I'm not saying that this couldn't have happened with a gTLD But why put your brand at the mercy of a government like that?
Edit: .eu might be an even better candidate for this requirement, but you can ask British former domain owners how that worked out
gTLDs just subject you to an additional layer of incompetence, namely from the company running it. The government where they're located can still come knocking. It's also not like e.g. .nl is run by the Dutch government officials, it's a nonprofit started by some people in the 80s iirc
Ironically that one country happens to be the one that also controls gTLDs like .com, as others have pointed out, so arguably .us is the one ccTLD that isn't any more or less likely to be reliable.
You guys want to kick indigenous people off their land for military bases? Enjoy your new bill for .io domains.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/.su
See also '.yu' and friends, which have already been deleted.
I tend to trust my government (Canada) and I appreciate that WHOIS information is hidden by default for .ca domains. I live here and always will so it seems fit to use the national TLD for representing myself and my work.
And Mauritius have treated the Chagossians like dirt for decades, with no signs of that changing.
None of this is to deny the Chagossians were extremely ill treated by the British, but the idea that the Mauritanians have any interest in the welfare of the Chagossians is ridiculous.
False. I’m not sure what you’re trying to assert, but governments don’t necessarily need to control/admin gTLDs, and as far as ccTLDs go, they’re under jurisdiction of the corresponding nation, usually, but they’re going to be “administered” by a tech company that holds a contract.
Anyway, “.com” does indeed answer to U.S. jurisdiction, despite being technically a gTLD, but registrations are not restricted to US-based entities. The main things that keep “.com” associated with the USA include the history/legacy of this quintessential “original” domain, as well as a general support from major countries that provide a “second-level” commercial domain, such as “.co.uk”.
I don't know if that's actually the case, I've heard some shady sites are using .su(Soviet Union) to avoid judicial actions.
So then you don't have to produce an offence that takes the TLD down (whichever kind) but one that makes a judge within the country that the TLD operator operates in approve a takedown notice for your domain name or even get the TLD operator to cooperate voluntarily
A lot of Pacific islands territories have complicated histories like this (e.g. Hawaii, New Zealand), but the focus usually ends up on whatever bastards most recently took over from the previous bastards (relative levels of bastardy notwithstanding).
ICANN have a mostly hand-off approach to ccTDLs. The intention is that each country decide on their own regulations and management when it comes to their country code specific domains.
.nl is a very special case, and it is true that the Dutch government was not involved. .nl was the first country code TLD created outside of the US, when the domain system still was part of ARPANET and operated by the United States Department of Defense. .nl was then transferred to a foundation 10 years later, and that's where ownership now resides.
ccTLDs are somewhat of a mess. Many are created in universities, then transferred to a company or foundation. Others were sold to companies from the start. In some cases, government have sold their ccTLD to other countries.
.se for example was created in a Swedish university, and then later the government took possession of it (or the university gave it to them, can't really say). Now there are laws that explicitly defines how it should be used and governed, which then a non-profit foundation manage the implementation.
ccTLDs also have to be run by some organization, which is often a private company. Maybe the country's oversight over this organization is better than ICANN's oversight over gTLD operators. Maybe it's not. Historically, the worst technical incidents have occurred at ccTLDs.
So ICANN has a non-trivial choice to make. Either they maintain the position that switching costs are bearable and let .io disappear, or they admit that TLD switching is impossible and save .io, which will make it hard to argue the threat of (registrants) TLD switching keeps the industry competitive.
Barely. The NTIA gave up all their leverage over .com in 2018. The only thing the US can do at this point is let the cooperative agreement auto-renew to limit price increases.
I wouldn't be surprised if the US withdrew from the agreement altogether at this point. Then .com would fall under the joint control of ICANN and Verisign.
The thing with the island of Diego Garcia is quite strange and I strongly suspect there is corruption involved. The UK wishes to divest itself? Instead of holding an auction where the rest of the planet can bid on purchasing the territory, the UK decided that Mauritius would take it (who doesn't really want it) and to entice them, the UK is going to PAY Mauritius to take the territory and leave the base alone. The amount is £90 million annually, adjusted for inflation for 99 years.
This is a lot of money, why not just NOT turn it over and not have to give away £90 million a year for a century? So, it begs the question.. is someone from the UK side benefiting from this no-bid deal?
Give the island to me, and I won't charge the UK to have the base.
As you might notice from the dates and names, this was very early in the history of TLDs.
As I understand it there were no Maori before NZ was settled, that culture formed there from the Polynesian"moa-hunters". Some descendants of those settlers became the Maori, but that a different claim.
Furthermore, there are just generally very few records so I think it's very difficult to make definite claims like you or GP do.