{"id":3470,"date":"2015-04-15T12:00:38","date_gmt":"2015-04-15T12:00:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ncjolt.org\/?p=3470"},"modified":"2020-06-04T20:53:36","modified_gmt":"2020-06-04T20:53:36","slug":"who-really-cares-if-your-company-sucks","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/journals.law.unc.edu\/ncjolt\/blogs\/who-really-cares-if-your-company-sucks\/","title":{"rendered":"Who really cares if your company .sucks?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Suffixes of web domain names are sometimes used to give negative<\/a> feedback for certain companies.\u00a0 For example, \u201c.fail\u201d and \u201c.gripe\u201d are two that are live on the internet currently, and someone pay purchase a domain name with a company she does not like with one of these suffixes, as long as the domain name has not already been purchased.\u00a0 However, one domain suffix that will go live later this year is \u201c.sucks<\/a>\u201d.\u00a0 Vox Populi is the administrator of the .sucks registry, and its purpose for creating this new domain name is to start open debate about opinions of various businesses or goods that consumers interact with daily.
\nICANN, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, said that when Vox Populi applied for this domain suffix, there were no objections.\u00a0 The Vice President of ICANN said this is a good thing because freedom of speech is \u201cthe fundamental rule of what the Internet is supposed to enable,\u201d therefore curbing the use of domain names like this would infringe on this right.
\nHowever, companies have begun to speak up against Vox Populi. Companies that are opposed to this registry are not upset because of the chance that they will have negative things said about them on the Internet, mostly because they realize free speech is highly value in America and people have the right to put their opinions in the open; they are upset because the high price a company must pay to register a .sucks domain name.\u00a0 Currently, a company must pay $2,500 dollars a year to register and keep a .sucks domain name.\u00a0 Some argue that this price makes Vox Populi\u2019s scheme borderline extortion.\u00a0 It should be noted that independent activists that want to purchase a .sucks domain name and vow to blog are required to pay \u201cas little as 10 dollars a year.\u201d \u00a0The Vox Populi CEO claims the exact opposite of what the companies claim- he says that in the past, his company contemplated charging $25,000 a year for a company to preemptively buy a .sucks domain name to keep someone else from buying it and putting shame on its brand.
\nWith all of this being said, the outcry calling Vox Populi\u2019s method extortion is unnecessary.<\/p>\n

While the price is high, companies have a better way of combating bad publicity.\u00a0 Simply produce a high quality product.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

That way, free speech actually works to the advantage of the companies.\u00a0 Consumers will use the Internet to praise them instead of badmouth them.\u00a0 Also, if a person is unsatisfied and actually does purchase a .sucks domain name, if anyone else finds this website and reads the content, she will not give the site any merit.\u00a0 It would be interesting to take a survey to see if someone would actually give the opinions written on a website with a .sucks domain name any credibility, anyways.\u00a0 It does not seem very professional, and makes the owner of the website seem like her main purpose is to take a low-blow at a company, not give valuable feedback for other consumers.\u00a0 Currently, litigation has not been started over Vox Populi\u2019s registry, but the threat is there.\u00a0 Let\u2019s hope the unhappy companies do not clog the judicial system with claims concerning this issue, because there are means of overcoming the concerns the companies have with Vox Populi that are outside of the legal realm that may be more effective in the end.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Suffixes of web domain names are sometimes used to give negative feedback for certain companies.\u00a0 For example, \u201c.fail\u201d and \u201c.gripe\u201d are two that are live on the internet currently, and someone pay purchase a domain name with a company she does not like with one of these suffixes, as long as the domain name has …<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3471,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[51],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.unc.edu\/ncjolt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3470"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.unc.edu\/ncjolt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.unc.edu\/ncjolt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.unc.edu\/ncjolt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.unc.edu\/ncjolt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3470"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.unc.edu\/ncjolt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3470\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7336,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.unc.edu\/ncjolt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3470\/revisions\/7336"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.unc.edu\/ncjolt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3471"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.unc.edu\/ncjolt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3470"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.unc.edu\/ncjolt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3470"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/journals.law.unc.edu\/ncjolt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3470"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}