For better or for worse, sex and the internet are two things that have always gone hand in hand. Online pornography has grown to become a multi-billion dollar industry and the number of pornographic websites out there is almost beyond measure. Up until now though, none of them could be found residing under the Irish country code (CC), or ‘.ie’ to the man on the street.

All that changed when Stephen Ryan tried to register the domain porn.ie last November. He was refused permission by the IE Domain Registry (IEDR), under paragraph 3.4 of their rules and regulations, which states that any .ie domain names that are registered must not be ‘offensive’ or ‘against generally accepted principles of morality.’ Ryan then changed his tactics, and filed documents with the Companies Registration Office in relation to a company called ‘ORN’, which he described as an ‘art group focused on digital media.’ Within the last fortnight, he has successfully registered the domain name orn.ie which when typed into a browser, will automatically redirect to the subdomain p.orn.ie, which offers a variety of adult content under the heading of ‘Ireland’s original porn website.’
Speaking to hotpress, Ryan said that he set up the site to make a point. “Banning the domain porn.ie won’t prevent pornography on the internet,” he said. “It’s a completely pointless exercise. I think it would be a lot better if this type of content was on a related domain name rather than just some random domain where it could be stumbled upon by anybody.” The content that appears on Ryan’s website is hosted on a server in the United States and is being displayed through a ‘frame’ on the site. Ryan says the venture was ‘just a bit of fun.’ “I’m not trying to make any money off it – there’s no long-term plans for it really. I’ll make a decision on whether or not to take it down when the time comes to renew the domain.”
Irish technology blogger Damien Mulley believes the orn.ie situation highlights the ‘silly rules’ that are attached to applying for a .ie address. “From a moralistic point of view I think people should be free to do what they want, once it’s within the parameters of Irish law,” he says. “The rules governing what names can be registered are very subjective. It seems to me that the morality clause was put in there by the IEDR in case somebody asked them ‘would you register anything?’ It seems to be their way of covering themselves.”
Michele Neylon runs Blacknight.ie, a web hosting company that features many .ie websites amongst its clients. He too is critical of the ambiguity surrounding domain name registration in Ireland. “The IEDR’s regulations are ambiguous because Irish law, based as it is on common law, is ambiguous,” he says. “If you look at the laws governing .fr (the French country code), they are about 40 pages long. They’re extremely detailed and it’s not the most exciting document on the face of the planet, but guess what – there’s no ambiguity or subjectivity.”
Neylon is not optimistic that the rules and regulations can be improved easily. He thinks the IEDR could do a lot to improve the transparency of its policymaking. “Unlike a lot of CCs (country codes) and TLDs (top-level domains), the .ie namespace does not have a policy advisory board,” he explains. “Other countries have bodies that can consult with people, learn their opinions and feed that back into the development of rules and regulations. With .ie you just have the board of directors and they’re not the most influential or active bunch. Proposals for personal .ie domains have been floated many times but it still hasn’t been put into action.”
Although Neylon has no moral objection to pornography, he does not agree with the methods Stephen Ryan has used to make his point. “I wasn’t impressed with some of the things he was doing because my view on the world is if there are certain rules and regulations that I might not like, I’ll try to effect a change rather than trying to circumvent them.”
In America, Kieren McCarthy has written an entire book about the epic struggle for control of the world’s most coveted domain name ‘sex.com’. If this situation continues to develop, we could have enough material for a similar tome right here in Ireland.