Peter,

Accuracy is, as always a valuable attribute when racking over history...


>I am mindful that back in 1995, when KRE delegated the COM.AU DNA to
>another agency for some months, some-one appears to have accepted all
>applications received during that period without applying any of the
>Naming Rules.  As a result a few DNs like sex.com.au were registered,
>which by violating the rules existing then (and now), serve to undermine
>the integrity of the DN administration process.  

Andy Linton and myself operated this space at the time, using a "veto"
policy whereby kre, as the delegated authority had the ability to veto
any decision we made.

There were no "Naming Rules" as you phrase it (I do like your use of
capitals - does that give them a higher level of citation authority
than merely "naming rules"?), regarding what was or was not
acceptable.  We adopted a principle along the lines of first come first
served as the only rational way to manage the space, similar to that
used with .net.au, simply becuase the imposition of any more detailed
policy degenerated into a situation of arbitrary decision making, with
all the potential liability such a situation bears.

The second issue raised in this email was multiple operators for
.com.au.

The multiple operator argument is indeed a thorny one. The issue is
that multiple operators would quickly fall afoul of single policy
constraints, so that the real situation is that you can allow multiple
operators as long as there were effectively no imposed policy
constraint on entry.

So the underlying guts of the question is:

Do you want a name system which includes the imposition of policy,
which allows a high degree of imposed integrity in the name space
at the cost of monopoly operators in the market and consequent
risk of price gouging (or to phrase it more politely, a case
of risk of "overservicing" or "overhead escalation").

Or do you want a name system which has effectively no imposed policy,
which may compromise the utility of the name space, but which does
allow full open access to any name space, thereby removing any
monopolistic aspects of the administrative function?

The question is, in my mind, one of public policy determination.  One
way lies a replay of a well trodden track of planned regulated activity
- the other is a less familiar path which may or may not produce
positive outcomes in terms of enhanced functionality, enhanced
accessibility and reduction of overheads.

I know I cannot provide an objective conclusion to this - it is largely
a matter of style as to the level of risk the policy position is
prepared to take. Personally I would be in favour of multiple domain
operators with a reduction in the level of imposed policy and trust
that the resultant environment will stabilise into a workable outcome
simply through the dynamics of interaction within the deregulated
space - but I readily admit that this is a high risk view!

Thanks,
 
   Geoff