] 2. Financial support of the DNS system
] Should all users contribute financially to the support of the DNS system,
] or should there be some cross subsidisation?  This is a 'morality' sort of
] issue - there's no right or wrong on this one, it's going to be a matter or
] individual opinion for everyone.

Given the context in which the Australian DNS system has developed, this
question looks very much like a red herring to me.  Perhaps Mark isn't
aware of some of the finer details of DNS history in Australia.

If Geoff or his employer was receiving money which came from registrants
or registrars in other *.au domains, then that would be cross-subsidisation.

Geoff does not receive any money for looking after edu.au or gov.au.
In fact through AUNIC, Geoff (and/or his employer) are providing services 
which are used for com.au.  (The equivalent in the USA is run by InterNIC,
and presumably part of the US$35/year they charge for domain names covers
maintenance of their whois database.)

I'm not suggesting that Geoff is complaining about this situation.
It seems that he has taken the approach of automating almost all of
the work, rather than charging for it.  Allowing "self-service" for
basic requests, with up-to-date information (including status) and
forms/CGIs on a Web page probably helps a lot too.

A more appropriate question about edu.au/gov.au would be:
	If it ain't broke, why try to "fix" it?

Unless of course someone can point to a number of applicants who
meet the criteria for edu.au/gov.au and are having trouble (eg: long
delays, spurious rejections) through no fault of their own.
__________________________________________________________________________
 David Keegel <djk&#167;cyber.com.au>  URL: http://www.cyber.com.au/users/djk/
Cybersource P/L: Unix Systems Administration and TCP/IP network management