You can't make this stuff up. Verisign, yeah that Verisign, is set to have a No. 1 hit song this week in the UK. It's based on the Crazy Frog ringtone published by Verisign subsidiary Jamba. The truly scary thing is that I suspect this will migrate to the United States. From the stories, it sounds like the next Macarena.

Speaking of crazy, Ross Rader has been sucker punched in the CIRA online elections. The idea that you can withdraw support previously given is a very bad idea...now exploited to the detriment of a candidate. You can't do that in real elections; once you sign your name on the ballot qualification petition, it's there. In ink. The CIRA folks ought to make sure that a digital endorsement has the same effect as ink.

Wendy Seltzer: "We worried about this kind of gaming when I worked with the early ICANN membership studies, but I hadn't seen it happen before. Instead, ICANN has gone so far in the other direction as to eliminate individual representation entirely. CIRA's prompt investigation can show that there's a better balance of representation and accountability."

Agenda for the next ALAC meeting (May 25th)

Agenda for the next GNSO Council meeting (June 2nd).

GoDaddy Press Release: "The Go Daddy Group, Inc., parentcompany of GoDaddy.com, the No. 1 registrar of domain names worldwide,announced today the launch of its newest venture, Radio Go Daddy."

Reuters story on IPOs of 2005: "Among other offerings backed by private equity firms that have filed for public offering this year are Hexion Specialty Chemicals Inc., Neustar Inc. and Refco Inc." I'm planning to buy a little bit of Neustar stock. I don't know the price yet -- a big factor -- but I'm bullish on registration services generally, and Neustar seems like a solid play.

Jovan Kurbalija making a point on Internet Governance: "There are many analogous elements between climate change and the Internet...."

Not many comments yet on the next Proposed ICANN Budget.

Question: why did IANA not issue a report on .EU?

I think it's great that ICANN Staffers will be attending this week's Domain Name Roundtable conference in Seattle. It would be a great opportunity to make a pitch for At Large membership. These are exactly the people we need in the At Large: registrants of domain names....on a massive scale.

ICANN needs two more lawyers. I don't think it's a good sign that, going forward, ICANN thinks it needs a full-time lawyer to oversee litigation.

The other day I said I wasn't the typical domain name consumer. I suspect Rich Miller is closer to the target. He has a weblog called "DomainWorks" which focuses on the business of domain names. (And he's using one of those newfangled TLDs: domainworks.biz).  I've subscribed. Today's story: "Cleveland Man Patents WHOIS Integration in Search Results." Worth reading.

Speaking of the business of domain names, two conferences (Seattle / Las Vegas) are competing next week for the hearts and minds of the domain name industry. I really wish I could attend both of them but a family vacation will take me home to Arkansas next week. Next year, if you folks hold the conferences at different times, I'll attend them both.

Question: How do we get all of the people who are paying to go to these conferences interested in the work of ICANN?

Interesting story on ICANNWatch, but temper it with this: The first time I heard that an "exclusive, invitation only" meeting was occurring in Washington, D.C., I was surprised...and offended. No longer. It's happened so many times over the last seven years that I've lost count. The folks in Washington think they have some exclusive authority to govern. That may be true when it comes to things like the U.S. tax code, but it's ridiculous when it comes to the Internet. Let them choke on their own cigar smoke. I no longer worry about the private meetings in D.C. It's all a charade to make them feel important...or, at best, look important to their employers and constituents. Kudos to ICANN for opting out.

New ICANN Help Wanted Ad for Regional Liaison Managers: "The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) has immediate job openings for the position of Liaison Managers for multiple world regions." Closing date for applications is 30 June 2005.

Alick Wilson: "It seems inappropriate...to post these 'immediate job openings' when Version 7.3 of the plan is still open for comment; Version 7.3 proposes deferment and detailed treatment of issues related to regional presence; and the Board has not approved Version 7.3 of the plan or any variation thereof. Perhaps this is a logistics error, in which case the job listings should be removed ASAP with appropriate notice. If it is not a logistics error, would Board and/or staff please explain?"

It's not yet posted on the Reconsideration Committee's web page, but last week, I submitted another in my continuing series of requests related to posting minutes. By sharp contrast, the GNSO posted an mp3 of the Council's call within minutes after the call ended. Transparency has never been an impediment to the Council's work.

Today's blog entries courtesy of the United Airlines terminal at SFO.

Another May 16th has rolled around, and now I finally understand. You know, 42, Deep Thought's answer to life, the universe, and everything? I have reached the age of enlightenment. Celebration tonight at Dodger Stadium. I hope the team knows they're expected to win.

The comment period on the Strategic Plan, version 7.3, has been extended until Friday, May 20th.

Glen de Saint Géry, GNSO Secretariat: "Please find attached an excerpt from the draft minutes of the GNSO Council meeting held on May 12, 2005 where it was agreed to post the Council discussion on dot Net to the ICANN public comment forum."

Dotster Promotion: "We're giving away domain names every day. Visit us today for your chance to win. In fact, visit us every day - there's no limit to the number of times you can win." I guess I still don't understand the domain name industry very well. A domain name only has value to me when I want to use it to identify a host, and my need for a new domain probably doesn't coincide with a domain name promotion very often. Which suggests to me that I'm not the typical domain name consumer.

