Re: [wg-c] new TLDs

[Kent Crispin <kent@songbird.com>]

On Wed, Dec 22, 1999 at 12:05:49PM -0800, Karl Auerbach wrote:
> 
> Tell me, is Credit Union at which my wife has a checking account, a
> savings account, several credit cards, several loans etc a "bank"?  (Hint,
> it's not one under California or US Federal law for some purposes, but it
> is lumped with other "financial" institutions for other purposes.)
> 
> And is Charles Schwab, a brokerage house, where one can obtain several of
> the same services also a "bank"?

It doesn't make any difference whatsoever.  The issue is not defining
what we mean by the word "bank" -- the issue is just coming up with a
clean, enforcable criteria by which entities can be authorized to have a
domain name in a TLD.  If Schwab meets the criteria, it can have
"schwab.bank", if it doesn't it can't.  On the other hand, it might very
well get something like "schwab.brokerage"

> At this point the use of the word "bank" as a TLD becomes no use at all to
> help inform the outsider about whether something does or does not offer
> banking services.

Of course it has some use.  The criteria don't have to be perfect to be 
useful. 

> And it is my understanding that we are proposing using the TLD to add
> semantics to help the *user* of the name.

??Not really.  The goal is simply to differentiate the name space.

> Presumably a bank already knows
> that it is a bank and does not need to refer to its domain name to refresh
> its memory.
> 
> 
> 
> > This is about as objective as any criteria can be. There are, 
> > moreover, established frameworks: SWIFT, the Bank of International 
> > Settlements, national and international Bankers' associations. And
> > central banks publish the data on their banks.
> 
> Fine, let the "bankers" get their own coined TLD name (or better yet a
> SLD) and set up their own acceptance criteria, enforce it, accept the
> liability for it.  We don't have to do it for them.

Um, Earth to Karl, that is precisely the proposal at hand...

We *aren't* doing it for them.  The presumption is that some official 
organization ALREADY CHARGED with regulating international banking 
would apply to ICANN for a TLD, and they would be the ones delegated 
the job of enforcing the criteria, because THEY ALREADY HAVE THAT JOB 
IN ANOTHER ARENA.  They have already proven that they are immune to 
anti-trust action, by their existence, etc etc.

> Indeed, in this country we have trade organizations that have established
> umbrella terms, coined words like "Realtor".  That's their business.

Yep.  Such organizations, provided that they are non-profit, open, etc, 
would be perfect sponsors.  I'm glad that you are finally beginning to 
understand this :-)

[...]

> I conclude the exact opposite, if we charter .bank then we set ourselves
> up as the monopoly body to decide who is and who isn't a bank.

Precisely right.  We are going to do that.

>  If we let
> somebody else coin a non-generic word like "cross-of-gold" and set their
> own membership criteria, accepting whatever liability ensues, then fine.
> 
> It's not our role to get into the business of categorizing.

And we aren't.  All we have to do is to verify that the proposed sponsor
is legitimate -- that is complex enough, but there are many many
organizations that already meet that kind of legitimacy test... 


-- 
Kent Crispin                               "Do good, and you'll be
kent@songbird.com                           lonesome." -- Mark Twain