Rather than respond to every point I think it's better to just summarise
the main points of the argument because I think this is an important
issue.
The owner of the domain and the admin contact are clearly not the same
thing. The owner of a domain is more often than not a company. Someone
must be the admin contact, there has to be an actual person who makes
decisions about the management of the domain name. That person doesn't
own the domain, that's patently ridiculous, they are merely the person
whose job it is to manage the domain.
The person "whose job it is" for me is the key point because that person
doesn't have to be an employee of the company that has ownership. They
can be working there on contract or they can work for some other company
that has been contracted to manage the domain. The point is that the
domain owner can assign the admin contact role to whoever they want and
in many cases that is some other company that will act on their behalf
to manage the domain.
To give an actual example, I am the admin contact for many domains that
were purchased long before I became involved. The domain owners have
made me the admin contact so that the domains can be managed properly,
in some cases that has included moving them to a different registrar so
that they can be maintained more easily. In other cases I have moved
them for other reasons. The point is that I am being hired to manage the
domains by a domain owner that doesn't have the means to do so
themselves and they are making me the admin contact in full knowledge of
what that means and in the expectation that I will act on their behalf
to ensure the domain is managed in their best interests.
There is nothing unethical about any of this, it's a perfectly
reasonable support arrangement.
Paul Richards
Originative Solutions Ltd
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