In order to put an end to Domain tasting ICANN puts forward its solution: a change in fee policy.

After discussions, its board gave its ruling on a proposal : the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers is looking to effectively end domain tasting with a proposal to start charging the annual ICANN fee on registrar   domain registrations.

Though an explanation has been given in a story on “How Google cope with Domain Tasting”, official resolution states, “Domain tasting is the use of the Add Grace Period to test the profitability of a domain name registration. The AGP is a five-day period following the initial registration of a domain name when the registration may be deleted and a credit can be issued to a registrar  ”.

AGP was originally introduced by registries so registrars could avoid costs if a domain name was mistyped or misspelled during the registration process. It is part of the .com, .net, .org, .info, .name, .pro, and .biz registry contracts.

Tasting has been a serious challenge for the Internet community and has grown exponentially. In January 2007 the top 10 domain tasters accounted for 95% of all deleted .com and .net domain names — or 45,450,897 domain names out of 47,824,131 total deletes.

"Domain tasting has been an issue for the Internet community and ICANN is offering this proposal as a way to stop tasting," said Dr Paul Twomey, ICANN’s President and CEO. "Charging the ICANN fee as soon as a domain name is registered would close the loophole used by tasters to test a domain name’s profitability for free."

The proposal will be part of the ICANN budget process for the fiscal year starting 1 July 2008. The early draft version of that budget will be released for and discussed at ICANN’s New Delhi meeting later this month.

After public discussions of this proposal and other budget issues, the proposed budget will be released for addition discussions by 17 May 2008 and be voted on at the board meeting to be held during the ICANN meeting in Paris in June. ICANN accredited registrars including our sponsor Domaine.fr representing two-thirds of fees collected will be asked to approve the proposal.

Registrars consulted through Registrar   Constituency about this topic are divided between two main streams:

 some of them think that Tasting should be controled or clean out;
 others think that ICANN should not deal with Tasting and that this question rely on market rules

We should know during the ICANN meeting in Paris where Domaine.info   team will take part which solution will be adopted.

Hélène de Brettes By Domaine.info