Nominet announces new policy consultation for expiring .UK domains

[timter51]

Can someone expand on what this "new flaw"? Even if it's fixed I'd be interested purely out of curiosity. I never knew of one other than the infamous DAC slowdown, but I never put any effort into find anything else after that stopped. Maybe I should have

 

[ian]

Why would you obviously favour a method that will encourage and reward cheating, than a fair method?

Hard to have dialogue with someone when I don't know who they are, but in brief, I don't favour a method for that purpose, but I do favour any method that doesn't take away the element of luck involved in drop catching, as small a percentage as that is. There are hundreds of tags in this community that play the drop catch game, and don't invest in higher ticket value domains; that revenue stream would be largely taken away which is a shame. There are a handful of individuals that buy said high ticket items, and neither approach would directly impact them.

Don’t you think that it ultimately always comes back to money, and has done for the past twenty years too? How much is one party prepared to pay to gain a limited resource compared to another. I’ve obviously read claims by some that they say they’ve never breached the AUPs but I suspect a significant number of others have been involved in registar (and membership to gain multiple DAC) stacking through proxies to one extent or another, from the mild to the severe. Even those that are customers of hosted service that mandate all catches go to auction and proceeds are split 50:50 aren’t operating at arms length, which is surely a breach of the AUPs too.

The options presented in the consultation paper were probably not the only options considered but they are the most logical. Obviously auctions are commonplace. The other economically controlled option is to try to prevent the proliferation of unnecessary membership and registrar tag resources while at the same time offering a dedicated system with a way for registrars to participate by instead paying for more access and using more technical means. Nominet accept that some won’t stop themselves from finding a way to pay for more access and trying to prevent that is fruitless. Might be sensible for us all to be honest and open about that part. A lot of people have likely done very well with a system that hasn’t been reviewed in an incredibly long time but eventually things have needed reviewing. Staying as things are doesn’t seem sensible.

I think we largely agree on this point; money has always been a deciding factor (and ethics), but ultimately Nominet have looked at this and decided to protect their margin, they should offer a tiered system to compensate for loss of members. I don't think it is any coincidence that this decision will come after August renewals. Why couldn't Nominet have considered the ROR tiered approach; credit your account with X amount, get X creates per minute. Assuming this is David, happy to discuss privately some points.

 

[Derek]

but I do favour any method that doesn't take away the element of luck involved in drop catching, as small a percentage as that is.

But if you want to involve luck in the transaction, you'll end up with something similar to what we have now. Someones "tag partners" and an Eastern European village seeing a lot of the "luck".

I think in theory the luck angle is fine. But it doesn't work in any real life situation we can come up with. When you add in money, greed and the ease of cheating it just becomes a mess.

I'd like to see a "lucky" angle if anyone could come up with a cheat proof system. How could that be done? I think its probably impossible.

 

[davedevelopment]

Much worse. I speculate that we might then find one or two parties would manage to use dozens or more individuals to create the same number of free non-member registrar tags to then use them in concert. Many others might just ask a few close friends and family members.

There’d be absolutely no setup fee or ongoing cost to do this. All those free tags sending unnecessary create requests could eventually put too much additional load on the main systems and would encourage an unnecessary proliferation of free registrar tags potentially up in the many thousands. I hope this explains where the economically controlled option in the consultation came from.

Not sure if I consider that much worse, people are already creating multiple accounts and I imagine the only thing that is stopping them creating more, is that they want to try and remain under the radar, rather than the fees etc. Perhaps nominet should have focused on fixing that first.

 

[Derek]

Not sure if I consider that much worse, people are already creating multiple accounts and I imagine the only thing that is stopping them creating more, is that they want to try and remain under the radar, rather than the fees etc. Perhaps nominet should have focused on fixing that first.

A lot of people are saying "fix it" but nobody is saying how thats going to be viable.

How can you stop me signing up for accounts/tags/lottery draws/whatever in other peoples names? I can pay them to do it, they can do it from their own homes, devices, ip, bank cards. If you can't come up with a solution to stop me doing that then we need a new solution.

