
Regulating Cybersquatting (Domain Sharks) - thebillkidy
I think in the world that we live in today that Cybersquatting should get regulated by the government. Some of the reasons I think this should be regulated:<p>1. Currently there are tons of startups out there that found a name, want to start their startup and then they get hold back because a domain shark just bought their name. These sharks then ask a huge amount of money just to annoy everyone out there.<p>2. .com domains are getting rarer each day and harder to come by. Because of these sharks there a lot of rare domains are out there just to be sold for a ridiculous amount of money, therefor these domains just stay &quot;parked&quot; until they expire again.<p>3. This Cybersquatting is exactly the same as selling drugs, only this time they sell domains. They pick them up cheap, get addicted to doing it so they keep doing it. With the sole purpose off making money with it. This is completely done in bad faith and does not contribute to this society.<p>Because of these simple points we are currently looking at a world that is stopping it&#x27;s own growth. People will not have the chance anymore to &quot;try&quot; a startup idea and will get discouraged because of it. The .com tld and soon the .io tld will also become extinct in the years to come because of the huge growth of the internet and it&#x27;s domains. Cybersquatting<p>I think that a possible solution to this would be to let the registrars put limits on the amount of domains you can buy. When buying a domain people should also provide their ID too ensure this limit gets followed.<p>I posted this here to ask other people&#x27;s opinion about this matter and hope this gets resolved in the years to come.
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mobiplayer
1\. Flawed logic: They don't do it to annoy everyone. They do it as a
business. Yes, it is annoying! but your logic is flawed.

2\. They've invested money and are sitting on that. Don't you have money in
the bank? That money gets invested on other things and that's why you get an
interest on it. Why is this something bad? I even might agree with you, but
again you fail to show why is this a bad thing at all.

3\. That's just plain stupid. What you call cybersquatting is just people
buying goods, sitting on them until they've got some more value and then
selling them for a profit. It sounds like any other legal business to me.

And the rest of your rant doesn't get any better. Are you seriously stopped
because you couldn't get the domain you wanted? Then my advice is to work for
someone else, don't even try to start a business if you give up so early for
the smallest of the reasons.

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theaccordance
Give up on the idea of regulating cybersquatting; it will never happen in a
free economy. Counter Points:

1\. IMO, a startup who's being held back by a domain shark is already in the
wrong mindset and is probably going to fail. Successful startups work with
what's available to them and pick up the domain they truly want when they have
the capital to do so. Facebook for example, started as thefacebook.com; they
purchased facebook.com in 2005 for $200k

2\. Yes, .coms are becoming a rarity, but again - free economy; it's all about
supply and demand. While .coms may be the ideal domain, it's not like there
aren't other completely feasible choices out there. If the .com isn't
available, why not .io? .ninja?

3\. The drug analogy is incorrect and improper. A better analogy is to think
of domains as land. Both are finite in what's usable; and in both cases owners
are entitled to deciding what they want to do with the property - whether
that's building something, letting it sit there, or selling it for profit.

Don't get mad at people because they thought of your name before you did;
accept it as a reality and embrace the practice yourself. A certain founder I
know of a publicly traded deals website is sitting on over 100+ domains. Why?
The opportunity to use them in the future. I myself am sitting on 20+ for the
same exact reason, I recommend you do the same.

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insoluble
Although I believe that many things in this world ought not to be regulated, I
have believed for a long time that domain squatting really ought to be. Some
folks here have expressed that it is okay to make a profit from an investment.
While this may be true in many cases, there is a serious lack of ethics in any
case where the "investor" is not _creating_ value. Back hundreds (or more)
years ago, it was considered by many to be inappropriate to buy land with the
intent of selling for a higher price later _without_ that land having been
actively _improved_ by the party holding it. Holding on to something, leaving
it as it is, and selling it later is _not_ improving it. Any profit gained
from its later selling is appreciation accumulated by the actions and labour
of _society_ \-- not the squatter. In other words, the squatter is leeching on
society, much like someone counterfeiting money. This situation applies not
only to domains but also to many other things that are squatted. If he or she
cares about ethics, an investor needs to ask by whom and to what extent the
value is being created. After all, investing in buying slaves was surely a way
to make a profit. But was it ethical?

As for how exactly domain registration could successfully be regulated for the
greater good of society, that is a tricky one. Perhaps a limit on the number
of unimproved domains concurrently held by one party would be an effective
start. Or perhaps a track record whereby a certain minimum proportion of
purchased domains must end up being used legitimately, with a certain
allowance for newcomers.

I agree with others that the drug analogy was a poor fit.

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klez
Maybe there should be a way to challange a domain squat, stating for example
that you can't park domain for more than X time, and you can't renew it if you
kept it parked for X time without doing anything with it. I see a lot of
legitimate reasons to keep a domain parked, but clearly a domain that
redirects to the likes of "get the best offers for..." has the only purpose of
reselling squatted domains, and that would be a sufficient reason, IMHO, to
'expropriate' a domain.

> This Cybersquatting is exactly the same as selling drugs

Please, give me a break.

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thebillkidy
I agree there are a lot of reasons to keep a domain parked. The only thing I
do not agree on is buying domains just to resell them again. You can do that
with ground, properties and so on because these are valuable. But on a
platform such as the internet this just puts a stop to the evolution of it.

The drugs reference might be a bit overdone, I just want to make a statement
here to find a regulation for this.

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kafei
There are hundreds of new TLDs available now. Just use one of them and move
on.

