What do you think>
Re:Country codes? (Score:2)
Note that my proposed outline however handled default country codes, ones that you can program into the browser, so that if you type in "foobar.com", it would try each "foobar.com" in each country code you've defined to find the site of interest; if it doesn't find it after that type of search (assuming the DNS system worked right), you probably would have had to use Yahoo to find the site in the first place.
Yes, the internet can transend boundaries, but those that pretend they run it (ecommerce) are forcing us to make sure that the boundaries are still visible.
Re:Finally, some common sense. (Score:1)
By changing the TLD namespace into multiple namespaces, we can have mcdonald.sport or reese.home domains that clearly are not attempts to infringe on established business names but also enable others rightful access to those names.
Re:How did the whole domain "ownership" come about (Score:1)
Re:It's more efficient simply to kill the weakling (Score:1)
To put it simply, there exists no universal namespace in human conversation. All names are qualified to some degree. We need a domain naming system to address this fact. A hierarchical namespace may or may not be the answer. But a global namespace is most definitely not the answer.
Domains were not delegayed properly. (Score:1)
There should be a set of subdomains under the
ie.
sun.os-vendors.software.com
microsoft.os-vendors.software.com
microsoft.productivi.software.com
Linux.os.free.software.org
*.telecoms.electronics.com
etc etc
The client software then hides the various domains from the user.
The existing flat structures are completely fucked up. I bet they'll fuck up any new structures as well.
Re:Finally, some common sense. (Score:1)
Only if you're into hyperbole. Usenet existed about 8 years before it got onto the "internet". They used a different communications mechanism. I'll refer you to uucp(1) for more details.
Scenario: Somebody registers YOUR name, they make money out of things YOU have done. They trade on YOUR brand, on YOUR image (well, maybe not image - Geek!).
You put up your own web page, you put up an explaination of what's going on, and make fun of your "competitor". Get quoted in Wired, and on Slashdot, and elsewhere. There are two types of publicity: good and bad. You can't buy better bad publicity for your competition than if they appear to be mean-spirited and petty.
They could have drilled him into the ground...a pity.
Remember to remain calm.
James
Re:I've said it before... (Score:2)
I'm off topic, but you must be kidding: McDonalds the hamburger chain has thoroughly colonised the UK (where I live) as well as every other country that I've been to.
And ironically, as a Scot I'm sad to say that there is probably more interest in Scottish family history on your side of the pond (among the numerous descendants of the victims of the Highland Clearances, and homesick expat Scottish engineers in S.V. too) than there is on mine. If homebound Scots these days gave a toss about their cultural identity they'd have seceded from the UK years ago.
Consciousness is not what it thinks it is
Thought exists only as an abstraction
keep country codes (Score:2)
We can ditch country codes exactly when "countries" become obsolete--when the governments that define those countries stop trying to pass different laws governing how things work.
Re:Spare me the näive populist arglebargle. (Score:1)
Re:Who controls the media? *We* control the media. (Score:1)
What really annoys me (Score:1)
I guess that's what annoys me so much about the current domain name problem. I don't feel like I can make one bit of difference in the solution. It's now up to the government and business.
This stinks.
--Frog
Re:I've said it before... (Score:1)
IE has something they call "Internet Keywords" which seems like a step in the right direction here.
Re:I believe in liberty: Pay as you go. (Score:2)
> Pay as you go. Any other arrangement is theft.
More Randite nonsense. Sounds as thrilling and makes as little sense as the lyrics on a heavy metal album. I hope you never have any children, or if you do that you have thought these issues out a little bit more thoroughly by then. Because, see, your two-week-old infant can't "pay as he goes." He's, like, too young to get a job, get it?
By the way, if Americans had adopted your attitude in, say, 1941, then today you and I would both know all the lyrics to the "Horst Wessel Lied" by heart.
Yours WDK - WKiernan@concentric.net
Re:And rightly so. (Score:2)
If wealthy creators do the best work, we'd all benefit by filtering out the trash at the bottom of the heap.
