UK registrars angry with Nominet

More than 15 UK registrars are angry with Nominet’s proposed .uk right of registration (ROR) release process planned for 1st July – 5th July 2019.

Over 3 million remaining .uk rights are set to be released over the coming few weeks and so far and the registrars think the whole process is unfair.

The registrars have created a website and written an open letter to Nominet.

Here is their open letter:

Dear Nominet Board,

We are a group of Nominet registrars and stakeholders who are extremely disappointed with the proposed .uk right of registration (ROR) release process planned for 1st July – 5th July 2019.

Over 3 million remaining .uk rights are set to be released over the coming few weeks and so far, Nominet has proposed what we consider to be unfair and unequal access to those remaining .uk rights.

In particular we feel that:

• The Registrar sign up process for this release was not communicated appropriately and not open long enough (8th April to 3rd May 2019). Several of the signatories below have been refused access even though the release isn’t until July 2019.

• The Registrar credit limits vs requests per minute were not communicated appropriately prior to signup. The tiers of credit £450 (6 per minute), £4500 (9 per minute), £45,000 (60 per minute), £90,000 (150 per minute) are also disproportionately unfair to our business models.

• Technically we do not have the capacity or programming skills to engineer a time sensitive EPP script by 1st July as we normally use the Web Domain Manager (WDM) or have existing EPP scripts that need to be re-written for this release.

• In addition to this many of us below have a shared concern that these 3 million .uk rights are a valuable national asset and could be worth millions of pounds. When Nominet auctioned one & two-character names it raised £3 million for the Nominet Trust.

• In our view the majority of the general public also doesn’t know about this release. Many brand owners have not registered their trademarks such as Asda.uk and Audi.uk either.

We therefore call upon Nominet to:

1. Re-open the release signup for registrars
2. Review the credit limits and requests per minute
3. Provide EPP connection code or WDM access for registrars
4. Email every .uk rights holder during the promotion period
5. Increase awareness substantially before 25th June

Yours Sincerely,

Nominet Registrars:

Andrew Bennett – Netistrar Ltd – NETISTRAR
Lucien Taylor – Oxford Information Labs Ltd – NETISTRAR
Angelica Barrow – Any-Web Ltd – WEBHOUND
Tony Brown – Starworks Ltd – STARWORKS
Dale Hubbard – Hubbard Media – HUBBARD-MEDIA
Steven Morgan – Look2 Services – LOOK2
D Iddins – NOMAD
George Marshall – MARSHALL
Islam Hegazy – HEGAZY
Serdinc Yilmaz – TURNIC-TR
Will Bonning – WEB-5
Karl Beaney – BEANEYSDESIGN
Murray Gardener – MURRAY
Reza Sobati – Vital Domains Ltd – REZASOBATI
Jonathan Ratcliffe – Attack Ltd – ATTACK
Will Broome – Stung Ltd – STUNG

Stakeholders:

Jim Davies (DRS Solicitor)
Simon Coopey – SimonCoopey.net

UPDATE (there are now over 25 registrars):

Nominet Registrars:

• Andrew Bennett – Netistrar Ltd – NETISTRAR
• Angelica Barrow – Any-Web Ltd – WEBHOUND
• Tony Brown – Starworks Ltd – STARWORKS
• Dale Hubbard – Hubbard Media – HUBBARD-MEDIA
• Steven Morgan – Look2 Services – LOOK2
• D Iddins – NOMAD
• George Marshall – MARSHALL
• Islam Hegazy – HEGAZY
• Serdinc Yilmaz – TURNIC-TR
• Will Bonning – WEB-5
• Karl Beaney – BEANEYSDESIGN
• Murray Gardener – MURRAY
• Reza Sobati – Vital Domains Ltd – REZASOBATI
• Jonathan Ratcliffe – Attack Ltd – ATTACK
• Will Broome – Stung Ltd – STUNG
• James Wittams-Smith – Searchlight Digital Ltd – SEARCHLIGHT
• Angus Hanton – Giant Games Ltd – GIRAFFE
• Servitor Ltd – SERVITOR
• Simon Fox – FAIRY
• Dan Rodgers – Domain Registrar Services Ltd – ALLTHEDOMAINS
• David Blackburn – Paragon Ltd – BLUEROCK
• Rob Taylor – Hey.co.uk Ltd – HEY
• Aaron Clifford – ADOMAINS
• Tim Boswell – Stitchbob Ltd – STITCHBOB

Stakeholders:

• Lucien Taylor – Oxford Information Labs Ltd
• Jim Davies (DRS Solicitor)
• Simon Coopey – SimonCoopey.net