OpenDomain.org owner: Selfless FOSS helper or domain squatter? OpenDomain.org所有者： 无私的FOSS帮手还是域名抢注者？
Submitted by Fannie on Mon, 08/11/2008 - 10:49.
in
OpenDomain.org owner: Selfless FOSS helper or domain squatter?
OpenDomain.org所有者： 无私的FOSS帮手还是域名抢注者？
OpenDomain.org is an organization that offers to provide free use of certain domain names to worthwhile open source projects. Ric Johnson, the leader of OpenDomain.org and the owner of dozens of domain names, says he has spent thousands of dollars registering those domains in order to prevent "squatters and phishers" from snapping them up. He's keeping them safe so you can have a chance to use them. However, to some people, based on Johnson's past practices, it's not clear how OpenDomain.org differs from other organizations that buy up domain names in the hopes of future gains.
OpenDomain.org是一个为那些值得投资的开源项目提供一定数量免费使用的域名的组织。OpenDomain.org的领导者和数十个域名的所有者Ric Johnson表示，他花费了数以万计的美元注册了那些域名，以防止域名抢注的人和“钓鱼”的人来抢购他们。他一直在保持这些域名的安全，所以你可以有机会一直使用他们。但是，基于Johnson 过去以来的经历,对于某些人来说，他们并不知道，OpenDomain.org和其他组织怎样的不同，他们把这些域名全部买下是希望将来会得到什么结果。
Johnson is a consultant and developer who uses Microsoft products to code. He says he wants to "break into the open source world," but doesn't have the skills. He says he decided to give to open source in his own way: by purchasing domain names and providing free use of them to worthy open source projects. Johnson says he is an "anti-squatter," purchasing domains for hundreds of dollars and protecting them from misuse. He asks nothing in return except an acknowledgment and a link to opendomain.org on every page of the sites he licenses.
Johnson是一个顾问，也是一个使用微软产品进行编码的开发者。 他说他要“闯进开源世界，” 但是他没有这个技能。 他说他决定用他自己的方式投身于开源这份事业：他通过购买域名和为那些值得投资的开源项目提供这些域名的免费使用权。约翰逊说他是“反域名抢注的人，”花费了数百美元来购买域名，保护他们免受误用。他除了接受一次感谢，以及在每个他准许的页面添加opendomain.org的链接之外，不求回报。
Johnson gained notoriety back in 2000 when he purchased free.tv for $100,000. "I came up with an invention that was a lot like TiVo," Johnson says. "It was more like a Microsoft media center computer than anything, and I founded the company free.tv [to market the invention]. I spent more on that domain than I did on my house. I believed at the time that by getting [one of the] first .tv domains, I would get a lot of exposure."
在2000年的时候，Johnson用100,000美元购买了free.tv的时候他得到的是一个恶名。“我提出了一项发明，很象TiVo，”Johnson说。“它比其他任何东西都象微软媒体中心计算机，并且我[为了销售发明的东西]创办了free.tv公司。比起我家的房子，我在域名里花费的钱要多得多。我相信，到一定时候，通过first .tv中的某个域名，我可以得到很多曝光的机会。”
Johnson says he experienced frustration because his Web host wasn't able to host .tv domains. The invention didn't go anywhere either. Somehow this gave him the idea, he says, to buy domains and let certain groups use them. "I thought, I have to spend this much, why don't I set up a program that collects domains and helps out different groups." Johnson wanted to advertise on those groups' sites in exchange for the use of the domain. "Usually, if you wanted to advertise your domain you'd go to Google and buy some ad space. My idea was to take a few thousand and buy a domain that a squatter had and give it to a good group in hopes that they would link to us. I was trying to get money because I'm Joe Developer -- I'm not a millionaire."
Johnson说他体验了失望的感觉，因为他的服务器主机不能支持.tv的域名。他的发明什么地方都安置不了。不知道怎么地，这给了他一个主意，他说，去购买域名并且让某些特定的小组来使用他们。“我想，既然我是必须要花费这笔钱的，那为什么我自己不成立一个可以搜集域名和又可以帮助不同小组的项目呢？”Johnson想在那些小组的网站上做广告，以交换域名的使用权。“通常，如果你想给你的域名做广告，你得去谷歌还得买一些广告空间。我的目的就是，用几千块美元买一个域名抢注者拥有的域名，然后给一个好的小组来使用，希望他们能给个链接给我们。我一直都在设法盈利，毕竟我不是一个百万富翁，我只是一个开发商。”
Johnson says the reason he began to focus on open source groups is that he realized the value of open code and wanted to help out. "I am a Microsoft developer. I couldn't really break out into the open source world. If I switch over to Linux, I'm going to be starting over as a PHP or JavaScript developer. I couldn't just stop my job and start over in the open source world. [Donating domains] was a way of me working for open source."
