random memes }

Tacky namespace grab

This is bogus - WWW.BANNISTER.NAME - Bannister Family - Bannister's Homepage.

So ... guess I wasn't keeping up with the new top-level domains for the web. Saw a comment about registration for the new ".name" TLD. Checked to see if anyone had grabbed "bannister.name" (and whom if taken). Instead I find that some outfit has grabbed the name (and probably thousands of others), only for the purpose of (hopefully) reselling the name at a higher price.

Now in a free economy resellers are common. Most resellers add value in one form or another - and as such can be justified as serving a purpose.

There is no added value here. Instead the outfits re-selling domain names are something like ticket-scalpers. This smells bad.

I believe it would be better if domain names were only sold to folks who would actually make some use (other than name-price-speculation). Doubtless the registrars - outfits that make money off each registration - would not be keen on this notion. Also, what sort of scheme could you come up with that would be workable?

The simplest might be to limit the number of domains that could be registered to any one individual. A limit of ten domains per individual should be more (far more) than enough.

You could ban re-selling of names, but I do not know if this could be checked or enforcable in any sort of practical sense.