Hacker News Reader

Comment by wmf | Hacker News Reader

Instead of registering your.name you would register first.last.name (nobody owned last.name). This was intended to allow more people to have personal domains with fewer conflicts.

Now, years later, they are undoing it and they're even breaking existing domains. ("existing third level domain names will be terminated") This kind of breaking change shouldn't be allowed.

View on HN

Most critically, the intent was to offer email forwarding at lastname.name, so you could also get email at firstname@lastname.name.

That was the starting point - we started as a webmail provider letting people share lastname.sometld domains

Without that, it's just another name.

I currently have firstnamelastname.name which I use. I’m thinking I need to switch after this.

Same. That would be an ugly transition for me, but I guess I should start thinking about it.

They are cancelling 3rd level domains, not the 2-level domain you have.

Sets a bad precedent though, right?

Exactly

Wait, if it was only firstname.lastname.name, how was he able to register firstnamelastname.name? Does it let you register 2nd level domains if you get there before someone else registers a 3rd level domain that uses the 2nd level domain that you want to register?

They altered the deal. Now they are altering it further.

I don't know the history of when the offerings were available, but I initially bought my-first-name.my-rare-last-name.name, and fortunately nobody else bought another-name.my-rare-last-name.name, and I was able to let mine lapse then buy my-rare-last-name.name.

The status quo is that the registry proactively reserves a large list of 2LDs corresponding to attested personal names and surnames, making them unavailable for registration. One can register 3LDs underneath these. It will also reserve a 2LD reactively if someone wants to register a 3LD underneath it. Or, if a 2LD is not on the reserved list, someone can register it outright.

As far as I know the list of reserved 2LDs is not available, but you can query individual names via whois to see if they are reserved or not.

I guess they assume that nobody with a personal domain cares enough to sue them over this.

I have one. I'm honestly not sure whether my registration will be refunded or not--the email I got from my registrar said that this is expected to happen but the details are yet to be worked out, while at the same time Verisign's own public statements don't even touch on the point that there will be services paid for and unrendered.

My guess is it would be hard for me to substantiate damages in excess of the actual registration fees, which in my case will amount to some $93 or so once prorated. It's sort of the perfect number: just high enough to be insulting, just low enough not to be worth chasing adversarially.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com