[ga] Re: Profit = Tax (was ITU Resolution 102 -- four years later)

["Ross Wm. Rader" <ross@tucows.com>]

> "It is the cost of the domain name."
>
> It is absolutely NOT the cost of the domain name.  It is the price of the
> domain name.

The cost of the domain name depends completely on who you are. For Sky
Dayton, the cost of a domain name was $7.5 million USD. For resellers, it is
as low as $7, for the registries, who knows. The point is that $6 is
absolutely the cost of a dotCOM registration - for registrars.

> The cost is US$6.00.  The profit margin as a result of the
> spread between the price and the cost is indeed a tax because the cost is
> capped.

The difference between a suppliers cost and a suppliers price has always
been the penalty payed by free market participants. Why should this be any
different? Unless of course you are advocating a wholesale shift to a
socialized DNS.

> Some might call this "tax" artificially inflated.  If I have to
> pay $1,000 for a used domain name because there is nothing comparable that
> I can buy new, I am being taxed or penalized or whatever one cares to call
> it.  This is the status quo that benefits a few rather than the majority
> for no DNS technical reason.

Huh? You are being penalized because there is a secondary market? Last time
I checked, there were more than 250 alternatives to dotCOM. If you are
paying $1000 for domain names because there are no reasonable alternatives,
one might be inclined to think that you aren't looking hard enough.

>
> "Have they thrown out capitalism over in Europe?"
>
> It's been thrown out in the U.S too.  Otherwise the cost would not be
> capped in today's "competitive" DNS landscape.

Would you prefer that the price of domain names were solely priced by the
monopoly providers? I'm sure that VGRS would *love* to reprice their
inventory at "market" prices. Sometimes, in order to ensure a free and fair
market, certain checks and balances need to be artificially introduced. The
price cap is a perfectly reasonable market control.


                     -rwr




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 - Soren Kierkegaard



----- Original Message -----
From: "Ray Fassett" <ray@fassett.org>
To: <ga@dnso.org>
Cc: <ross@tucows.com>; <jefsey@club-internet.fr>
Sent: Saturday, October 19, 2002 5:08 PM
Subject: Profit = Tax (was ITU Resolution 102 -- four years later)


> "It is the cost of the domain name."
>
> It is absolutely NOT the cost of the domain name.  It is the price of the
> domain name.  The cost is US$6.00.  The profit margin as a result of the
> spread between the price and the cost is indeed a tax because the cost is
> capped.  Some might call this "tax" artificially inflated.  If I have to
> pay $1,000 for a used domain name because there is nothing comparable that
> I can buy new, I am being taxed or penalized or whatever one cares to call
> it.  This is the status quo that benefits a few rather than the majority
> for no DNS technical reason.
>
> "Have they thrown out capitalism over in Europe?"
>
> It's been thrown out in the U.S too.  Otherwise the cost would not be
> capped in today's "competitive" DNS landscape.
>
> Ray
> --
>
>
>

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