George said, in response to Wilson:
>
>I think their costpoints are wrong, and their model of fee collection is
>wrong, but I do *not* think that your name is viable and active in perpetuity
>without some maintenance costs. If you haven't been paying any, doesn't this
>suggest you too have been rorting the system?
>
>If you go out and examine the issues, I suspect you will find that
registration
>and ongoing re-registration is very common. Of course we all need to know
what
>the money gets spent on, but that doesn't invalidate the requirement to pay
>towards the costs of making names (and in this internet case) addresses work.
>

But the issue that a number of folks take issue with, myself included, is
the notion of being asked to pay to re-register the name on a date boundary
with no logic to it, rather than on the anniversary of the creation of the
name and/or when someone wants to claim it during the current calendar
year. i.e. the issue of being forced to pay up early just as a way to gain
a lock on the market.

Melbourne IT have responded to this query from myself and others by (thus
far) agreeing to a compromise - that they'll refund remaining monies to you
if you change com.au operators in the future (once there are >1 of them).
In a monopoly situation (as currently exists), one either reasons civilly
and is satisfied, reasons civilly and is not, or reasons civilly, fails,
and decides to raise a complaint with an appropriate watchdog body such as
the ACCC. 

Wilson, you should do what your conscience dictates. If "somebody" should
do this, and you care, are you not "somebody"?

Simon
---
Simon Hackett, Technical Director, Internode Systems Pty Ltd
31 York St [PO Box 284, Rundle Mall], Adelaide, SA 5000 Australia
Email: simon§internode.com.au  Web: http://www.on.net
Phone: +61-8-8223-2999          Fax: +61-8-8223-1777