Linux.com

My company was recently faced with the dilemma of choosing both a company name & a domain name. Today a good domain name is so important for some companies (Mine included) - that our brainstorming session for a corporate name & identity was lead by a lengthy WhoIs session.

Since every simple domain under the sun has been registered and is being squatted on - we began looking to the new extension, ".biz" since we are in fact - a business. We are now sharing the name <A HREF="http://www.solidblue.biz/">SolidBlue</a solidblue.biz> with a couple of other companies - one of which has SolidBlue.com .

Personally, I think .BIZ sticks out better than .COM - and from feedback I've received - we haven't lost any business to 'confusion between extensions'. If anything, our extension is easier to remember, our acceptance of other companies with identical domain names and different extensions, and our unique-ness actually keeps us at the top of our clients thoughts.

For this reason it is my belief that any domain owner whose domain extension does not reflect their organization, or no-longer reflects their organization - should begin the process of switching over to the accurate extension.

I believe these wars over domains and extension squatters (Almost every business does it) - is self-perpetuating. After all, if companies were comfortable saying, "No, we're whoever.com... whoever.org is a non-profit organization, [or] an internet community that discusses similar subjects" - then the average person would realize they can't just type "dot com" after everything their interested in looking at...

Just my two cents,

--<A HREF="http://www.myhometechie.com/">The Home Techie</a myhometechie.com>

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I do agree heartily. One thing struck me, though -- you talk about .com, .org, etc as of `extensions', like, for example in `document.txt' or `document.ps', meaning basically `the same thing seen differently'. Those are top-level domains, that's more like the country in a postal address. Paris means something completely different when you look for it in France or, say, in Texas.
May be this (implicit) misconception is part of the problem.

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Anything that takes control away from Verisign is a good thing. Their dubious ways of doing business surely serves the extension squatters and domain name pirates best ("non-expiry" of expired domains combined with the mini-industry around "pre-reservation" of domains), not to mention their own scams (sending renewal notices to other registrars' customers).

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No, whoever.org is me. I think I should start to charge a fee every time someone uses it as an example domain name.<nobr> <wbr></nobr>;p

http://www.whoever.org

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I currently maintain three domains for several loose-knit groups - one, a retreat program, one is my Mom's family, and the third is just a group of friends spread throughout Texas. Two of the domains (the family and friends) are .org, the third is a .net.

What happens to those non-profit, but not registered as such (since there is nothing to register, really) domains when they expire? do we lose them, or will there be exceptions for groups that are not "registered nonprofits", but simply groups that don't fit into any other categories (.com, .biz, .edu, .net)? Will we have to go with a .us name in that case?

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I work with a US based Linux Users Group with a .org address. We don't charge dues and don't spend any money, so I *guess* we fall into the category.

The <A HREF="http://www.isoc.org/dotorg/faq.shtml">faq</a isoc.org> is kind of low on details, which is worrying to me. They say that the do not intend to make any changes in how .org is managed. However this quote from the <A HREF="http://www.isoc.org/isoc/media/releases/020619pr.shtml">press release</a isoc.org> implies otherwise:

ISOC's global outreach enables it to work cooperatively with many other global organizations, such as UNESCO, and the Center for Democracy and Technology, to create consensus around critical policy and standards issues.

If they gain control of the .org domain, will we be faced with UNESCO bureaucrats helping to decide who is a .org? It seems to me that if ISOC wants to create a consensus on "standards issues" then an obvious standard will be what qualifies as a non-profit. Having worked for the UN in the past, I remember how important "proper documentation" is to them. I can easily see a proposed non-profit standard being "any group that is legally registered as a non-profit." After all, allowing non-registered groups is effectively allowing anyone, which means there is no standard, right?

At least in the US, registering as an official non-profit involves much paperwork and reporting to Federal and state tax officials. It may not be worth it for smaller groups such as LUGs.

I hope they clarify that a little better. The lack of information and the implications of the above quote make me wonder if having a .org domain name will suddenly become an expensive, time consuming proposition.

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1) How does this affect existing domain name owners, such as almost every Linux-related site in existence?

2) Do you have to be a registered non-profit organization before you can get the domain, like openprojects.net is working toward?

If *anybody* decides to regulate .org more strictly, won't that create market for things like .info and .name? It may be logical from a business standpoint to change the rules and create havoc. It's not like Verisign is known for their good customer service, anyway.

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Everyone should be clear here. There are actually nine proposals to run .org, because ICANN is moving the operations away from Verisign to a new party. Some of the proposals benefit the community more than others. You really need to read the poposals at

http://www.icann.org/tlds/org/applications/

to understand which one benefit the community the most. ICANN has a comment page there as well.

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I'm at a loss to understand why registration fees from some 2,500,000 registrants should be used to support the work of a single organization like ISOC. Don't get me wrong, ISOC does good work and I want to see the organization thrive, but doing so on the backs of the .org registrant community doesn't seem right. <A HREF="http://icann.blog.us/stories/2002/06/20/goodWorks.html">I think the ICANN Board agrees with me</a icann.blog.us>. -- Bret Fausett

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If the ICANN board agrees with anything, that just about proves that it is a bad idea.

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