Too bad the best work is often done by high school and college kids with no money who don't even know sombody who knows sombody who can name a single VC. Then there's the distinct possability that some worthy ideas are anathema to VC's by nature. For example who would fund a site warning about an unprofessional VC who ripped a person for all they were worth?
Consider this site! It did not exactly start out as a multi-million dollar investment. Part of the real power and usefulness is that anybody can have their say here for a very modest fee.
Lazy people will be too lazy to get their site set up and bring it to your attention. Useless people reveal their uselessness quickly enough to not be a problem.
There's another way to look at it (Score:2)
Now, you're probably asking, "where did
It doesn't have to stop there, of course. Consider my original idea of
The idea is that
Re:Finally, some common sense. (Score:2)
They didn't create the Net, but without them we wouldn't want the Net.
Maybe YOU wouldn't want it, but I sure would! That's why back in the day, I was a regular user of FIDOnet. Somehow, I found it to be a good thing in spite of not being able to find a corperate sponsored chatroom where I could talk to like minded individuals who were obsessive/compulsive about Taco Bell. (Yes, Taco Bell ACTUALLY has/had a chat area. Talk about worthless and unwanted).
Yes, I spent hours a day on it even though I couldn't use it to discover the godlike virtues of colegate-palmolive and Ajax (the scouring powder).
There is a reason there aren't any malls in the Antarctic. There are no people there who want to buy things. Without people on the net, there would be no businesses there either.
re-reading, this sounds like a flame. Please take it as the humour with a point that it was ment to be.
Re:Oh, please. (Score:2)
We'll compare the two: The Slim Corporation creates wealth and jobs. Mr. Slim wants to post pictures of his fat girlfriend.
By that logic, if K-mart wants the land your house is on, you should have 2 weeks to get out.
Too many problems (Score:4)
Unless the domain names allow for the type of detail necessary to distinguish between trademark uses -- is this domain for a company that sells detergent or operating systems? -- it will continue to completely undermine the very notion that trademarks are assigned for specific uses and don't automatically remove normal words from everyday language. Nevermind complications from considering multiple languages
What is to be done about various international trademark disputes? In some countries, "aspirin" is a trademark owned by Bayer Aspirin, but not in the US where it's considered the generic name for acetylsalicylic acid. Is it just that US policy will continue to dictate how the internet functions on a global basis?
Solution... (Score:2)
Or is that too obvious.
Whats the Problem (Score:2)
Nathaniel P. Wilkerson
NPS Internet Solutions, LLC
www.npsis.com [npsis.com]
Re:The Big Question: Why? (Score:2)
Maybe a ".home.uk" would be fun, though, if only to clear out all the
Re:Solution... (Score:2)
Or is that too obvious.
A bit. There are no general trademarks.
.tm.us, .tm.uk, .tm.se etc
You would need something like:
Actually, that would not work either, you would need:
.food.tm.us, .software.tm.us etc.
The shortage is not in domain names, but in *names*
Re:Finally, some common sense. (Score:2)
Registering YOUR name:
It is not MY name in the sense of MY exclusive property. If two companies or organisations would not be able to share the same name, we would have to use serial numbers instead.
Making money out of things YOU have done.
That is not the same thing. Copyright, trademark or patent infringement are allready criminal. There is no need for a law that says "Oh yeah, the same applies to the web"
Trading on YOUR brand, on YOUR image
Again a separete offence. In your Manchester United example: Writing/posting/shouting "Manchester United sucks" is no offence. (or every fan club would be criminal). Registering manchesterunited.co.uk is not neccessarily wrong. After all it was a page *about* united, even if it was not *by* them.
What *would* be wrong (and probably illegal) is to pretend that you are representing someone else. A slashdot.com site pretending to be slashdot.org would be wrong. So would a www.mikrosoft.com site selling similar software.
How would you like me to register www.slashdot.com and use it to vent my frustrations against everything /. stands for?
