June 27, 2001

12:01 PM

Zeldman'sseemingly constant problems with Network Solutions continue. It raises two questions for me. 1. Why wouldn't he change the domain and/or name rather cease publication of one of the best independant publications on the web? and 2. How come they haven't overhauled the domain registration system to have other methods for verification? At the company where I work we have over 50 domains and we're constantly having problems with peoples' names who are long since gone being on the registration and not being able to remove them. Hope it works out for him, I couldn't live without my ALA fix.
posted by abosio (37 comments total)

I hope it works out too.

I have had the same problems with NetSol as Zeldman is having. Unfortunately, he can't switch providers because according to NetSol, he doesn't own the domain, so they can't transfer it to someone.

NetSol is a hugely incompetent bureaurocracy, and there won't be any crying on my part if they are their own downfall. The only reason they're still in business, it seems, are their exorbatent rates.
posted by SpecialK at 12:16 PM on June 27, 2001

can't they just arrange a sale of the domain from exodus to ala? network solutions doesn't have to know that money isn't changing hands.
posted by o2b at 12:19 PM on June 27, 2001

if he could get exodus to move the domain to another registar, that registar could probably easily make the changes.

it amazes me, that with all the advances, and the new registrars using web based tools (ie. forms, submit buttons) NSI still uses that stupid e-mail back.

i am in process of slowly moving my domain names from NSI to Tucows as the registrations come up.
posted by benjh at 12:23 PM on June 27, 2001

When I couldn't get into ALA for the past couple of days I started poking around with WHOIS and DIG and wondered why Faucette Publications was listed as the admin contact.

Then, barely an hour later I notice Zeldman himself was talking about it. Ah. Plate, Shrimp, Plate-o-Shrimp.

However, I did manage to hack around inelegantly with my DNS. The IP for the machine ALA is hosted on appears to be 209.115.232.136 - but just putting that address in your browser won't work because ALA seems to be hosted on a virtual domain server - which needs to be told by the browser which site it thinks its visiting.

So instead, I think you can put the IP and domain in your /etc/hosts file (if you have one), or create a temporary entry in your DNS.

I shouldn't recommend this, though, because if the IP for the site changes then you won't be able to get to it anymore because your local DNS is overriding the authority. Implementors beware.
posted by wenham at 12:33 PM on June 27, 2001

I've had a similar problem with NSI. The email address I had registered my domain with suddenly went dead, leaving me no way to validate registration changes. I struggled with their phone system for a while, sent them faxes, and generally made a nuisance of myself (on my own dime, of course) to no avail. Eventually I just gave up. I send them a check every year and they fail to notice that the address, phone number, and email address listed on the registration have all been obsolete for three years.

They're an impenetrable bureaucracy. The only way I can see to get control of my domain back would be to let it expire and then buy it again. Unfortunately this would leave my primary email address dead for a while as the transfer went through, and it's simpler just to roll my eyes and deal with it.

Die, NSI, die - and the sooner the better.

-Mars
posted by Mars Saxman at 12:58 PM on June 27, 2001

By far, the best line in his most recent rant:

Please don't write to us about this issue, because it is out of our hands and too distressing to contemplate further.

Umm, if you don't want people to write you, don't provide them a link to... umm... you know, write you.

The thing to understand about Network Solutions and, really, any large megalith corporation is that they don't care, individually, about you. Really. They could care less. That's not how they make money. They make money on the volume. You're one tiny data point in their spreadsheet. If you go bye-bye, and even take 100 or 1,000 other domains with you, it wouldn't even show up on their radar screen. They simply don't care on that level.

So why do people put up with it? Because it works. Most of the time. And it's a bitch to change. And we've all heard horror stories about changes gone wrong. And other registrars going out of business. And hijacked domains while doing the transfer. I mean, who wants to deal with any of that shit? Not me, that's fer certain.
posted by yarf at 12:59 PM on June 27, 2001

Just a question from looking at the WHOIS record, and this question is probably best answered by ALA themselves, but the Registrant for the domain is "A List Apart" at "10611 Wilkins Ave #1" in Los Angeles. Then in the Billing Contact section we see that Brian Platz, with an alistapart.com e-mail address, has the same street address as the Registrant.

This tells me that if Brian Platz prepares an authorization letter - on letterhead that uses the Registrant address - then he can fax that letter along with a formal domain modification request.

