.Jobs debate “ends” Thursday.
I wrote last month about a move to open up the .jobs domain name. Currently only companies can register .jobs domains, and only with their company name (e.g. ATT.jobs). The group behind this sponsored TLD wants to open it up, with the idea of creating a ton of (million?) job boards using the domains. From Policy.jobs:
Previously, Employ Media [which runs .jobs under contract] began the process of creating a self-managed class of names in the .jobs tld. Called the shared domain beta test, many non-“companyname” .jobs domains were (and in many cases still are) registered to Employ Media. Employ Media “used” these domains in the DNS by redirecting them to a third party (the Direct Employers Association), who themselves “used” the domains by providing uniform, consistent content to all the domains in the shared beta test.
Essentially, .jobs has found a backdoor way to enter as an sTLD and create a structure that will allow it to operate as an open gTLD before other new gTLDs are launched, if its plans are approved. And, much like .travel, average joe’s probably won’t be able to get their hands on the good domain names because they will be kept under an arrangement with the registry to create job boards.
Plenty of people have voiced their opinions in a public comment period that ends tomorrow. It seems that most of the opposition is coming from job board owners, who complain both of new competition and lack of transparency. Those in favor include some members of Society for Human Resource Management, which makes policy decisions regarding .jobs under the .jobs charter. Of course, the .jobs registry and operator Employ Media stands to profit from this move.
Trusty old .jobs, what a great reminder of better times when there were jobs to be had. Seems a little pointless now 🙂
Hopefully they won’t run into the same situation dotTravel did by restricting sales to the point that they lost momentum when they finally opened it up. Will be interesting to see if their marketing strategy takes off.
And, much like .travel, average joe’s probably won’t be able to get their hands on the good domain names because they will be kept under an arrangement with the registry to create job boards.
It’s a pity RSEP is used in this way and I guess ICANN will have to guard against it becoming a predominantly one way street where contracted parties simply ask for amendments that earn them more revenue rather than a mechanism to improve the workings of the DNS overall.
It will be interesting to see if ICANN reject this request as most of the objections seem to be by people involved in the jobs industry and likely to be directly disadvantaged by ICANN amending its own agreement with its contracted party [.jobs registry] for the advantage of the contracted party.