Pricing & Promotions of TLDs - Is Your Billing System Holding You Back?

As the leading consulting firm to the Domain Name industry, we work with many of the existing gTLDs, ccTLDs and new gTLDs. During our engagements we do a lot of listening (as well as work) and this gives us a unique perspective on the key challenges the industry is facing. Recently, we are hearing feedback from many leading registries and registrars about their need for more dynamic pricing and promotions and their concern that there may not be enough flexibility in their billing systems to speedily handle their promotion plans. more

Dot Brands Should Not Rush to Market, but Build Effective Strategies First

Brands applied for their new gTLDs to protect their brand and ensure they didn't miss an important new opportunity, but few had a clear business case for how they would use the gTLD platform when they applied. As brands approach the July 29th contracting deadline, the inevitable question is arising: "What do we do with this?" more

Law and Disorder: When .Brand Meets .Crime

Barclays Bank is a .brand pioneer, having recently announced plans to migrate its primary online presence to two new gTLDs it will operate on its own behalf. But Barclays Bank has also just plead guilty to a major financial services felony and been fined $2.4 billion for that criminal activity. While the new gTLD Registry Agreement is clear that a registry operator must remove any officer or director convicted of a felony, it is ambiguous in regard to whether the Agreement can be terminated when the operator itself has been found to have operated a criminal enterprise. more

Parallels Between Our Oceans and Internet Governance #WorldOceanDay

Today is June 8th and World Ocean Day. As I ponder on the threats and challenges to the world's ocean with the enormous stresses such as overfishing, pollution, ocean acidification that threatens all global standards of living, I cannot help but think about the startling similarities that global internet governance faces with its respective stresses of increasing cyber security vulnerabilities, threats, breaches of trust, growing cyber crime, breaches of privacy and data protection, identity thefts, pedophilia and many other things that threaten global public interest and our safety within an internet ecosystem. more

Should Barclays Lose the .Barclays Top-Level Domain?

According to Reuters, Barclays has plead guilty to trying to manipulate foreign exchange rates, and has agreed to pay substantial fines, along with other major banks. Barclays is also the operator of the .Barclays new top-level domain name. This is not a case where it's a single rogue employee or officer has been found guilty of a financial crime. Here, it is the entire bank (and registry operator) that has plead guilty. more

FIFA and the Perils of No Accountability

Forgive me if you can, but I am about to say something blindingly obvious. The arrests made by the US Government and Swiss authorities of senior FIFA officials should remind us of a deep truth. Organizations must be accountable: to members, to users, to superiors, to markets, to someone who can say "stop what you are doing and amend your ways". When we consider the transfer of authority from the USG over the IANA function, let us keep in mind... more

What’s Going on in China’s Domain Name Industry?

Recently, there has been a lot of noise about China tightening control of the new top-level domains and how it could severely damper domain name registrations in China and one should make preparation for the worst. Initially, I tried to stay out of this as I know all the players behind this. But given that at least 3 people have emailed me asking what's going on, I decided to clear the air here. more

Hacking: Users, Computers, and Systems

As many people have heard, there's been a security problem at the Internal Revenue Service. Some stories have used the word hack; other people, though, have complained that nothing was hacked, that the only problem was unauthorized access to taxpayer data but via authorized, intentionally built channels. The problem with this analysis is that it's looking at security from far too narrow a perspective... more

Watch Live Thurs 28 May: The Way Forward for the WSIS+10 Review Process

Would you like to learn more about what the WSIS+10 Review process is all about? How can you participate in the process if you are not with a government? What is "WSIS" all about anyway -- and why should you care? Those questions and more will be part of a luncheon briefing on Thursday, May 28, 2015, from 13:15 - 14:45 Central European Time (UTC+2). more

Snowshoe Spam: What It Is, and How Not to Look Like You Send It

Have you ever found yourself blocked by a snowshoe spam filter or listed on a snowshoe blacklist? Or perhaps you've been told that one of your mailing practices makes you look like a snowshoe spammer? If so, you're probably wondering what snowshoe spam is, what you're doing to earn this reputation and what you should be doing differently. Here's a brief overview of the history of snowshoe and some suggestions on how to avoid being mistaken for a snowshoe spammer. more

Advantages of Crowdinvesting in Financing New gTLDs

The second-round new gTLD applicants have a tool they don't even know about: "crowdinvesting." That's when a venture sidesteps banks and venture capitalists and instead raises money by selling shares directly to the public. Usually this is done over the Internet, and often enough the investors can hope for a financial return that's far better than what banks and stocks offer. more

The Economics of Magic

Arthur C. Clarke said any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic. Milton Friedman said there's no such thing as a free lunch. The validity of the former statement does not invalidate the later. From this we can see that even magic has a price. Hence, its application is subject to cost-benefit analysis. There are many developing technologies that may eventually qualify as magic. more

Curbing Cyber- and Typosquatting

We need a tax. You don't hear that too often. But right now a tax is the weapon needed by the domain name community. We face way too many cyber- and typosquatters. To drive them back, let's tax parked and unused domain names. Done right -- sized properly and phased in -- the tax will make it much harder for speculators to turn a profit while they keep domains sitting idle or parked. more

In Congressional Hearing, Stakeholders Highlight ICANN’s Failures and Need for Reform

Can we trust ICANN to conduct itself in a predictable, open, transparent, and accountable manner if it takes over governance of the Internet's domain name system from the U.S. government? That was the main question up for discussion Wednesday in the House Judiciary Subcommittee on Courts, Intellectual Property, and the Internet, as lawmakers heard feedback from a diverse group of stakeholders about the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) plan to relinquish its historical oversight of key technical Internet functions.  more

Diving Into the DNS

If you are at all interested in how the Internet's Domain Name System (DNS) works, then one of the most rewarding meetings that is dedicated to this topic is the DNS OARC workshops. I attended the spring workshop in Amsterdam in early May, and the following are my impressions from the presentations and discussion. What makes these meetings unique in the context of DNS is the way it combines operations and research, bringing together researchers, builders and maintainers of DNS software systems, and operators of DNS infrastructure services into a single room and a broad and insightful conversation. more