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0 pointsCthulhu_5y ago0 comments

Like how many UK businesses and individuals had to give up their .eu domain name after leaving the EU.

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9 comments · 2 top-level

londons_explore5y ago· 7 in thread

I'm really surprised they didn't do the logical thing and grandfather all existing domains in when the UK left the EU.

It seems like the policy was simply designed to frustrate as many people as possible for no real gain for the EU.

tialaramex5y ago

The EU continues to control .eu because it is available only to EU citizens. Nothing changed.

Your surprise exactly reflects the typical beliefs of a Brexit supporter, you thought the idea is you get to keep all the benefits you had before, and also you get rid of any downsides you didn't like, and somehow it's the EU's job to help you achieve this after you leave.

That didn't make any sense in 2016, and it still didn't make any sense in 2020, and so unsurprisingly here we are in 2021 and it isn't what happened. "We told you so" is boring but it's true. We told you so.

tshaddox5y ago

It might make sense for certain Internet resources to be made available only to citizens of some political region. It might make sense to revoke access to such resources if an individual renounced their citizenship or loses it due to their own actions (like, say, treason). But it really doesn’t make much sense that I could lose access to an arbitrary Internet resource I legitimately possessed because of large-scale political changes unrelated to my actions as an individual.

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londons_explore5y ago

But this policy doesn't make sense for the EU either. They lose domain registration revenue. Thousands companies migrating to a new domain name will lead to confusion for EU citizens too, etc.

It just seems like a case of "we want it to be as painful as possible for you, even if we have to take a bit of additional pain for us too".

9 more replies

alibarber5y ago

The EU domain is available to EU residents and citizens, not just citizens. I as a British citizen and EU resident am entitled to one (not that I have bothered - someone got the one I wanted first :O )

I guess an EU citizen living in the UK could also hold them on behalf of UK based UK citizens. Thinking about it this situation does seem a little convoluted...

rendall5y ago

Harsh. But fair.

zahllos5y ago

.eu domain usage isn't that high, I don't think. I only have anecdata from my time in the UK, but .co.uk appears to be "the" domain to have in the UK.

From what I've seen the same is true on the continent. .fr and .de for example are highly popular in France and Germany. You rarely see local business reaching for .eu domains.

According to wikipedia, the number of affected domains is 344,584. Also compared to wiki there are 11M .uk domains and 16.5M .de domains. According to EurID[0] there are 3.7M .eu domains

[0]: https://eurid.eu/en/welcome-to-eurid/statistics/

rorykoehler5y ago

It could be a fraud prevention and accidental legal misrepresentation defense mechanism to take away the .eu domains from the UK. If you go to a .eu domain and buy something you would expect not to be subject to import duties etc.

sigio5y ago

Just a matter of getting a TTP / Intermediary to hold the domain for you in the EU, same as for the local presence requirements in for example .no(rway) and many other TLD's.

It's just another $10-20/year and fixes your 'problem'

Many domain registrars will offer this service, as 90+% of their clients will need it for these ccTLD's.

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