Domains and Registrars
What is the domain registration process and the correlation between domains and registrars? In order to understand the interdependency of domains and registrars is to first understand the background of domains in general. Originally various tasks related to the Internet and its governance was performed by the United States government. Eventually they spun out the underlying domain tasks and gave that authority to the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN).

Timeline of Domain Registration Responsibilities
Here is a time line with items of note, beginning with the creation of the domain name system. The oversight through one organization, eventually transferred to another and finally opening up the competition of domain registration and allowing for more than one registrar.

• 1983 – DNS (Domain Name System) was invented and used at ARPANET (Advanced Research Projects Agency Network) funded by DARPA (Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, the U.S. government loves acronyms
• 1985 – First commercial .COM domain was registered (symbolics.com)
• 1991 – Network Solutions had a sub-contract with DISA (U.S. Defense Information Systems Agency) to operate the registry
• 1993 – Network Solutions had an exclusive (they were the sole registrar) agreement to operate the registry for TLDs (Top Level Domains .com .net .org), and maintained WHOIS (database of domain ownership)
• 1995 – Network Solutions was granted the ability to charge for domain name registrations
• 1998 – ICANN (Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers) was incorporated to oversee the domain functions as opposed to the U.S. government through organizations such as Network Solutions
• 1999 – ICANN provided for a shared registration system and now opened up the field for additional registrars

The system of shared registration allowing for multiple registrars continues today through ICANN.

ICANN (Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers)
ICANN oversees and regulates domain name registration through the develoment of policy. The organization is a not-for-profit corporation which they state exists for the public-benefit.

They do not have the infrastructure to deal with individual customers of domains and that was not their mandate. The purpose of the creation of ICANN is to work with registrars more of a Business to Business relationship with registrars than a Business to end Consumer which is the domain registrant. While there may be multiple registrars they all have too abide by ICANN policies and pay fees for each domain registration. These fees fund ICANN.

How Registrars Work
There are multiple registrars. A registrar is a consumer facing company that allows individuals or companies to register domains. Every domain name is unique. This is important to understand as there may be multiple registrars but only one registrar can register each unique domain name. Domain names are available on a first-come first-served basis. So the correlation between domain names and registrars is what they call a one to many relationship. For each unique domain there are multiple registrars that have the ability to allow it to be registered but only one registrar and one individual will obtain it.

As an individual you can only obtain a domain name through the process of domain registration and you must go through a registrar. You can use any registrar but each registrar has to check with ICANN to assure the domain or domains is not already registered. If the domain is not registered then you pay the registrar a fee which they decide and a portion of that fee is paid to ICANN by the registrar. Therefore each domain registrar can set their own price, however each registrar must pay a fixed price to ICANN.

Who Controls a Domain and Can It be Sold?
And individual or company that registers a domain name never truly has complete control over it. Think of a domain registration as the equivalent of a car lease. When you lease a car you have control of the car but only under certain terms. If you do not make your lease payments the leasing company will be able to take the car back. When the lease term is up, depending on the terms, the leasing company can take the car back. A domain name works in a similar fashion. You register a domain which means you have exclusive control of it during the registration period. You can point the domain at whatever website you want, utilize it for email etc. However you never truly own the domain. Issues may come up of trademark registration and you could actually lose a domain. You may forget to pay your yearly fee and again will lose control of the domain. You may choose not to pay the registration fee and allow your registration of the domain to lapse. In all the above cases the domain will revert back to the domain registry.

Selling a Domain
You can transfer a domain to another individual and they can pay you for it. However you are not technically selling the domain as much as you are selling the right to register it and control it. Since you do not own the domain, merely control it through your registration fee, you can sell that right.

To use the car analogy again, think of the Assumption of the lease. Someone can actually assume the lease to your car. If the lease is assumed then that person is assuming the same rights, obligations, and restrictions that you had. So they still have to pay the registrar their fee and can still potentially lose the domain even though they bought the right to control it from you. However once you transfer ownership it is out of your control. So technically you are not selling the domain, but what does that matter if you still get paid, haha.

Domain Registrars

• Network Solutions
• GoDaddy
• Register.com

I hope this explains domain registration and the history of registration in an easy to understand manner.