And comment now. Three public comment deadlines expire this week.

First, Version 7.3 of the Strategic Plan was published for public comment over the weekend. Drop everything and read it now because "The comment period will be open until 13 May 2005 at 23:59 UTC."  Add: Heh. Looks like someone already complained. The quote above has been changed to read "comments on this latest version of the strategic plan will be most useful if submitted by 13 May 2005." That's likely because the Board has scheduled an as yet unannounced Board meeting for the following week. And still another add: Okay, now they're playing with us. They switched the language back to read: "The comment period will be open until 13 May 2005 at 23:59 UTC." In other words, whether the comment deadline is hard or soft depends on what time of day you load the page. Not funny.

Here's a good rule of thumb: Anytime you go beyond Version 3 of a public comment document, you have a serious disconnect between the public views and the views of the drafting team. After Version 3, it's time to try a different approach. The number 7.3 speaks for itself.

Trivia Question: Whose famous thumb is that? (answer below)

Thomas Niles, speaking at the Board meeting in Mar del Plata about the Strategic Plan: "IF NOMINET CAN DO [A STRATEGIC PLAN] ON ONE PAGE, WE SHOULD BE ABLE TO DO IT ON TWO OR THREE. AND LEAVE IT AT THAT." Then again, maybe not. The new version? 31 pages. Perhaps there's a disconnect between the Board and the staff.  

Second Public Comment Opportunity:  "Final task force report on Recommendations for improving notification and consent for the use of contact data in the Whois system" | For public comment 23 April 2005 to 12 May 2005.

Melbourne IT: "These are merely additional barriers to prevent a registrant registering a name, when a far better customer experience would be to offer the option to opt-out of the public display of Personal Data, rather than force the registrant to acknowledge that they have no choice but to have Personal Data available for public access."

My post to the ALAC: "Ironically, both the proposed policy and Melbourne IT's objection to it are grounded on what is 'good for the consumer/registrant.'" If you have thoughts on this, drop me a note.

Third Opportunity for Public Comment: "ccNSO Request for Issue Report Regarding Changes to Bylaws, Policy Development Process, and Scope of ccNSO" | Comment period will open on 5th May 2005 and close on 15th May 2005.

Meanwhile, Iron Mountain Inc., the company used by many registries and registrars to escrow data has decided to compete with those same customers in the domain name registration business. PR Release: "Iron Mountain Gains ICANN Accreditation." If I'm a registrar, I'm finding a new data escrow company.

Trivia Answer linked here.

And, last but not least, Tommy Lasorda has a blog: "Fans who run on to the field are a disgrace to the game of baseball!" 

The Telecordia report was posted this afternoon. It's here in PDF format. The bottom-line: "With these changes the relative positions of the top respondents did not change." What surprised me is that Telecordia considered only the comments of the applicants, not the comments from the public. The Board, however, has pledged to consider "any and all public or Internet Community comments received by ICANN on its website." And the answer is?

What I'd like to see is a point-by-point response to the concerns expressed on the public forum. It doesn't need to be detailed, but if this stuff is irrelevant or, as Telecordia seemed to say in its response today, "out-of-scope," someone needs to explain why. I still don't get it.

Board meeting today! So far, no smoke coming out of the chimney in Marina del Rey. On calendar: .NET, .XXX, and .ASIA. By contrast, I missed the conference call this morning for the GNSO's whois task force, but the mp3 was available within minutes after the meeting concluded. That's transparency.

Vittorio Bertola: "[I]f the market wants privacy, the only reasonable thing that the supply side could do is provide it."

Ross Rader: "This is a very useful statement - that I agree with almost completely. "

EURid: "Today, another milestone was reached in the creation of .eu. Following agreement with ICANN in March, the .eu top level domain has now been put in the internet root and, as our email address and web site demonstrate, it works!"

Monika Ermert: "While at EUrid in Belgium they continue to wait to put the last signature under the agreement with the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), the first "multinational country domain" was quickly entered after the US Department of Commerce gave the green light."

Kieren McCarthy, writing in The Register:  "ICANN skewed the process to select a new owner for the .net registry in favour of incumbent owner VeriSign."  I don't disagree with that, though I'm withholding judgment until the final Telecordia report is released and the Board makes its decision. It still boggles my mind that none of this was considered relevant, but I hold out hope that we'll get an explanation.

Also in The Register: "Paul Kane made his points bluntly, accusing ICANN of being a quasi-regulator and a 'United States private-sector company' from which sovereign nations would not accept orders." Yeah, well, they're not going to take orders from CENTR either. I expect the text of the referenced letter to be posted on the ICANN web site.

I know that life is random, but traffic too? Check out this Apple billboard as seen from a freeway on-ramp. Advertisement or freeway sign? (Full size photo here.)

