[svlug] Registrars?

[Ian Kluft]

>From: Greg Herlein <gherlein at herlein.com>
>Well, Registrar.com got bought by Verisign, who has proven to be
>a royal pain in the rear this week...  and since I am pondering
>creating a new domain for a project, I'm curious who else is
>still in the registrar market.
>
>Can anyone recommend a good registrar?

I moved all my domains from Verisign/NetSoil to Domain Discover.
I recently finished moving the last of them there.

I found them a couple years ago through a domain buyer's guide that
unfortunatley has since shut down.  They compared registrars based
on price, service, and registration agreements.

For example, with Verisign/NetSoil, you can register the domain.  But
they own it according to the agreement.  I decided that was an important
criteria to fix.  But it eliminated all the most inexpensive registrars
at the time.  I won't try to say that the one I found is the only good
one - undoubtedly there are others.  But those are the criteria you
should look at when selecting a registrar.

Domain Discover ( http://www.domaindiscover.com/ ) looked to me like one
of the best by the criteria...
* Almost everything can be done by self-service through their web interface
* Their web site behaves well with Mozilla and Netscape.  (No Windoze-only
  "feature" restrictions.)
* Good support - they stake their reputation on it (and I can confirm
  they're responsive for the few times I needed help)
* You own your domains according to their agreement
* The price is reasonable, a little less than Verisign/NetSoil.
* During a domain transfer, they tell you when things happen and status
  changes along the way.

One thing to watch for when transferring domains from Verisign/NetSoil is
that they'll send an e-mail to the domain's administrative contact asking
for confirmation.  Read it carefully because there's a response code
hidden deep inside the message that you must MANUALLY PASTE INTO THE SUBJECT
of your e-mail reply to them.  And the reply must have a From address which
matches their record of the admin contact.  Even once you comply with
that, they might reject the transfer claiming they never got a response
from the admin contact.  (I even had some cases that they never sent the
confirmation message and rejected it when they got no response.)  Re-initiate
the transfer and keep trying - it eventually works.  This almost seemed
intentional because all their delaying factors came into play at once when
I transferred thunder.com and thunder.net away from them, as if they wanted
to keep them.  It could be explained by incompetence but the conincidence
is suspicious.

It's a relief to be rid of Verisign/NetSoil.  I never want to do business
with them again.