November 2007 Archives
Nominet has published a very detailed and comprehensive position paper on "front running". Although the paper is a mere 5 pages long it covers all the areas that the topic encompasses very well and is well worth a read.
The topic of "front running" has received some publicity in the last few months. If you're not familiar with the concept Nominet's definition is helpful:
While nobody can deny that there maybe a certain amount of "front running" it probably doesn't warrant as much attention as people are currently giving it. During one of the SSAC's sessions at the recent ICANN meeting in Los Angeles the topic was touched on briefly, but nobody has been able to provide any tangible evidence of it actually occurring.
As someone who works in the internet business I've been contacted several times by clients who felt that they were victims of DNFR. Unfortunately for the clients none of the cases were genuine, as the names could easily have been chosen by someone else for perfectly legitimate reasons.
One of the things that isn't mentioned in the Nominet paper, however, is whois caching. As Nominet is a registry it's understandable that they may have overlooked this issue. In essence what happens is that larger registrars don't use whois lookups to check availability, as whois is far too slow. It might work fine for Joe Soap who only sends a few queries to the servers per day, but when you are generating thousands of queries per hour you want and need ultra-fast responses. Rather than rely on the mechanisms underlying whois many registrars use other methods, such as polling copies of zonefiles etc., to check domain availability. The result being that it is possible that a domain may appear to be available after it has been registered. Of course the time differences we're talking about can be minutes or even seconds, but the average registrant probably isn't aware of this.
In any case I hope that the SSAC and other organisations don't waste too many resources on this sort of investigation. While it may have its merits there are other matters that are of much greater importance to both registrars and registrants that should be addressed and any time spent on secondary and less important matters is a distraction.
The topic of "front running" has received some publicity in the last few months. If you're not familiar with the concept Nominet's definition is helpful:
Domain Name Front Running (DNFR) is a technique believed to exist, but so far unproved, whereby one person monitors the activity of a second person who is planning to register a domain name and the first person then registers the domain name before the second person.
While nobody can deny that there maybe a certain amount of "front running" it probably doesn't warrant as much attention as people are currently giving it. During one of the SSAC's sessions at the recent ICANN meeting in Los Angeles the topic was touched on briefly, but nobody has been able to provide any tangible evidence of it actually occurring.
As someone who works in the internet business I've been contacted several times by clients who felt that they were victims of DNFR. Unfortunately for the clients none of the cases were genuine, as the names could easily have been chosen by someone else for perfectly legitimate reasons.
One of the things that isn't mentioned in the Nominet paper, however, is whois caching. As Nominet is a registry it's understandable that they may have overlooked this issue. In essence what happens is that larger registrars don't use whois lookups to check availability, as whois is far too slow. It might work fine for Joe Soap who only sends a few queries to the servers per day, but when you are generating thousands of queries per hour you want and need ultra-fast responses. Rather than rely on the mechanisms underlying whois many registrars use other methods, such as polling copies of zonefiles etc., to check domain availability. The result being that it is possible that a domain may appear to be available after it has been registered. Of course the time differences we're talking about can be minutes or even seconds, but the average registrant probably isn't aware of this.
In any case I hope that the SSAC and other organisations don't waste too many resources on this sort of investigation. While it may have its merits there are other matters that are of much greater importance to both registrars and registrants that should be addressed and any time spent on secondary and less important matters is a distraction.
The IE Domain Registry has added an RSS feed with their latest news items.
You can subscribe to the feed here
You can subscribe to the feed here
Nominet has been awarded the contract to run the Tier 1 registry for ENUM services in the UK (+44).
ENUM is slowly gaining ground across the EU and elsewhere, as it allows for the convergence of telephony with IP services.
ENUM is slowly gaining ground across the EU and elsewhere, as it allows for the convergence of telephony with IP services.
According to several reports UK registrar and hosting company UK Reg has been experiencing intermittent issues.
More details are available here and here
The company issued a statement to explain what happened:
More details are available here and here
The company issued a statement to explain what happened:
123-reg experienced intermittent performance issues on its DNS servers between late afternoon on Friday 16 November and Sunday 18 November. This meant that some customers have encountered difficulties with their domain names during this period.
