On Domain Monetization
We note that there is a meaningful difference between Domain Tasting
and Domain Monetization. Monetization is a straightforward arbitrage
between the cost of domain registrations and the revenue from as much
pay-per-click traffic as the domain owner can get from people who
visit web sites in the domain. It's a fundamentally sleazy business,
since the web sites have no useful content and the way they get the
traffic is basically by tricking people, either via typos or recently
expired domains. More importantly, the presence of such website makes
web-surfing by ordinary users far more difficult and confusing than
they should be.
We do not think it is appropriate in this case to make ICANN as a
regulator to watch and prohibit the Domain Monetization practices per
se. Instead, on behalf of ordinary Internet users, we call upon those
commercial enterprises such as Google or Overture to take appropriate
measures such as to stop paying for clicks on pages with no content,
thereby dealing with a problem that is not limited to typo and expired
domains. We've seen click arbitrage, people buying Google ads to drive
traffic to pages that are simply other Google ads. This kind of
self-generating traffic for pay-per-click advertising is confusing and
unnecessary for ordinary Internet users and, in the long run, not
healthy for the development of Internet as a whole.
Since Domain monetization is a relatively new phenomena, the impact to
the ordinary users and the wider Internet community is hard to measure
at this point. It seems clear, however, that it does not improve the
user experience at all. We think it is worth to keep watching on how
it develops and may seek for specific actions when we have clearer
understanding of measurable impact.