Why don't you post your frustrations as AC or after writing "This will certainly be moderated down but..." like the rest of us :-)
American Imperialist Hegemony rules OK, what? (Score:2)
------------------- begin quote -----------------
US SEIZES JURISDICTION OVER DOT.COM COMPANIES
Mere registration of top level domain sufficient
US companies able to seize worldwide registrations
US trademark owners able to have domain names of others expropriated
Over the last few years we have commented on Internet cases from around the world which
we believe would be of interest to UK businesses and others. For some readers these
cases may have been more relevant than others. Today however we report on a decision of
the District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia which has perhaps the furthest
reaching implications for worldwide internet governance.
In its Decision of Friday 5th March 2000, Caesars World, Inc -v- Caesars-Palace
and others (Civil Action No 99-550-A), Judge Albert Bryan effectively decreed that his
court would be the arbiter of the property rights in respect of all the approx.
7,000,000
dealt solely with the motions of two of the defendants to dismiss an action for lack of
jurisdiction, the effect of the Decision is to open the floodgate to litigation by
holders of US trademarks against domain name proprietors based outwith the US (or at
least outwith Virginia.
-------------------- end quote ------------------
Now, it may have escaped your attention in America, but the Internet is international; it has been international since Arpanet was linked to Janet in the early eighties. When we set up ICANN (I say 'we' - I was convenor of one of the Geneva sessions of the working party which led to the setting up of ICANN) it was precisely to prevent this sort of thing from happening.
The only possible consequence of this sort of nonsense is that the domain name service will collapse; courts and politicians in Europe (and, I imagine, in Japan) are not going to like being told that American trade-mark owners have first claim on an international resource. Either the Virginia court is persuaded to see sense, or we'd better get on with developing a replacement for the Domain Name System.
What about... (Score:3)
-mark
Re:keep country codes (Score:2)
Centralist governments which are trying to resist nationalist movements (such as in Britain, Spain or Indonesia) strongly do not want to allow the aspirant nations which they control to have TLDs; independence movements within those nations strongly do.
This isn't an argument either to have country-code TLDs or not to have them, but it's worth being aware that there are very strong political undercurrents around this issue which will not make it easy to solve.
Finally, I suspect that governments particularly of smaller and less self-confident nations would strongly resist moves to do away with CCTLDs.
We Are Heading To A Crisis In Trademark Law (Score:4)
Re:What's wrong with giving TM holders first dibs? (Score:3)
Re:Finally, some common sense. (Score:2)
Scenario: Somebody registers YOUR name, they make money out of things YOU have done. They trade on YOUR brand, on YOUR image (well, maybe not image - Geek!).
You'd like that? I mean, recently there was a case of http://www.manchesterunited.co.uk/ - it was registered by a fan of a rival team (Arsenal), for two reasons:
1. To make money (by trading football stuff)
2. To hurt ManUtd (he plans to put propoganda there)
3. To eventually sell to Man Utd.
Why shouldn't Man Utd be able to say "No, the name belongs to us"? They're the biggest club in the world, so they class as a Big Corporation. With typical
They took the guy to court btw.
Now, it's not a great example, but I just read about it, so it's the best I have. But seriously, think about it.
How would you like me to register www.slashdot.com and use it to vent my frustrations against everything
Let's stop being so typically
Mong.
* Paul Madley
The Big Question: Why? (Score:2)
We get all riled up when someone squats on, say, openssh, but we feel its our right and privilidge to be able to grab www.microsoft.sucks.
The whole point of trademarks is that companies can have some control over how their name is used. Am I the only one who notices a double standard?
ICQ: 49636524
snowphoton@mindspring.com
TLD? Whuzzat?? (Score:2)
Re:What's wrong with giving TM holders first dibs? (Score:2)
There's three possibilities:
1. Joe Blow like you and me can't get in on the game until those who already have trademarked domains can get in. Bad Cuz Blizzard games is suing blizzard.net for that domain. Bad cuz businesses get to pretend they were here first (who do they think they're kidding: Gov't creates 32-bit adressable, 7-bit speaking weakling; Hackers built the software infrastructure, and Businesses ride on it. Not the other way around.)
2. Trademark bullies can say they own TM-sucks.com.
3. It's just to protect the trademarks they already own when
Finally the whole TLD thing is bogus. I should be able to register domains the same way newsgroups are registered.
