Network Solutions Take 2 124
sirkin writes "Washington Post Technews is reporting that VeriSign is resurrecting the Network Solutions name with a new subsidiary responsible for domain name registration. It seems so eerily familiar."
This discussion has been archived.
No new comments can be posted.
Network Solutions Take 2
Related Links Top of the: day, week, month.
It is clear that the individual who persecutes a man, his brother, because he is not of the same opinion, is a monster. - Voltaire
eh? (Score:2, Funny)
Re:eh? (Score:1, Troll)
Best quote: (Score:5, Insightful)
Of course, they don't say why their name is recognizable. Long hold-times, bad support, dubious transfer-away procedures
87% of Internet address buyers are also familiar with the phrase "bunch of crappy morons".
Re:Best quote: (Score:1)
I wonder whether Al Gore works there?
Re:Best quote: (Score:1)
You gota love Verisignas idea of a domain transfer approval request..
It's a 2 page email thats 90% Please stay, here's a great deal!!.. nowhere in the subjet or the first 3/4 of the message does it mention anything about a request for approval.. only at the bottom in the fine print do you find the link to approve the transfer..
OpenSRS (Tucows) [tucows.com] went out of their way to help me get away from Verisign and explain thier deceptive practices when it comes to domain transfers.
I thought the same thing. (Score:5, Funny)
I thought the same thing, Hemos, but it actually isn't a dupe.
Re:I thought the same thing. (Score:5, Funny)
"It's deja-vous all over again"
Re:I thought the same thing. (Score:2)
Verisign Subterfuge? (Score:4, Insightful)
pricing for domain registrations (Score:4, Insightful)
I recently switched a bunch of names from Melbourne IT to Register.com after getting a flyer in the mail offering a transfer ("plus remaining time on your old registration" for something like $15 per year, or cheaper if you get longer terms. Unfortunately, their normal quoted registrations are like $30 a year [register.com], so I wouldn't have done it otherwise. Verisign's offer was similar (no flyer needed but $19 a year for transfers) [networksolutions.com], but I was a bit leery of their bad rep regarding tying up domain names that expire, yanking registrations away anytime a big business hints that it wants a domain, etc., and I remembered the spam that I got from them to my hostmaster address when a domain was registered through them.
For that matter, the agent of Melbourne IT that I went through had prices similar to Verisign's, but I had to order and renew each domain separately, which was a pain, and I figured, if another provider (in this case, Register.com) could do it cheaper and put them all in one place for me to manage, great. If they try to charge me the "regular" price next year, I'll move them all again; I'll risk a few placements with "bulk" registrars once I see that they've survived another year post-internet-burst-bubble.
One thing I do miss about having my domains at the old Network Solutions: the ability to use a crypto key to manage the domains, and doing it all through email. Of course, the downside of using email for their plaintext password alternative was that anyone could see that password, and I'm guessing that email insecurity made forging transfers easier.
Re:pricing for domain registrations (Score:5, Insightful)
On top of that, don't ever let your information in their records become obsolete. If they have a wrong e-mail account for you, you can pretty much give up seeing any use out of that domain until they get around to giving a crap (which is never).
It's been several months since I could get any replies or answers out of them regarding the information on one domain that I own, and it wille expire in April. If I don't have any control of it by then, I'll renew it with someone else that will give me some control over it.
Transfering from Network Solutions is a nightmare (Score:4, Insightful)
If you're thinking about moving your domain somewhere else, I would recommend you start NOW. If you wait until a few weeks before the name expires, Network Solutions will screw you around untill it expires and you'll have to re-renew with Network Solutions before you can transfer it (true story).
Re:Transfering from Network Solutions is a nightma (Score:1)
Re:Transfering from Network Solutions is a nightma (Score:1)
Re:Transfering from Network Solutions is a nightma (Score:2)
They probably kept it in the hope that someone would pay to be on the "waiting list." I don't know how much the waiting list costs, but I'm sure it makes waiting 6-8 months or more before releasing cost effective.
Re:Transfering from Network Solutions is a nightma (Score:1)
Re:Transfering from Network Solutions is a nightma (Score:1)
I have found that their customer support department is set up entirely under the presumption that Network Solutions has not made any mistakes, and that the user simply needs help. That's fine when the user doesn't know how to do something, but it means that when Network Solutions screws up (and they can and do screw up BIG), nothing can be done by anyone that you are able to contact. The support staff isn't unwilling to help - they simply don't have the authority, or even the ability to fix things. All they can do is answer your questions.
