Re: VGRS, again <sigh> (fwd)

[Harald Tveit Alvestrand <harald@alvestrand.no>]

--On tirsdag, februar 11, 2003 20:50:59 -0500 Steve Bellovin 
<smb@research.att.com> wrote (quoting Paul):

> Hi again. I assume that Geoff has told you that VeriSign intends to
> revise their protocol to get around some of the problems that the IAB
> brought up in your message to ICANN. However, from reading VeriSign's
> response, they still will be running a name-guessing service instead
> of a lookup service. Specifically, the last step they describe still
> takes you to a list of colliding names and ask you in an HTML form to
> pick the one you really wanted.
FWIW: I think this point is debatable, and said so on the IAB call.

Counterargument: The service being provided is more like that of the 
"typosquatter" who registers a common spelling mistake in order to catch 
traffic intended for some popular site.

While this has been ruled an abuse of trademarks several times, and this 
particular instance of it may be challenged because it attempts to leverage 
the monopoly role of a registry, I don't believe it changes the nature of 
the DNS, so labelling the argument as "architectural" may be stretching the 
term too far.

Your mileage may vary. Discussion will continue on the IAB list, and the 
IAB will ask DNSOPS, and possibly CRISP too, for help.


                  Harald