Ask HN: SSL is free now, why domain names are not | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: SSL is free now, why domain names are not

5 pointstuyguntn9 comments

Thanks to letsencrypt and others, now SSL is free, but why same is not happening with domain names?

I think if fraudulent (or lots of) name registrations will be fixed, then it is possible to make domain name registration free (like telegram did for their bot names, max was 20name last time I checked)

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OK. Let's say domain registration becomes free. Now I want to register all remaining domain names. What's stopping me? Artificial limits of domains per person? That's not really fair, because some people really need to buy domains to prevent cybersquatting.

The current system isn't perfect, but it's better than open, free registration.

There is Freenom that let you register free .tk, .ml, .ga, .cf, .gq domains. And the number of scam web-sites IMO discredit those domain zones.

Though according to the feedback online, Freenom to domains is not what Letsencrypt is to SSL. Their business model (cancel domain name registration then ask $xxxx to register it again) looks like fraud to me [1].

[1]: https://www.quora.com/Is-Freenom-a-fraudulent-company

What stops anyone from squatting all the domain names possible?

arent there an infinite number of domains?

> According to the domain registrars, the longest legal domain name is 63 characters starting with a letter or number.

So no

http://archive.oreilly.com/pub/post/the_worlds_longest_domai...

event though you can generate more than 36^63 combinations, it doesn't make sense to use 63 character long domain name and even now it is difficult to find & register representative domain name.

It would definitely make bookmarking a more important feature for browsers, but we remember street addresses that are longer than 36 characters, why not longer domain names?

I sure don't remember those anywhere near the scale of app and domain names

There is a finite number of words people understand.

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