>The .AU top level domain is setup the way DNS was intended - in an
>hierarchical fashion.

Intended?  That's debateable.  DNS was created so as to replace the HOSTS
file and allow easier administration.  There was no intention that it be
further made heiracical, although that's just an option.

Surely your not saying that France, which has had Minitel, since what the
1980's maybe earlier, in just about every CBD home isn't advanced and well
thought out?

>.AU contains 8 active domains

11 actually.  

>.NET.AU contains thousands of domains
>.COM.AU contains 10's of thousands of domains
>(I'm guessing here, but I'd say those figures are in the right ball-park)

10's maybe not more than around 20,000 if lucky. I haven't run a parser of
the files for a while.

conf.au
info.au
csiro.au
gov.au

I had a list somewhere.

>> Aren't there any Australian company, or organization, which would want
>> to have its site under its .AU name ?

Hundreds would love to get rid of the COM.

>There are literally thousands of companies with their sites under .AU,
>just not directly under .AU.
>
>> http://www.ibm.fr
>> http://www.lotus.fr
>> http://www.apple.fr
>> http://www.coca-cola.fr
>
>ibm.com.au, lotus.com.au, apple.com.au and coke.com.au all exist, all exactly
>where they should under .COM.AU

I wonder for how long?

>> You'd benefit from a .AU zone really competitive...
>
>No, we wouldnt. We would benefit from a competitive .COM.AU domain, but I
>doubt anyone will argue too hard about that...

Well that would be a start, but perhaps the way to do that is to make AU
itself competitive.  That's an idea I haven't yet seen approached.

We should listen to other peoples experience and comments.  Australia is a
VERY VERY long way behind in the internet game.