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Comment by kikoreis | Hacker News Reader

For those curious about what's going on (the post was removed) they merged with TWS: https://your.online/press-release/

We're getting bitten by this in the Netherlands as well. Two domain registrars, PCExtreme and Neostrada, merged with Versio, and Versio is now owned by TWS.

My company has domains registered with Versio (and PCExtreme and Neostrada), but the control panel was showing multiple domains wrongly flagged as 'processing', and actually getting through to customer service takes the better part of day by now. I'm not looking forward to our domains getting migrated due to these mergers.

Start looking for alternative registrars if your domains are hosted by Versio, Neostrada, or PCExtreme! The competent staff of PCExtreme and Neostrada seem to have evaporated in these mergers.

Any suggestion of a good serious independent European registrar?

I wish I had something useful to recommend now, but we've only just started looking.

I am happy with OVH. Only bit that’s missing is IPv6 for dynamic IPs.

doesn't OVH require ID verification after you pay? and then run off with your money if they don't get it

at least, that is my experience

I had to identify by ID iirc because I wanted a .eu domain which is restricted to EU citizens. But I had to give the ID upfront.

I wanted to purchase a VPS and they took my money before asking for ID. I refused to give them an ID that I didn't have (because I don't have one) and they kept my money and refused to provide service.

So at least don't get a VPS unless you're ready to give ID, heh.

I had a dedicated server for.. 4 months? or something before they suddenly required a scan of my ID before they would let me renew. Really weird and annoying. No abuse complaints or anything awry I was doing with it either :/

Sounds like a wonderful reason for a chargeback.

I tried to chargeback but the card company was like "nah chargebacks are inconvenient, just have some credit". Was pleasantly surprised.

I'm happy with INWX

I'm using Infomaniak. I especially like their renewal warranty [0]. It's a few bucks more a year but they renew the Domain even if you are not paying and try to contact you by phone, snail mail etc. They also support IPv6 and DNSSEC.

[0] https://www.infomaniak.com/en/renewal-warranty

Not sure if it meets the European criteria but I use a combination of DNSimple and Porkbun and am very happy with them both.

For less common ccTLDs, Gandi is still hard to beat since they support virtually everything. Apart from that, I have no regrets moving... I saw the writing on the wall about 2 years ago and moved virtually all my domains away from them.

> Not sure if it meets the European criteria but I use a combination of DNSimple and Porkbun

Neither of these meets the European criterion.

Shame because they're good registrars. I wonder why the European requirement though (since the TLDs themselves are ultimately governed by the registries and you can always use your own - or third party, EU based - name servers).

Because of GDPR, it’s so much simpler so have a host within the EU than elsewhere and especially simpler than having one in the US

Not sure I understand why GDPR has anything to do with domain _registration_ (not hosting).

I used to be on Versio, but moved to TransIP after the acquisition of Versio by TWS.

TransIP is not exactly the cheapest, but they work fine. Vimexx (which is under the same company as TransIP) is cheaper (closer to pre-TWS Versio pricing), but I'm a bit hesitant to trust a 'budget' registrar again.

I use INWX for some years for 2 domains and can't complain about anything.

Is it printed so much money that they just buy up everything and jack up the prices?

Where the hell is the date on this press release...

> "Gandi SAS (“Gandi”) and Total Webhosting Solutions B.V. (“TWS”), today announced"

when was "today"?

This reposting - https://news.knowledia.com/US/en/articles/gandi-and-tws-join... indicates it was Feb 23, 2023

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