Excerpt from Paolo Bevilacqua's mail:
... For you it is 10 minutes but for 80% of the people it is about 30 minutes and often more. "Hello, I'd like a domain name." "Ok, what is your primary and secondary DNS?" "My what!!??" explain, explain, explain, "But all I want is tada.co.cc! I don't have a Unix system or Windows NT. I am dialing into crISP and I don't want to be user@crISP.net"
and on and on and on.
And if you are not polite and helpful, you get a lawyers letter for "denial of service" and "monopolization".
So NICs have to *average* out the time spent. Not all users are as up to date as you are.
I don't think that a delegated TLD registry should necessarely cope with such issues. The InterNIC (and RIPE) model is exemplar. They have clear, published rules, a standard procedure and a ticketing system. They point the misinformed user to books or other info about the DNS. Fax submissions and answers are considered, but email has to be the standard. Phone support should not be given, except for emergencies about pollutioned zones or similar. This should keep the human costs to the minimum.
As far as I know: 1- RIPE does not manage any TLD. It manages IP address space allocation. 2- RIPE-NCC staff spends many hours on any possible communication mean (phone, fax, e-mail, meetings, training courses, etc) to train new providers (new registries). That is an unavoidable task of every conscious Network Information Center. The efforts of RIPE-NCC and of the other european NICs have greatly contributed in making the Internet success in Europe. That has some costs... ---------- ---------- Antonio_Blasco Bonito E-Mail: bonito@nis.garr.it GARR - Network Information Service c=it;a=garr;p=garr;o=nis;s=bonito c/o CNUCE - Istituto del CNR Tel: +39 50 593246 Via S. Maria, 36 Fax: +39 50 904052 I-56126 PISA Telex: 500371 CNUCE I Italy Url: http://www.nis.garr.it/nis/staff/bonito.html ---------- ----------