RE: [registrars] Draft terms of reference for task force to review data collected and data displayed

["Bruce Tonkin" <Bruce.Tonkin@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Hello Tim,


> >In some cases this may require the provision of
> >searching facilities (e.g that can return more 
> >than one record in response to a query)
> 
> Narrow it by removing the above. Providing additional search 
> capabilities is going to be a hotly debated topic that should 
> probably be in its own PDP.
> 


Yes - I believe that Tom Keller was also concerned about that.

>From my perspective the issue is not whether to add a requirement for
registrars to provide searching, but to consider providing a registrar
with the choice to offer searching "instead" of bulk access.  Right now
we are required to provide bulk access.  The recipient of the bulk WHOIS
data can of course then carry out a large variety of searches.  The
alternative is to provide more restrictive searches.  This seems to be a
common approach to Government provided data - ie you can't get the
entire database, but you can access a series of constrained searches.
So I was thinking in terms of providing registrars/registries with more
options, but not more mandatory requirements.  Any changes to the
contracts of course would need to allow for competitive provision of
such searching services.

Anyway just some alternative ideas.

Regards,
Bruce