This problem was caused by a combination of excessive loading on the DNS servers and a rare hardware failure. During this time, 123-reg engineers have replaced the hardware and full service has been resumed.
We apologise to our customers for the inconvenience that the outage would have caused and we have begun an investigation to identify the cause of the failure, and any necessary actions required will be implemented without delay. Further information and updates is available from http://www.hosting-status.pipex.net
According to the latest report from Eurid to the EU Commission usage of .eu domains is up based on DNS query volumes.
Seemingly registrants average 2.6 domains each!
The full report is available for download as a PDF
Seemingly registrants average 2.6 domains each!
The full report is available for download as a PDF
ICANN's new chairman, Peter Dengate Thrush, has been urging more public participation in ICANN.
Speaking at the Internet Governance Forum in Rio, Mr Dengate Thrush told attendees that "the door is open".
In common with a lot of big organisations ICANN has been trying in recent months to get more public involvement, with Kieren McCarthy doing stellar work on the communications front.
Further details on how people may get involved or be put in contact with the relevant people may be found on the ICANN site
Speaking at the Internet Governance Forum in Rio, Mr Dengate Thrush told attendees that "the door is open".
In common with a lot of big organisations ICANN has been trying in recent months to get more public involvement, with Kieren McCarthy doing stellar work on the communications front.
Further details on how people may get involved or be put in contact with the relevant people may be found on the ICANN site
The Irish eNum registry is organising a public "user day" later this month:
Venue: Gresham Hotel, O'Connell St, Dublin 1
Date: Wednesday 28th November 2007
Time: 4.00 p.m. to 7.00 p.m. (followed by drinks and snacks)
Venue: Gresham Hotel, O'Connell St, Dublin 1
Date: Wednesday 28th November 2007
Time: 4.00 p.m. to 7.00 p.m. (followed by drinks and snacks)
here will be no charge to attend the information session.
(parking available; close to DART and LUAS)
Agenda:
* Welcome and Introduction (IENUM)
* ENUM in Ireland (IENUM)
* ENUM in Austria (IPA)
* ENUM in the UK (BT)
* How to become an ENUM registrar (IENUM)
* ENUM - an Irish implementation (Soft Telecom)
* ENUM – an industry-led policy perspective (ENUM Policy Advisory Board)
* Open forum - Q&A
Objectives of the session:
• Share the experiences of ENUM in Europe, and understand the various business models used by registrars
• Inform about the benefits to service providers of being an ENUM tier 2 registrar
• Show how to become an ENUM registrar
• Discuss technical implementation details of ENUM and VoIP
• Share experience of a practical business implementation in Ireland -
ENUM as a tool to connect remote sites
Nominet have announced that they will be delaying the registrant welcome emails by 48 hours for new registrations.
This change comes in response to registrar feedback, as many registrants were getting confused by the Nominet emails.
More info on the Nominet news site
This change comes in response to registrar feedback, as many registrants were getting confused by the Nominet emails.
More info on the Nominet news site
Nominet is organising a conference next week to bring its registrars up to date on services and products (as well as industry trends!).
The conference will cover topics such as enum, raising capital, email marketing and SEO.
Full details may be found on the Nominet site
The conference will cover topics such as enum, raising capital, email marketing and SEO.
Full details may be found on the Nominet site
The 2008 DomainFest, which is to be held in Hollywood, will include a live auction this time round.
Since Oversee acquired SnapNames earlier this year it's only logical that they would be the partner chosen to run that part of the event.
If you have some domains that you'd like to auction off now is the time to let the guys in DomainFest / SnapNames know
Since Oversee acquired SnapNames earlier this year it's only logical that they would be the partner chosen to run that part of the event.
If you have some domains that you'd like to auction off now is the time to let the guys in DomainFest / SnapNames know
The British Museum has won a dispute involving the domain britishmuseum.com
The Museum, which has been established for over 250 years did not have any issue in proving their rights in the name. What is interesting, however, is that the respondent attempted to claim that the UDRP was a reverse hijack.
