K Heitman & Co wrote:
> That's unreal. The Federal Government asserts control of the .au
> domain space, and has appointed auDA to manage the .au namespace on
> behalf of Her Majesty. 

It is ICANN that allows auDA to run .au, the Federal Government simply 
endorsed auDA as their choice to run .au.

The Federal Government does not have the power to remove control of .au 
from auDA, they would have to ask ICANN to do it.

I'm not saying for a second that ICANN would not go along with such a 
request, but it is not appropriate to say that the Federal Government 
controls .au.


> There have been good points made as to where to draw the line, but
> unless there is an acknowledgement by list members that a domain name
> is a licence, not property, there will be little communication. As

There have been a number of cases in the US courts where judges have 
deemed hat domain name licences are to be treated as property. 
Regardless, this has nothing to do with the issue, people can trade both 
property and licences as they wish in most other environments.


> Though some registrars reckon that the current registrant transfer
> policy is too hard for micro-businesses and hard cases, anecdotes
> aren't evidence. The next review panel will need more economic
> analysis and evidence than the Ayn Rand rhetoric so far. 

and why is that? was the original decision based on evidence and data? 
No, it was entirely based on the fears and paranoia of a panel mostly 
made up of people that feared the world would end if they allowed .au to 
be properly commercialised.


> Kimberley Heitman
> www.kheitman.com

Another person who seems to have trouble using an .au domain. Have the 
overly restrictive .au rules made it hard for you to register an .au 
domain for yourself or your business?

I notice both the com.au and .id.au version of the above are available...

You espouse the benefits of .au, yet you choose to use the apparently 
much inferior .com space. Very interesting indeed.

Regards,
Bennett.