From: Peter Hyland 
Sent: Tuesday, 27 July 2004 1:34 PM
To: jo.lim@auda.org.au
Subject: A statement opposing the release of Australian geographic (place) names
Dear Ms Lim,

I am a reseacher in the field of Community Informatics - the use of Informatics to improve 
the stability and quality of life in communities. Some of my colleagues working on the 
Community Geographic 2LDs inform me that auDA is considering releasing Australian Geographic 
place names as domain names. Can I voice my strong opposition to this possibility at the 
current time. 

I had the opportunity to attend a conference on Web Based Communities in Portugal recently, 
where I explained to my international colleagues that the Australian Domain Name Authority 
had chosen to keep a set of geographic 3LDs specifically for the use of community groups. 
They expressed unanimous approval of the idea and said how lucky we were in Australia. I was 
asked how the community domain names were able to compete with other geographic domain names 
like sydney.net or melbourne.com. I explained that auDA had the foresight not to release 
these names in competition to the 3LDs resrved for individual communities.  

I was horrified to hear that you are considering reversing a decision which is clearly a 
world standard in the support of community domain names. Please do  NOT release the geographic 
names, at least until the community domain names have a chance to become really well 
established.

Assoc. Prof. Peter Hyland 
University of Wollongong