What you say is correct. I'll chip in a bit on "registrar to registrar". In case of Namecheap,renewing a expired domain is just like renewing a regular domain. While other registrars charge re-activation fee, Namecheap has no additional fees. So, Ryan can just renew the domain instantly whenever this comes into his attention.
In this particular case namecheap is merely a reseller for enom.
Important to point out here that namecheap which is much touted on HN as being so great to deal with is the organization that made the decision to take this domain offline - not enom.com the registrar.
When people fail to respond to expiration notices, taking the domain offline on the expiration date seems like a good way to bring it to their attention.
Off the top I wonder if an idea might be to do the following, keeping in mind that the registrar would charge extra but ultimately it would be to the registrants benefit and less disruptive if the normal ways (that have no cost) were interupted:
- Send postal notice (some do this already)
- Send express or certified letter (charging up front to be notified this way)
- Make phone call
- Send email to any contact addresses on the website
I would like to point out also that this is a reason also why "privacy" on whois is a bad idea in some cases. In this case it is fairly easy for a third party to get in touch with the joyent contact (someone might know him or have an alternative means of contacting him - even by phone if not the whois phone number). If contact info is protected by privacy that becomes a different issue (you would have to have more specific knowledge).