 

[WalkinDude]

I'm not even sure if i care too much anymore. There's too many tags now and the same small group of people catching the contested stuff I'm not sure how much it bothers me personally. You've got the same person often catching multiple contested domains each and every day it makes me question why i bother paying for my membership. Maybe not a bad thing?

Not a tag but maybe worthwhile hanging on. Nominet say themselves it's the same 10 tags getting all the domains. Since that's been acknowledged and as in any industry completely unacceptable they are going to have to do something about it.

If this was America a future class action lawsuit would be inevitable because the business of catching names is hardly fair competition and barriers to entry exist not by way of any obvious barrier Nominet created but by Nominet turning a blind eye on the fact system isn't working fairly or openly for many years. I mean if there was any legal potential in that first place lawyer gonna go is right here and read up on the endless complaints about it all. Not saying the suit would be successful just saying it would be launched and wouldn't surprise me if that does happen over here.

I'm no lawyer but if people are claiming of catching cartels, it remains unknown if the top tags have colluded with each other to their own exclusive and collective advantage but it's certainly known they've accused each other of collusion.

If I was a tag I'd hang on. Try and find any industry that hasn't faced legacy class action lawsuits.

Fact Nominet themselves have been caused to become so concerned they are changing the system is an admission something is wrong as things stand.

As a non tag I'd say what's wrong is domaining in the UK hasn't got a mainstream face. Still a bunch of people doing it, I find it impossible to imagine how Joe or Joanna Bloggs would have obvious and encouraging entry points into it. Most successful domainers are ridiculously self-motivated individuals imho, massive iq's, and it's pretty much stayed that way for like two decades. This isn't actually helpful to the industry. I'd liken it if to if BMW said only people with 140plus iq's [not a believer in IQ tests myself], could buy their cars.

If I had the dosh I'd just hire the lawyers and set them lose on all of this. There's no reason any tag should feel they are at any particular disadvantage. The shouldn't be caused to question their investment in being a tag or caused to feel all sorts of sh... goes on pertinent to their investment they don't know about.

My words are not an attack on the successful individual tags who don't collude, don't see much of any legal concern they should have. They've seized an opportunity Nominet should never have allowed to let arisen or become so funnelled in the first place.

 

[Murray]

I don't blame everyone who is cheating

It's like when toilet rolls started running out at the supermarket it forced you to buy some and hoard yourself even if you didn't want to partake

It's Nominets fault for nor enforcing the rules, albeit people are saying they can't enforce them but maybe they just have to go off it's obvious even if they haven't got hard evidence

Like when you have a David Thornton posting, you can't be sure 100%, but you know and can take appropriate action

 

[PoshTiger]

Ben we know you have at least 5 tags because you decided to share that info with me, when you were in the process of using me. You’ve got a little temper on you haven’t you. But if you feel you need to message me privately again and speak to me in a threatening attitude, I’ll drive to Grimsby and we can have the conversation face to face. I couldn’t give a shit what edge you have, or that I don’t know how to code. Some of us have different skills. Coding low level languages isn’t one of mine.

Congratulations, you gamed a system and probably brought around a change, that’ll significantly affect all of our abilities to make money from this industry.

Go you!

Let me know when you're going to Grimsby - I'll come too..

 

[Siusaidh]

Gentlemen, shall we play nicely please? If it wasn't intended as humour, I am sorrowfully obliged to delete your post for threatening language... if you were just planning to visit Grimsby for its cultural highlights, then good luck with that.

 

[Murray]

Thinking about it you can tell who is cheating just not prove it

So the answer is instead of maybe punishing the wrong person, you punish everyone..

100% be punished with auctions or very unlikely be punished for something you haven't done

I know which option everyone should choose?

I don't know about the legality but I'd be happy when renewing my membership to agree to a new registrar agreement that they can inhibit my ability to catch if they suspect me of violating the rules at any time without any evidence

 

[Breakline]

Wow, this is great. No honour among thieves so let's go to auction and see who can get what. Thank you denys, bhaydom, bulgarians and ukbackorder.

