NEWDOM: Re: Read this...Re: offtopic for NANOG - do not read

Sat Apr 26 21:59:08 UTC 1997

On Sat, 26 Apr 1997, Carl Oppedahl wrote:

> Unfortunately for the Internet community, NSI has made it clear that it
> doesn't plan to yield any control over .COM to anyone else, ever:

That's just the current management of NSI. They can be replaced.
Once the shareholders of NSI realize that there is more hay to be made by
cooperating with the IAHC and by getting back to Network Solutions' roots,
then this whole tempest in a teapot will evaporate.

Many people don't realize that NSI used to do a lot of consulting, network
integration, etc. And it seems that the shortsighted management at NSI
doesn't see that the IAHC is actually creating a market for both the
services and the software expertise that NSI has in regards to domain name
registries. If they don't wake up quickly and stop this silly political
grandstanding, the new registry companies will simply hire away all their
expert employees and NSI will have nothing left.

This is a technology industry and when you lose your key employees to a
competitor, you have problems. Political grandstanding, and PR
spin-doctoring does nothing to help retain skilled people as many a
technology company has learned in the past.

> Thus, it seems likely that (barring a shift in control over .COM) NSI would
> continue forever, carrying out its awful policy and putting innocent domain
> name owners out of business.  

Smart domain name owners will simply move out of .COM and use the
occasion of their domain name change to generate lots of PR attention for
themselves. Realistically though, NSI will be forced by competitive
pressures to modify their policies and bring them into line with the rest
of the commercial registries. The beauty of competition is that it affects
not only pricing, but all aspects of a companies business. In the face of
competition the only sane and viable strategy is to serve the customer and
this includes a domain name dispute policy that puts the customer first.

Michael Dillon                   -               Internet & ISP Consulting
Memra Software Inc.              -                  Fax: +1-250-546-3049
http://www.memra.com             -               E-mail: michael at memra.com