back to article Sir Michael Lyons tells .uk registry Nominet: Time to grow up

A long-awaited review into the future of .uk registry operator Nominet by former chairman of the BBC Trust has told the company it's time to grow up. Sir Michael Lyons' review [PDF] was completed and sent to Nominet's Board in October, but was only published Thursday along with the Board's response [PDF] to his 19 …

  1. Ian 55

    Get rid of the lot of them, now

    They cannot even organise a domain launch. Does anyone think that .uk has been a success? Any domain that has to resort to free taster years in order to get anyone to register it was not wanted.

    1. Yes Me Silver badge

      Re: Get rid of the lot of them, now

      Er, what? .uk has existed since some time in the 1980s. The question of whether it was wanted was answered long before Nominet existed.

      What went wrong, and still seems to be going wrong, was the change of direction from thinking of it as a public good run at cost and not for profit, to thinking of it as a pseudocommercial operation. Same problem as ICANN, but not so bad. Greed.

  2. Pascal Monett Silver badge

    Nominet board members

    Is this a training ground to become ICANN board members ?

    From what I've read here, it sounds like a rather excellent fit.

  3. Paul IT
    WTF?

    Scumbags every day

    I used to drive past their offices in Oxford every day and wished I could throw a brick through their posh offices as they were not for profit, but all the cars in car park were Mercedes, bmw and audi. In the past, the high costs of changing a name on a domain name were ridiculous and it was obvious where the money was spent. At least now the cars in the car park include Mini's and Fiesta's.

    1. allthecoolshortnamesweretaken

      Re: Scumbags every day

      Technically (in both meanings) a present-day Mini is a BMW. Sorry.

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Scumbags every day

      You mean when we were at Sandy Lane, off the ring road? Before we moved to the science park? You may have the wrong car park mate. You could barely see ours from the road, and the cars were far from posh.

      In fact, the only time I can remember posh cars was when we briefly had a famous lawyer and car collector as our Chair, and he visited once in a blue moon.

      I feel you may be talking nonsense.

  4. msknight

    I wish...

    ...I could up thumb an article... or by Lyons a pint... or get him a medal for bravery in the line of fire... or something...

  5. Will Godfrey Silver badge
    Unhappy

    Is it something in the water?

    What is it about these Internet organisations? They even seem to out-arrogance politicians. In fact I surprised governments put up with such competition.

    1. annodomini2

      Re: Is it something in the water?

      Jobs for their idiot mates, keeping them away from where they can do real damage.

    2. I ain't Spartacus Gold badge
      Devil

      Re: Is it something in the water?

      I suspect it's because they've got nothing to do any more.

      Sure, there's a bit of housekeeping, and taking on new staff to replace people that leave. But they've all now got a nice steady income, and a bunch of more or less organised procedures on how to handle stuff. So what's left? International junkets to have arguments about changing things, or not doing so. And then looking at the pretty decent cashflows and thinking: How can I increase them and make a nice bonus for myself?

      The devil makes work for idle hands.

  6. This post has been deleted by its author

  7. Disgruntled of TW
    Facepalm

    Poor, poor Nominet behaviour ....

    Not everything is about money and power. Oh wait ...

  8. David Roberts

    Still a small amateur committee

    Like the user groups from 30 years ago.

    Back in the day all you had to be were enthusiasts who would do all the boring stuff that nobody else could be arsed to. Willingness was the main qualification. Transitioning to a fully accountable public organisation from a geek club in a garden shed should have been possible by now.

    However it looks like the focus still needs some adjustment.

  9. Vince

    Nominet long went out of favour in my books. The self-righteous attitude they display is not even thinly veiled anymore, and anyone who has to deal with them knows.

    It's actually become pointless trying to respond to any "consultation" because they don't actually give a toss - just like this (and I imagine that also suits them just fine!). If you say you don't want what they suggest, they'll just ignore you, do it anyhow, or do it a different way so you can't object. Whilst the wording used by El Reg isn't of course what they actually said, it is I would wager pretty close to what they *actually* think internally.

    There was a time where I felt that Nominet was acting in the interests of the membership and stakeholders as they put it, but in case it wasn't obvious from the above, no longer feel that way and indeed don't really promote Nominet controlled domains anymore.

  10. Alan Brown Silver badge

    They've been taking lessons...

    ...from New Zealand.

    The Domainz mess was pretty similar, right down to the wanting to hire consultants who gave answers the board wanted to hear, etc.

    In the end it took a membership revolt to get rid of the massively inflated egos, one of whom went on to front ICANN and from whom ICAN has taken its cues going forward.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: They've been taking lessons...

      Our (Nominet's) IT Director left Nominet to run that registry. Jay Daley.

  11. This post has been deleted by its author

  12. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Hundreds of generously paid staff and even more generously paid board to manage a fairly simple database, and in my personal experience, screw it up (disputed my ownership of a domain I'd held since Willie Black was in charge, released another name with no warning, no period of suspension, and despite having 9 months to run - for what turned out to be a completely spurious reason).

    And despite massive salaries and profits they're about to hike prices by 50%!

    Anyone know just how you get tickets to ride this gravy train?

    As for the offer of the bare .uk for .co.uk domain name owners - unwanted and unnecessary, merely an opportunity to double nominet's income. So far take up has been very limited. Even with "free first year" offers. Many of the "household names" who bought the variant haven't bothered to point the name at their current website. The lawyers and Nominet dispute resolution service (£££) will have a field day when Nominet release the currently "reserved for .co.uk name holders variant" and scammers start buying and holding the .co.uk to ransom. Or when competitors buy the variant and infringe the rights of the .co.uk registrant.

    1. Richard Cranium

      It's a scam

      Query to 123reg:

      My 123-reg invoice to renew one .co.uk domain for 2 years is £16.78 in 2014 the same cost £8.38 (inc VAT)

      123reg response:

      Nominet, the registry for all .UK domain names, has decided to increase their domain prices. Therefore, we are updating our prices in line with Nominet’s industry standard.

      The new pricing structure standardises the price of all .UK domain names (including .CO.UK, .ME.UK and .ORG.UK) to £6.99+VAT a year, regardless of the length of registration period.

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