Republic vs Democracy (Score:2)
The Icann voting process would allow any user who was/is over the age of 16,(Yeah like that can be proved on-line) international election of the special council, then they appoint their on chioces on 9 more members to the board. The other nine will be representing commercial interests only. Follow the money to get to the root of the policy, the whole thing is geared toward big business who can afford to lobby their representetive to the council to push their agenda. The meeting in Cairo will be more of the same. ICANN has members.icann.org (too lazy to link) which is set up for non commercial interests to voice their opinions. I don't beleive this weill get any attention at all, more a pr move than anything else.
do it like this... (Score:2)
without violating these rules, NSI could still profit from arbitrary names without domain limitations like bill.gates.my.hero, which does ~not~ include license or rights to cmdr.taco.my.hero. NSI makes money; people can choose names better than 1eye41eye.org; trademark holders are happy and i can get the name idiot.freak if i want. name servers need almost no reconfigs or upgrades for this to happen, pop mail services would have to be set up for the exact name, but most
Common Sense? (Score:5)
1. If the Internet had not been "exploited" and "taken over" by businesses, it would still be a useless boondoggle.
Really? And all the scientific dialog, the ability for university research programs to communicate quickly and effectively - do I even need to go on? - a "useless boondoggle?" Hm. I expect the creation of alt.flame was probably one of the points at which people realized the 'Net had a lot more potential than simply exchanging research data.
2. They didn't create the Net, but without them we wouldn't want the Net.
You are so wrong. We could still be using it to develop open source software, host useless web pages, and pour nice hot bowls of grits down your pants. Come on, now.
3. Here's an interesting question: if I decide that I want to name the street I'm developing something like "Apple Street," should Apple be able to stop me? No. Because while Apple(TM) may be a trademark, apple (or even Apple) is not. Isn't that roughly analagous to this situation? Think about the implications of businesses with plain-language names getting involved here. There are many. There are also many businesses names that are common last names. What if mister Slim buys Slim.ert before the diet company does? is there a problem with that?
nope.
Re:The whole damn thing needs a reorg... (Score:2)
Re:The Big Question: Why? (Score:4)
Not at all. ISTR a few years ago when ".to" came out that it caused a little stink... all this "come.to" cutesyism stuff.
Frankly I'm pretty sick of seeing things like "www.m8motorwaymaintenance.co.uk" on the backend of lorries, for two reasons. If I wanted a hostname stuck on my butt, I'd stick a hostname on my butt. If I wanted to point people at my website, I'd at least have the decency to make it a valid URL (see RFC1738). Secondly, the name itself it merely cute, not descriptive.
I'm all for country + a few other TLDs and whatever-the-InterNIC-calls-itself-today enforcing it strictly. If you're not a UK-based seller of things, you don't get a
We need restrictions on what TLD you can register. (Score:5)
Of course, one asks how do internation rules come into play. For that, we need to force the use of country codes, then have each country decide the usage of the TLD within that country code. If you are looking for megacorp.com, the browser should be smart enough to start at www.megacorp.com.us if you are in the States, or www.megacorp.co.uk if in britian or so on. Thus, the *true* TLDs are the country codes, then each country can set it's own restrictions, so that the definition of a US non-profit organization does not play into how the UK might decide who gets org.uk domains.
But it all falls down to teaching the public and businesses that those TLDs *are* important in distiquishing between commercial and non-commercial interests. Commercial companies should have absolutely no reason to grab an .org name, and should be prevented from doing so. Thus, trademark dilution due to domain names in a unappropriate TLD become null and void; the TLD indicates that the word is not associated with the commercial business. (Mind you, if the content on the page is libel, that's something different).
Alas, the days when URLs were meant to be invisible to the non-proficent user are long gone.
Re:Finally, some common sense. (Score:5)
Not true. I wanted the net back when companies didn't make it possible. As a matter of fact, lots of people wanted it back then. After Oct 31st, 1994 (I think), I wasn't so sure I wanted it.
"So should they now get special consideration? Should we pause just for a moment and question our compulsion to bite the hand that feeds us? All those who work for a living, raise your hands. Thank you."
