I only recently learned of icann through a domain name
dispute that brushed uncomfortably close to my domain name in its fury. And only
just now have I learned of the preregistrations that have been taking place. Frankly,
I'm quite shocked that this has been taking place.I'm involved in international
business and keep track of news through various journals, but I hadn't yet learned
of these preregistrations taking place. From what I've learned so far, these suffixes
are not assured to even be adopted. Thus the plot thickens. Let's say I'm promoting
a web suffix, .sex for example. By myself I'm not a very strong force to push this
through. However, if I can get several thousand people to preregister their domain
names then I've got a fighting force of several thousand, all of whom have a vested
interested in the suffix being accepted.
This certainly isn't in the best interest
of the public. If the suffixes are approved and a roll-out date is set, what do you
think the general public opinion is going to be when people realize that names have
been grabbed already? I'm sure spiderweb.com (random example) will be very happy
when they realize that spider.web has been reserved and isn't available anymore.
If
those of you who preregistered think that there was enough publicity and people are
just going to sit back and let it pass that this all took place without them knowing,
you're dead wrong. However, you're doing what everyone in their right mind would
to- seize an opportunity while it is still available. The fault lies with the decision
to preregister names in the first place- a no doubt self-serving decision which will
come back to haunt the decision makers.