Internet News

Isgrimnur · Post by **Isgrimnur** » Tue Jan 28, 2014 1:33 pm

Starting next week, the Internet is going to look very different -- and ICANN Chief Executive Fadi Chehade is the one who'll get both the credit and the blame.

Today, Net addresses end with 22 familiar terms -- .com, .net, and .edu -- called generic top-level domains (GTLDs). But starting Feb. 4, the first of hundreds of new GTLDs will begin arriving -- .ninja, .farm, .shoes, .photography, .bike, .pink, and even .wtf.

The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), a non-profit organization, oversees the domain-name expansion and the core Internet technology called the Domain Name System that makes it tick. Chehade took over ICANN leadership in 2012 and now is grappling not just with the GTLD expansion, but also the dwindling supply of numeric Internet addresses and an attempt to wean the Internet from the US government's dominant oversight role.
...
The reason Chehade is also in the hot seat, though, is fielding criticisms from those with a trademark to protect. For them, the explosion of new GTLDs means new hassles and expenses.
...
ICANN charges $185,000 for an organization to apply to run a generic top-level domain, and then there are further annual fees on top.

Interview with Chehade at the link.

Trent Steel · Post by **Trent Steel** » Tue Jan 28, 2014 1:46 pm

twointhe.pink

I also hope to see some .monkey and .robot domains.

Jeff V · Post by **Jeff V** » Tue Jan 28, 2014 2:20 pm

Who the fuck is going to shell out $185,000 to run a WTF TLD?

Or maybe it does become instantly profitable as companies will buy up any that infriges on their brand name and simply redirect it to their .com site.

Matrix · Post by **Matrix** » Tue Jan 28, 2014 6:07 pm

Jeff V wrote:Who the fuck is going to shell out $185,000 to run a WTF TLD?

Or maybe it does become instantly profitable as companies will buy up any that infriges on their brand name and simply redirect it to their .com site.

Most of large and medium size companies. To protect their brand, or build on their brand. Marketing wise, also they can target their customers all through out their network of sites, without people leaving it all the better. .ibm, .toyota, .candy

I think there is plenty of top level name domains as is, making anymore is not needed but lack of need never stopped anyone from trying to make money on it. I done domain development for a while, and its a lot of work. Brining more domains to the market is to delute value even further. Considering that google chrome is aggressively anti domain (since it doesnt make money on direct traffic), domains this days is mostly used for brands. While, even 3 years ago it was also strong traffic driver. Not so much anymore.

Jeff V · Post by **Jeff V** » Tue Jan 28, 2014 6:31 pm

Matrix wrote:
Jeff V wrote:Who the fuck is going to shell out $185,000 to run a WTF TLD?

Or maybe it does become instantly profitable as companies will buy up any that infriges on their brand name and simply redirect it to their .com site.
Most of large and medium size companies. To protect their brand, or build on their brand. Marketing wise, also they can target their customers all through out their network of sites, without people leaving it all the better. .ibm, .toyota, .candy

I think there is plenty of top level name domains as is, making anymore is not needed but lack of need never stopped anyone from trying to make money on it. I done domain development for a while, and its a lot of work. Brining more domains to the market is to delute value even further. Considering that google chrome is aggressively anti domain (since it doesnt make money on direct traffic), domains this days is mostly used for brands. While, even 3 years ago it was also strong traffic driver. Not so much anymore.

I think it's more likely bigger companies find this to be a nuisiance expense fostered upon them by the money grabbers. Toyota might have no reason to exploit their brand in the .junk domain, but they surely don't want anyone else putting up a website there either. So for every silly tld, it just sucks money from companies who want to keep others away from damaging or exploiting thier brand. And that's pretty shitty.

Kraken · Post by **Kraken** » Tue Jan 28, 2014 8:04 pm

Where can a lazy person find a list of all these new domains? Based on JeffV's extortion principle I might have to buy a few.

gilraen · Post by **gilraen** » Wed Jan 29, 2014 12:05 am

I think they're about to find out the surprising masses of people out there that can't spell "photography".

Isgrimnur · Post by **Isgrimnur** » Wed Jan 29, 2014 1:38 pm

The 107 new gTLDs are listed here.

wonderpug · Post by **wonderpug** » Wed Jan 29, 2014 3:26 pm

There's a .ninja?!

Isgrimnur · Post by **Isgrimnur** » Wed Jan 29, 2014 3:32 pm

Yeah, but it's being managed by a registration company to sell off rather than anyone that will actually do anything cool with it.

