David,

>> 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.

I'm not really focussing on the existing arrangements - rather I'm trying
to identify some issues that might need resolution in any attempt to set up
a solution that is robust, equitable, responsive, etc, for the longer term.

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

In general, I tend to agree with that philosophy, but I think introducing multiple
registrars - even in SLDs like .edu.au and .asn.au, not to mention .com.au
and .net .au - raises some issues that to date have not had to be addressed.

One of those issues is whether cross subsidisation should exist in the future
(regardless of what has happened in the past).  If no, then its easy - we just
let any costs fall where they may.  If yes, then we need to think about who
subsidises who ('whom' for the pedants :) ) and what mechanism is used for
one group to pick up the tab for the others.

One of the reasons there have not been major issues in .asn.au, .edu.au so
far is that they have each had one Registrar, who has been pretty committed
to providing those domains as a public service and supporting the idea that
there should be some restrictions on what those domains should be used for.

If we say "ok, we're now going to let multiple Registrar's operate in those
SLDs" and we get, say 10 or 20 folks being Registrars in each of those domains,
are we confident that all of those Registrars will have the same 'public good' values
as the existing ones?

Regards, Mark