You are right. Since I pay to access the net everyday, I should get special consideration. *I* gave my money to those companies for MY sake, not for their ability to get what they want. I gave them money, they supported OUR network. The transaction is complete, they are not owed a damn thing. If we didn't want the net, those companies would have ever spent a nickle to run a damn thing.
Without US, they wouldn't want the Net.
Bad Mojo
Re:What problem will new TLDs solve? (Score:2)
I go to namespace.ORG, and right in the center of the page is an advertisement, from "Name.Space" for domain registration for $69.95.
Just because they charge money doesn`t mean they`re necessarily for-profit. For all you know, they`re charging the minimum necessary to cover their costs. And since they`re fighting a legal battle [namespace.org] at the moment against Network Solutions, they probably need all the money they can get.
Here`s another point. At the moment, most people looking for a business either know the URL from advertisements or use search engines. Why should this change when we have new TLDs? So why should more choices be a problem?
Re:Whats the Problem (Score:2)
The "Joe Average" ICANN registration IMO is a total sham, once "Joe Average" ICANN member votes in the initial 9 board member election, he/she's out of the decision/policy making process.
how many tld's will I have to buy? (Score:2)
I own a couple of
This is about US$35.00 each or US$105.00 per year for a domain name.
Now I'm going to have to buy more TLD's to avoid cybersquatters?
Where are the TLD police?
Can't they troll the internet for misused TLD's?
my
-- Andy
Cyber Squating (Score:4)
At any account the two large issues were trademark and the incredible chunks of change a row in a database cost.
As for trademarks I echo what others have said. Although there are rules in place they arn't applied across the board. For instance, by NSI's rules etoy should have never been pulled. But the deeper issues are corporate interests VS. "the little guy".
An example is nissan.com. This domain is owned by Mr. Nissan, (who's family has held the name for almost 3000 years). Nissan Computer Corp has had a trademark since 1991 on the name. Nissan Motor corp wants the name. Although NSI rules have kept Nissan Motors from taking the name outright they can still litigate Mr. Nissan into the poor house.
No matter how you cut it money and power pervail over rightful ownership.
Re:Finally, some common sense. (Score:2)
Specifically, they said, Icann needs to define its mission more clearly and adopt language that limits its scope of power.
I see some value it what the base scope of their effort was, but with the current structure, they will have way to much power and that will lead to more rules, more regs, higher access costs, $1K domain registrations etc. etc.
Record for most links? (Score:2)
Fork the namespace (Score:4)
Trademarks and questions and borders (Score:2)
Lets say that any TLDs would have to protect trademarks as proposed. So is there a great big Trademark database out there to be consulted (and can I find it on the web)?
I'm reminded of an old article in an MS TechNet CD (not sure if it's still on there) that actually had a list of all the computer related Trademarks and who owned them. It was always fun to browse through and see what people trademarked.
If there is then is it just a national dB or does it cover international Trademarks?
What if some international Trademarks conflict?
Would the rules protecting Trademarks protect "current" Trademarks, or could domains with those new TLDs get kicked out by someone claiming the domain after Trademarking something?
Rehash of the same old thing (Score:5)
Now, here's another story, stating the truth of what I and others have been saying for $DEITY knows how long now.
I'll make this very simple:
IF YOU DON'T LIKE THIS, GET INVOLVED AND CHANGE IT!
And that doesn't mean joining the ICANN At-Large membership. It means getting involved with the Domain name Service Organization [dnso.org], specifically Working Groups B and C, and working to get rid of business-centric, short-sighted policies before they're enacted. In the end, it all comes down to numbers: Right now, the corporate lawyers and the businesspeople have a stronger lobby within ICANN than the individuals and the end-users do.
Don't be fooled, you will NOT have any impact on policy from the At-Large Membership. The proper venue for activism is within the DNSO working groups.
See this page [dnso.org] for the mailing list archives of the working groups, and instructions on how to join. It's as easy as subscribing to a mailing list.
Unless and until you actually get off your ass and do something to change things, you're just going to be pissing in the wind. Slashdot is a wonderful forum, but all of you should be voicing your concerns where they matter, in the Working Groups, instead of here.
