January 15, 2006

Sleazy DNS Registrar Practices

Today I went through the recurring, periodic ritual of paying bills.

One bill caught my eye as strange - and after a second look it proved to be more than strange, it was downright sleazy.

I have one domain remaining with Network Solutions - I had paid up for several years and was simply waiting until near the end of the term before moving it to someone else.  The expiration date is in December of 2006.  Note, that's 2006, not 2005.

What I received was an invoice to renew the name - nearly a full year in advance of the actual end of the current registration period.

Is Network Solutions that broke or that sleazy that it starts to send out bills a year in advance?

Sheesh, the domain name business is so unseemly that it makes used car sales positively ethical by comparison.  Thanks ICANN for creating this awful system and imposing it upon us.

Posted by karl at January 15, 2006 9:05 PM