.nz news & views

	Tuesday, 30 September 2003

Domainz and Melbourne IT story in NZ Herald NZ Herald has a story about Domainz and what Melbourne IT plans to do with it and its overall role. 10:12:39 AM      Like to comment? []

	Friday, 26 September 2003

NZRS and Wild West? Just after reading the .geek.nz "story" this morning I read the .nz monthly newsletter. Pretty run of the mill until the NZRS section which has the following (my emphasis added) "The SRS responded well to its first experience of a landgrab." Wow, what a poor choice of words. Terms like Wild West, cowboys, and Verisign come to mind when I read landgrab. Could have stated "first 2LD launch" or similar, but Nick had to state "landgrab". I am still amazed that this survived any review from the DNC office. 3:15:43 PM      Like to comment? []

Moronic lawyers pretending to be netural XtraMSN has a "story" about geek.nz today. I use story in quotes as it is really a one eyed biased piece of crap. I took the 30 nanoseconds required to trash the story on the InternetNZ members list with the following: 1, few examined the proposal in any depth If 1000's of people is few then yeah, few people examined this proposal. 2, would allow for the registration of a large number of new domain names. I do not recall the application ever stating anything like this. 3, such as trade-mark registrations or use as a company name, will likely assert their rights over them. As per the 11 other 2LD's in NZ. Shock Horror, has geek.nz lead to trade mark owners waking up to domain names?!?!? 4, The creation of .geek.nz may lead to a new round of cybersquatting Right... 5, Offering the domain names on a "first come, first served" basis, as is the case with .geek.nz, As it is with ALL other unmoderated 2LD's in .nz. 6, Elsewhere this problem has been addressed through the use of a "sunrise" period, Elsewhere it has been proved how flawed these sunrise periods have been. 7, For whatever reason, this has not happened here. Perhaps because InternetNZ has clue? 8, The creation of .geek.nz may also reawaken disputes between organisations with competing rights to the same or similar name. If this is the case why have single digit submissions been received on the dispute process/issue questionnaire? 9, Who, for instance, should be entitled to register sun.geek.nz? The biggest SunOS/Solaris geek? If that is a tie the one with the scruffiest facial hair :-) 10, There is no purpose-specific dispute-resolution mechanism available through which to contest the registration of .nz domain names, as there is with .com and other top-level domain names. *boggle*. This would require an essay to outline the stupidity of that comment. 11, Existing name-holders should consider registering the .geek.nz variants of their trade marks and any other names they use. Please do, and do the other unmoderated names as well, more names will lead to cheaper prices for the rest of us. 2:57:56 PM      Like to comment? []

	Wednesday, 24 September 2003

IDG and 'local ICANN watcher' IDG has a story on the .com/.net wildcard Verisign issue. I am quoted as a 'local ICANN watcher'. I'm ready for my close up Mr. De Mille! 11:53:56 AM      Like to comment? []

Stuff on Domainz GM and 'new math' Stuff had a story on the new Domainz GM on Monday, I find the last sentence amusing, 40,000 names and $5.19 million revenue. Lets do the math, assuming only income is from .nz names (and not the website stuff that MelbourneIT has hinted they are dropping) then thats an average of $129.75 a name. Hmm, me thinks Stuff stuffed it up. 11:50:02 AM      Like to comment? []

	Tuesday, 23 September 2003

Screen grab of Site Finder Many ISP's are adding patches to 'restore' the DNS to pre Site Finder status. This means many people may not have actually seen what Site Finder looks like. I took a screen grab of Site Finder while I could. 9:20:24 PM      Like to comment? []

$100,000 for conz.co.nz? I wonder why this TradeMe auction did not met its reserve price. Perhaps it was because they were asking $100,000 for conz.co.nz with the explanation of 'so easy to remember'. They also cite newzealand.com be sold for $1 million. 9:51:57 AM      Like to comment? []

	Monday, 22 September 2003

July 2003 traffic figures for www.newzealand.com Shift has a 'news story' about www.newzealand.com (one of their clients). It claims of the 200,000 user sessions recorded in July 2003 100,000 of them were from the visitors typing in www.newzealand.com directly. I guess the guys at NZ Trade & Enterprise have been busy in their lunch hour :-) 5:07:53 PM      Like to comment? []

Bernard Blake appointed GM of Domainz MelbourneIT have just anounced that Bernard Blake has been appointed General Manager of Domainz. Blake has been with MelbourneIT for a number of years (Google shows him attending some ICANN junkets) and seems to be an internal appointment. One interesting thing did come up on him which makes me want to meet him :-) 3:21:44 PM      Like to comment? []

	Friday, 19 September 2003

IDG on SRS and Local loop I missed posting about an opinion piece on IDG about comparing the SRS to to the Telecom local loop issue. I think it is a very good read and other than the comments about 'Domainz splitting in two' it has no major errors :-) 2:50:47 PM      Like to comment? []