I've done this several times before with other domains and it has always worked. So I'm wondering if this Brian Platz is a fellah who can be contacted to help, or why this method hasn't already been tried successfully.
posted by wenham at 1:09 PM on June 27, 2001

What amazes me is that Zeldman can't get the changes made, even though cases like this seem to happen all the time. What's to prevent them from getting some soft of letterhead made up from "Brian Platz," writing up a nice little letter describing the modifications they'd like made & sending it in?

(Note: I'm not advocating illegal activities. Performing actions described in this post may be hazardous to your health.)
posted by zempf at 1:28 PM on June 27, 2001

Why wouldn't he change the domain and/or name rather cease publication of one of the best independant publications on the web?

Ceasing publication is an empty threat/rant/plea for attention IMHO. If he's old school and has never worked with another registrar, it could be difficult to simply jump ship to unfamiliar territory.
posted by fleener at 1:31 PM on June 27, 2001

Zeldman said that "[e-mail]" didn't exist, which had a fuzzy enough edge to it that I wondered if this meant Brian Platz didn't exist, or just the e-mail address.

Nonetheless, it's an interesting ethical question: should you make a forgery in order to claim your own property?

(Obligatory Reader Education blurb: When your contact e-mail addresses don't work, all you need to do is compose the modification request anyway, send it by e-mail to NSI (from any address, it doesn't matter), wait for them to respond with a tracking number, then write that tracking number on the letter and fax it to them. About 24-48 hours later the domain modification should be complete.)
posted by wenham at 1:35 PM on June 27, 2001

hi, guys. brian platz can't make the changes because NetSol would email brian platz at alistapart.com to confirm. there is no mail at alistapart.com because netsol thinks exodus hosts alistapart. therefore we can't serve mail.

fawcette is now endeavoring to list me as contact. they did this last year and it worked for 24 hours before netsol hiccuped. if they can get thru the netsol bureaucracy one more time and list me as contact, i'll do what i have to do.

i don't publicize this nonsense to solicit suggestions (though i appreciate them all). i publicize it to (a.) warn folks living under rocks that netsol is unreliable, e.g., take your business elsewhere (b.) not have to answer 400 emails asking what happened to a list apart.

yarf, you're right, i debated adding that "write" link, and mainly did it because so few people realize there's a mail form on the site. anyway, thanks y'all.
posted by Zeldman at 1:36 PM on June 27, 2001

never post when pissed. i did not mean to imply that i would cease publication of ALA, and if that implication came thru, it was bad writing on my part, caused by frustration. must remember to write only when calm. problem: when calm, i have better things to do than write stuff on the daily report.
posted by Zeldman at 1:39 PM on June 27, 2001

Zeldman, I don't think Brain _has_ to respond to an e-mail sent to [e-mail].

All you should need to do is have him compose a paper letter of authorization ("I, the undersigned, authorize whoever to make changes to my domain.") and fax that with the tracking number that NSI sends you after you e-mail them the modification request. Note that the tracking number will be sent as a reply to whatever e-mail address you send the modification request from, and it DOESN'T have to be an address from any of the domain contacts.

As long as the letter Brian sends includes the Los Angeles address listed for the Registrant, the modification should work (fingers crossed).
posted by wenham at 1:44 PM on June 27, 2001

(I say that it should work because it's one of the things I do all the time at work. In each case, the fax always made the e-mail confirmation stage moot)
posted by wenham at 1:50 PM on June 27, 2001

It seems that, if Exodus is willing to put in a little effort to straighten this mess out, it would be possible to set up a temporary mail server at that address just long enough to receive and respond to an authorization e-mail. Is this technically infeasible for some reason I don't understand, or would it just be more trouble than Exodus considers worthwhile?
posted by harmful at 1:59 PM on June 27, 2001

Who cares?

Honestly, would we be so worried about someone's problems with NSI if that someone weren't Zeldman?
posted by dogmatic at 2:35 PM on June 27, 2001

Mars: I would certainly recommend against letting your domain expire. It has been well covered in the press that NSI hoard expired domain names, in order to auction them for even more substantial profits.

I find it hard to believe that anyone within ALA's target audience has the time to actually read to the end of a typical article. The sub headings are sufficiently cryptic that it's impossible to quickly scan the text for the main points.
posted by tmbkr at 2:41 PM on June 27, 2001

Honestly, would we be so worried about someone's problems with NSI if that someone weren't Zeldman?

