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Path: utzoo!mnetor!seismo!decuac!grebyn!karl
From: karl@grebyn.COM (Karl A. Nyberg)
Newsgroups: comp.mail.uucp
Subject: Re: Justifying uucp domain registry
Message-ID: <609@grebyn.COM>
Date: Fri, 29-May-87 10:19:59 EDT
Article-I.D.: grebyn.609
Posted: Fri May 29 10:19:59 1987
Date-Received: Sun, 31-May-87 03:04:21 EDT
References: <855@rtech.UUCP>
Organization: Grebyn Corporation; Vienna, VA
Lines: 48

In article <855@rtech.UUCP>, daveb@rtech.UUCP (Dave Brower) writes:
> Registering our domain is the right and sensible thing to do. 
> Unfortunately, the people holding purse strings do not seem to
> understand:
> 
> 	"What do we get out of it that justifies us paying $150?"

For starters, it helps if you hold the purse strings (I happen to own the
company) - as the golden rule says:

	Them what's got the gold makes the rules...

I'm sure that the initial costs of setting the database up, providing the
initial software etc., maintaining correspondence with the various entities,
etc. must be some of the things included in that cost.  I, for one, have
been quite pleased that the UUCP domain project has registered my top level
domain with the DDN Network Information Center.  At the moment, I'm still a
one person company, but the timesharing users on my system are coming to
appreciate the fact that people from various networks (DDN, BITNET, etc.)
can send mail to them with great ease.  Thus, for me, it's an added service
that I provide to my users, and they appreciate it (some even put it on
their business cards, stationery, etc.)  I also enjoy a fair amount of envy
when I give people my net address, and it doesn't have all these percent
signs, exclamation marks, etc.  I may not be able to afford a Rolls, but I
can afford a top level domain (if it were $500, that would be a different
story).

I also don't expect that the folks at NIC would like to have to interface to
all the small companies (you can't get much smaller), unless we wanted to
pay them the money...  I know that the NIC provides services for the DDN
subscribers (user lists, network configuration management, etc.).  I figure
that I'm getting some part of this for my money as well.

Perhaps the costs in the beginning are a little steeper than might be found
out after running the system a while.  There's always startup overhead, and
I'm certain that as time goes on, better (read faster / cheaper, etc.)
methods will be found for providing the services that will help bring the
costs down.

Finally, I have to admit, I got on this bandwagon real early, and was a
guinea pig for the early software, the registration process, etc., and so
the first six months of service this year have been free (they called it
"grandfathering").  As they also say, "the check is in the mail"...

-- Karl -- 
DDN:	nyberg@ada20.isi.edu
INET:   karl@grebyn.com - AKA - karl%grebyn.com@seismo.css.gov
uucp:   {decuac, seismo}!grebyn!karl