Case in point: Most registrars offer a service whereby you can electronically transfer a domain to another registrar. You tell the new registrar what you want to transfer, they make the request to the old registrar, and the old registrar emails the owner of the domain (you) with detail on how to authorize the transaction, along with a tracking number for the order so you can call support if need be.
The problem with it is that it doesn't work correctly. Every time I've used this, Network Solutions entirely refuses to even acknowledge that the request has been made. I get no mail about it, not even the tracking number, which makes things even worse because the Network Solutions support staff can't even find your request in their system without it. This is not something you want to do in a rush. I've had to do this at least twice for every single domain I've tried to transfer. Eventually, it takes, but their system is broken, they refuse to believe it, and the only people you can talk to are too low on the food chain to do anything about it. I have dealt with telemarketers, businesses, angry customers, you name it - but the only time I ever yelled at someone over the phone was when I had to deal with Network Solutions. They are an abysmal excuse for a company.
What's worse, when I tried to transfer a domain at the end of its registration period, a Network Solutions support staffer told me that you have to request the transfer at least 30 days before the domain expires. Couldn't explain why that's necessary. A higher-up the next day said that wasn't necessarily true, but it *is* company policy, so beware!
Ugh, and now I have yet another domain that needs transferring from that bureaucratic monster.
Alternatives are eNom.com, which has lousy support but fantastic user control and features - Their support is slow at best, but I've almost never needed it. There is also gkg.net, which is said to have the best customer support, though I've found them to be light on features.
Re:pricing for domain registrations (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Verisign Subterfuge? (Score:1)
I don't understand why... (Score:1)
Simple really (Score:3, Interesting)
A little known fact. (Score:5, Funny)
Re:A little known fact. (Score:5, Informative)
My employer has been trying to the get organization name changed on our domain name since Network Solutions put the wrong one on the domain. That was Feb 14, 1995! Yes, it's been almost eight years, and they still haven't been able to fix a simple text record associated with a domain name. We've jumped through the "create a fake letterhead with the invalid name on it and FAX it to us" hoops several times for nothing. What do you have to do to get them to listen? Eight years!
The American way (Score:3, Funny)
Easy. Sue them.
Re:A little known fact. (Score:3, Informative)
There is still a separate procedure for transfering ownership, although I have no idea why you can't now transfer ownership yourself by changing the org name, address, and admin/billing/tech contact handles yourself. Technically they want the new owner to enter a legal agreement with them (and charge big bucks to do an express transfer of course...)
Re:A little known fact. (Score:2)
We don't have time or money for lawsuits. The only option seems to be to let the domain expire (in Feb 2004), and then try to be the first to re-register it (with a different registrar of course).
Re:A little known fact. (Score:1)
Re:A little known fact. (Score:2, Informative)
And I just noticed that Verisign doesn't show the billing party on the whois screen anymore.
Re:A little known fact. (Score:1)
Re:A little known fact. (Score:1)
I'm actually campaigning for an entirely new domain, preferably shorter. :-)
If we can get the old one too for a reasonable amount, that would be gravy.
Re:A little known fact. (Score:1)
Some old favorites are set to return (Score:5, Informative)
Among them are the hassle-free domain transfer [wired.com] as well as the "helpful and targeted" informational mailing sent out on the daily basis to thousands of small site operators by their "trusted partners".
Re:Some old favorites are set to return (Score:1)
What did all those domains have in common? They all had IRC servers on EfNet. Now I keep all my domains with GoDaddy [godaddy.com], great service and they have clueful people answer the phone, even late at night on weekends.
-Joe
Verisign == Spam! (Score:1)
Finally (Score:4, Funny)
Actually... (Score:5, Funny)
Network Solutions (Score:1, Troll)
Network Solutions Redux (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Network Solutions Redux (Score:3, Interesting)
Good service, and cheap. Found a bug once. Got mail from the maintainer saying it was already fixed, and going out next week.
Still on hold with Network Solvent three years later on how the hell to transfer or delete a freakin HOST entry. Sigh.
Re:Network Solutions Redux (Score:1)
Still on hold with Network Solvent three years later on how the hell to transfer or delete a freakin HOST entry. Sigh.
I found it was easier to just make a new HOST and run with it.
Re:Network Solutions Redux (Score:1)
If the host entry belongs to a domain you've moved over to us, email support and we can remove that host entry for you (only if we're the registrar of the parent domain)
Re:Network Solutions Redux (Score:1)
It's still a rip-off though. I have one domain at Go Daddy and pay like 9 bucks a year instead of 35 at NSI.
The Real Branding/Marketing Reasons (Score:1)
Re:New name? (Score:1)
Who cares (Score:2, Insightful)
Everyone hated Network Solutions...Verisign bought 'em, and they bought the hate right along with it. Maybe they figure that the bad blood will be isolated if they spin the old name and business back off into a more seperate entity.