Isgrimnur · Post by **Isgrimnur** » Tue Mar 24, 2015 12:06 pm

MarketingLand

Controversy or not, .sucks is almost here. A company called Momentous won ICANN’s auction last November via its subsidiary, Vox Populi, giving it the right to operate the .sucks gTLD. The early registration period — “sunrise” is the official term — starts on March 30th and general availability begins on June 1st.

Isgrimnur · Post by **Isgrimnur** » Tue Mar 24, 2015 12:09 pm

Taylor Swift out in front.

As Team Swift realized, some new suffixes carry particularly high possibility of abuse. Chief among those are .porn and .adult, though we imagine the rich and powerful will line up to buy .sucks addresses as well.

So Swift’s people bought the rights to TaylorSwift.porn and TaylorSwift.adult, according to CNN.

Isgrimnur · Post by **Isgrimnur** » Mon Apr 13, 2015 4:28 pm

.sucks gets expensive

The authority that decides which letters a web address is allowed to finish with says it is concerned at the high charges for the new ".sucks" name.

The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Number (Icann) has asked the US and Canadian trade authorities to investigate Vox Populi, which secured the rights to sell the name.

The company denies any wrongdoing.
...
Specialist online website Domain Incite reports that actor "Kevin Spacey, Microsoft, Google and Apple have already bought up '.sucks' sites in a bid to protect their reputations".
...
Icann granted Vox Populi permission to sell the ".sucks" names but is now concerned at the price levels the Canadian company has set.

Kevin Murphy, from Domain Incite, told the BBC two key elements of the way Vox Populi was handling the sale were causing concern.

"They are charging a $2,000 'sunrise' premium to those wishing to register '.sucks' addresses early, before the addresses go on sale to the general public [next month]," he said.

"Also they are using a list of words or names that have been defensively registered in the past, for which they are charging the top amount."
...
But Murphy said: "They [Vox Populi] are charging a much bigger amount that you'd expect.
"They were considering a fee of $25,000 at one point when we spoke to them.
...
In a strongly worded letter to Icann, the authority's own advisory body, the Intellectual Property Constituency (IPC), demanded a "halt" to Vox Populi's "illicit", "predatory" and "coercive" selling scheme.
But even though Icann approved the ".sucks" domain name sale and issued the licence to sell the related website addresses, it appears not to have jurisdiction over how they are sold.

There is no evidence that Vox Populi has done anything wrong, and the company told Domain Incite its pricing and policies were "well within the rules".

Icann has referred Vox Populi to the two bodies it believes may have the regulatory authority to investigate the company's practices: the Federal Trade Commission in the United States and the Canadian Office of Consumer Affairs, as the company is registered in Canada.

But unless the company has broken the law, it is not clear what powers Icann has over Vox Populi's handing of the sale of ".sucks".

Jeff V · Post by **Jeff V** » Tue Apr 14, 2015 10:02 am

How is this not an extortion scheme? Every derogatory TLD is going to generate this sort of shit storm.

I hope instead someone with deep pockets decides to sue those responsible for this into oblivion.

GreenGoo · Post by **GreenGoo** » Tue Apr 14, 2015 11:09 am

Jeff V wrote:How is this not an extortion scheme? Every derogatory TLD is going to generate this sort of shit storm.

I hope instead someone with deep pockets decides to sue those responsible for this into oblivion.

They are saving everyone from the *real* extortionists! They're freakin' heroes. Why does america hate a little profitable enterprise?

Jaymann · Post by **Jaymann** » Tue Apr 14, 2015 12:15 pm

There is no shortage of hater sites now. How does the domain name change anything? It smacks of a vanity play for celebs.

Isgrimnur · Post by **Isgrimnur** » Fri Mar 17, 2017 10:12 am

A little behind the times, but you can look forward to emoji domains:

.ws

Paingod · Post by **Paingod** » Fri Mar 17, 2017 10:41 am

I predict a rush on Poo.

KDH · Post by **KDH** » Sat Mar 25, 2017 12:28 am

:

How ISPs can sell your Web history—and how to stop them
How the Senate's vote to kill privacy rules affects you.

just a bit of the article:

The US Senate yesterday voted to eliminate privacy rules that would have forced ISPs to get your consent before selling Web browsing history and app usage history to advertisers. Within a week, the House of Representatives could follow suit, and the rules approved by the Federal Communications Commission last year would be eliminated by Congress.

