Today I realized how neandartal some services in Israel still are. I tried to modify a domain I own, and change the domain owner since it is now being managed by a company and not a person. I have been modifying .com, .org, .co.uk, .de and many other TLDs for years now.

Right now, the registrar for .il domains is isoc.org.il and I suspect that like most things in Israel they received the “license” to operate this registrar as a result of some political connection. It used to be handled by a university sponsored body called “Machba”.

What bothers me is that these guys have the worse possible registrar system, and like a monopoly they don’t really care their system sucks big time. Undisturbed, They inflict their strange and nefarious schemes upon us Israelis. For example you have to pay for 2 years in advance. Renewal is also for 2 years at a time. Strange? Wait! For it does not end here… Perhaps you want to modify some detail in your domain? You have to FAX your signature (yes! you heard me right). Perhaps they should change their name to isuck.org.il.

Anyway today I tried to modify the owner, and hear this: Fax is not enough. They want money for it as if I am registering a new domain! This means 280nis AGAIN (that’s $60 USD). They treat the name change as a transfer. In the US or in many european registrars, this is a free operation. My American registrar is namecheap.com and they have an even better system – all a user has to do is create an account on their system (free) and then I can “push” the domain to his account, again – free!
So never mind that I pay for com/net/org domains $8.80 USD/year which is $21.20 less per year, and never mind that the guys at isoc charge for a minimum of 2 years, I also have to throw away my investment when I want to change the domain holder (free anywhere else!). I spoke with one of their guys on the phone, and instead of agreeing with me that things should improve he started finding all kinds of excuses for the mediocrity of the system (1. look at other countries they charge the same or more, 2. the system is not that bad [yes it is!!], 3. how can you compare a “generic” .com domain to .co.il domains? 4. etc, etc…).
Oh – I also have a “NIC” (Yes for those of you who remember the horror that was internic.net many years ago when the US registration system was held by little green trolls). A feeble attempt to assign some kind of “ID” to my persona. It would have been a good idea if executed properly – in theory I would have the same NIC forever, and I would keep updating the details for my NIC as I change phone numbers of move to another house, and all domains related to that NIC would automatically have the new NIC. Except it doesn’t work!!! My NIC is AF6442-IL and it contains outdated details. If I change the details of my NIC in one domain, they will not change for other domains. At least in the old internic.net days it did work and you could change the NIC details and they would update for all domains using that NIC, but I guess the blue trolls in Israel are even worse than the little green trolls that used to roam internic.net!

The case of the woman who’s face was savaged by her own dog got me thinking about the whole pet thing.

A good friend once told me that dogs have no soul, no feelings, and the “love” we humans think they feel towards us is an illusion. At the time I found that hard to accept – the love I seemed to be receiving from my own dog, a golden cocker spaniel seemed quite real to me (she died when I was 20, poisoned by an angry neighbour who didn’t like the dog roaming in the shared garden).

So what is the truth, then? If a cat or a dog live with you, what certainty do they have that they will be fed when they are hungry? Is it faith? Is it total stupidity (they can’t be sure, and can’t even think about what ‘sure’ is or what certainty is) and they just take it in strides – they will complain when hungry and until then they will not think about it, kinda like small children, they can not and will not plan in advance for food – it is the job of the parents to think about such things… AHA! Parents!

So do we get pets because we like to care for living things? It is more about having a creature that is willing to receive our inflictions, rather than having a creature initiate some kind of giving (for some, the only thing dogs or cats give willingly is poop).

If we look at early humanity, having animals had a practical aspect – we get milk, fat and meat from cattle, sheep, goats, etc. and dogs were used as early warning, or attack/protection, or herding sheep, etc. It is not difficult, then, to understand how human and animal have bonded. It is certainly interesting however to think about the leap dogs have made from being a practical “tool”, to a fashion, something people do on a whim. Perhaps the popularity of pets was born in france during the early stages of aristocracy? Maybe.

Me and Yamit have recently started going to Salsa courses again. It’s a lot of fun, and I feel I am improving. Last Saturday we went to Roueda which is Salsa in groups (usually circles). I think the meaning of the word “Roueda” is “Wheel” or “Circle”.

We joined a beginner group and although I know the basic step (and maybe one or more other steps beyond basic) it went from boring to interesting to difficult in a matter of minutes. We learned all the basic steps required for proper Roueda interaction. I learned that women are not naturally born dancers, and that while I exchange partners (part of the Roueda thing) I had success with some women, a total failure with some other women, and of course it was absolutely perfect with Yamit (and for you “awwwwwing” guys out there, it’s not because we’re a couple in love, it’s because Yamit is a very good Salsa dancer).

We decided that until the wedding, we will try to work on a Salsa dance, in a feeble attempt to impress our wedding guests (that’l show them who’s boss).
Of course some of you do not know who Yamit is, so just for the record we have been dating for 7 month now and as of 2 weeks ago we are engaged. More about that in a future post, perhaps, and perhaps never.

One thing I did notice, for all you single males out there, is that Salsa evenings are chock full of good looking babes who are looking for that special guy who can dance them to happy life (Who said I never gave tips?)