Re:Who cares (Score:1)
But everyone also hated Verisign. It seemed a match made in heaven. Network Solutions sold the most expensive domain name services and Verisign sells the most expensive SSL certificates. Nobody likes the hoops you have to jump through to get or modify their products, etc. How could such a merger go bad??
Dang! (Score:3, Funny)
Registration Highly Overrated ... (Score:4, Informative)
Plus lets look at it from a pure financial arena. Back in "the day" Network Solutions was basically the only place to grab a domain name, but that's not true anymore. Check This [www.nic.us] out for a little taste of why NetSol is screwed in the market. I remember switching from NetSol, to register.com [register.com] to finally, Tucows OpenSRS [tucows.com] which is dirt cheap. But NetSol is like the microsoft of the DNS world where people know it as being fairly big and its security sucks.
With the trtouble to get MY OWN DOMAIN out of their database, I hope they go bankrupt and never set up anytype of ecommerce site again. Does anyone have anything positive to say about netsol, I mean they really were and are a horrible company that overprices everything. I mean look at verisign now, the prices for a "virtual certificate". Insane.
Re:Registration Highly Overrated ... (Score:3, Funny)
Not everything I got from them is overpriced. For instance, when I had a registered domain with them, I used to get lots of free email offers delivered straight to my inbox!
related questions (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:related questions (Score:1)
I then mailed the new registrar and they said that netsol did that a lot, and that my best bet was to renew my account with netsol, and then immediately transfer the domain before netsol would flag my account as "unpaid." So I did that and it got switched ok.
Just my story... I will never deal with them again. I think this was after the VeriSign buyout.
To answer your final question... I use RegisterSite.com. They dont have the best prices, but they offer good service and support
Regardless of what they call themselves, (Score:5, Interesting)
Apart from the hokey 'mail from' security scheme they used to use, I find that getting through to them when there is a problem is nearly impossible. The drones on the phone (if you can find the phone number) know so little about DNS that it is physically painful, and they charge extra for what other registrars include in the price of the registration.
In addition to that they are constantly trying to 'slam' my customers into changing registrars and breaking their domain names in the process. They also denied one of my customers' transfers because there was a 'special' on that account. (I later found that a special meant was set to expire in under a month, and they were trying to prevent the change of registrar from going through.)
They are a thoroughly pitiful organization and they deserve all the headaches they have caused me over the years.
Re:Regardless of what they call themselves, (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Regardless of what they call themselves, (Score:2)
Re:Regardless of what they call themselves, (Score:1)
Screen Shot [binaryboy.com]
"YES, SWITCH MY DNS" is the WRONG button.
To change the DNS IPs, you must click the grey "NO THANKS" button.
Good Grief Charlie Brown (Score:5, Insightful)
The registration of domain names seems fairly staid, and yet, common-sense would dictate that little or no profit could really be meagered from such a one-point sale business. Wal-Mart on the other attempts multiple low-cost sales, with a wide variety of products. Though I'm not sure of the ROI for Verisign, I have a feeling, once all said and done, it's less than ten-percent. As a another inidicator, airlines make five to eight percent return on their money (though probably that number is worse as of late).
So the question I pose is thus: if a business or industry barely breaks even, and that industry or business is crucial to the welfare of our nation-state, shouldn't the government monopolize that business for the sake of our well-being? The answer, unfortunately, is NO. Because no matter how badly a business is run in the free-market, the government would only do worse.
So when it comes to privatization of airlines, oil, or domain names (the free flow of information is becoming more central to our security), I applaud a business trying to be more competitive, trying to evolve, trying to find a better way to manage customers, even if they stumble in doing so.
Re:Good Grief Charlie Brown (Score:2)
Well, Tucows [tucows.com] seems to be doing quite well [yahoo.com] (especially in their last three quarters). They have diversified into other businesses, but their primary income is still related to domain name registration.
- j
Re:Good Grief Charlie Brown (Score:3, Insightful)
Startup costs are minimal (and have been long-since absorbed, two buyouts ago) the infrastructure will never need to get bigger than it was in 2000... This *should* be a tidy profit center, if they could get customers.
I don't know what thier infrastrucutre is like, but i think thier problems stem from being born in a govenment-sponsored monopoly environment, and not having to scrape and fight in a free economy.
Re:Good Grief Charlie Brown (Score:3, Informative)
1. Volume registrants. Joe Schmoe might register one domain, once a year, but some high volume registrants will register 5000 domains a year. You give them a volume discount, but at this level of domain purchases it really is feasible to balance customer support costs with the meager income a domain registration provides.
