registrars

An Internet entrepreneur usually develops various businesses around domain names as an important step for his small business. The greed of some companies and the unethical business tactics that they employ to either gain competitive advantage or advertise to prospective consumers is one that needs to be carefully monitored by an impartial, independent body or watch-dog.

Isn’t this what President, Barack Obama is now forced to grapple with in another sector of the economy, namely the Banking Industry? This sector was allowed to continue for years unregulated or with regulators that either lack the capacity to act or failed in their public duty to do so. The result is now very well known and it has impacted companies, innocent people and countries worldwide.

The Internet, especially domain name registration and registrars is one area of the telecommunications sector that is heading in a similar direction. Registrars are acting like “gods” and appear to be “untouchables” even though the public is supposedly legally required to pay fees to regulators to enforce rules of engagement in its best interest.

Registrars are refusing access to “A Record IP” updates unless the domain name is registered and hosted with them. In other words, customers are denied the right to shop for the most economical registrar and web host as separate entities as was possible back in the early days of the Internet. Increasingly, it seems that Registrars are not aware of the basic rules of the structure of business in a Capitalist system.

Just like the Banks, Registrars are allowed to change the rules of the game to eliminate all competition, create misleading products, bully the public and in some cases hold “intellectual property” hostage by refusing to update “A Record IPs”, if the domain name is not registered and hosted by the same registrar.

domain names

The registrant (domain name owner) is left powerless because there is a 60-day waiting period after registration before a domain name can be moved to another registrar. In most cases investigated at the time of this article, the registrants are either forced to sit out the waiting period or buy web hosting from the registrar of the domain name so as not to impede the natural progress of the business.

This practice is becoming very prevalent amongst registrars and web hosting companies as the economy contracts. The current economic crisis, the way that is was cleverly engineered should serve as a guide to ensure that regulators have not only the will to enforce common sense rules but are held independent of the companies they regulate. In addition, there must be transparency and accountability if this industry too isn’t allowed to deteriorate into chaos.