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Ask HN: Why do we pay for domain names?

12 points by ChristianBundy ↗ HN
There are over 100 million domain names registered, which I'll assume average out at $15/year (being conservative). All said and done, that means $1.5 billion in revenue for the countries and corporations that own TLDs, which were assigned by ICANN.

Should DNS be crowdsourced, with the cost of the domain name accurately reflecting the cost of operating the DNS network? Even at $0.01 per domain name per year, we would still have $100,000 to operate the DNS network.

Is there something I haven't considered, or does the current system need to be replaced?

10 comments

[ 4.4 ms ] story [ 85.8 ms ] thread
zellio
Monopoly and regulation. Rather, monopoly is why it costs so damn much. Regulation is necessary because we need to have one internet, not many.
martey
If domain names cost $0.01 a year, wouldn't domain squatting become worse?
ChristianBundy
I look at it like emails – yes, we could make it so that it costs $0.50 to send an email, and this would make less people spam... but it isn't an elegant solution.

I think that domain name squatters should be flagged and the domains should be removed if they aren't being used appropriately. Furthermore, bulk domain registration should be banned – I can't think of a simple reason that this should be allowed.

argonaut
How is that inelegant? That would be a fantastic solution to email spam!

> I think that domain name squatters should be flagged and the domains should be removed if they aren't being used appropriately.

Who gets to flag squatters? How do we define "used appropriately?" Who gets to decide whether a squatter meets that definition?

A system of flagging is more complicated than you think.

catinsocks
Sure have it cost $0.01 and then for your $0.01 you can get your very own thisismyuniquedomainname4311.com because everyone else got there before you.
jeorgun
The main answer seems to be `domain squatting'. Obviously this is a definite concern, but couldn't it also be solved by having TLD owners instituting some requirement to the effect of ``if you've owned your domain for over a year but still haven't used it for anything, we're taking it back''?

Of course, that leads to concerns over what qualifies as `using', but I'd imagine something could be worked out.

weddpros
In a sense, domain names are similar to (software) patents. They're considered private property. Which is, imho, a very bad idea. It's a kind of legal extortion, just like patent trolls and software patents in general. And unused domain names ownership hurt entrepreneurship the same way patents hurt it.