Single Registrant TLD

[tlhackque]

I thought I would add a bit of analysis to your delusion.    So here are some of
mine:

I'm not one of those institutional member.  But I think it comes down to cost.

If TLDs are becoming un-scarce, why wouldn't ANYONE consider one?

I have family members scattered across the globe.  If it was the same USD 10/yr
for
MYFAMILY as it is for MYFAMILY.net, maybe I'd go for me at myfamily and
www.myfamily and smtp.myfamily and ... instead of me at myfamily.net.  After all,
.net is just a techno-geek appendage that adds no value to the end user.  (As an
engineer, I know full well what it has done for the network :-)

I oppose dramatic expansion of TLDs on technical grounds.   There is no tangible
benefit that justifies making a really hard  technical problem (running the root
servers) harder/more expensive.  Everyone seems to have adapted to these little
appendages - and even made things like '.com' mainline chic.  (Something I never
thought I'd see when the DNS first replaced HOSTS files.)  However, that battle
is lost.   So now it comes down to who can claim the intangible so-called
benefits - and at what cost.

In the past, TLDs were intentionally scarce to make the root nameservers's job
manageable.  If MegaCorp can have a TLD, why not Microme?

The other consideration has been standard of service.  TLDs have traditionally
been held to (well, more or less) a higher level of service - meaning redundant
servers, anycast addresses, geographic dispersion -- all that stuff.  This has
been because of the impact on registrants were .COM to go dark.  But the
discussions I've heard about seem to be trending toward not requiring this of a
single registrant TLD, which actually makes sense.  It's the owner of the domain
who needs to set service standards based on his customer's needs.  In the case
of the traditional TLDs, the end customers are so far removed from the TLD that
it ought to be standarized.  But for a single registrant TLD, it's strictly an
internal matter - it doesn't effect the stability of the net as a whole if
MYFAMILY's nameservers are shut down when I'm on vacation.  (Of course, my
family might have a different opinion.  But that's an internal family matter...)

So if it doesn't cost more, and someone wants a TLD for esthetic reasons, why
are NC users different?

But, as I said, it comes down to cost.  Non-commerical users, by and large,
don't have deep pockets.  So the USD 300K+ fees I've seen tossed about for a TLD
application - much less a world-wide infrastructure for traditional TLD
level-of-service - would certainly rule me out (and, I suspect most NCSG
members.)

It may be worth discussing whether price is the proper allocation function for
this suddenly not-so-scarce resource.  It always does seem to trend against
non-commercial interests.  The marginal cost of a TLD to the root servers is
minimal -- but if every domain became a TLD, the total cost would be enormous -
and have to be born by someone.  However, the extreme prices being proposed seem
to be aimed at ensuring allocation ONLY to the very rich.


That said, I'm not all that anxious to add my own TLD.  If it cost 50% more than
my current domain name, I might consider it.  But not 30,000 times more.  I just
run my own family network.


My bank balance pretty much controls which of my delusions I can entertain :-)


---------------------------------------------------------
This communication may not represent my employer's views,
if any, on the matters discussed.



----- Original Message ----
From: Avri Doria <avri at LTU.SE>
To: NCSG-NCUC-DISCUSS at LISTSERV.SYR.EDU
Sent: Tue, July 20, 2010 10:56:24 AM
Subject: Single Registrant TLD

Hi,

Just checking.

The contention by some on the VIWG has been that I am deluded when I argue that
the NCSG, especially some of its institutional members have no interest in
seeing Single Registrant TLD (.ngo for want of a better name) where the names
could be distributed internally, without use of a registrar, to employees or
members.

Can anyone confirm my delusion?  Are their institutional members who think this
sort of thing should exist - even if their name in not a famous brand?

thanks

a.