What if that someone were Haughey? Or Kottke? Or Greenpeace? Or the local cancer foundation? Or your kid's school?

The point is, Network Solutions is incompetent and unnecessarily bureaucrapic. It's a fairly short step from the specific (ALA) to the general (the web).

I went through this nonsense a couple of months ago when I moved bradlands.com to a new registrar. I ended up on the phone with Network "Solutions" for a long time and finally reached someone who I was able to convince that "blgraham(at)stlnet.com" no longer existed because my ISP went ass-over-teakettle.

They eventually made the necessary change, but it still took two weeks, three FAXes and a lot of time on hold.
posted by bradlands at 2:48 PM on June 27, 2001

I don't see why J the Z doesn't just register alistapart.{nu/cc/cx/to/tv/am/fm}, or simply a-list-apart.com, and FTP the files over there.

It solves the immediate problem and buys time to fix the domain issue properly.
posted by joeclark at 3:04 PM on June 27, 2001

Wouldn't solve the problem for anyone who isn't aware of the new domain. Re-promotion is time consuming and expensive.
posted by wenham at 3:11 PM on June 27, 2001

I tried the blatant fraud route. One of my domains is said to be owned by me, but the admin contact is some guy with a gnn.com e-mail address at a company in Rhinebeck, New York. That company has since gone out of business. (This is because his NetSol handle and mine are excruciatingly similar, but not the same. Something didn't go quite right in the registration process.)

As owner, I should be able to change a contact, but they won't chance a contact without the approval of said contact. Because Mr. Whoeverheis no longer has that e-mail address, the approvals bounce back and NetSol won't make the change.

After several excruciating (and toll) calls to VA, I was told that I needed to fax something in on "official letterhead" which doesn't actually exist for the entity in question. (And doesn't for most personal sites, hello, outmoded "only businesses have domains" thinking.) So I dummied something up, sent it in, and was still told that Mr. Whoeverheis would have to approve the change, even though I am the named registrant. So I dummied up something from Mr. Whoeverheis and sent it in. I was told that they had "questions" about that and would need to contact Me. Whoeverheis about it -- of course, they couldn't, so the cycle continues.

The domain expires in November. I'm letting it go. It's not worth the fight.
posted by Dreama at 3:12 PM on June 27, 2001

The way I solved most of my NetSol email hassle, after switching corporate email domains and personal email addresses numerous times and having old mail go to non-existent addresses, was this:

First, make sure that, if possible, all old email forwards somewhere, or that all old domains get their mail collected somehow. For example, I've got about 17 domains right now, some old, some new, all pointing to the same server. Email to any of those domains goes to a single email box, no matter what address, what account or what sender. Failing that, see about cooperation from the admin of that domain, usually an easier task than wrestling with Network Solutions.

Second, use an email client that allows personas. Not all do, and of those that do, most people do not make use of the feature. I use QuickMail Pro 2.1, a highly neglected but subtly wonderful email client that does.

So when I get some email that comes in to an old, now nonexistent, address, perhaps for a past user, or a now dis-used domain, or for a forgotten Network Solutions registration, I can use a easily made persona to reply. To all appearances, except when you examine the path in the headers, using a persona makes the email I send look like it comes from the old, but really invalid, email address. This also works for domains which you do not control but in which you have an admin ally who will forward the wayward messages to you so that you can send a reply attributed to the proper email persona.

[Side note: I've always been a big fan of bounce-with-store on email systems. That means that all incoming email to an invalid address both bounces and is stored for examination by the admin. This facilitates problems like the one Zeldman is having, and in a corporate environment, allows messages mis-directed by clients who can't spell to be forwarded to the proper employee. Not much you can do when they mis-type the domain, however.]

In QuickMail Pro, if you set up a main persona, that main persona (independent of your POP account login or password, or SMTP setting), will show up as both Reply-To and Return-Path.

This also works well when you are the admin for a domain and one of your long-departed users still receives a lot of listserv traffic. You can use the persona to unsubscribe them from lists and keep from cluttering the dead mail box.

This does not always work if the a) the domain is completely outside of your control (and have no way to receive any kind of mail sent to it) and the exchange involves multiple back-and-forth efforts. You can, however, at least initiate the procedure by using a persona to imitate an account that no longer exists or you don't control.

