Nominet .UK Consultation

Edwin Hayward of MyDomainNames.co.uk has kindly produced a diagram of how to fill in Nominet’s second direct .uk consultation:

In an email sent to registrars today Nominet has detailed  it’s plans to take “.co.uk on the road” for the rest of 2013.

Please note the use of the word “trusted” in their email:

.co.uk remains the number one relevant and trusted domain for doing business in the UK and the .co.uk brand team will be reaching out to our target audiences and spreading the word through branded exhibition presence and presentation workshops at the following events:

The Liverpool Business Fair – 19th March 2013

Business Startup Show – 6th – 7th June 2013

Email: http://info.nominet.org.uk/go.asp?/bNOM001/m9DMH9/u8NOW4/xIHVZ9

Dates: http://registrars.nominet.org.uk/marketing-tools-and-events/events/co-uk-events

Following the Nominet Board meeting on 26th February, Nominet are NOT now proceeding with their original proposal on ‘direct.uk’ but we will respond to feedback by looking at whether a revised proposal will address issues raised in the recent consultation.

Over the coming months, this work will explore:

• A revised phased release mechanism based largely on the prior registrations of domains in existing third levels within .uk and in which contention between different applicants for the same domain name should be reduced or eliminated.

• Measures to improve security across the whole of the .uk namespace. This would include increased focus on encouraging the adoption of DNSSEC.

• A firm focus on registrant verification and some form of UK presence.

• Further investigations into the impact on the SME sector.

• An appropriate pricing model.

Read more here: Nominet – Update on Direct.uk 27/02/2013

Credit: Names.co.uk 21/02/2013

Despite the current Nominet consultation on direct.uk second level domain names more large Nominet registrars have joined in promoting .co.uk in recent weeks.

Names.co.uk for example now has a slider on the homepage promoting .co.uk as “a great place to be”.

We believe Names.co.uk to be one of six registrars chosen by Nominet to take part in their .co.uk campaign 2013 which they announced in January.

Chris Williams writes in the Telegraph:

A children’s charities coalition, internet activists and businesses have lined up to criticise the plans by Nominet, the quango in charge of web addresses, to create a new “secure” area online for British businesses. Nominet wants to create a new class of web addresses ending in just “.uk”, to be sold alongside those with the more familiar “.co.uk” suffix. It says websites with one of new addresses will be more secure for people browsing the web, because it will check their operators are based in Britain and have supplied real contact details.

Read more: 15/01/13 – Telegraph: Childrens charities oppose Nominet plan for ‘secure’ .uk web addresses

On Tuesday 8th January 2013 Stephen McPartland MP asked a Parliamentary question regarding .uk:

To ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport what steps she plans to take to ensure that small businesses with .co.uk addresses are not put at a disadvantage by the creation of the .uk domain name.

The response by the Minister Ed Vaizey MP was:

Nominet is recognised by the Government as the registry with responsibility for oversight of the “.uk” top level internet domain. It is a private sector, not for profit, public purpose company. Its day-to-day operations are not subject to regulation by the Government. Nominet welcomes suggestions about “.uk” policy development. It is currently carrying out a public consultation on proposals to create a new shorter “.uk” domain with enhanced security features which would allow for the first time registrations at the second level immediately before the dot (e.g. “culture.uk”).

Nominet has informed Government that its consultation is gathering perspectives from a broad range of stakeholders—including small businesses and their representatives—to inform their decision-making. Nominet has stated that it will be carefully considering that feedback in line with the company’s public purpose.

Hansard source (Citation: HC Deb, 8 January 2013, c213W)

Dave Thomas, head of Sedo UK and a member of Nominet’s stakeholder committee, gives another take on Nominet’s direct.uk consultation, assessing potential impact on UK business.

I did some comparison using SEDO’s trading history of the Spanish domain market comparing .com.es to .es – it is clearly to me that there is now a preference for .es over .com.es. This indicates that there’s a real appetite from businesses and consumers to migrate over time to a shorter direct name space. Although, on the other hand, if you consider that the United States launched a shorter name space in 1985, when the internet was in its infancy, it has had little or no real effect as the majority of US companies and consumers prefer using .com to this day. Therefore, we are in the dark whether direct.uk will have an impact on the value of .co.uk.

Read more: http://www.guardian.co.uk/media-network/media-network-blog/2012/dec/21/dave-thomas-nominet-directuk-consultation

Source: Daily Mail 20/12/12

Interesting letter today in the Daily Mail regarding foreign ownership of .co.uk domains. Remember Nominet’s proposal for .uk requires Verification of UK contact details of registrant (see page 9 of consultation).

Do you have plans to purchase a .co.uk domain for your business? Adam Grunwerg thinks you might want to think again:

Nominet, the non-profit organisation responsible for managing the UK namespace, recently launched a three-month consultation on a direct.uk domain name service, which means you’ll soon be able to register UK names at the second level – in the forma yourbusiness.uk – in 2013.

The new .uk domain service will provide a shorter string for UK businesses and has plans to include a number of security benefits to promote a secure UK namespace, which includes UK address verification, daily malware monitoring and a digital signature.

However, the current proposal for the new direct.uk domains and the release structure has caused significant backlash from Nominet’s main stakeholders – especially registrars, UK businesses and the domain community.

Read more: http://www.guardian.co.uk/media-network/media-network-blog/2012/dec/13/nominet-plans-direct-uk-domain

On 18 December 2012 Nominet issued the following statement:

There’s undoubtedly a wide range of opinions, particularly in the following areas:

• The principle of opening up the second level.
• Whether direct.uk should be treated as a new, distinct product within the .uk portfolio or as a transition or migration from existing SLDs.
• The fairest release mechanism.
• The impact on existing .co.uk, .org.uk or .me.uk registrants.
• How the package of security features proposed will contribute to our aims of improving trust and security.

We are considering all ideas and suggestions that have been – and continue to – flow in. The consultation is a genuine process to gather the perspectives and thinking from a broad range of stakeholders in order to inform our decision-making.

Source: http://www.nominet.org.uk/news/latest/directuk-consultation-closes-7-january-%E2%80%93-give-us-your-views