There are business reasons why you would want to operate your own whois. But giving up that, for example, you give up one more thing that makes you more like a "reseller" for a registry and less like a registrar. What's next? How about if we just operate web sites with links to the registry web site which handles all of the transactions and pays a commision? The "broken whois" reason can and should, as Bruce said, be handled by enforcement. I've noticed that certain registrars handle their resellers by posting the name of the "registration service provider" right in the whois. Has anyone thought how this would be handled with a thick model? I prefer this: Registration Service Provided By: eNom, Inc. Contact: paul.stahura@enom.com Visit: Domain name: enom.org Registrant Contact: eNom, Inc. DNS Manager (kelsie@enom.com) +1.4258838860 Fax: +1.4258833553 PO Box 7449 Bellevue, WA 98008 US Administrative Contact: eNom, Inc. DNS Manager (kelsie@enom.com) +1.4258838860 Fax: +1.4258833553 PO Box 7449 Bellevue, WA 98008 US (snip) to this: Domain ID:D3231451-LROR Domain Name:ENOM.ORG Created On:30-Oct-1998 05:00:00 UTC Last Updated On:14-Nov-2003 00:14:00 UTC Expiration Date:29-Oct-2007 05:00:00 UTC Sponsoring Registrar:R39-LROR Status:OK Registrant ID:876E360CB7A3B687 Registrant Name:DNS Manager Registrant Organization:eNom, Inc. Registrant Street1:PO Box 7449 Registrant City:Bellevue Registrant State/Province:WA Registrant Postal Code:98008 Registrant Country:US Registrant Email:kelsie@enom.com Admin ID:876E360CB7A3B687 Admin Name:DNS Manager Admin Organization:eNom, Inc. Admin Street1:PO Box 7449 Admin City:Bellevue Admin State/Province:WA Admin Postal Code:98008 Admin Country:US Admin Email:kelsie@enom.com (Machines of course prefer #2) Next, the registry whois doesn't contain the true "expiration" date. It currently contains the auto renew expiration date. So, with that issue it practically guarantees that even with a thick model the registrar has to maintain a parallel whois. Of course if machine readability is an issue, there is no reason that machine readable information can't follow the human readable information that appears in a registrar's whois. Larry Erlich http://www.DomainRegistry.com Eric Brunner-Williams in Portland Maine wrote:
Bruce,
I agree that a registry operator can technically operate a thick and thin model in parallel, and the choice can be made available to registrars according to their business model and technical resources.
Jean-Michel,
I agree that less code to maintain = less cost. I think that registrar selection between two registry-offered models can meet that goal.
Eric
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