 

[PoshTiger]

Gentlemen, shall we play nicely please? If it wasn't intended as humour, I am sorrowfully obliged to delete your post for threatening language... if you were just planning to visit Grimsby for its cultural highlights, then good luck with that.

Actually - I think I'm done here...

If you guys are fine with this toxic guy being here, then I guess this place is not for me any more..

Old schoolers know where to contact me if you need to..

 

[Siusaidh]

I 'get' that point, Murray, but it's a total minefield. Better to re-write the rules for validating Nominet membership and making 'arms length' more stringent. There's also the question of multiple tags. How many tags does a person need to be a law-abiding citizen? The real difficulty remains, how do you ever prove collusion. I don't drop-catch, but how could Nominet ever stop me from inviting my aunties and sundry relatives and friends in the Scottish Highlands to become Nominet members, and my cousins in Australia, and my randomised nursing colleagues past and present? And the village postman?

The rules, as they stand, can't be enforced. Therefore the rules need to be re-written, or you just accept the mayhem for the sake of all the honest people's businesses. Nominet are clearly not prepared to do that.

 

[Murray]

The real difficulty remains, how do you ever prove collusion.

You don't need to

If it walks like a duck and all that

This is how I see

Nom1: We think this person is cheating
Nom2: yes it looks as though they are but we can't prove it so it would be unfair to punish them
Nom:1: yes you're right, punishing them without proof would be unfair,so we will just have to punish them anyway and everyone else
Nom2: what?
Nom1: yes because it would be unfair to punish someone without proof we will have to 100% punish them and everyone else and move to an auction model
Nom2: An auction model ££££££


Maybe I'm being naive with the legal side but surely no one has a given right to be a Nominet member and can be removed at Noms discretion?

 

[Siusaidh]

I honestly get what you're saying. I'm just 99.9999% certain that Nominet won't touch that approach. Just being honest about the realpolitik.

At this point, I think the only option people here have, if they don't want to lose drop-catching in the UK, is to work together on possible amendments of Nominet's non-auction proposal, OR if the system as it works is to be salvaged, then somehow people need to propose new rules, new structures, which can be enforced - and I don't have suggestions because I don't have drop-catching expertise - but what I do know is that the consultation ends in 27 days.

 

[Siusaidh]

I know that, Ben. But I'm fed up with his provocations and insults against the integrity of people on this forum, and I'm fed up with the fact that this is a pivotal moment in Nominet history and domaining in the UK, and it's a classic mistake if people turn inwards and put each other to the sword, when what's needed is collaboration. Also, some people feel threatened even with the suggestion that a guy on the internet says he will turn up on your doorstep. I know I would. Can we move on please?

PS: hope you got my PM last night and really curious about how things are going.

 

[ukdomains]

Its going to benefit 1 or 2 entities this new approach not the public either way.

People with deep pockets and nominet .

The way things are going in any industry (Digital-led) you either are a big player or medium player. No room for the small timers prime example was RoR FYI 90k entry...

This will be pivot for many of the key plays (Deny has already pivoted he has a marketplace .. )

 

[Siusaidh]

I thought the ROR tiered arrangements were the wrong way to go, and yes, in tech generally the big players have huge influence - they almost make up their own rules as they go along.

 

[davedevelopment]

A lot of people are saying "fix it" but nobody is saying how thats going to be viable.

How can you stop me signing up for accounts/tags/lottery draws/whatever in other peoples names? I can pay them to do it, they can do it from their own homes, devices, ip, bank cards. If you can't come up with a solution to stop me doing that then we need a new solution.

Sure, I understand it's not easy, but I don't think any of this is. I haven't seen any proposals from nominet on how they might enforce their AUP, nor have I seen any discussions on how they might. Has there been anything?

 

[Siusaidh]

Roger that.

I got your PM, Susannah Sorry I didn't reply sooner, as you can imagine it's manic at the moment poo flying everywhere, etc.

Poo is something I'm expert at, as a nurse, and to be honest baby poo is inoffensive - it's more like mustard and hardly smells at all. On the other hand, babies and sleep...

Anyway, congratulations, and all of you stay well.