The respondent tried to claim that they had been making legitimate use of the domain name.
For full details have a look at the WIPO decision in full.
The Museum, which has been established for over 250 years did not have any issue in proving their rights in the name. What is interesting, however, is that the respondent attempted to claim that the UDRP was a reverse hijack.
The respondent tried to claim that they had been making legitimate use of the domain name.
For full details have a look at the WIPO decision in full.
I've mentioned some of the concerns that have been raised in the ICANN community over the past year.
One of the areas that was of particular concern in the aftermath of the RegisterFly meltdown was registrant data. In simple terms, if a registrar fails there could be a serious issue gaining access to the information linking registrants to their domain names. For some registries this isn't that much of an issue, as they are what is known as "thick registries" ie. the registrant details are also held directly by the registry. Unfortunately this isn't the case for .com, which is where the bulk of registrations lie.
In order to rectify this situation ICANN put in motion a data escrow program. Basically this would mean that registrars would have to place registrant information with a 3rd party. If the registrar has issues then the data associated with the domains should still be safe.
According to a recent announcement from ICANN the data escrow contract has been granted to Iron Mountain.
While the technical implementation of the data escrow may incur extra costs for registrars they are not being expected to pay the escrow fees - these will be covered by ICANN directly.
One of the areas that was of particular concern in the aftermath of the RegisterFly meltdown was registrant data. In simple terms, if a registrar fails there could be a serious issue gaining access to the information linking registrants to their domain names. For some registries this isn't that much of an issue, as they are what is known as "thick registries" ie. the registrant details are also held directly by the registry. Unfortunately this isn't the case for .com, which is where the bulk of registrations lie.
In order to rectify this situation ICANN put in motion a data escrow program. Basically this would mean that registrars would have to place registrant information with a 3rd party. If the registrar has issues then the data associated with the domains should still be safe.
According to a recent announcement from ICANN the data escrow contract has been granted to Iron Mountain.
Under the data escrow provision of the Registrar Accreditation Agreement (RAA), all ICANN-accredited registrars must regularly deposit a backup copy of their gTLD registration data with ICANN through ICANN's arrangement with Iron Mountain or they may elect to use a Third Party Provider of RDE services that has been approved by ICANN. The data held in escrow may be released to ICANN upon termination of a registrar's accreditation agreement or expiration of the accreditation agreement without renewal to facilitate transfer of registrations from the failed registrar to another registrar. ICANN plans to have all accredited registrars enrolled in the RDE program within the next six months.While this is probably a very positive move in terms of protecting registrants it does raise some interesting privacy issues as well. Does this sort of data transfer have implications for EU data privacy law?
While the technical implementation of the data escrow may incur extra costs for registrars they are not being expected to pay the escrow fees - these will be covered by ICANN directly.
While it is possible to register a .com for up to 10 years the same is not true of many ccTLDs.
In the case of .ie for example the only registration period currently supported by the registry is one year.
With .eu, which might be better described as a regional TLD, the registration period is one year also.
Nominet, for reasons that I've never fully understood, offer a two year registration period.
Is a one year or two year registration period enough?
Is ten years too long?
Should people be allowed to register domains for up to 100 years?
If you consider the importance of a domain name to a business, then you must accept that a domain is property. It's an asset of some kind. Whether you "own" the domain or not you definitely have some "rights" in it, so protecting it in much the same way as an extended lease agreement would be the norm for property only seems logical.
In the case of .ie multi-year registrations have been "on the table" for quite some time, but nothing concrete seems to have been decided. While there does not seem to be any resistance from the registry to the concept there also isn't a firm timetable available for their implementation. (The recent introduction of personal domains may have given them some breathing space).
With .eu the situation is slightly more complicated, as any core changes to the registry's functions may involve agreement and or discussion with the EU itself, as the registry's mandate is governed by them.
But what of *.uk?
Recent discussions would suggest that the concept of multi-year registrations is in a lot of people's minds, but the debate seems to be provoking some rather odd reactions.
One such reaction, which could best be described as "knee jerk" is that multi-year registrations would have a negative impact on the aftermarket and dropcatching.
