On Thu, 3 Sep 1998, Sean Donelan wrote:
with NSF. As much as I dislike SPAM, I do not think concern about the use of the data for marketing purposes is a good justification for NSI to unilaterally block individuals from accessing the WHOIS data.
According to David Holtzman of NSI (i asked him), the restrictions on whois are merely for technical reasons. I believe that he believes this, and from his point of view they have every right to filter/limit obnoxious or badly configured hosts/sites. But even if what he thinks is true, the facts are that NSI is restricting access to the database while using it's data for mailings designed to make a profit. I'm not an attorney, but it sounds like any spammer/marketeer could sue them successfully unless they can show that they own the database, or that the database owner wants the status to remain quo.
I would be interested in knowing why a couple of sites have found the need to query the WHOIS data so heavily. And once we knew their need, perhaps finding a better solution. But the NSF cooperative agreement
George wouldn't tell me who they are but he implied that they are just clueless.
If NSI is looking for a nice off-site storage facility to store a backup of the database in case something happens on the east coast (see http://nic.ddn.mil/DNS/root-server.html) I know of a nice centrally located facility :-) -- Sean Donelan, Data Research Associates, Inc, St. Louis, MO
You mean Saint Louis? The original home of the FidoNet NIC? Sounds good to me. Bill