Hi,
It does seem kind of odd to have a pre-preregistration
landrush, to get in the Tucows cue, in addition to the
landrush when the real preregistration opens. I guess the
question is, if only one person gets to pre-register each
domain, should it be the first person to request it, or
should it be selected at random. Normally, I might say it
should be the first person, since they made the effort to
request it early. However, isn't the main point of
pre-registration to give many people an equal chance at
getting a name? If the "early birds" should get the names,
why not just open up the registry in real time? It seems
weird to have the pre-prereg be first come, first serve, but
the real pre-reg be random.
However, that said, I can see how a random system might
cause problems. What do RSPs tell they're customers if they
aren't picked. "Sorry, you lost the pre-preregistration
lottery, so you can't participate in the real pre-reg. But
you might want to check out NSI, Register.com, Registrars,
or any other registrar, because they still may be able to
help you get the name."
I'm not sure why I'm even trying to argue this point, since
I'll most likely not participate in the .info launch because
I just don't have that kind of capital to be tied up for all
that time, especially without any real idea of how much of a
return I'll get on it. If I only had a few hundred
customers it would be fine, but I've got a LOT more then
that, and my guess is I'd need at least $50,000 to put into
pre-regs. If any RSPs do have this kind of money, and are
interested in partnering with me for .info pre-regs, e-mail
me and perhaps we can work something out.
Regards,
ST
-----Original Message-----
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
[mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]On Behalf Of Kai
Schaetzl
Sent: Wednesday, June 06, 2001 7:32 AM
To: Rick Baraniuk; [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: Re: .biz and .info updates
> In addition to the reseller updates (at least 2 weeks ago
or so) the answer
> has been also available on our FAQ (which was posted on
5/22) found at:
> http://www.opensrs.org/dotinfo_FAQ.shtml#q13
>
Well, it's actually No. 5 not 13 and the page says it's been
last updated on
June 4, so I very much doubt that No. 5 has been there from
the beginning.
;-) But's let's not start argueing about that.
> Please understand that Tucows is doing this to increase
the chances within
> our queue.
>
Rick, I completely understand this and I back the purpose
very much. I just
don't think that you are using an adequate method to achieve
this purpose. If
I would run your registry system I would never have come up
with such a
solution, it would never have even crossed my mind.
Way to a solution:
Background: A lottery where each queue submits one domain
per drawing round.
Problem: No chance to submit a substitute if you submit a
domain a second
time. So you lose this draw automatically.
Solution: Make a lottery yourself. That is:
1. Take *all* submissions (for landrush) from July 1 to July
20, put them in
a pool.
2. On July 20 (f.i.), put the pool in a queued order and
randomize it.
3. Parse the pool and delete any doubles.
4. Show in the RWI which domains were accepted for the
submit queue and which
were not. Put the money on hold for the accepted domains. If
there isn't
enough money the reseller has the chance to submit
additional payment until
the lottery starts (or a day before or so). If he doesn't
the domains get
dropped from your queue.
5. On July 26 or whatever you submit to the Afilias lottery.
Result: everyone is happy.
I assume steps 2 and 3 may take a day, no longer. I don't
think it's any
threat to the stability of the system or there could be
other technical
reasons why this could not be feasible.
If you use this system you happen to solve all problems
regarding the
submission and regarding the holding of money.
1. resellers definitely have an equal chance in *your*
queue.
2. money is not put on hold for 4 to 6 weeks (but only for 1
to 3 weeks
3. you relief the system a lot because nobody is forced to
submit urgent
requests on July 1.
I get the feeling that you didn't learn from the start of
the multilingual
registrations. Do you remember what happened? First there
were still bugs and
second the system was massively overloaded. The result was
that you couldn't
barely submit a domain for about half a day when it started.
You are now trying to let this happen again. What will
happen when you
release the pre-reg tool for Landrush on July 1? Yes, there
*will* be a
"landrush", a totally unnecessary landrush.
I'm also still concerned very much about the long time you
place money on
hold. This, again, is not making it "equal" for your
resellers. Not everyone
can just drop $10.000 for 6 weeks on the account with you
because he wants to
prereg 500 domains he theoretically may not get *at all*
(and so placed the
money there for just "nothing"!).
Rick, don't get me wrong. You have been very responsive to
this group and to
my questions in private mail, don't take this as a rant. I
just think there
is a better way to process the prereg and I don't think that
it would put
much more stress on your programmers and system engineers.
Thanks,
Kai
--
Kai Sch�tzl, Berlin, Germany
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