	Tuesday, 16 September 2003

Verisign Site Minder is Supernatural Intuitive Transmundane Entity Verisign have released a new 'feature' for .com and .net called Site Finder. They claim this is a 'service' to help 'the public'. After a great detail of research I have realised in fact Site stands for Supernatural Intuitive Transmundane Entity. I have decided to place my life in the hands of Site Finder and I have sworn off the Magic 8 Ball, Tarot Cards and churches created by pulp sci fi writers. Now, like most transmundane entities you have to word your questions in a particular style, in this case embedded within domain names. When you ask a question it actually states the answer back in a question. This is far better than the Oracle's at Delphi or Usenet. The following are some of the questions of our time: Which is better, Linux or Microsoft Will SCO or Open Source prevail What about HP vs Dell Does Elvis live Should I have Pepsi or Coke with lunch Should I have Thai or Indian for lunch Was Clinton or Bush more popular and if only SITE existed before the invasion looking for WMD in Iraq Finally do Versign execs do LSD or crack at board meetings 9:22:31 PM      Like to comment? []

	Friday, 12 September 2003

Locke leaves Domainz Rumours had been floating around all week that Derek Locke was leaving (had left) Domainz. This has been confirmed via a story on IDG this morning. With MelbourneIT wanting Domainz to turn a profit 'within 3 months' it was obvious that a CEO being paid in the order of $180,000 last year would be one of the first things to go. I guess he and Hnarakis shook hands, Derek grabbed his cufflinks and left. 8:22:44 AM      Like to comment? []

	Tuesday, 9 September 2003

ACCC guide to domain names The ACCC (Aus. version of the Commerce Comission) has issued a one page document as a guide/FYI about domain name issues. It is non technical, has some background info, details on what ACCC has done with regard scams in last year, bit of glossary, links for .au and gTLDs. Overall a good idea. 11:21:36 PM      Like to comment? []

Updated Registrar pricing list I have just updated the Registrar Pricing list. Adding iHug's charges increased the average price due to the way they appear to charge for DNS service, just like Xtra and Watchdog. I am planning on trying to show the cost of name registration seperate from other costs. This is one of my many 'in progress' projects however. 3:44:17 PM      Like to comment? []

	Monday, 8 September 2003

Domainz stories in the media Infotech and NBR have stories on the Domainz sale today. 10:49:07 AM      Like to comment? []

	Saturday, 6 September 2003

Domainz no longer stabilising registrar With the sale of Domainz being completed on Friday Domainz is no longer the stabilising registrar. A message is on the Domainz website about the new owner, the official DNC logo is being used and the DNC website has been updated. 10:33:04 PM      Like to comment? []

	Thursday, 4 September 2003

Domainz sale tomorrow and Domainz to make money? Today is the last day the InternetNZ owns Domainz. Yesterday the offer from MelbourneIT went unconditonal and tomorrow settlement occurs. IDG has a story on how MelbourneIT expects to get domainz to turn a profit within 3 months. 3:32:00 PM      Like to comment? []

	Wednesday, 3 September 2003

Impact of InternetNZ's dividend 'forecasts' on registrants InternetNZ is in 2006 expecting (hoping? demanding?) a dividend of $500,000 from NZRS. This requires a profit of nearly $750,000 to generate that dividend. Lets assume that .nz has 200,000 names in 2006 whichs means that to provide InternetNZ with this income registrants will be charged an extra $3.75 a year. Money well spent? VUW hopes so :-) 10:51:20 PM      Like to comment? []

CyberLaw, IDG and more IDG has a story on the CyberLaw proposal that was discussed at the last council meeting. Several interesting things have occurred, first of which the document is now in the council protected area of the InternetNZ website with no reason given. I have a copy which I obtained from the public area of the website to help keep InternetNZ members informed. This idea of this is interesting, but lets look at what has been presented so far: InternetNZ will effectively pay all costs, VUW will pay for 'overhead' of a one person of $66,500. In IDG story states "If we went to the members with every idea that we look at they'd be inundated with emails from us.". I am not aware of many ideas that have had at least 4 people working on them (including non councillors) for 9 months. Hardly call this proposal a 'whim'. The Fellow will also be teaching at LLB/LLM level at VUW. Hey, thats great, lets pay for this person to allow VUW to get a free resource to help with their paying students. One person to cover "spam, domain name scam artists, copyright issues and other areas of internet law and to do so in a timely manner" seems optimistic. Law has many areas of practice but it seems like the proposed Fellow can cover many different legal and non legal areas and help with the VUW teaching and be proactive. Finally why should domain name fees pay for this, we have already seen InternetNZ 'forecast' $500,000 dividend from NZRS in the future. InternetNZ already has 5 employees plus some contractors. 10:37:04 PM      Like to comment? []

	Tuesday, 2 September 2003

Does InternetNZ really want lower .nz domain fees? How much incentive does InternetNZ have to lower domain name fees when they have forecasted a dividend from NZRS of $400,000 in 2005/06 and $500,000 in 2006/07. Lets see, lower prices to cost plus small margin or ensure prices can cover costs plus small margin plus half a million dollars to InternetNZ. Which do you think is the lower amount? 4:19:40 PM      Like to comment? []