Hot breaking news from the root server…

here is the nslookup result for EU from server ns1.kloth.net :

DNS server handling your query: ns1.kloth.net DNS server's address: 213.133.98.149#53 Non-authoritative answer: EU origin = a.eu.dns.be. mail addr = tech.eurid.org. serial = 2005042800 refresh = 3600 retry = 1800 expire = 3600000 minimum = 600 EU nameserver = m.nic.EU. EU nameserver = a.eu.dns.be. EU nameserver = b.eu.dns.be. EU nameserver = l.nic.EU. Authoritative answers can be found from: EU nameserver = b.eu.dns.be. EU nameserver = l.nic.EU. EU nameserver = m.nic.EU. EU nameserver = a.eu.dns.be.

Try it yourself here. When I checked last night, it wasn't there. We all knew it was coming, but it's an important milestone to mark, nonetheless. Congratulations to the folks at EURID and everyone else who worked to make this happen.

IANA Root Whois for .EU: "Record Created 28-April-2005."

Oh, and here's a live one: www.eurid.eu. Thanks, Simon! This works too: www.nic.eu. 

.JOBS and .TRAVEL aren’t there yet.

Global Name Registry is making progress on its Privacy Enhanced Whois Service: "After extensive research and development, the .NAME Privacy Enhanced Whois Service is now entering its Closed Beta Testing mode."

eWeek: "Secure e-mail service provider Hushmail Communications plans to pursue a criminal investigation into a hacking attack that redirected users to a defaced Web site. The company pinned the blame for the breach squarely on the shoulders of domain name registrar Network Solutions."

ICANN's Nominating Committee has issued its annual call for Statements of Interest. Up for appointment this year are two seats on the Board, two seats on the GNSO Council, one seat on the ccNSO Council, and three seats on the ALAC.

One of my Google Ads yesterday brought me to this site, recruiting new resellers for a .WS multi-level marketing scheme (not an illegal pyramid scheme, since you’re actually paying for services). For $10/mo., you get a .WS domain name registration plus hosting. Then, if you convince others to buy the same package, you get $1/mo. from their monthly payment, plus $1/mo. for each person they recruit, and so on, up to five levels down the marketing pyramid. For an extra chuckle, check the “income calculator” about 3/4 down the page for a putative estimate of what you could earn each month. More about .WS here. Seems like a strange way to sell domain names, but who knows. It works for laundry soap.

ICANNWatch reports on three new TLDs: .公司, .网络 and .中国. I definitely want to know more about this. Post links or comments if you have them.

ICANN .NET Update: “The anticipated response from Telcordia to the applicant's written comments as noted in ICANN’s Update dated 20 April 2005 has been delayed. To date, we have not received the response from Telcordia but expect this response later this week. Accordingly, we are not yet certain about the timing of the posting but will continue to post updates as the information becomes available.” That means tomorrow.

.NET is on the agenda for the Board’s next meeting, which will be held by closed teleconference on Tuesday, 3 May 2005. The formal agenda includes:

• Approval of Minutes;
• .NET Discussion;
• sTLD Discussions, including .ASIA and .XXX;
• Strategic Plan Discussion; and,
• Other Business.

The ICANN Meetings page now includes the proposed dates for all of the Board’s teleconferences this year: May 3rd, June 7th, August 16th, September 13th, October 18th, and November 8th.  

Stephane Van Gelder: “The German Registry DENIC claims to be ‘baffled’ over the outcome of the evaluation process for the new .NET registry which ranked it fourth out of five applicants.”

ICANNWatch has a post on Verisign’s new registry-level auction service. Verisign made a presentation on this at the GNSO meeting in Mar del Plata (see transcript here). It’s not WLS. It takes place after the deletion grace period ends — which means after the registrar-level deleting name services have had a chance to do their thing — so it strikes me as fairly non-controversial. This is an auction for names that didn't sell during an earlier auction.

Steven Lang, writing on AllAfrica.com: “AfriNIC, the internet numbers registry for Africa , has slashed the minimum cost of joining the organisation from $400 to $100 per year.”

GoDaddy Press Release: “GoDaddy.com, the No. 1 registrar of new domain names for the past three years, announced today that it had surpassed Network Solutions in total domain names under management, to become the world’s No. 1 ICANN-accredited domain name registrar for the .COM, NET, .ORG, .INFO, .BIZ, and .US domain extensions, according to the April 20 statistics reported by domain industry analyst Name Intelligence, Inc.”

Interesting discussion on whois and national laws (and related mp3 file of today's conference call).

Here’s the Agenda for the next GNSO Council meeting, taking place on 12 May 2005.

Question of the Day. Which ICANN Board member said: “The internet is a bottom up network and I think it is the cornerstone of democracy.” Answer here.

John C. Dvorak has gripes -- what else? -- on domain name registrations and domain squatting.

Here's a fascinating privacy issue. California is thinking about putting a unique identifier on all bullets sold in the state and tracking who purchases them. According to the Attorney General, the proposed law "will strip criminals of their anonymity." Actually, it will strip everyone of their ammunition anonymity. Which raises the question, should anyone be allowed to buy bullets anonymously? Are bullets really as evil as domain names?  And how long until we see a bullet proxy service?

This is one of the most frightening things I've read in a long, long time. Like every parent, I hope the world is a safer, kinder place for my children than the one I grew up in.