VeriSign Begins To Back-Pedal
from the let's-rethink-this... dept
Not a huge surprise based on the volume of the backlash, but VeriSign is now starting to back away from their plan to hijack all mistyped web traffic. It's not a complete turnaround, but they say they'll make some adjustments to make sure the new system won't cause problems for spam filters.
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Just Plain Wrong But Not For Technical Reasons
Verisign should not be allowed to own this Internet traffic.
The problem is that instead of working to get Verisign to turn this off because it is just plain wrong, people are coming up with a bunch of technical reasons why it is bad. For example, spam filters that check to see if the domain exists. The result is that Verisign will come up with some way to fix the technical issues, but they will still own this traffic that does not belong to them.
This is a many-multi-million dollar tool for Verisign, they are not going to back down. I think they will just ride out the storm and wait for the inevitable calm ahead.
Unfortunately one cannot turn this off the way you can turn off Internet Explorer's action that takes you to the MSN search site. And even if you could turn it off, there are millions of non-technical people who wil lhave no idea what to do and will generate tons of money for Verisign.
It seems ridiculous to me that the Verisign site includes a terms of service declaration, but if you do not agree to those terms there is no way to not use the "service".
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