Any solution which preserves the integrity of the
Land Rush process and the rights of those who invested is worthwhile considering.
I had not considered the potential new Land Rush registrants being "locked out."
If a way can be found to preserve the rights of current Land Rush folks while not
locking out new Land Rush folks (especially for names taken by Sunrise squatters),
then fine. I have not seen the details for this proposal. Please see
some comments below. Your original message in quotes:"2. The smaller
flaw is that it cannot guarantee that all improperly seized domain names are challenged.
For example, "humanresourcesmanagement.info" and "manufacturingsystems.info" were
improperly taken, but would anyone else be on any landrush queues for these?
If not, there would be no challenge and these SLDs would remain wrongfully taken."
Yes,
cheats could get to keep some of the lesser-valued names if they go unchallenged.
But, if they are not worth some modest amount ($40? $60?) for the Land Rush "winner"
or "would have been winner", then perhaps this is not that bad. At least the
consumers (Land Rush winners) get to make those economic decisions instead of some
other entity.
"3. The bigger flaw is that the crs/domebase solution EXCLUDES
all persons who might have wanted to purchase landrush queue positions in the 1 1/2
month period after August 1 (after the 1st Sunrise queue was processed)."
Yep.
This is a serious equity issue that I had not thought of. I do not want to
push for my rights as a current Land Rush pre-registrant to the exclusion of new
Land Rush pre-registrants. Of course, there will come a time when the "door
to the ark" closes and if you ain't inside, you get wet, but it would be unfair not
to give new folks a shot at the names that are currently locked up. If the
mini-Land-Rush or whatever it is called new proposal preserves the rights of current
Land Rush folks and enables rights of new Land Rush folks, great! we should
all check out the details when they are available.
"4. The above problem
happens because all properly run registrar queues do an EPP check with Afilias/WHOIS
before allowing a name to be entered onto the queue. This has a big impact:
While many of us purchased our queue positions before August 1 (when there was nothing
in the WHOIS database to check against), those who want to purchase queue positions
since August 1 cannot, because they will be rejected in light of the wronfully assigned
SLDs. Thus, if I wanted to get on a queue for the SLD "humanresourcesmanagement.info,"
I could not, because an EPP/WHOIS check would reject it. (I've tried as a test,
and can confirm that this is so. You should try yourself on, say, catalog.com,
which now takes multiple copies of SLD requests)"
Same point as above?
"5.
So, while those of us (including me) on queues prior to August 1 might be happy with
the crs/domebase proposal, it improperly EXCLUDES any innocents who happen along
after August 1. Exclusion for this entire 1 1/2 month period is not fair."
Same
point as above?
"6. The Afilias mini-land rush proposal does not have these
drawbacks for the following reasons:"
"7. First, Afilias can essentially
use the wrongdoers own money to challenge them (which is cool). With all the
information it has been provided, it could conceivably challenge more names than
would even have been challenged in the crs/domebase proposal. Moreover, even
if Afilias misses some names, the same could have happened anyway."
Using Sunrise
squatters' own money to challenge their registrations does have appeal. Rich
Henderson's site http://www.theinternetchallenge is very useful for providing Afilias
with additional information on where to focus their efforts. I am also concluding
an analysis of over 7,500 Sunrise registrations and will make the results public
when the Sunrise Period ends. If there are assurances and good criteria that
ensure that Afilias will challenge a sufficiently large number of probably-bogus
Sunrise registrations then this might work. For my two cents, I would like
to retain the option for the Land Rush "winner" to challenge and keep non-trademarked
name in the event that Afilias does not... just in case Land Rush "winner" and Afilias
have a difference of opinion on whether a registration should be challenged or not.
"8.
Second, and more importantly, once Afilias captures back the challenged domain names,
they will no longer show up on WHOIS. Therefore, assuming a 2 or 4 week period
after challenge completion and before mini-land rush is run again, those people who
came along after August 1 would, in fact, be given a chance to get on a queue (assuming
the queue was not already sold out, and remember that some queues sell multiple copies
anyway, like catalog.com)."
Same point as those above concerning new Land Rush
pre-registrants?
"So, bottom line, I now favor the mini-land rush idea for its
greater fairness to all, early-birds and latecomers alike."
Sounds promising.
I would really like to see the details before I modify or replace DomeBase / Simple
Solution Proposals.
Thanks for the important post.
Thanks also to Afilias for
considering the plight of the poor Land Rush souls ;)