So a real live example: One of the domains I own is worldnewyork.net. It has never had an email address assigned to it; all the mail just gets tagged as worldnewyork.org mail and is thus forwarded to my main account. But if you send any message to it, i'll get it and can reply from that domain as well. In fact, I can reply from any domain at all: personas allow you to fake a sender in appearance, though the trick is easily discovered in the headers.
posted by Mo Nickels at 3:22 PM on June 27, 2001

It's likely that Jeffrey's writings have helped people avoid those bastards at NSI. For many of us, domain maintenance is a living hell.

As always, he's letting others learn from his experiences. Even the bad ones.
posted by Chief Typist at 3:23 PM on June 27, 2001

I don't understand why people use NSI at all.. They used to be the only game in town, but these days, christ..

For service, I use Dotster.com, they cost more, but they have a nice interface..

For price, nobody I know of it cheaper then godaddy.com.. Something like a tenth the price of NSI for exactly the same thing and a lot less paperwork..
posted by Leonard at 3:35 PM on June 27, 2001

maybe it's time to by a new domain registered with a better company than NetSol, then on the old domain, have a little 'we moved cuz NetSol is suck', and a forward script?

it might be a pain in the ass, but it might yet be easier than dealing with NetSol all together.
posted by jcterminal at 3:36 PM on June 27, 2001

I'd recommend Directnic, cheaper than Netsol and their change interface is web-based and fast...
posted by owillis at 3:37 PM on June 27, 2001

I recommend Gandi, especially if you can read the lengthy terms of service in French. (It's fun, if nothing else.) But more importantly, as the dollar continues to strengthen against the Euro, the price of Gandi registered domains is down to about $10.25 each, with lots of good service attached.
posted by Dreama at 3:41 PM on June 27, 2001

transferring away from nsi is a) easier than changing any of your registration details with them; and b) not something you have to wait until your domain is about to expire to do.

if you are transferring to an opensrs reseller (domainstore.com and pairnic.com are two that i have experience with), the current administrative contact of the domain will get sent an email with a url (on the opensrs site) and a password. once they've gone to that page and supplied the password, some behind-the-scenes shuffling goes on between opensrs and nsi (which, from all accounts i've heard, appears to be a trouble-free process).

pairnic (and i think most, if not all, opensrs resellers) adds the time for the new registration to the old one, so you don't end up being double-billed for any time, and there's really no reason to wait (unless you really want to milk the interest on that $19 by waiting until the last minute).

my guess is that nsi makes more of a profit off the $6/domain per year they get from being the backend database keeper than they do from their $35/year registration customers if they actually have to do something horrible like deal with them to update registration information.
posted by jimw at 3:48 PM on June 27, 2001

I do empathize with Jeffrey, here, but at a certain point you have to ask someone why they put up with getting kicked by the horse with the bad disposition. If I'd gone through what he went through to get the fix done before, no way would it have taken me more than 24 hours to get that domain dotster'ed away from the grubby minions of NetSol.

Dreama, haven't you considered a lawyer letter? Sure, it might cost you a pittance of a retainer, but it might get their attention. Who the heck's been paying the bills for that domain, anyway?
posted by dhartung at 4:31 PM on June 27, 2001

Interesting e-mail i got today as i was transferring one of my domains to tucows...

In order to protect you against unauthorized or fraudulent registrar changes, we want to obtain your authorization before we act to change your registrar. Please reply to this email by copying and pasting the appropriate response as described below:

If you wish to remain with Network Solutions, copy the following line in its entirety and paste it into the subject line of your return email

[NIC-######.####]:XYZ.COM:TRANSFER=NO

If you wish to change the registrar, copy the following line in its entirety and paste it into the subject line of your return email

[NIC-######.####]:XYZ.COM:TRANSFER=YES

If you don't respond within 3 calendar days in the manner described above, the request to Change Registrar will be denied.

Notice it is not a easy e-mail back, you actually have to edit the subject line (how hard is it though, haha) and the default is for them NOT to transfer the domain. Guess they are making it harder to transfer.
posted by benjh at 4:40 PM on June 27, 2001

hmm... my friday afternoon will be a lot less entertaining.

I don't see why J the Z doesn't just register alistapart.{nu/cc/cx/to/tv/am/fm}, or simply a-list-apart.com, and FTP the files over there.

Wouldn't solve the problem for anyone who isn't aware of the new domain. Re-promotion is time consuming and expensive.

i'm pretty sure that if J-Z had decided to go that route, promotion wouldn't be a problem at all... sites large (k10k and digital web) and small (thousands of bloggers, including myself) would be more than willing to help him out.
posted by lotsofno at 6:44 PM on June 27, 2001

bradlands - yes, we should be concerned that NSI is evil. But not necessarily that NSI has been evil to Zeldman. That link, and the way this thread has been presented, is more about a-list sympathy than anti-NSI advocacy.

That's not to say that the thread hasn't evolved into something else...But should Zeldman's problems, however problematic, be front page news just because he's Zeldman?
posted by dogmatic at 10:40 PM on June 27, 2001

When you earn fame, you earn fame.

Disgusting, isn't it? :-)
posted by wenham at 7:53 AM on June 28, 2001

CHIEF TYPIST said:

It's likely that Jeffrey's writings have helped people avoid those bastards at NSI. For many of us, domain maintenance is a living hell. As always, he's letting others learn from his experiences. Even the bad ones.

That was my hope, yes.

LEONARD said:

I don't understand why people use NSI at all.. They used to be the only game in town, but these days, christ.

I'm with you. But ALA was registered a long time ago, when NSI *was* the only game in town. And since NSI bungled the records, I can't yank the domain any more than you can (at least, not legally and officially).

JIM W SAID:

transferring away from nsi is a) easier than changing any of your registration details with them; and b) not something you have to wait until your domain is about to expire to do.

yes, it *IS* easy, IF you are listed as the admin or tech contact. but if you are unlisted, you have no rights.

ABOSIO SAID:

Why wouldn't he change the domain and/or name rather cease publication of one of the best independant publications on the web?

several alternative domains DO exist, including alistapart.net, alistapart.org, alistapart.zeldman.com, and others that were donated by readers. they're out there. however,

(a.) everyone knows alistapart.com. it's kind of like saying, why didn't tylenol change its name after the poisoning scare of the late 1980s? because customers knew (and looked for) tylenol.

(b.) for technical and managerial reasons that would put you to sleep, ALA uses a base href that essentially hardwires all file references to the official domain name. thus, unless nick or i go in and manually change all base hrefs on hundreds and hundreds of pages, all internal file references (including pages, images, scripts, and stylesheets) will fail as long as the domain name fails.

if the registrar wasn't asleep at the wheel of my car, this base href system would work flawlessly.

DHARTUNG SAID:

If I'd gone through what he went through to get the fix done before, no way would it have taken me more than 24 hours to get that domain dotster'ed away from the grubby minions of NetSol.

they fucked up before i could make the switch.
posted by Zeldman at 8:56 AM on June 28, 2001

DOGMATIC said:

yes, we should be concerned that NSI is evil. But not necessarily that NSI has been evil to Zeldman.

i agree, and in writing about it at zeldman.com i'm not whining about my troubles so much as protesting the incompetence of a very stupid company with way too much power over our content. if the same thing were happening to someone else's site, i'd be writing about the same way. just as i wrote about nosepilot's hosting troubles though i've never personally been screwed by a hosting company the way nosepilot was.

as to what this thread has evolved into, to me it seems like intelligent people offering helpful suggestions and sharing similar horror stories about the incompetent bureaucrats at NetSol. and i think folks would be doing that whether the site was ALA or Johnny's First HomePage.
posted by Zeldman at 9:00 AM on June 28, 2001

it is also easy if you have the cooperation of the person listed as the admin contact. all they have to do is go to a webpage to approve the transfer, and return an email to nsi approving the transfer, as benjh pointed out.

if you already have fawcette's cooperation in transferring the registration within nsi, perhaps i'm just missing why using their cooperation to effect this completely automated method wouldn't be easier.

(i'm in the midst of the transfer of two domains away from nsi. for one, i'm the current administrative contact, but the domain is being taken over by a friend. he registered for the transfer, and i just had to deal with approving the transfer with opensrs and nsi. the transfer isn't complete yet, but it wouldn't surprise if it was complete very soon. we started the process yesterday.)
posted by jimw at 10:39 AM on June 28, 2001