Restrict the number of TLD's allowed per-company (Score:2)
This will be incredibly difficult to manage and simple to defeat but will put a quick and easy end to cybersquatting of Top Level Domains. You can bet that there won't be 3 million weird sounding domains.
Mark
Re:DNS needs to be replaced (Score:2)
I hear ya on IPv6. I've actually spoken with a few places using it in production environments, but even they're treated somewhat experimental, but that's OT.
Re:What's wrong with giving TM holders first dibs? (Score:4)
I don't mind trademarks, and I'd even go so far as saying that Chase Manhattan has a better claim on chase.com than I do, they being a commercial entity with a trademark. They also have a better claim on chase.org than I do, simply because they registered it before I did. But their claim is no better than mine for using Chase with any future top level domain. I should not be precluded from the opportunity to register it first (and neither should they).
What problem will new TLDs solve? (Score:4)
Or are there supposed to be restrictions on who can register these new ones (like country codes)?
--
Patrick Doyle
Interesting Problem (Score:3)
But what other ways can this be resolved? Well, there is the current Anti Cybersquatting legislation. I am not familiar enough with it for an in-depth dissection, but from what I've seen it is a rather clumsy, heavy-handed approach
that may harm legitimate, private users.
Until we have an easy, universal set of criteria to aid in determining whether a domain claim is legitimate, we are going to see this problem, and variations thereof.
Perhaps what we need is a "Meta" TLD that would allow multiple companies/individuals with legitimate claims on a domain to register it. Example: I, proprieter of ford computers, wish to register ford.com, a domain to which I have an arguable claim to. However, it's already been claimed by Ford, a popular auto maker. So, with the meta TLD, any queries to www.ford.com would pull up a page that would present choices to the user: (i.e., "Are you looking for Ford auto? Click here." "Are you looking for Ford computers? Click here."). I imagine it would ultimately end up similiar to some of the redirect pages (openssh.org) we see posted voluntarily.
Not a perfect solution, granted, but I think it may go a long ways towards solving some of the current issues.
TM/IP protection and ICANN (Score:5)
As a trademark (or other intellectual property) owner, you are required by US and International law to protect your TM/IP, or lose it. The law clearly and firmly places the burden of policing possible infringements on the TM owner.
This includes the time, effort, and cost involved.
There are existing services that charge a nominal fee to do domain name/trademark infringement searches. Some registrars have this as part of their business model (e.g., look at the links off of http://www.whois.net).
Now, ICANN, via Working Group B (which is stacked full of TM/IP lawyers), wants to shift that burden to the registrars themselves, eliminating that business model, and superceeding US and International trademark/intellectual property law!
The folks from Working Group B have even invaded Working Group C, the WG for the addition of new Top-Level Domains (such as a
In short, the TM holders don't like US and International law placing the burden and cost of protecting their marks on their shoulders, and have found a political venue in which they can get away with shifting this burden onto someone else.
And every single one of you who isn't in there fighting to prevent this is tacitly allowing this to happen.
If this becomes reality, ICANN will have effectively superceded worldwide laws and treaties.
And since the DNSO leading body, the "Names Council", and the ICANN Board of Directors is full of trademark/intellectual property owners and biased business owners, this stands a very good chance of happening. The only way to prevent this is for each and every one of you to GET INVOLVED.
Re:Finally, some common sense. (Score:5)
All new subdivisions should be zoned for commercial interests. Residential developement should occur only after businesses have declined to take advantage new developments.
Free speech was nice 200 years ago, but the Companies are much larger now and they often find this "free speech" used against them to publicize boycotts and the like. Consumer advocacy should be outlawed because no one is a bigger advocate of the consumer than the Companies.
There should be no notion of balance in public policy. Just because we *could* create TLDs for non-commercial interests (personal home pages, free software, consumer advocacy, etc), doesn't mean we *should*. We must seek to make sure that Business Interests are catered to at every corner to show our debt to the Companies.
