Jim, please forward to the appropriate lists, as I'm not subscribed to most of them) More than 6 months ago, when I was telling each and everyone of you about the problems with the .bg TLDA (see details at http://www.bol.bg/protest/ - English version is also available), Mr. Postel answered me that there's no conflict of interests, since I am the only one to have written him?! The Bulgarian TLDA is behaving in total disaccordance with the current RIPE, IANA and Bulgarian Laws; they are combining at the same time ISP and a public service. They've decided to introduce a tax for registering new domain ($ 50), plus a yearly tax ($ 50); that's more than twice as high as in the US, yet in Bulgaria average monthly payment is $ 100! This brings them about $ 20-30 thousand per year - money that could be used for the good of all the Internet in Bulgaria, and not only for the profit of one private company which is misusing it's monopolist situation Noone from abroad except for 8 European ISOC (http://www.isoc.bg/disc_e.htm) representatives supported us in our protest. Mr. Postel is obviously and unonditionally taking side of the current TLDA in Bulgaria, eventhough they've shown their disrespect towards the Internet community in the country. He could have at least asked for more details from the Internet Society - Bulgaria, and from other interested parties to learn the trutn. regards, Veni Markovski, Chairman, the Internet Society - Bulgaria p.o.box 71, Sofia 1164, Bulgaria phone +359-2-9809666, phone/fax: () 9806431 p.s. off topic. I had a domain veni.bg, which was stopped, eventhough I've paid in advance some money, and have specifically expressed my interest in keeping my domain but in return for my money I wanted a contract from the .bg TLDA. The contract was never received, but the domain was stopped. Now I had to register veni.com to be able to have private correspondence.

-----Original Message----- From: mueller <mueller at syr.edu> To: apple at apnic.net <apple at apnic.net>; anr-talk at anr.org <anr-talk at anr.org> Date: Sunday, August 02, 1998 11:34 AM Subject: Abuse of ccTLD powers

...

Apple members: If you read the following news article, you will see how control of a ccTLD can be abused for economic reasons. This is why many of us coming out of Geneva are concerned about the efforts of ccTLD registrars to organize themselves as a political bloc. I hope any apple member who is interested in maintaining a free and open Internet will attend the Singapore meeting with this in mind. I also hope that the Asia Pacific Internet Association members who are part of the IFWP steering committee will make it clear that they oppose such absuses, otherwise they may begin to lose the trust of the international community. --MM

http://www.sjmercury.com/asia/center/japan080198.htm

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Milton,

This is not the only ccTLD with such practices. Jon Postel's IANA has allowed people to obtain top level domains and claim they have the support of the government. When challenged, they claim they have the support of the people. When really challenged, they claim to have the support of ISPs. In some cases, they are that ISP. In other words, they endorse themselves.

This is one of the reasons why experts in this area have concluded that TLDs should be TLDs because there is no way to clean up the existing mess and little benefit in doing it. The general public needs to be better educated about the fraud and corruption in ccTLDs. In some areas of the world, this is done and their solution is to send everyone to .COM. That is one of the reasons why it is so crowded.

Jim Fleming Unir Corporation - http://www.unir.com

-------- Logged at Thu Aug 27 18:22:08 MET DST 1998 ---------