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IETF vs. ICANN
Ian Lance Taylor writes: "Two IETF drafts were filed today which fire a shot across ICANN's bows. They say that anybody who introduces a new version of an existing TLD is destabilizing the DNS--even ICANN. These are still only drafts, mind, not standards. They both acknowledge input from Karl Auerbach, the member of ICANN's board who was elected by North America. The drafts are Alternative Roots and the Virtual Inclusive Root and Root Server Definitions." The IETF drafters are attempting to define a system where non-ICANN TLDs can easily be added. ICANN is set to push their one root concept of operations where ICANN gets absolute authority over internet naming. All ICANN PR is geared toward presenting the ICANN-only plan as being necessary for "internet stability".
Note: Anyone at all can publish a document as internet-draft. These documents are the work of Simon Higgs, who has been a proponent of "alternative roots" for many years.
Their publication says ABSOLUTELY NOTHING about how the IETF community as a whole views these matters.
Unfortunately, the commonly-proposed solution -- adding more gTLDs -- is not going to help. If health-care organizations get their ".med", then sooner or later, someone is bound to want separate gTLDs for doctors, dentists, and homeopaths. If a ".mp3" gTLD becomes widely used and another music format supplants MP3, then people distributing music in the new format will still set up ".mp3" sites for that purpose. And so on and so on, until users are confused by too many gTLDs, and companies afraid of cybersquatting register their names with 20 gTLDs, not just two or three.
When people learn vocabulary, they learn the words for genuses first, and learn other levels of classification later. That's why a child, seeing a wolf, says "that's a dog", and not "that's a member of the species Canis lupus in the order Carnivora." That's why so many people set up personal domains under the ".com" TLD, even if they have no intention of making these domains commercial ventures -- they recognize ".com" as the default TLD and don't care about its alleged purpose.
Back in the eighteenth century, a number of philosophers tried to construct languages to mirror (their views of) the natural order of things -- their dream was a language where a false statement would be ungrammatical and where related concepts would have similar-sounding words. The people who want to "improve" DNS by adding more gTLDs are falling into the same trap.
We need fewer gTLDs, not more.
--
send all spam to theotherwhitemeat@ropine.com
/. .med TLD for years... so those readers who keep up on DNS issues have already heard this rant.
.med domain is so strong that one of the alternative registries has already created the TLD. Unfortunately, ICANN's stranglehold on the industry prevents this alternative registry from seeing wide use (although adoption by hospitals through inclusion of alternative roots in the bind cache is ramping up).
.med finally comes about, the people currently trying to serve the public good by providing the TLD will be marginalized if not driven out of business.
Disclaimer: I'm one of the people that've been petitioning for a
Currently, the hospitals of the world are randomly scattered across the DNS. For example, Fox Chase Cancer Center is fccc.edu, and Holy Spirit Hospital is HolySpiritHospital.Com, and the American Hospital Directory is AHD.Org. All these are non-profits except possibly the last.
The need for a
ICANN has refused to discuss the issue except to say that people who supply a solution to the problem (i.e. alternative registries) are the bad guys, destablizing the Internet (ha! I've been using all the major DNS roots simultaneously for years; just add the additional root entries in BIND).
I expect that when the
--Charlie
Mr connerbd,
You are hereby notified to cease and desist from any further such posts.
As you must be aware, any more discussion of distributed root servers would violate your Windows XP NDA.
Without going into particulars, your public disclosure could jeopardize critical intellectual property that would subject you to immediate and severe litigation that would cause your molars to disintegrate.
I am referring, of course, to the new Windows XP name server cache, which is meant to enhance the end user experience with increases in efficiency by caching frequently desired URLs, including advanced aliasing, such as
that provides a richer experience and the innovation that our customers have come to expect. Of course the same product includes our advanced Pr0nKiller/anti-terrorist MShopping Cart that will be pre-announced by our Chief Software Architect.Good day.
Sternly,
Geoffrey P. Foggbottom, JD
"Provided by the management for your protection."
My opinion on the whole TLD mess is that there should only be one domain.[net|org|com|.*] Instead of having slashdot.org & slashdot.com that whoever registers it has to pick a tld and the rest of the tld's with that domain are unavailable.
.net is most likely a network provider, a .org is an organization, etc. Since you'd pick which tld is going to be most appropriate for you business.
.net tld).
What this would get me is the confidence that I can say a
Also we don't have lawsuits between joeblow.biz & joeblow.com, etc. since they couldn't exist because they'd have a domain clash.
While I'm on a roll (rant), I'd even like it better if you actually had to show you truley belonged in a certain tld (you have to provide network services to be in the
I have no idea how to reverse the mess with all the different organization that are in the mess of having conflicts, but I know it could be implented for any new domains.
Of course that's me being an old curmudgeon
Lie of the 70's = The check is in the mail
Lie of the 80's = Trickle down economics
Lie of the 90's = I have not had sex with that woman/man/computer/etc.
Lie of the 00's = Monopoly promotes innovation
-- .sig are belong to us!
All your
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar