Dear IA and Paul, concerning closed registrar lists,The
issue of registrar submission of names and closed lists is a
really tough issue
-- ethically, technically, and politically.
I have given this some thought,
but probably just scratched
the surface. Some of you might not like some of what
I say, but I
am trying to be balanced and practical and ethical. I am also
open
to counter-point and changing my views based on good
reasons.
ETHICALLY:
From one perspective, this could be viewed as an issue of
consumer surplus,
value added, and profit. "Consumer surplus" is
the difference between the value
of something and what a consumer
pays for it. Suppose that a commodity is
made from raw materials
by firm A, these raw materials are assemble into a product
by
firm B, these products are sold by retailer C, and bought by
customer D.
Who gets what portion of the value added between the
raw material and the end
consumer? There may be answers to this
depending on market conditions in
the supply chain between raw
materials to consumer. On the face of it, it
does not appear to
be an ethical issue whether, say, firm A gets 15% of the value
and
firm C gets 60%, or the other way around. Few people would
say that it would
be unethical for the consumer to pay anything
more than the sum of the costs of
firms A, B and C -- for the
consumer to get the entire value added as consumer
surplus.
The analogy to .INFO and .BIZ is -- who gets the added value for
more
valuable names -- the registry? the registrar? the consumer?
or some combination
thereof? The registry can get most of the
added value, and most of the consumer
surplus, by having a lottery
or an auction. It looks to me like .BIZ works
this way. To
their credit, Afilias did not take this route. Registrars
can
get most of the added value by accepting multiple applications or
having
auctions (bids) for places in their line. Some registrars
have gone this
route. Consumers get the bulk for the consumer
surplus for the "good names"
when registrars charge the same for
good names as for not-so-good ones in a single
submission per
name, randomized process. From this perspective, although
different
parties benefit in different ways from these
approaches, at this point they do
not look to me like one is
immoral vs. the other.
Now moving to registrars reserving
good names. There is no
question that this is a case of registrars taking some
of the
consumer surplus for some names. When the registrars sell them,
they
will sell them for actual consumer value, and pocket the
difference. Is
this wrong? In the above perspective, if all
parties are informed of how
things work, one could argue that it
is not wrong. However, if consumers
do not know about this, then
it probably is wrong. If consumers are bidding
on names that
registrars reserve, particularly if those names are beyond those
publicized
in some list somewhere as to be reserved, then this is
probably wrong. There
analogies to insider trading. The issue
is generally one of whether consumers
are informed about what is
going on when they make economic decisions. I
would also note
that there have been decades of development and definition of
what
"insider trading" is and complex mechanisms to enforce the
rules. This bring
me to technical considerations in the next
section.
TECHNICALLY:
Even if you
decided that submission of closed lists or too many
registrar reserved names is
unethical, and even if you gained
political support to try to implement this,
how would you work
out the technical definition and enforcement of this?
What does
it mean to have a list that is open to the public? A period of
time?
A percentage of registrations? How is inside vs. public
distinguished? Employee
of registrar? Family of employee?
Friend of employee? Person who
made agreement with employee of
registrar? As I mentioned early, we have
had decades to develop
the complex rules concerning insider trading and the mechanisms
to
enforce them... and there are still problems. I am open to
suggestions,
but would be very surprised if one could resolve
these technical issues in two
weeks, or even two years?
Nonetheless, I am open to suggestion if you have a
shot at how
this would work.
POLITICALLY:
I have had a tough time selling
a solution that would be
consistent with the original intent of the sunrise period
and
would benefit pretty much all parties involved except sunrise
squatters.
If THAT has been a tough sell, how much luck do you
think I would have with a
proposal that takes away something that
registrars were probably given in the
original agreements. I
guess if one really resolved the ethical and technical
issues,
one might argue that whatever the agreements, they should be
undone
for the public good, but sometimes seeking everything you
wind up with nothing.
I am focusing on the sunrise squatters, an
issue for which the ethics are really
clear (once you adjust for
innocent folks who can cancel their regs) and which
is clearly in
violation of the contracts and agreements on the books.
If you
are game for pursuing bigger things, then please start working up
the
technical specifics and your game plan for how to get it
done. Hopefully
this does not make me a moral wimp.
I am not fully happy with what I have
written above. It is not as clean and logical and ethically-clear as I believe the
issue of sunrise squatters to be. It is my best shot at this time and I welcome
reasons to change my mind.