So what has changed for Internet users? In one sense, nothing changed this week, because the requirement to obtain customer consent before sharing or selling data is not scheduled to take effect until at least December 4, 2017. ISPs didn’t have to follow the rules yesterday or the day before, and they won’t ever have to follow them if the rules are eliminated.

But the Senate vote is nonetheless one big step toward a major victory for ISPs, one that would give them legal certainty if they continue to make aggressive moves into the advertising market. The Senate vote invoked the Congressional Review Act, which lets Congress eliminate regulations it doesn't like and prevent the agency from issuing similar regulations in the future. For ISPs, this is better than the FCC undoing its own rules, because it means a future FCC won't be able to reinstate them.

Unless the House or President Donald Trump oppose the Senate's action, ISPs will not have to worry about any strong privacy rules getting in the way of using your browsing history for profit. There won’t be any specific rules requiring them to get opt-in consent before sharing browsing history, even if that data is related to just one customer instead of being aggregated with other customers’ data in order to anonymize it.

Senate Democrats warned before yesterday’s vote that ISPs will be able to “draw a map” of where families shop and go to school, detect health information by seeing which illnesses they use the Internet to gather information on, and build profiles of customers' listening and viewing history.

The Senate vote was 50-48, with every Republican senator voting to kill privacy rules and every Democratic senator voting to preserve them.

gbasden · Post by **gbasden** » Sat Mar 25, 2017 1:30 am

It is amazing how the R's seem to come down on the amoral side of just about everything right now. Cartoon villains would be dinged as too unbelievable if they had this kind of record.

Daehawk · Post by **Daehawk** » Sat Mar 25, 2017 1:36 am

Stupid damn US government.

Kraken · Post by **Kraken** » Sat Mar 25, 2017 2:15 am

"Unless the House or President Donald Trump oppose the Senate's action, ISPs will not have to worry about any strong privacy rules getting in the way of using your browsing history for profit." Hah! Republicans put profit above all else.

KDH · Post by **KDH** » Wed Mar 29, 2017 4:59 am

.

The GOP Just Killed Consumer Broadband Privacy Protections

some of the article:

As most had expected, the House of Representatives today voted 215 to 205 to kill privacy rules protecting US broadband subscribers. If you're interested in a little thing called public accountability, you can find a breakdown of which Representatives voted for the measure here. The rules, approved by the FCC last fall, were slated to take effect this month.

But thanks to relentless lobbying by the broadband and marketing industries, the GOP quickly rushed to dismantle the rules at ISP request. The effort involved using the Congressional Review Act, which only lets Congress kill recently passed regulations, but prevents the regulator in question from implementing the same regulations down the road.

The rules would have required that ISPs transparently disclose private data collection and sales, while requiring ISPs have consumers opt in to the collection of more private financial or browsing history data.

Today's vote came after the Senate voted 50-48 last week to kille the rules. The vote to dismantle the rules is seen as one of the more brazen examples of pay-to-play politics in recent memory. It's a massive win for giant ISPs; especially those like AT&T and Verizon that are pushing hard into the Millennial advertising business.

The FCC pursued broadband privacy rules after companies like Verizon got caught covertly modifying packets to track users around the internet, and companies like AT&T and Comcast began exploring forcing users to pay more for privacy. Other ISPs, like CableOne, have crowed about using financial data to provide poor customers with even worse customer service.

But thanks to incumbent campaign contributions, it was apparently an easy trick for ISP lobbyists to convince lawmakers that the rules were "burdensome regulations" and not necessary consumer protections. ISP lobbyists had told many Representatives that this was just a power grab by the FCC, and the FTC has ample authority to police consumer privacy issues (it wasn't, and it doesn't). In fact, most ISPs have already made it clear they intent to use the common carrier exemptions carved out by AT&T lobbyists to dodge FTC oversight anyway.

I think all meetings with lobbyists should be recorded by a citizens agency and made public record .. even those on the golf course .. and while slurping soup at the brothels

Rip · Post by **Rip** » Wed Mar 29, 2017 5:03 am

The government keeps it all and exploits it, why shouldn't they?

Isgrimnur · Post by **Isgrimnur** » Wed Mar 29, 2017 7:45 am

That's a low-effort troll. Pathetic.

dbt1949 · Post by **dbt1949** » Wed Mar 29, 2017 12:41 pm

I got .dbt pretty cheap.

Isgrimnur · Post by **Isgrimnur** » Wed Mar 29, 2017 4:51 pm

WaPo breaks it down.