2. Hosting. This is typically very profitable (at least compared to registrations). If a customer on the phone or at the website is interested in purchasing a domain they're probably also looking for hosting. Presenting a complete web package from design to registration to hosting makes it easy for a consumer to do it all in just one stop.
Versign (network solutions) is screwed. Sure it was a cash cow at first when they had a monopoly, but now they have a broken business model.
Re:Good Grief Charlie Brown (Score:1)
87 percent solution? (Score:2)
VeriSign is the WORST company EVER. (Score:5, Interesting)
We're now getting started with a criminal investigation (I'll probably send the details into Slashdot in a few weeks). VeriSign is a horrable company. They are insecure, they have a pathetic legal deptartment (only about 3 people), it is nearly impossible reach anyone aside from tech support, etc etc. VeriSign makes MicroSoft look like an angel.
dotster anyone?
NOOOOO!!! (Score:4, Informative)
I'm no longer a sysadmin around here, but the people who are admins respect my opinions, and we will deal with a reconstituted "Network Solutions" over my dead body. How they can think that that name has any positive value in the world today is beyond me.
Re:NOOOOO!!! (Score:2, Funny)
Registrar: NETWORK SOLUTIONS, INC.
Looks like they went over your dead body.
Dept. (Score:1)
from the like-evil-dead-two dept.
Does this mean that they just give up and some point and try to be shitty?
:)
Ouch... (Score:1)
How is it that every person involved with the internet could have told them this, but they had to conduct a survey, after debranding, and now have incur the cost of rebranding this division...
and who really cares about this???? (Score:3, Informative)
Why would you register a domain name through VeriSign anyways???
Use register.com's Name Bargain!! [namebargain.com]
BTW: Anyone know of a RELIABLE place that is cheaper than this??
Re:and who really cares about this???? (Score:1)
Re:and who really cares about this???? (Score:1)
Verisign, NSI, Dotster... (Score:2, Interesting)
My doctor has advised me to not discuss the plethora of issues I've historically had with Verisign/NSI due to my blood pressure.
What I see now however, is most of the alternative registrars being almost as bad.
We migrated all our domains over to Dotster a few years back and in the beginning we were concerned with the stability of their IIS-based system, which would often crawl to a stop in SSL mode during business hours. We actually had to make post-it note reminders to perform domain maintenance on their system later in the day because their site often was too slow. When they migrated over to a Unix-based system, we were very pleased.
However, recently, Dotster, who was a decent registrar in my opnion, has really gone down the tubes. Their automated domain renewal system seems to not work. The web page where users can enter credit card info on file has been broken (their response, "Nobody uses that page much so we didn't notice it was broken"). And most recently, the've unleashed this obnoxious web-hosting-component company called Hostlane, which has invoiced us for services we didn't ask for and automatically charged credit cards. What's insidious is that the hosting charge is the same amount as domain renewal, which seems to make it suspiciously appear as if they're trying to sneak extra charges through on the customer's billing statements.
I am fed up with these registrars and their sleazy business practices. NSI was the first and the worst, but now so many of the others, from Verisign to Verio, Register.com and others, they all are the pits. Does anyone have any advice for what the best choice is now? I can no longer recommend Dotster.
... easyDNS (Score:2)
A little more expensive then other registrars but, then again, you've already found out you get what you pay for.
Registration and DNS management, regular and stealth web forwarding, URL forwarding, spam filtering (and a good anti-spam policy to kick off abusers), DNS redundancy, ACL access to your management pages
Search through Usenet [google.com] for lots of recommendations.
Re:... easyDNS (Score:1)
duh (Score:1)
Being well known isn't always good (Score:5, Interesting)
A lot of people recognise the name "Osama" too, but that doesn't necessarily come as a positive thing for him when a large portion of those people want him dead.
Verisign should recognise that there is a difference between "famous" and "infamous"... from reading the posting of the slashdot crew here, I think Verisign would be much better off to build a new easy-to-remember untarnished name, rather than resurrecting one dripping with poor opinion and bad history.
Re:Being well known isn't always good (Score:2)
I bet they can get enron.com for pretty cheap. I see that cluelessidiots.com is open too. I don't care what they change their name to however since I will never allow them to mismanage any domains for me again.
Re:Being well known isn't always good (Score:1)
I think it's a male plane...
http://www.atlyrics.com/quotes/t/threeamigos.html [atlyrics.com]
Verisign horror stories (Score:3, Informative)
Verisign Horror Stories [nsihorrorstories.com]
The Verisign Sucks Page [aetherlumina.com].
