2.
Industry Update
Australian
watchdog acts against domain name fraudster
The
Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) has
taken a businessman to court, alleging that he tried to
trick them into paying a fee for an online business listings
directory.
The
scam came to light when businesses complained to the watchdog
that they were deceived into handing over $330 for what
they thought was registration renewal to the Australian
domain name registry. In fact, the company, .com.au Register,
is not even a domain name registrar, but merely a directory
of business names with details of Internet addresses.
The
ACCC is alleging misleading and deceptive conduct in breach
of fair trading provisions of the Trade Practices Act.
ICANN
decision blasted by board member
ICANN
(the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers)
was heavily criticised this week by one of its own board
members, Cisco Systems Engineer Karl Auerbach, who claimed
that it had violated its own bylaws by approving a contract
that could see Verisign with near permanent control over
the '.com' address space. The contract would allow Verisign
to maintain control of the dot-com database until 2007.
"This
was not a win for the Internet community. This was a win
for some business interests, Verisign in particular. The
Department of Commerce has a responsibility to the citizens
of the United States who have been left out of the benefits
of this contract," Auerbach said. The decision still
has to be approved by the Department of Commerce.
Espanol.com
assets for sale
Online
auction site, bid4assets.com is selling assets from defunct
portal Espagnol.com and 88 other Spanish and Portuguese
domain names. The portal was formed two years ago targeting
Spanish speakers around the world. Despite the Latino community
being one of the fastest-growing demographic groups in the
U.S., the company laid off nearly all its staff last summer
and filed for bankruptcy in September.
3.
Fact
of the Week
Although
domain name registration is still largely concentrated in
the States, domain name registrations are steadily diffusing
to the rest of the world, as the graph below shows.
4.
Tip of the Week
How
your home PC can help to defeat cancer
How
much time does your computer spend sitting idle each day?
Even the busiest among us can honestly say that for a few
minutes each day, their PC is free. In fact, studies have
shown that on average an office worker uses only 20 percent
of the power available on his or her PC.
Researchers
at the Centre for Drug Discovery at Oxford University have
just released a computer program that will test a list of
molecules against three-dimensional models of proteins known
to cause cancer.
The
program works as a screensaver when users are not actively
working on their PC, so there's no need to worry about the
war against cancer interrupting their own work. Go to the
site at www.ud.com
to find out how you can help.