Johnson说他开始集中在开源小组的原因是，他意识到开放代码的价值，并且想帮助他们。“我是微软的开发商。我不能真正的进入开源世界。如果我转换到Linux，我将要从PHP或Java语言开发商重新开始我的工作。我不可能才停止我的工作，就在开源世界里重新开始。[捐赠域名]是我为开源工作的方式
Johnson scored a few big-name domains and contacted the project leaders, with mixed results. His first attempt at helping a well-known open source project turned sour. In 2005, Johnson stumbled upon the Wordpress.com domain and bought it, then offered to let Matt Mullenweg, the founding developer of WordPress, use the domain according to the terms of OpenDomain.org. That didn't go over well with Mullenweg. He wrote, "I think the main disagreement between Ric and myself is that I believe [Wordpress.com] should be used for the nonprofit, free to everyone WordPress project, and he wants a hand in some sort of commercial venture on top of the work of WP volunteers."
Johnson标注过一些名声响亮的域名，带着混乱的结果，和那些项目的负责人取得了联系。他的第一次企图帮助那些知名的开源项目的想法落空了。2005年，Johnson在Wordpress.com做了一个错误的决定，他把这个域名买了下来，然后提供给了WordPress的创建开发商Matt Mullenweg，希望他遵循OpenDomain.org的规定来使用这个域名。其实Mullenweg和这个域名并不匹配。他写过。“我觉得在Ric和我自己之间的主要分歧是，我相信[Wordpress.com] 是应该被非盈利地使用的，WordPress项目应该对每个人都是免费的，但是Ric想投资给那些基于WP志愿者工作的商业投资的某一类组织。”
Mullenweg, who had no comment for Linux.com, convinced Johnson to hand the domain over to him. "After I gave it to him, he sued me," Johnson says. "I spent a hell of a lot of money on that domain and $30,000 more on lawyers." Mullenweg refused to comment.
Mullenweg，那个对Linux.com不予置评的人，说服了Johnson把域名给他。“在我给了他以后，他起诉了我。”Johnson说。“在那个域名上我花费了更多的钞票，还多花费了30,000美元在律师费上。”Mullenweg拒绝评论。
Johnson admits he made a mistake with the WordPress affair. "He was completely right. He owned the idea of WordPress and I didn't understand that at the time. I think we could have worked it out better." Since that misunderstanding, it seems Johnson has changed his tack with regard to donating domain names to open source projects.
Johnson承认他在WordPress这件事上犯了一个错误。“他完全是正确的。他有WordPress的构想，但在那个时候，我并不明白。我认为我们本可以完成得更好的。”自从那次误解以后，看起来Johnson改变了他对开源项目捐赠域名的行动方针。
"I thought I was doing something good with Matt. All my advisors starting saying, 'Hey this is great,' so in the midst of that we bought drupal.com." The Drupal community reacted with disdain when it found out that Johnson had registered drupal.com. "Everybody in the community hated me," Johnson says."
“我认为我在和Matt做着好事。我所有的顾问都开始说，‘嘿，这很伟大嘛’，所以在那关键时刻，我们购买了drupal.com。”当Drupal社区发现了Johnson注册了drupal.com的时候，他们开始蔑视我们。“在那个社区的所有人几乎都很讨厌我，”Johnson说。
"They want to piggy-back on the great reputation of Drupal to get their link on high traffic, high page-rank sites," wrote a forum member at drupal.org. "And they want to do it under the guise of 'open.' What is so open about cybersquatting a domain, then 'benevolently' allowing the people who are busy making the domain valuable to use it..."
“他们想把Drupal的伟大的名誉扛在肩上，以此得到他们高点击率的链接，成为页面点击率排行最高的站点，”一名论坛成员在drupal.org写到。“他们想打着‘开源'的幌子来这样做。这就是所谓的‘开源'，通过网络抢注一个域名，然后‘慷慨的'允许那些忙于使域名值钱的人来使用……”
Johnson says it took a bit of explaining. "When I talked to Dries Buytaert [Drupal's creator and original project leader] he was originally like, 'OK, what are you trying to do? OK, you're contributing in a different way, but you're still contributing." Johnson ended up transferring ownership of drupal.com to Buytaert, and the domain sits unused, though Buytaert commented in a press release that he was "very grateful" for the contribution.
