1) I suggest you read up on and/or join ADNA. (www.adna.asn.au) if you
haven't already done so. They (in my view) are way way behind on real
progress but at least they're trying to make some rather than just rip
shreads off of people :)

2) One org in charge of com.au and one in charge of net.au is surely twice
as good as the US situation, where one org is currently in charge of *all*
of .NET, .COM, .ORG, etc etc. So the number of orgs in charge of the
process is not, of itself, guaranteed to have a one to one relationship to
quality of service.

3) point 2 notwithstanding, there is a large move in this country to bring
about multiple competing domain name registration service providers in
australian domain name spaces. See point 1) above for details.

4) By registering your name in all the spaces you can find, you are
demonstrating the fundamental problem with the use of the DNS right now,
which is that people want to stick "their" name in all available spaces,
not just the one that would be necessary and sufficient for them to trade
globally, and obviously (to paraphrase a Dire Straits lyric), "Two men say
they want jesus.com.au, one of them's gotta be wrong". In other words,
you'll complain if you're second to the post, but not if you're the first
to grab all you want.

That's called "First come-first served". It's how .COM and .NET work, and
in my personal view it remains nearly the only registry allocation method
that's equally unfair to all participants and is easy to automate across
lots of registries without the issues you (quite rightly point out) with
differences in interpretation of theoretically "identical" rules for
permitting a name (as in your example, dart.(com|net).au )

5) If you really believe that "All domain space should be FREE, without
restrictions of any kind!" as you say, I respectfully submit that you might
like to lighten up on the Jolt for an afternoon and reconsider how much you
know about how the Internet actually works in commercial terms.

6) SHOUTING in lots of SENTENCES with LOTS of UPPERCASE WORDS is both
TIRING TO READ and tends to make you come across as someone more interested
in SHOUTING than in understanding the ISSUES properly before firing from
the HIP 

:)

Simon  

At 14:50 28/01/98 +1100, James Austin wrote:
>Hi ALL,
>
>I have given up on the .AU domain space, it is becoming a BIG joke.
>
>It is much easier to register through InterNIC and get .COM .NET etc.
>
>There seems to be no COHERENT and SENSIBLE approach to the whole Domain Name
>thing. Also to have only ONE org in control of all .COM.AU and another in
>control of all .NET.AU is another BIG Joke. Back to the days when TELSTRA
>could also do as they PLEASED.
>
>The policy outlined by MelbIT and now Connect.com is far to restrictive in
>nature, the name space should be administered with a little more freedom.
>
>I have recently had DART.NET.AU approved by Connect.com.au, but DART.COM.AU
>was killed by MelbIT for being a generic word/product. Yet both these domain
>name spaces are governed under identical rules.
>
>Further the Connect.com.au Rules as posted at
>http://registry.connect.com.au/cgi-bin/na-policy.cgi clearly state:-
>
>1. be unique within the net.au domain;
>2. start with an alphabetic character;
>3. contain only alphanumeric characters and hyphens;
>4. be at least 2 characters long;
>5. if 2 characters long, have a second character that is only numeric;
>6. not match any existing or proposed top level domain;
>7. be directly derived from the complete registered company or business name
>    of the applicant organisation;
>8. not be a generic word describing products, industries, industry sectors,
>or
>   organisations;
>9. not be an unqualified Australian place name; and
>10. not contravene any third party's rights to use the name.
>
>item 7 above states BE DERIVED FROM THE COMPLETE BUSINESS NAME, not BE THE
>COMPLETE BUSINESS NAME.
>
>"Printlink Digital Copy Centre has been rejected for the
>domain printlink.net.au, because "printlink" isn't their
>full business name.  For some reason, "pdcc.net.au" is ok,
>even though that's not their full business name either,
>and they have no less claim to "pdcc" than they do to
>"printlink"."
>
>This demonstrates fully the stupidity of the policy PDCC.NET.AU is no better
>than PINKLINK.NET.AU, both or either should be available to the registrant.
>
>I would suggest that MelbIT have been lobbying NET.AU to stick with the
>policy they have implemented to stop any competition in the domain space,
>ie: if MelbIT wont give it to me I'll go to NET.AU and get it.
>
>This is just the biggest JOKE I have ever encountered in ANY kind of
>business.
>
>in a country with less than 20 million people and only approx 1 million or
>so on the net to implement a policy with such restriction is MAD.
>
>The InterNIC is an international org and as such administers far more SPACE
>(like 300+ million people US, 50 Million users) than AuNIC without the
>problems, This is because they run on a FIRT COME FIRST SERVED Basis.
>
>Lets put this into perspective, If we go to register a business name or
>Company lets say,
>
>ABC Pty. Ltd. if the name is available its yours no question!
>
>If you then want to register this on the net and its unavailable then TOUGH.
>
>There would be rights under common law, I suspect, that if you had a claim
>against this name then you can pursue it.
>
>ALL Domain space should be FREE, without restrictions of any kind!
>
>NO business name reg no. or A.C.N required just fill in the form pay the
>money and its yours. (Provided it isn't gone already)
>
>Having said that the registrant would have to indemnify the registrar from
>any claim arising from the use of the name by the registrant.
>
>ie: if ABC Pty. Ltd. registered SHELL.COM.AU
>
>SHELL would file a claim to the name against ABC Pty. Ltd. not the
>registrar.
>as it is not the responsibility of the registrar to confirm eligibility of
>the name for any purpose other than it is not to SIMILAR to a registered
>name or infact already REGISTERED.
>
>I would appreciate hearing from others who would like to pursue other DAMAIN
>NAME procedures.
>
>Regards,
>James Austin
>
>Rainer Group Pty. Ltd.
>PO Box 863
>BAULKHAM HILLS NSW 2153
>AUSTRALIA
>Voice:   61 2 9894 1985
>Fax:      61 2 9894 1986
>E-Mail:  jea§rainer-group.com
>
>
>
---
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