[WEB4LIB] .US Domain

[James Cayz]

> I had this wonderful piece of spam show up in my mailbox overnight. I
> haven't followed the latest with the ,US domain. Does this mean that those
> of us with library and government .US sites are now going to have to
> contend with domain squatters, domain grabbers who snag old sites and
> turn them into porn sites, and all the other unseemly behavior which up to
> now we have been able to avoid in our .US domain?
>
> Andrew Mutch
> Library Systems Technician
> Waterford Township Public Library
> Waterford, MI
>
> Official .us (United States) Domain Names are now Available!

Andrew,

In a word - Yes.

The .us domain is currently under major reorganization.  There was Good and
Bad before, and I feel we'll have Good and Bad, but in different forms,
in the new system.

There are many, many of the 800+ currently .us delegators who are taking
this reorganization *very* seriously, and are trying to keep .US better
than what has happened in .com, .org, etc.

However, in typical Government fashion, the Dept of Commerce turned control
of .us over to a commercial entity (neustar), who also runs .biz, and
there are clearly signs that at least the currently-undeveloped sections
of .us may be developed commercially.  How that affects lib.XX.us, no
one can tell yet.  I'm not sure, but I appear to be one of few (only?)
lib.XX.us people truly getting into the debates (how many lib.XX.us
lurkers are on the us-domain listserv, I can't tell).

If this makes you feel better, OK.
If this makes you feel worse, I'm sorry.

James


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| James Cayz          Telecommunications / Network Technologist I          |
| Email:cayz at lib.de.us     Voice:302-739-4748 x130      Fax:302-739-6787   |
| Delaware Division of Libraries # 43 S. DuPont Hwy / Dover, DE 19901-7430 |
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