Ummm... What's Wrong? (Score:2)
I'm being serious in this question (if this is a real issue). I've had no problems with them in the past, and I have no problem with giving them the few bucks they will require to keep the couple domains that I have.
Re:Ummm... What's Wrong? (Score:1)
I had to wait for 12 months to recover a domain that they kept losing fax authorization to modify. I had to wait for over two years for an expired domain to be released from the registry.
Neither of these domains were critical, so it was just a matter of convenience, but geez, why can't they just answer the phones and fix problems as they occur?
They suck.
Why is it? (Score:2)
Re:Why is it? (Score:2)
|\|4w! (Score:1)
NetSolutions New Motto (Score:1)
Our Brand New Complaint department is staffed by Steve Balmer, Bill Gates, and Nuekom. Please don;t call or find the phone number, you will be sorry!
it's the price, stupid (Score:2)
Actually, I lied, it's not the exact same service. It's far better than anything verisign can fathom.
VeriSign, Network Solutions, The Incompetent NIC (Score:5, Informative)
I own three domain names, one of them under VeriSign/Network Solutions. Recently I had to make changes to the records for my domain names. It was a hassle.
How long has this company been at domain name handling? While they finally have a completely web based interface for the majority of functions related to domain names, you still have to use the eMail to hostmaster@networksolutions.com to change hosts records -- that is, your domain name's domain name servers. This shows blatant incompetency in regards to automation and their engineering staff.
How hard is it to make a little web form that is attached to a database? It's not.
Password, what password? I had been using the old crypt-password scheme for modifications to my domain names though the old eMail change method. When I went to use their website, I found that my account required a password. What password? It was not my old password, and they never asked me to modify my account. So I had to call up and get a password assigned to my domain name account.
And how long did it take for changed to propagate? For everything other than the hosts records, 24 hours or less. For the hosts modifications, it took over four days, and intervention by engineers because their system apparently was dropping the request for change. That would be four days of downtime for a website. Holy crap.
Trouble ticketing system for issues? They don't really have one as far as I can tell. I had to harass the support phone-droid to give me something to track the issue by, and she gave me some tracking number that they use in their database, but she seemed to indicate that they did not have any kind of trouble ticketing system.
If you are in business, you can't afford to do business with VeriSign/Network Solutions.
Re:VeriSign, Network Solutions, The Incompetent NI (Score:1)
"If you are in business, you can't afford to do business with VeriSign/Network Solutions."
Bloody hell, if this message could be moderated above the five it's already at, I'd hack slashdot to do it.
Likewise with headers. This one simple statement absolutely defines the trustworthiness, reliability, and dependability of Verisign/NetSol. None. They're slimy incompetent companies that shouldn't be allowed to exist.
DON'T SUPPORT THEM! EVER! ANYONE!
Boot to the head ... (Score:1)
I've gone from a simple dislike to a passionate hate of this company. I'm trying to transfer domains from these morons to Joker for 2 weeks now. Each time it takes Netslo 5 days to reject them. Inquiries to Netslo reply with cut-n-paste uselessness. I found the problem yesterday. Netslo's request to confirm the transfer emails came in with the subject "Information about your account". Guess where these where going? /dev/null
I contend these domain name jackals purposely wrote the subject to get snuffed by spam filters. Every other email from them contain the domain name in the subject line except for these transfer confirms. Now I've wasted money on a last minute payment to prevent an expire and on a non-refundable transfer fee to Joker. Their "Customer Retention" tactics are more pathetic than AOL's.
Improvements already underway (Score:2)
And their attempt to restrict tech contacts not to modify admin info is a nice try.. Just edit the URL and you're done
So that explains why pacbells SSL cert failed.. (Score:1)
Free Domain... (Score:2, Insightful)
After a month or two of emailing back and forth with tech support, trying to get them to sort out my DNS's, I gave up in frustration when none of the host registration things you have to do for each DNS actually got processed, and when I finally got them to work (or so it seemed) the host records for my domain still never updated.
The "24 hour" replies to email support NEVER took less than 2 days, normally being around 3-4. And their final solution after constant nagging on my part was "sorry we can't help you on email, call up our tech support number and get them to fix it". Unfortunately for me, I live in Australia so I'm usually sleeping when the number is open, and I don't want to pay hundreds of dollars in phone calls just to get them to fix their own problems.
So, being the Aussie Battler I am, I gave up.
If anyone wants the domain "ravin.gs", just email me and i'll transfer it to you for free (as in beer, speech, whatever - i don't want the fucking thing). It expires next month but I don't want it. It's got the NetSol curse.
SPAMMMM!!! (Score:2)