Considering the size of the aftermarket and dropcatching services in the .com realm I find that argument a bit hard to believe.
But what should be the upper limit?
While ten years does not seem to be unreasonable offering a fifty or one hundred year registration brings a whole new set of issues. How many registrars or registries will still be functioning in 100 years time? While it would not be unreasonable to expect that some of the "big boys" would still exist there is an interesting issue to be faced.
In the case of .ie for example the only registration period currently supported by the registry is one year.
With .eu, which might be better described as a regional TLD, the registration period is one year also.
Nominet, for reasons that I've never fully understood, offer a two year registration period.
Is a one year or two year registration period enough?
Is ten years too long?
Should people be allowed to register domains for up to 100 years?
If you consider the importance of a domain name to a business, then you must accept that a domain is property. It's an asset of some kind. Whether you "own" the domain or not you definitely have some "rights" in it, so protecting it in much the same way as an extended lease agreement would be the norm for property only seems logical.
In the case of .ie multi-year registrations have been "on the table" for quite some time, but nothing concrete seems to have been decided. While there does not seem to be any resistance from the registry to the concept there also isn't a firm timetable available for their implementation. (The recent introduction of personal domains may have given them some breathing space).
With .eu the situation is slightly more complicated, as any core changes to the registry's functions may involve agreement and or discussion with the EU itself, as the registry's mandate is governed by them.
But what of *.uk?
Recent discussions would suggest that the concept of multi-year registrations is in a lot of people's minds, but the debate seems to be provoking some rather odd reactions.
One such reaction, which could best be described as "knee jerk" is that multi-year registrations would have a negative impact on the aftermarket and dropcatching.
Considering the size of the aftermarket and dropcatching services in the .com realm I find that argument a bit hard to believe.
But what should be the upper limit?
While ten years does not seem to be unreasonable offering a fifty or one hundred year registration brings a whole new set of issues. How many registrars or registries will still be functioning in 100 years time? While it would not be unreasonable to expect that some of the "big boys" would still exist there is an interesting issue to be faced.
Businesses may rely on domain names to conduct their day to day work, but that does not mean that they really understand what they are using or how important they are.
Of course those of us in industry may feel tempted to either scoff at people's naivety or feel terribly frustrated with their ignorance, however neither action is particularly productive.
Loic Damilaville, however, has tried to take a more practical and positive approach by publishing a white paper on domain name management. The document was published a few months ago in French and has since been made available in English.
The document covers all aspects of domain name management and starts from the very basics ie. what is a domain name and why it is important to you, and then moves onto provide some very useful tips that business people may need.
Some of the highlights:
If you have a few minutes to spare it's a good read and if, like me, you're getting tired of having to explain "basic" domain related concepts then this could save you a lot of time and hassle.
Of course those of us in industry may feel tempted to either scoff at people's naivety or feel terribly frustrated with their ignorance, however neither action is particularly productive.
Loic Damilaville, however, has tried to take a more practical and positive approach by publishing a white paper on domain name management. The document was published a few months ago in French and has since been made available in English.
The document covers all aspects of domain name management and starts from the very basics ie. what is a domain name and why it is important to you, and then moves onto provide some very useful tips that business people may need.
Some of the highlights:
- Keep domain contacts up to date - as Loic rightly points out this causes so many headaches!
- Domain administrators should actually be aware of their responsibilities - in a lot of cases in my experience the person registering the domain has no real interest in it and won't pay attention to correspondence once the domain is "live"
If you have a few minutes to spare it's a good read and if, like me, you're getting tired of having to explain "basic" domain related concepts then this could save you a lot of time and hassle.
According to DomainesInfo the venue for the ICANN meeting in Paris has been confirmed.
They're saying that the meeting will take place in the Méridien Montparnasse. Hopefully there will be an ICANN rate announced soon, as the pricing I'm seeing for that period is rather expensive!
They're saying that the meeting will take place in the Méridien Montparnasse. Hopefully there will be an ICANN rate announced soon, as the pricing I'm seeing for that period is rather expensive!
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