Domain Name NASA.COM

Phil Howard phil at charon.milepost.com
Sat Jul 12 16:09:18 UTC 1997


William Allen Simpson writes...

> As far as I can see, you wouldn't even have to prove that NASA.COM was
> "in a manner reasonably calculated to convey the impression".  That
> would be up to NASA and/or FTC, should Internic get them to come to the
> court (third party cross complaint, perhaps).

There are indeed two cases here now:

1.  Is NASA.COM violating the law?

2.  Did NSI violate the terms of the contract?


If there is no valid pre-existing justification for the letters NASA held
by those who ran NASA.COM, then I'd probably end up deciding that they were
in violation of the law.  But given the late manner of pointing this out,
they would not be found to be causing damages that they could control.
NASA.GOV has had plenty of time to form a legal case against NASA.COM and
get them cut off, and didn't do so, so I would not consider any expediency
or damages as appropriate here.

Likewise, I would be ruling against NSI for the actual loses, although not
likely any punitive damages, for failing to provide for a transition period
of 30 days (starting when a new registration goes online), when in fact
they had plenty of opportunity to do so, and most certainly have the
technical capacity to do so.

But then, I'm not the judge in the case, nor am I a lawyer, so you'll have
to put yourself in the same position and figure it out for yourself.  Keep
in mind that what we are hearing over the net may not be the whole story,
and were this to have truly followed the due process course it should have,
entirely different facts may have come out.

I certainly believe had NSI followed its own policy, there would be a very
weak case, if any at all, against it.  Were NSI's policy better formulated,
there would be virtually no cases against it.


> Although, for curiousities sake, what did this NASA stand for, and what
> was their product?

I have several ideas.  But none are appropriate for a family-oriented
mailing list.  I have no interest in taking a peek at the site.

-- 
Phil Howard KA9WGN   +-------------------------------------------------------+
Linux Consultant     |  Linux installation, configuration, administration,   |
Milepost Services    |  monitoring, maintenance, and diagnostic services.    |
phil at milepost.com +-------------------------------------------------------+



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