We know .Com is managed by VeriSign because of a contract with the ICANN. In this sense, the putting in motion of the “waiting list” (WLS), that would allow to reserve a domain name in .com and register it if its titular forgets or denies the renovation, goes by an agreement between the Californian society and the .com operator, the ICANN which gives the O.K. The Dotster Registrar had tried to obtain a justice prescription for forbidding the restoration of “anti-competitive practices”. Beyond the WLS problem, this decision was politically important because it is about the relations between the ICANN and the Registry of .com still bad faced in the Finder site matter on last December (see DomaiNews n°9).

It is a success for the Californian association that has its origin in a press communication in its site. The decision is important because it points the ICANN doesn’t have to do that the other Registrars approve its decisions, except if these ones avoid them to work under normal conditions. Clearly, WLSD establishes the more complex working conditions to the Registrars but – and especially not for the ICANN- nothing avoids them to adjust its offer according to, even the WLS sitting up on its own benefit.

The problem about the price of the putting in motion that was quieted in relation with the ICANN site is the rest The WLS won’t be in active service before the end of the juridical procedure, but when this be made, you can ask yourself how the other Registrars will propose WLS services with competitive prices in relation with the ones from VeriSign which has a real monopoly over .com and .net. This topic must be put under control, therefore !

Voir http://www.icann.org/announcements/advisory-13nov03.htm

JCV & SB