Johnson说他解释了很多。“当我和Dries Buytaert[Drupal的创作者和最初的项目负责人]说他还是和最初的一样的时候，他说‘好，你想做什么？好，你在用别的方式资助我们是吗，但是你仍然付出的是更多更多。”虽然Buytaert在新闻发布评论了他为这次的资助感到“ 非常感激”，但是Johnson还是结束转移了Buytaert对drupal.com的所有权，域名也一直闲置着。
"Its been a couple of years now. If he thinks it dilutes his mark, that's up to him and I have to take a step back and believe that for Drupal he's doing the right thing. But remember, my whole training for 30 years is Microsoft, so it's very hard for me to look back and say, 'I gave you this domain. It cost me, and it's still not used.' It's frustrating because I could have put ads on it and taken the money and donated that over a period of time."
“到现在已经好几年了。如果他认为这件事已经冲淡了，其实这完全由他决定的，我会把这个决定撤回，我也相信Drupal会作这个正确的选择。但是要记住的是，我整整30年训练的时光都是在微软，所以我很难回头，也很难说‘我给了你这个域名。我花费了这么多，但它仍然没有被使用。’这太令人沮丧了，因为我本来有一段时间可以捐赠、在上面做广告、获取回佣的。”
Not everyone hates him
不是每个人都讨厌他
Not all of Johnson's domain registrations lead to acrimony. Gerry Demaret, part of the leadership team of FOSDEM, was surprised by the response he received from Johnson after Demaret discovered that Johnson had registered fosdem.com. "At first we were suspicious," Demaret says. "The [OpenDomain.org] Web site only gave vague information and their goal was not very clear to us. We thought that [Johnson] was a domain squatter with a cover to make his actions seem generally accepted."
不是所有在Johnson域名注册了的组织都失败了，也有很好的例子。Gerry Demaret，FOSDEM领导小组的一部分，在发现Johnson已经注册了fosdem.com之后，Demaret收到了Johnson的回复，他感到非常的惊奇。“起初我们是很怀疑的，”Demaret说，“[OpenDomain.org]网站只提供了很含糊的信息，他们的目标也不是很明确的针对我们。我们想那个[Johnson]是一个打着幌子的域名抢注者，他要使他的举动看起来容易被接受。”
Demaret contacted Johnson to try to understand the situation better. "Almost instantaneously I received a reply from Ric, telling me he had tried to query [the nameservers for fosdem.org] to see if they responded authoritatively for fosdem.com, because he wanted to point the nameserver records to us already. No need to say, I was really surprised by this friendly and quick action from him."
Demaret联系了Johnson，以试图更好的了解当前的形势。“几乎一眨眼的时光，我就得到了Ric的回复，他告诉我他曾经试着询问过[fosdem.org的域名服务器]，看看他们是不是能回应fosdem.com的命令，因为他已经想指向域名服务器记录下我们的域名了。不用说，我对他的这个友好而迅速的举动真的感到很惊讶。”
Brendan Eich, the creator of JavaScript, says Johnson donated ecmascript.org to the Ecma standards body without incident, and Eich placed an acknowledgement in the footer according to the terms specified by OpenDomain.org. And Jon Ferraiolo, the leader of the OpenAjax Alliance, picked up openajax.org from OpenDomain.org. "His donation was a pure gift, with absolutely no strings attached," Ferraiolo says. "Everything I have seen indicated that he work with other organizations in a similar way to how we worked with us."
Brendan Eich，Java语言的创作者，他说Johnson毫无征兆的就向Ecma标准组织捐献了ecmascript.org，Eich也遵循了OpenDomain.org制定的规定，在网页的底部放置了一个感谢辞。还有Jon Ferraiolo，OpenAjax联盟的主席，从OpenDomain.org得到了openajax.org这个域名。“他的捐赠是一件很纯净的礼物，绝对没有别的什么附加条件，”Ferraiolo说。“我看过他们做的每件事情，这些事情都表明了他和别的组织的工作，就像我们与我们自己的人在工作一样。
By all appearances, it seems that those in favor of Johnson's method of contributing to open source software development outnumber those who are perhaps not so happy. In any case, Johnson is not likely to make many new domain purchases because, he says, his wife is not happy with the amount of money he's already spent. And unless you're the likes of Brendan Eich or Druys Buytaert, don't expect a quick response to your request for a domain nowadays, because Johnson admits he's been "ignoring" many of the requests that still get posted to the site.
显然，似乎那些倾向于Johnson对待开源软件发展的方法的人在数量上超过那些也许不那么愉快的人。但无论如何，Johnson不可能再购买新域名了，因为，他说，他的妻子对他已经花费了的大量的金钱感到非常不满。并且，除非你是象Brendan Eich或者Druys Buytaert这一类，否则，在现在这个时候，不要期望在你的请求得到域名后很快就可以收到回应，因为Johnson承认，他已经在忽略许多仍然贴到网站上请求。
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