On Jan. 1, 07 the Italian Domain Name Registry set up new rules for Maintainers (ISP’s allowed to sell .it domains). The new “standard agreement” was supposed to bring some order into the former legal mess that ruled the matter (just to name one among the many: in the past TEN YEARS neither the Registry, nor the Data Protection Authority ever handled the WHOIS personal data access problem.); but it seems that a chance has been missed again.
The agreement is, basically, a way to shift any legal liability over the Maintainer’s shoulder, while letting the Registry free of substantive burdens. Further more, the agreement perpetuates the misunderstanding about the “domain ownership” meaning. The Registry – so the agreement says – is the OWNER of the domain that is just USED by the registrant… I really wonder whether Microsoft, IBM, Coca-Cola etc. are actually aware that they don’t own their business name… in Italy, at least.