[wildcard-comments] Verisign NET and COM Wildcards Considered Unethical

[stanislav shalunov <shalunov@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Here's a list of reasons why I believe Verisign's introduction of
wildcard A records into NET and COM TLDs is abuse of their power as
the keepers of the TLD servers:

  * Why should they get advertizing revenues from Sitefinder?

  * Why should they collect sender and (misspelled) recipient
    addresses in email messages sent to misspelled domains?

  * Why should they delay bounce generation for email sent to
    misspelled addresses? (Currently often takes hours to reach their
    overloaded quasi-SMTP server.)

  * Why should they break access to expired domains on the Internet
    Wayback Machine through theirs use of restrictive robots.txt file
    on Sitefinder?

  * Why should they be allowed to brand the web with their company
    name?

  * Why should they interfere with the development of new applications
    by using special-case treatment of SMTP and HTTP?

  * Non-English speakers trying to access *.com and *.net sites and
    making a spelling error will be presented with English-only
    diagnostics.

  * Mail to sites with misspelled high-priority MX record and correct
    low-priority MX record (or correct A record) will bounce while it
    worked before.

  * Terms of use of the Sitefinder service (which you are supposed to
    accept by ``using the service'' -- i.e., misspelling a domain
    name) make you legally indemnify Verisign.

-- 
Stanislav Shalunov              http://www.internet2.edu/~shalunov/

A fool's brain digests philosophy into folly, science into superstition,
and art into pedantry.  Hence University education.       -- G. B. Shaw