New York: New Hubris <Rant>

First there was the campaign for .nyc - a totally pointless call for yet another TLD for the City of New York. We have enough TLD's already - we don't need to pollute the namespace any further with city TLD's. If .nyc or .berlin get their way, who has the right to claim .bristol? The original one in the UK? Or Bristol, TN? Or Bristol, NB? The arrogance of these cities to think that they have the right to pollute the DNS namespace with this nonsense is astounding.

Now there's a story that Spamazon is suing NY State because of a new tax law that allows NY State to force online retailers to collect sales tax at the point of sale for goods shipped to NY residents. Normally, I wouldn't support Amazon (they're on my boycott list, generically, for being email spamtards) but I have to admit that Amazon are in the right here. Only an arrogant State Legislature would pass a law requiring a business in another state to collect taxes on the State's behalf.

It's also disappointing to read that this legislation was originally proposed by former New York Governor Eliot Spitzer. I had a lot of respect for the man - even when he was caught with his trousers down - due to his stance on spammers and telescum like Xentel Inc.

Still, this doesn't score as high in the hubris stakes as Judge Charles Kocoras of the IL courts, who suffers from a superiority complex: he was the one who returned a default judgement against Spamhaus, who don't even have a presence in the US.