Many Internet service providers (ISPs) have privacy policies that may cover this type of information. If an ISP shares or sells an individual's personal information in violation of its own privacy policy, a state attorney general could take the company to court, said Travis LeBlanc, a former enforcement bureau chief at the Federal Communications Commission. State attorneys general could also sue ISPs whose data practices could be construed as “unfair” to other businesses. Meanwhile, the chairman of the Federal Communications Commission has said what's left of his agency's privacy authority still allows him to bring lawsuits against companies — he just won't be able to write rules that look similar to what Congress rejected this week.
...
Based on how companies use and share data today, it's still relatively unlikely that an ISP would simply hand over data for cash, particularly about an individual, said Chris Calabrese, policy vice president at the Center for Democracy and Technology.

Vorret · Post by **Vorret** » Wed Mar 29, 2017 4:58 pm

I'm baffled that as a company you can simply give a few hundred thousand dollard to politician and woopidoo change some laws in your favor.

That's as corrupted as it gets, why is it even allowed?

Moliere · Post by **Moliere** » Wed Mar 29, 2017 5:07 pm

Vorret wrote:I'm baffled that as a company you can simply give a few hundred thousand dollard to politician and woopidoo change some laws in your favor.

That's as corrupted as it gets, why is it even allowed?

Are you trying to put the entire Lobbyist industry out of business? Why do you hate America and jobs? What are you, Canadian?

Ralph-Wiggum · Post by **Ralph-Wiggum** » Wed Mar 29, 2017 6:07 pm

There's now a gofundme to buy the internet search history of everyone who voted to repeal the privacy laws. Pretty awesome. Of course, there's no way it's going to reach its goal of $500 million, but it will donate whatever it gets to the ACLU.

Enough · Post by **Enough** » Wed Mar 29, 2017 6:20 pm

Isgrimnur wrote:That's a low-effort troll. Pathetic.

It's what r/the_donald has turned into as well. Sort of just going through the motions now.

gbasden · Post by **gbasden** » Thu Mar 30, 2017 4:32 am

Enough wrote:
It's what r/the_donald has turned into as well. Sort of just going through the motions now.

Except a number of folks on r/the_donald are freaking out...

President Trump’s coming signature on a Republican bill to kill internet privacy rules is triggering thousands of people in the official Trump subreddit.
In the subreddit The_Donald, which has more than 600,000 subscribers as of this writing, Trump’s endorsement of a Republican proposal to gut Obama-era regulations prohibiting internet service providers (ISPs) from buying and selling the browser history of customers has even President Trump’s most ardent supporters threatening to withdraw their support of the candidate they’ve backed for more than a year.
...
“It’s way more important than the wall,” wrote Redditor ShillTeam6, though he acknowledged that online privacy still came second to Trump’s proposed tax plan that would give the richest 1 percent an average tax cut of $214,000 per year.
“I don’t buy the other people do it so the ISPs should allowed too argument. I get that it already happens and my stuff is already being sold and the genie is out of the bottle, but with fb, twitter, etc. I get a free service for it. With my ISP, I’m already paying them for my service,” ShillTeam6 added, underscoring their opposition to the proposal.
Tech website The Verge managed to capture one particularly revealing comment that has since been removed, which read, “Is there any way we can get god emperor and his advisers to veto this? I guess this’ll be a test to see if he is a real populist after all.”

I guess they are finally starting to notice he doesn't give a shit about them either.

KDH · Post by **KDH** » Fri Mar 31, 2017 8:45 pm

.

Trump sets sights on net neutrality

a pinch:

President Trump is spoiling for yet another fight and this time, much to the despair of internet experts, it is net neutrality.

At a White House press conference on Thursday, presidential spokesman Sean Spicer went out of his way to highlight the controversial topic and characterized it using the Trump Administration's favorite insults: that it was a product of the Obama Administration and was developed by "bureaucrats in Washington."

Spicer noted that the previous administration had reclassified cable companies as "common carriers" and by doing so was "picking winners and losers" by "treating ISPs as different to edge providers such as Google or Facebook." This was an "unfair regulatory framework" that he noted President Trump had "pledged to reverse."

The decision to bring up the highly contested issue of net neutrality, especially in the same week that Congress voted to get rid of privacy protections for ISPs, would usually be an odd one, but seems to follow the Trump Administration's scorched-earth approach to policy-making.

KDH · Post by **KDH** » Sat Apr 15, 2017 12:19 am

.

