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Someone forgot to renew NodeJS.org

nodejs.org

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Re: Someone forgot to renew NodeJS.org

#41
post #31
post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What you say is correct. I'll chip in a bit on "registrar to registrar". In case of Namecheap,renewing a expired domain is just like renewing a regular domain. While other registrars charge re-activation fee, Namecheap has no additional fees. So, Ryan can just renew the domain instantly whenever this comes into his attention.

The "registrar" of this name is actually enom. In this particular case namecheap is merely a reseller for enom. Important to point out here that namecheap which is much touted on HN as being so great to deal with is the organization that made the decision to take this domain offline - not enom.com the registrar.

When people fail to respond to expiration notices, taking the domain offline on the expiration date seems like a good way to bring it to their attention.

Re: Someone forgot to renew NodeJS.org

#43
post #23

ERROR 500.5150 - Too busy being rockstar tech

Please stop using this bs terminology, rockstars, ninjas and all that sort of crap. With all respect to Ryan he is just one of many great programmers.

I thought this was just an allusion to the 5150 in the error message.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/5150_(album) and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peavey_5150

So rockstar in this context is spot on.

But otherwise, that terminology is complete shit, yes.

Re: Someone forgot to renew NodeJS.org

#44
I hope the node installation never did one of these:

  curl -s -L http://nodejs.org/some-script.sh |sh 
I have never understood why people install software like that. I can not remember which project it is that uses this in the installation.

Re: Someone forgot to renew NodeJS.org

#45
post #44

I hope the node installation never did one of these: curl -s -L http://nodejs.org/some-script.sh |sh I have never understood why people install software like that. I can not remember which project it is that uses this in the installation.

Homebrew, rbenv, rvm, to name a few. Never understood it either. If you could get ahold of a domain write a malicious script at /some-script.sh, you could do a lot of damage.

Re: Someone forgot to renew NodeJS.org

#46
post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The "registrar" of this name is actually enom. In this particular case namecheap is merely a reseller for enom. Important to point out here that namecheap which is much touted on HN as being so great to deal with is the organization that made the decision to take this domain offline - not enom.com the registrar.

When people fail to respond to expiration notices, taking the domain offline on the expiration date seems like a good way to bring it to their attention.

Off the top I wonder if an idea might be to do the following, keeping in mind that the registrar would charge extra but ultimately it would be to the registrants benefit and less disruptive if the normal ways (that have no cost) were interupted:

- Send postal notice (some do this already) - Send express or certified letter (charging up front to be notified this way) - Make phone call - Send email to any contact addresses on the website

I would like to point out also that this is a reason also why "privacy" on whois is a bad idea in some cases. In this case it is fairly easy for a third party to get in touch with the joyent contact (someone might know him or have an alternative means of contacting him - even by phone if not the whois phone number). If contact info is protected by privacy that becomes a different issue (you would have to have more specific knowledge).

Re: Someone forgot to renew NodeJS.org

#47
post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes you are correct about that... It happened to me once on an old domain and I was able to get it back in the following week after expiration but I don't recall seeing a parked page during that period of time. Doing a quick Whois for nodejs.org show that the name is expiring today: Domain ID:D157222203-LROR Domain Name:NODEJS.ORG Created On:29-Sep-2009 14:50:55 UTC Last Updated On:20-Sep-2011 00:04:23 UTC Expiration…

eNom does all kinds of shady shenanigans with domain renewals. There are stories of names going up on their auction block the moment the registration expires (meaning someone has to pay a greatly inflated amount of cash to reclaim the name)

"eNom does all kinds of shady shenanigans with domain renewals."

This wasn't done by enom. It was done by the reseller, namecheap. Their DNS is in the record (and it points to a page controlled by namecheap).

Re: Someone forgot to renew NodeJS.org

#48

I know people make mistakes and overlook things, but really...there is no excuse for this. I get about 8 emails from my registrars warning me before a domain expires...60 days, 45 days, 30 days, 1 week, then one like every day until the date. Unless these emails are going to an address nobody is monitoring I can't see how this can get overlooked.

I don't know if this is a standard, but on the few registrars I've used, they don't allow you to use an email address on the domain itself -- so if you register X.com because you want bob@X.com to be your primary identity, it's pretty easy to forget about the bob@gmail.com address you used to register with...

Re: Someone forgot to renew NodeJS.org

#49
post #44

I hope the node installation never did one of these: curl -s -L http://nodejs.org/some-script.sh |sh I have never understood why people install software like that. I can not remember which project it is that uses this in the installation.

Homebrew, rbenv, rvm, to name a few. Never understood it either. If you could get ahold of a domain write a malicious script at /some-script.sh, you could do a lot of damage.

I agree that it feels insecure, but is there really a difference between this and downloading and running files from a .tar.gz or installing a .deb for example?

Re: Someone forgot to renew NodeJS.org

#50
post #40

How does this keep happening to people? No registrar I know has a default of "don't renew", and they send your reminders. Why not just buy the doman for 10 years, or set autorenew, or ... seriously. There is NO excuse for this.

Maybe the creators didn't expect node to live this long? :P
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