Bennet,

For a long time auDA have been accused of and perceived as being toothless,
for whatever reason.  In this action the wishes of the majority of our
industry to "do something about Rafferty" were heeded.

auDA's difficulties were significant because Rafferty elected to stay
outside of the Code of Conduct, with which most of us abide and agree to be
judged.  They were further compounded by the fact that registrars with whom
Rafferty provided registrations had no recourse against him, because he had
no status as a reseller, let alone as an accredited one.  Whether they would
have is quite another matter.

By succeeding in obtaining judgement against Rafferty, there are several
outcomes thus far:

1	There has been significant publicity exposing the need for
registrants to be vigilant in their dealilngs with domain name providers
2	It has resulted in public education as to the existence and role of
auDA
3	The public has now some comfort in knowing that their interests are
being monitored and protected by a governing authority
4	One rogue has been removed from our midst - at least for the moment.
The outcome of auDA's and ACCC's actions should give others pause for
thought
5	Important precedents in provisioning domain names have now been set,
thereby simplifying any future action that may be necessitated by Rafferty
clones or "wannabes"
6	The status of reseller accreditation has been elevated, and
awareness heightened
7	Registrars may be more inclined to deal only through accredited
resellers.
8	Rafferty has been identified as the "bad egg" in an otherwise
reasonable industry, thereby helping to enhance the reputation of those of
us serious operators who remain.
9	The judgement has, as I understand it, created a firm foundation for
further mooted recourse against Rafferty.

My own preference would be for auDA to leverage off the publicity already
generated to improve public education on domain name matters.

As regards to your comment about explanatory notices, the judgement said "As
presently advised I am by no means satisfied that there is any utility in
making an order of this kind, but if the parties so wish I will hear further
submissions on this issue."  It did NOT say that the breach was not bad
enough to warrant such an action.

You should also note that the restraint order was against DNA as well as
Rafferty as an individual.

I'm not so naïve as to think that Rafferty won't try something else.  After
all, we already have his (or his colleagues') overpriced medical kits and
unsolicited security software that apparently contains spyware, and an
onerous contract that, as far as I as a layman can see, ensnares users who
try his "free trial" services.

Nevertheless, I'm happy as to the outcomes from auDA's action.  I'm a little
surprised that you seem not to have seen a bigger picture.

Ron Stark

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Bennett Oprysa [mailto:bennett§enetica.com.au] 
> Sent: Wednesday, 14 April 2004 8:11 PM
> To: dns§dotau.org
> Subject: Re: [DNS] Rafferty's Outcome
> 
> Ron,
> 
> appart from the bad publicity that DNS etc have received, 
> what 'outcome' are you actually happy about?
> 
> As far as I can see the courts rejected the majority of 
> claims by auDA and ACCC, and the action to be taken as a 
> result of the claim it did uphold will have very little effect.
> 
> The court has simply said that DNA is not allowed to breach 
> Section 52 for 3 years. Well derr... they were not allowed to 
> do so in the first place. The court has not even deemed the 
> breach to be bad enough to force DNA to send explanatory 
> notices to their clients as yet.
> 
> The outcome is very similar to what happened 2 years ago, the 
> courts simply told the parties to stop being bad, and made 
> them pay court costs. It took less than 6 months for these 
> people to move state and start up again doing the same thing. 
> We've now had to go through another long court case, and we 
> are no further along the road then we were 2 years ago, 
> meanwhile DNA is still making considerable profits from these 
> actions...
> 
> As far as I can see, the only significant damage done to DNA 
> has been done by the NZ and UK regulators.
> 
> I'm not saying auDA should not be going after DNA, just the 
> bad publicity is probably worth it, but the simple fact is 
> that based on the courts judgements, I'm quite sure that with 
> a few modifications to the text of the letters and a change 
> of name, DNA will be able to continue operating and doing 
> similar things, and nobody will be able to stop them.
> 
> Maybe in about 10 years enough people will have been burnt by 
> this to make it not worth while for DNA to do it....
> 
> Bennett.
> 
> 
> 
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: Ron Stark <ronstark&#167;snapsite.com.au>
> To: <dns&#167;dotau.org>
> Sent: Wednesday, April 14, 2004 12:20 PM
> Subject: [DNS] Rafferty's Outcome
> 
> 
> > To Chris Disspain:
> >
> > Congratulations and well done on the outcome of auDA's 
> action against 
> > Rafferty & Co.  I, for one, would like to express my 
> appreciation, and 
> > suggest that it was money well spent on behalf of our industry.
> >
> > I hope that you also succeed in recovering some of the 
> funds that he 
> > has taken from unsuspecting registrants.
> >
> > Ron Stark
> >
> 
> 
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