Discuss mailing list

[<hacktivist AT keemail.me>]

Hi comunity,

For begin, please excuse our english. We're from francophone zone. We even
think about creating and boosting the francophone OpenNIC community soon.

We are LECOCYT. A TEAM of passionate people about technology and the spirit of
free software. We currently operate in the Republic of Benin (West Africa) and
we are formalized as a company named LECOCYT SARL. We provide services based
on Open Source Software to particulars and professionnals.

We founded a local community with goal to share tech knowledge and open source
spirit with  african  people in particulary and the rest of the world in
general. Often we provide free tech-class for beginners through our comunity
in our local areas.  We also fight for fundamental liberties and adheres to
web neutrality  and every tech-concept which bring positive change in this
domain. We think OpenNIC is an awesome project and we want to do our best to
bring it to the highest level in Africa and Benin in particular.

Our proposal is to create the dot BEN extension.

Despite technological evolution in the world, the situation in Africa and
Benin in particular does not favour free access to Internet resources and the
creation of websites under the ccTLD ".BJ".

dot BEN is the ccTLD (country code Top-Level Domain) custom made for the
Beninese people, which is estimated at about 10,000,000 inhabitants on the
African continent.  dot BEN is a free alternative to the traditional dot BJ,
which is not open, has many constraints and does not facilitate technological
development on this side of the continent. As this problem is recurrent in
Africa, the ccTLD dot BEN is intended to be a development tool for Benin in
particular and for Africa in general. Opening Africa to the world and
encouraging cultural mix through the dot BEN ccTLD is our vision.

To vvande's question : "How will your users learn to reconfigure their
networking software so this will work?" on the OpenNIC IRC Channel, we're
actually developping a cross platform OpenNic browser and also DNS Overider.
We'll release all the job when we finish to the public under Open Source
Licence. The software will be downloadable for Linux/Unix, Mac OS, Windows,
Android and Iphone. We also plan to create a web site accessible via ICANN DNS
as an entry point for beginners people to explain the whole OpenNic concept
and how to benefit from the dot BEN extension. We currently have our own
network of people all over the country who will be in charge of promoting
OpenNic to the general public in order to get as many people as possible to
join us and democratize OpenNic.

There a many people in Africa who want better and open technologies without
censors and our goal is to bring this dream to reality. LECOCYT plan also to
launch a competitive free email service like ProtonMail or TutaNota,
accessible for all to get a free web email box under the "dot BEN" ccTLD

We invite all members of the community to express their opinion on the
proposal to create the dot BEN extension. Your comments and opinions are
welcome.


Here is our charter proposal:

***************************************************

Registrant Criteria

Registrations are available to all entities such as persons, partnerships,
corporations, non-profits, etc. It is recommended, though not required, that
an entity register one domain and have others, such as specific promotions and
so forth, underneath their existing registration. Registrants will be allowed
to register as many domains as they wish, within reason and subject to network
and administrative resources, server support, etc.


General Policies

By default and intention, the .BEN ccTLD includes the OpenNIC general policies
against spamming from registered domains and that the registry is run by its
members, who are domain holders. Domain registrations will be accepted on a
first-come first-served basis. Since commercial interests can be involved,
trademarks will be honoured. Disputes will be handled under the .BEN dispute
policy. Proven violation of .BEN policies will result in the immediate
suspension of the domain name. No domain name will be suspended, barring
exceptional circumstances, on the basis of a complaint or dispute alone.


Domain Disputes

As a general rule, a domain may only be disputed by the holder of a trademark
registered before the domain in question was registered. Disputes must first
be brought to both the .BEN Hostmaster and the registrant of the disputed
domain. The registrant will be contacted and given a chance to respond. In the
event the registrant does not make an initial response within 14 days, the
domain may be released or, if in the opinion of the .BEN ccTLD team the
dispute is not clear-cut, the matter will be referred to a vote by the .BEN
membership. Since legal issues are involved, the .BEN ccTLD will abide by the
decisions of a court of competent jurisdiction. Obtaining proof of a trademark
claim or seeking such a court decision will be the responsibility of the
entity seeking the dispute.


Notes

Trademarks are honoured only to ensure the commercial viability of the .BEN
TLD. The dispute policy is intended to be a democratic balance between the
needs of a commercial registrant and the rights of a domain holder.


http://www.opennic.ben

hostmaster AT opennic.ben
webmaster AT opennic.ben
abuse AT opennic.ben


***************************************************



Extra Notes :

We are thinking in the LECOCYT community about several concepts to be
implemented in the near future to accelerate the widespread adoption of
OpenNIC. At a time when everyone must be concerned about their privacy and
their future in a world of domination and thousands of connected objects.


Special Thanks :

We thank all the OpenNIC comunity, the IRC channel members in particulary
vvande for his retroaction and his questions. We also thank all contributors
from any side.