Re: [wg-c] breaking up (names) is hard to do

[Milton Mueller <mueller@syr.edu>]

I do not side with those who attempt to minimize the sunk costs
or disruptions associated with changing domain names.
They are significant (but not infinite, as some would suggest).
DNS policy should deal with those problems in a way
that seeks an optimum wrt consumer and supplier needs.

One odd thing I've noticed about this entire debate, however,
is the assumption that ICANN alone is responsible for solving
all regulatory problems associated with DNS.

This assumption is not only false, it is symptomatic of a
major problem that pushes the discussion in wrong directions.

The simple fact is that national governments can, do, and will
regulate registries within their jurisdiction. If NSI attempted to
charge AOL $10 million for aol.com the most important and
serious reaction would be in the US Congress and the FCC,
not in ICANN. Or, to use another pointed example, we have
shared registratoin in com net and org NOT because of anything
ICANN did, but because of a decision by the US Dept of
Commerce to regulate NSI's wholesale price.

I think this is a Good Thing, because the approaches of national governments
can vary. If one makes the (mistaken) assumption that everything
rests on ICANN and its contracts, then we are almost forced
into a "one size fits all" contractual policy.

ICANN should be more concerned with the technical coordination
and stability needs of adding TLDs to the root, and leave
economic regulation to economic regulators in various countries
who have more resources, more experience, and legislative
authority.

John Charles Broomfield wrote:

> (...)
> > I would agree that changing a domain name does hurt goodwill, although I
> > wouldn't go sofar as to say it is a customer confusion issue per se.
> > Search engines take care of most of that confusion easily, especially given
> > that names like "delta" or "continental" or "genesis" are so common that
> > one usually finds a search engine helpful to find the "right" company.
> > However, this is also the same problem when a domain name is reverse
> > hijacked.  Other businesses and individuals, some using the same domain
> > name for years and establishing goodwill and customer familiarity are
> > forced to change names.  I think that problem would be lessened if we had
> > enough gTLDs.
> (...)
>
> I know it's the biggest example around, but would you mind telling me how
> you would go about a domain name change for "aol.com" seeing that there are
> millions (literally. What was it, 14 million customers last count?) of
> people with a FRED-BLOGGS@AOL.COM type email address?
> Millions who have written out business cards, publicized their email
> addresses etc...
> How would you deal with that? The answer is that you CAN'T realistically.
> For better or for worse, AOL will have to continue using "aol.com" for the
> forseeable future no matter how pissed off it got with NSI.
> If NSI tomorrow demands US$10million to renew "aol.com", they might get sued
> by AOL, but AOL would most likely pay up in the meantime while seeking their
> legal remedies (hey, you don't suddenly want 14 million customers calling
> the hotline wondering why their email doesn't work, do you?).
> One of the largest amongst the many BIG problems to deal with is the lock-in
> that so many on these lists seem to live in denial of.
>
> Yours, John Broomfield.