Re: Availability of aggregate repository data

[Kent Crispin <kent@songbird.com>]

Robert Frank allegedly said:
>
[...] 
>To expect
> professional trademark search firms to conduct a whois on all
> matches and fuzzy matches gets us back into the mess we presently
> find ourselves with NSI.

Point of view.  This is something I like about NSI.

>  We presently run over 1,000 whois queries
> per day to find the details for the matches and fuzzy matches related 
> to the trademarks we are searching.  Often it takes longer to run the whois
> queries than it takes to do the entire rest of the search.

Only a thousand?  That's nothing, if you have automated it.

>  Adding on that 
> there will be  several places that we will have to go to get the various
> whois queries run and you will see fees for professional domain name
> searches going through the roof (and timelines for completing
> searches slowing down which diminishes the "I want my name
> right now" forces.)

I doubt it.  With automation you should be able to get a thousand 
queries in a few minutes.

> I don't buy the privacy issue. 
[...]
> And several scoundrels
> have also tracked trademark filings and as soon as the filing hit the
> public search room, filed for a domain name identical to the trademark.
> Then they would contact the trademark owner and offer to sell them
> the domain name.  

I notice you characterize them as scoundrels.  Scoundrels can do even 
more with aggregate data.  Why do you want to help scoundrels?  Your 
reasoning is 


> The point is that there will always be those who 
> will figure out a way to rip-off the system and we can't build a system
> that is 100% abuse proof.

So -- things can't be perfect, so we might as well contribute to the 
problem? 

> I was contacted by a business in California who had downloaded all
> the domain names from Internic. Then, over a two week period they
> conducted a whois on all 500,000 domain names (this was last year).
> He would sell me, for $12,000 per year, the database, complete with
> all the guts, plus updates every two weeks.  The point being that if
> you are concerned about privacy and you release the domain names
> in one swoop and allow whois for the details, someone will eventually
> compile all the information and your privacy concerns went down the
> tubes.

Not if it is illegal to distribute that data, which it may well be in 
some jurisdictions.  Hopefully it will become illegal in more places, 
and we won't have to have this discussion.  Personally I value 
individual privacy far more than I value easy trademark searches.

Remember that not all domain names are businesses, and in time the 
number of domains that just belong to individuals will grow.  The net 
has to be just as sensitive to the concerns of individuals as it does 
to businesses.

-- 
Kent Crispin				"No reason to get excited",
kent@songbird.com,kc@llnl.gov		the thief he kindly spoke...
PGP fingerprint:   5A 16 DA 04 31 33 40 1E  87 DA 29 02 97 A3 46 2F