Re: [ga] Karl's comments at the 2003 Senate hearings on allocation systems

["kidsearch" <kidsearch@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Sotiris, you shock me. I don't remember you ever being for limiting what
people want to do on the Internet or being against anything that is first
come first serve whether that be domain names or tlds.

You say people will be confused by all the new tlds. I say they won't be and
so what if they are. Anyone confused by more tlds is also confused by the
large number of categories in their phone book. These people would have to
be people who call the plumbing category to buy a computer. If they are that
simple then they are already confused and used to it.

You say it would hurt small business by having to register their domains in
all tlds to protect it. In what I proposed, category specific tlds, that
would not happen. It would allow several companies with similar marks that
sell different products to get their domain in the tld that matches what
they sell. This would afford them all the protection they need and deserve.

With a limited number of gtlds, like we have now with the .com monopoly,
only one company can get the domain name that matches their mark and others
who have a similar mark but sell something entirely different have no domain
name they can get that matches their mark. This is unfair to mark holders
and mostly hurts small business owners.

If you believe in free trade and a free Internet, then you cannot at the
same time be for limiting the number of tlds that can be offered. It's that
simple. You are either for innovation and freedom or for trade restraint and
monopolization by a handful of companies.

More generic sounding tlds whether chosen by ICANN or anyone else only
compounds the problem. Specific tlds that represent mark categories or phone
book type headings would be the best if ICANN is going to decide what new
tlds will be chosen. If not, the better system would be to let the market
decide.

Why do you cite how many are sold in other tlds? Why do you think that if I
created a tld, that your opinion of my sales numbers would matter? It's up
to me to invest my money and to turn a profit or not. If I don't, thats my
problem as it is in any business venture. A bunch of people sitting on the
ICANN BoD with dubious business acumen deciding whether or not my business
plan is valid doesn't interest me at all.

Free enterprise dictates that I get to decide what is or is not a good
business plan and it even gives me the right to be wrong. It's not up to us
to decide whose tld choices are valid and whose are not.

Chris McElroy, President,
Kidsearch Network
http://www.KidsearchNetwork.org
http://www.MissingChildrenBlog.com
http://www.RunawayTeens.org


----- Original Message ----- 
From: <sotiris@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: "Karl Auerbach" <karl@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
Cc: "Danny Younger" <dannyyounger@xxxxxxxxx>; <ga@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Tuesday, December 20, 2005 3:08 AM
Subject: Re: [ga] Karl's comments at the 2003 Senate hearings on allocation
systems


> >
> > On Mon, 19 Dec 2005, sotiris@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx wrote:
> >
> >> How does one measure the "demand for new TLDs"?
> >
> > Easy, open the door that those who want one can get one.  If nobody
> shows
> > up, demand is low.  If a lot of people show up then demand is high.
> >
> > We know for certain that even with a prodgious hurdle of a $50,000
> >application fee, plus heavy contractual obligations, that 47 groups
> applied >in year 2000.
>
>
> Karl, I never thought I'd see the day you'd be lobbying on behalf of
> potential registry operators and registrars.
>
> Allow me to present certain facts.  Please take a look at:
> http://www.whois.sc/internet-statistics/
>
> There are (as of this writing) 636,795 new .com domain registrations
> happening daily versus 67,077 new .ALLTHERESTPUBLICgTLD registrations per
> day. What does this tell you about the desirability of
> new/other-than-dotcom gTLDs at this time?
>
> What you and some others seem to be promoting is a free-for-all which in
> the final analysis would end up hurting the little people, i.e. the users
> who initially made a personality out of you and voted you onto the ICANN
> board. What you may have lost sight of is best embodied by that individual
> who showed up at the Vancouver meeting and spoke at the public meeting
> about how he depends on ICANN. What you, and some others, are promoting is
> a wild west scenario that would leave both large and small businesses and
> individuals confronted with a growing and ever-more confused mass of
> taxonomic designations (because any suffix proposed to date is essentially
> taxonomic), that would have the effect of:
>
> 1. creating more work for intellectual property lawyers;
> 2. driving companies and individuals to multiple gTLD registrations where
> one would have sufficed;
> 3. making it harder to implement any realistic oversight that would lead
> to ever greater potential for abuse, chicanery and/or corruption;
>
> There are more possible ill effects, but for me those three are worth
> serious consideration.
>
> Now, I am not saying that no more gTLDs should ever be introduced again.
> What I am saying is that the honeymoon period of the DNS is over and some
> real work has to be done to properly establish standards.  Otherwise, what
> we'll pass on to the future will be just another mess that we'll leave
> behind for them to clean up.
>
> >
> > And there are lots of TLD names in the competing roots (like my .ewe).
>
> Very nice for .ewe.  I won't be registering one of your .ewe TLDS anytime
> soon, but I wish you the best of luck in promoting "competing roots".
>
> >
> > Why should it matter if your clients get confused?  Should you or I or
> >anyone be blocked from putting out a new brand of laundry soap because
> some >people might find it confusing to see another brightly colored box
> on
> > the shelves of their local supermarket?
>
> Well Karl, my response to that is that you probably don't understand how
> supermarkets work, so I wll help you.  A supermarket has limited shelf
> space for the products it sells, so there are always brands left out which
> are struggling to get in.  Salespeople come and go all day long peddling
> their brands and store managers (or chain managers etc.) make a decision
> about what goes on their shelves based on what they believe will satisfy
> their clients and make them a reasonable (or better) profit.
>
> >
> > And should you or I or anyone be denied the opportunity to create a new
> >gasoline hybrid automobile for the marketplace based on your client's
> >feeling that they'd rather have a hydrogen powered BMW?
> >
>
> This analogy is no better so I won't waste my time dealing with it, but it
> goes much the same way.
>
> >
> > The kind of mentality of a priori economic and marketplace engineering
is
> > completely at odds with a free an open marketplace and is instead a
return
> > to the kind of Five Year Plans found in the old USSR.
>
> I am hardly a fan of Communism or the old USSR.
>
> If everybody and his mother's uncle who owned a spade and a tar trolley
> decided to start laying out roads everywhere across the country that they
> pleased (because they were technically capable of doing so), just reflect
> upon what kind of a road network would develop...
>
> Compliments of the Season,
>
> Sotiris Sotiropoulos
> ----
>
> I was from Connecticut, whose Constitution declares "that all political
> power is inherent in the people, and all free governments are founded on
> their authority and instituted for their benefit; and that they have AT
> ALL TIMES an undeniable and indefeasible right to ALTER THEIR FORM OF
> GOVERNMENT in such a manner as they may think expedient.
>                                   --- A Connecticut Yankee by Twain, Mark
>
>