.. Why one Republican voted to kill privacy rules: “Nobody has to use the Internet”

@JimPressOffice (Jim Sensenbrenner\(R) Wisconsin) tells his constituents not to use the internet if they don't like his vote to sell out their privacy to advertisers.

the gist of the embedded video:

"Facebook is not comparable to an ISP. I do not have to go on Facebook," the town hall meeting attendee said. But when it comes to Internet service providers, the person said, "I have one choice. I don't have to go on Google. My ISP provider is different than those providers."

That's when Sensenbrenner said, "Nobody's got to use the Internet." He praised ISPs for "invest[ing] an awful lot of money in having almost universal service now." He then said, "I don't think it's my job to tell you that you cannot get advertising for your information being sold. My job, I think, is to tell you that you have the opportunity to do it, and then you take it upon yourself to make the choice."

People "ought to have more choices rather than fewer choices with the government controlling our everyday lives," he concluded, before moving on to the next question.

Daehawk · Post by **Daehawk** » Sat Apr 15, 2017 12:43 am

Fucking assholes. Hope they keel over.

KDH · Post by **KDH** » Thu Apr 20, 2017 3:03 pm

.

.. Google will add an ad blocker to all versions of Chrome Web browser

a few select morsels

Google, the biggest Web advertising company in the world, is planning to build an ad blocker into Google Chrome, the world's most popular Web browser.

Today Chrome covers over 50 percent of the browsing market, according to Net Market Share, and Google would kill its income if it started blocking Google ads.

Of course, Google won't block Google ads. Instead, according to the report, Chrome will target "unacceptable ads" as defined by the Coalition for Better Ads. The Coalition for Better Ads, which counts Google and Facebook among its members, has a page of "least preferred ad experiences" up on its website. This page calls out pop-ups, autoplaying video ads with sound, interstitial ads with countdowns, and large "sticky" ads as "below the threshold of consumer acceptability."

"in one possible application Google is considering," Google could block all ads on a site that doesn't comply with the rules, rather than just block offending ads. Presumably this would stop websites from using a mix of "acceptable" and "unacceptable" ads with the hope that the "unacceptable" ads are seen by non-Chrome users, since they risk losing out on all revenue from all Chrome users.

KDH · Post by **KDH** » Tue May 30, 2017 9:44 pm

...

.... Chinese law requiring internet companies to spy on users comes into effect this week

While China has enlisted its internet giants -- such as Weibo -- in its system of social control and surveillance for years, a new "cyber security law" will come into effect on Thursday that expands and formalizes this role for tech companies, with implications for non-Chinese companies doing business in China.

The law -- passed last November by the rubberstamp Chinese parliament -- requires internet firms to surveil and retain all user communications, while implementing penalties for abuse of this information.

Until now, China's data industry has had no overarching data protection framework, being governed instead by loosely defined laws.

However, overseas critics say the new law threatens to shut foreign technology companies out of sectors the country deems "critical", and includes contentious requirements for security reviews and data stored on servers in China.

.... also, from: reuters.com

China, battling increased threats from cyber-terrorism and hacking, will adopt from Thursday a controversial law that mandates strict data surveillance and storage for firms working in the country, the official Xinhua news agency said.

The law, passed in November by the country's largely rubber-stamp parliament, bans online service providers from collecting and selling users' personal information, and gives users the right to have their information deleted, in cases of abuse.

"Those who violate the provisions and infringe on personal information will face hefty fines," the news agency said on Monday, without elaborating.

Reuters reported this month that overseas business groups were pushing Chinese regulators to delay implementation of the law, saying the rules would severely hurt activities.

Until now, China's data industry has had no overarching data protection framework, being governed instead by loosely defined laws.

However, overseas critics say the new law threatens to shut foreign technology companies out of sectors the country deems "critical", and includes contentious requirements for security reviews and data stored on servers in China.

dbt1949 · Post by **dbt1949** » Wed May 31, 2017 1:10 am

How do I turn off all the auto play videos from all the sites? Permanently.

Carpet_pissr · Post by **Carpet_pissr** » Wed May 31, 2017 7:28 am

Yes, please. That's a permanent deal-breaker for me.

gilraen · Post by **gilraen** » Wed May 31, 2017 10:03 am

dbt1949 wrote:How do I turn off all the auto play videos from all the sites? Permanently.

PCWorld's instructions on changing Flash settings that should fix most auto-play videos - ironically, that page itself has an auto-play video.