Re:Whats the Problem (Score:3)
Well, this method that the ICANN is chosing won't help me at all, because I don't have any trademark rights to anything and if I want to register some domain that these guys own (or will soon own) then I'll have to go buy it (which I will NOT!). Here's a question for you: why don't we just remove the incentive to squat on domains by making it impossible to sell them?
I'm serious, is there any reason besides greed that would motivate someone to register a domain and sell it to someone? I honestly can't think of any. A quick pick:
So why don't we do this? Make domains only brokerable between the registrar and the "owner", with no possibility of profit? I think that would stop domain scalping. IANAL, I have no MBA, and I'd love to hear from people who are more enlightened about this than I am.
The whole damn thing needs a reorg... (Score:5)
Besides this, country codes only rarely give any indication of the site's purpose, which a domain name should be restricted to doing. Take, for example, my old high school's URL; I think it ran http://flinthill.ind.k12.va.us or something like that. This is a classic example of too much information in a name (Flint Hill, Independent school, K-12, Virginia, US), leading to something a lot longer than a domain name should be. A simple http://www.flinthill.edu would have been better (and isn't taken either).
This also gets around trademark issues, because it makes it quite clear when a name is being used for commercial purposes.
How does this sound to people? The problem is that the current system is too fluid; flexibility has its place but this goes too far. Obviously, more TLD's than these are needed; feel free to contribute more. Just remember that any you add should be thought out such that an entity can obviously fit into only one of these TLD's, or obviously fits into one catecory far better than the rest.
Re:We need restrictions on what TLD you can regist (Score:2)
Almost all network providers are also commercial organizations. In their view, they have a perfect right to both a .com and a .net address. I find it hard to disagree with them.
IMHO half right:) this should not change the fact that each name space has it's own uses.
The {ISP}.COM name space should encapulate the commercial side of the organisation, ie, advertising, press releases, investor relations, etc.
The {ISP}.NET name space should encapsulate the network services, say DNS, email, ftp/web spaces, etc.
Re:We need restrictions on what TLD you can regist (Score:2)
non-profit organizations are
Except, of course, for the commercial
-----------------------------------------------
Re:Fork the namespace (Score:3)
AlterNIC [alternic.net] was trying to do exactly this for a long time. The problem is, you need existing root servers and DNS servers to use your server as a root server. How does my company's DNS server (ns.fooinc.com) know about foo.bar-nic.baz [bar-nic.baz] (the root server for the .baz TLD)? I have to tell it -- and every DNS admin needs to be told about foo.bar-nic.baz. That's the problem. It's a wonderful idea otherwise, and I'd be all for it.
Cthulhu for President! [cthulhu.org]
Re:We need restrictions on what TLD you can regist (Score:3)
Commercial vs personal (Score:2)
Really there are two problems, and nobody admits they have to be addressed seperatly.
First there is commercial tradmarks and the area the trademark covers. For instance:
McDonalds.com - the fast food restaruant we all know
McDonalds.com - the orginal restaruant that Ray Kroc bought the idea from (Are they still around, in any case the rights of that deal should handle this)
McDonalds.com - a local electrical company in some small city run by some brothers McDonald.
McDonalds.com Same as the last one, but diffierenty city. Maybe these guys are plumbers, whaterver.
McDonalds.com Again a small local buisness. Maybe a hairstylists that takes appointments on the web
You get the idea, a major recignised worldwide name, but it cannot do anything about the small reginal companies that are not compittion. Somehow the needs of all these comercial interests need to be met. (And I think we all agree that McDonalds restaruant and McDonalds heating can be in the same town without problem, but you can't have a second McDonalds restaruant in the world unless it has been McDonalds for 100 years)
On the other side we have personal sites. I want to be McDonalds.per because my family name is McDonald (okay, my last name is not McDonalds, but I know some McDonalds and it makes the point best) which when combined with the rest of my family allows email to bluGill@McDonalds.per and Jounior@McDonalds.per to get through easially. Since .per specificly dissallows anyone with a trademark from getting a domain we are free from the previous problems. Somehow however we need to solve the next one though: There are many families McDonald in the world, and most of them are not blood relatives. (you could up to Adam and Eve or the evoltion equevelent)
Re:What's wrong with giving TM holders first dibs? (Score:3)
If you take all the US trademarks, and all the Canadian trademarks, and all the Australian trademarks, and all the German trademarks etc etc etc, you'll end up with no names left over at all.
Secondly, some trademark owners take an overbroad view of their ownership. McDonalds is a classic case, who will harass anyone who uses "Mc" in any food related context [mcspotlight.org], even if McDonalds does not and never has used the particular word in question, or even go against a bank for giving out beanie babies to people opening accounts [mcspotlight.org].
Trademarks should not automatically convey ownership of a domain, there should be provisions for previous ownership (EG in the etoy.com case) and in the likelyhood of confusion.
One reason we should be worried is North American 1-800 telephone numbers. When the 1-888 code came out, because the 1-800 code was full, anyone with a 1-800 number was given the option of getting the matching 1-888 number as well, "to avoid confusion". The 1-800 code took 30 years to fill up, the 1-888 code took 2 years.
Bullshit. You don't know history. (Score:3)
The business world has a severely bloated sense of its own importance, and how much everyone needs them; they make big rationalizations to support this claim. In their ego, they like to take credit for everything. Your post is a classic example of all of this.
The idea that the Internet needs businesses is bullshit, totally unfounded. Businesses need the Internet, the Internet doesn't need businesses. The Internet exploded of its own accord, but the US economy is only exploding because of the Internet (thank you very much).
The Internet was just fine before businesses got involved. It was already exploding. The business world took years to figure out how to take advantage of it, or even whether "this Internet thing is here to stay"! Most had no clue. We have little if anything to "thank" them for. The Internet, and maybe everything else, would do just fine without them.
Your comments show you have no idea what was going on with the Internet before e-commerce. Well, lots of things were. For one, the very technology for the current Internet was developed on the Internet itself, back when it was what you call "a useless boondoggle". For another, it offered great academic and research benefit (but maybe you consider those useless, too). A lot of cross-cultural communication, more than ever before in history. The Internet was transforming the world long before the first banner ad appeared.
OK, so you say "we wouldn't all those high-speed lines and powerful servers if it weren't for banner ads." But this is wrong too. If people want to create and read Web pages, the system would adjust to accommodate them, distributing its load as needed. Instead of having one Yahoo, there would be a directory site, a news site, an email site, a map site.... If you know anything about Web technology, you know it would be very easy to do. The simple fact is, we don't need businesses, and that makes them very uncomfortable. They're used to pushing everyone around, and any situation where they can't is threatening to them.
I could go on. Perhaps you should question your own compulsion to kneel unquestioningly at the altar of business. Where did you get the impression they're doing everyone such favors? From reading and watching the news, maybe? Who controls the news media, hmm?
I do like how the truth sounds, but your post is nothing close to the truth. It's definitely not "common sense". It's revisionist history and pro-corporate propaganda.
I've said it before... (Score:4)
And I'll say it again...
DNS names were never meant to be seen by the general public. They were never really meant to be seen by anyone, but the process of creating a URL system over a URL system took too long and so people advertise domain names.
What we need to do is simple:
Currently the "location" field in a web browser is only vaguely useful. It's a good place to type in the web site URL when you know it, and it's a quick way to verify what domain/file you're on. But what about when it's what it is in mine right now:
http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=00%2F03%2F07%I, a trained geek who likes to know these obscure things don't need to see that, and the average joe definitely doesn't need to see it. What if that were replaced by a set of fields that gave me my location in some kind of logical hierarchy? "Language: English, Site Type: Online Forum, Site Name: Slashdot, Site Section: Article Comment Posting"
That (from what I understand) is that they're trying to allow with URNs.
That would also mean that when you're trying to reach McDonalds Clothing you fill in McDonalds in one box, Clothing in another, and then you're done. No accidental exposure to grease-filled nutrition free "sandwiches".
If that were done it wouldn't matter who owns mcdonalds.com or ford.com. It wouldn't matter that slashdot has a .org domain and that openssh.org isn't the main OpenSSH web site.
Am I dreaming? I don't think so... All we need is a push to get rid of browsers displaying URLs and we're halfway there.