U.S. Won't Let Go of DNS

An Anonymous Reader wrote in with a story on the Eweek site, reporting that the Federal Government is going to keep control of the Domain Name System rather than handing it over to ICANN. From the article: "...the United States is committed to taking no action that would have the potential to adversely impact the effective and efficient operation of the DNS, and will therefore maintain its historic role in authorizing changes or modifications to the authoritative root zone file..."

Comments

U.S. Won't Let Go of DNS - So what?

[zoloto]

And this is a problem how? This is an honest question. The U.S. has had control of the root servers since inception (as far as I have ever known) and things have been running wonderfully since... so what's the issue? We backed out of a plan to hand control over to ICANN because we were concerned? DU-H! Any country as powerful or even close would probably have done the same thing. //here's my solution

Keep one/two root servers in each country based on population of internet users/total population. Really, this is what I could see as being "fair" or "international" as they come in terms of a solution that would benefit everyone. That's a LOT of servers, right? Each country can come up with a solution as to how and what they'll be. Let the other countries make their own DNS servers and agree to everyone just co-operating with each other.

How hard can it be?

Re:U.S. Won't Let Go of DNS - So what?

[mi]

Yep, it is a strategic asset of ever increasing importance. Holding on to it makes sense.

Better be polite about it, of course, but do not let go.

Re:U.S. Won't Let Go of DNS - So what?

[MichaelSmith]

Keep one/two root servers in each country based on population of internet users/total population.

Most countries have servers for their own TLD's (.au in Australia). Come to think of it there is nothing to stop countries with firewalls (Iran, China, Sauda Arabia, etc) from diverting root server traffic to their own root servers. Personally this is the type of control which I would _not_ want my Government to have.

ZONK! READ THE DAMN SITE!

[Anonymous Coward]

Or quit as an editor. This is ridiculous.

ICANN Won't Get DNS Root Servers

And who should replace it?

[ShatteredDream]

Can anyone look at the history of the UN and honestly say that they would be any better, rather than a lot worse? Does anyone want the organization that puts the Sudan and other bloody, human rights violating states on its human rights commission to be the ones to regulate who gets a domain name? I sure don't.

Re:And who should replace it?

[gad_zuki!]

> Can anyone look at the history of the UN and honestly say that they would be any better, rather than a lot worse?

You'd probably be dead of smallpox, if not all out nuclear war, but hey who cares when you you've got fox news talking points to spread on the web.

I'll get you started on the path to some facts:

The World Health Organization eradicated smallpox. Guess who created WHO?

Playing the "rotating seat" card and claiming an evil conspiracy is pretty weak. The UN members states get representation of some kind, not just, say the US. Internationalism is ugly and messy. There's another country with a horrible human rights record that almost never gets mentioned by the "UN is bad, mmkay" crowd. Guess who? Guess who keeps covering for them in the security council.

Anyway, taking the "I hate stuff and I'm kinda a libertarian" stance on slashdot is a great way to get mod points. Congrats on your +5 post!

Re:Ask yourself this

[Wavicle]

And while we're on the subject...

Why are we suddenly supporting ICANN? Because it's an opportunity to attack the U.S.? Come on, wasn't this the same organization that held meetings on critical issues in Ghana so that critics wouldn't come? (i.e. Let's hold an important meeting on how much we'll let the public participate in ICANN in a country with less than impressive internal stability so the critics will be scared away.)

Sorry, given the choice of ICANN control of root servers and US control of root servers... I'll stick with the current well functioning system. One of the two is subject to political pressure from SOMEBODY.

It seems like

[suitepotato]

most of the opposition is knee-jerk and FUD. Like the "evil Bushies" are going to take away your pr0n collection.

(insert rolling eyes emoticon here)

I think the US government is well aware how dangerous the Internet and the flow of information across it is to its enemies. Iran and company can only be ever destabilized by the Internet and cutting themselves off completely will leave them behind more and more. Opening up access will accellerate disaffection in those nations more and more. Either way, the days of these totalitarians is numbered.

Yet supposedly the US government is suddenly going to do all sorts of nasty things with their control of the root servers.

I doubt Microsoft, IBM, General Motors, CitiBank, etc. would put up with that nor would any of the other many thousands of businesses and in short order, their money would do the talking to congressmen.

Re:The ITU != the rest of UN

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah, tell that to the two million Christians that were brutally slaughtered

Funny you should mention the Christians. They themselves have a stunning record of peaceful behaviour: The crusades, the Inquisition, today's USA.

Did you think that pointing out that two million Christians died would garner you anymore sympathy than pointing out that two million people died? Who the hell cares that they were Christians? Personally, the less intolerant, monotheistic, war mongering religions on the planet the better. Christians, Muslims, Jews -- all guilty.

Seeing two million people slaughtered is awful, don't weaken your point by attempting to back it up with an emotional response.

Re:The ITU != the rest of UN

[flubbergust]

You know, UN is not some strange foreign country but more like a democratic assembly. In that assembly all the countries around the world participate, like USA, and there is the Security council in which USA has a veto. USA choose not to make a big deal about Sudan. USA CHOOSE NOT TO MAKE A BIG DEAL.
Don't blame UN when you own government didn't do shit. You are just as guilty as the rest of us so don't try to make it seem like USA are some kind of Saint that only do good deeds and protect the weak against those who wants to inflict harm on them (especially if they are Christian). USA have destroyed a whole bunch of Christian democracys, like Chile and Guatemala, and bombed and killed countless of other innocent people. I don't think that is in the bible that its ok to do that.
And 2 millions? You pulled that out of your ass? Your own government (Yes the US of A with Bush as president) said that its only around 181000. So Muslims are now just evil? What about the new report from Iraq in which Iraq UN ambassador said that a relative of his were murdered by the peace-loving Christians in the US marine corps? That boy wanted to help you and you repaid him with a bullet in his neck.
And don't make it into some kind of religious war because its not. Learn first what the conflict is about BEFORE you start to make wild claims.
And your claim that UN is corrupt. SIGH. You know, USA is a big part of UN so if UN is corrupt then USA is partly to blame for it. Once again, UN is not some strange mythical organization. black helicopters flying around, that wants to destroy humankind and USA and Christians in particular.
I have nothing against USA, in fact I love that country and I love especially one American girl more than anything in this worl. I do however something against you in person. So just because someone is criticizing you, its not critique against democracy or freedom or USA or something like that, its because they just don't like what YOU say.

One little reminder

[gothamboy]

The Internet was funded with US taxpayer dollars and has been open to the world to use without financial consideration or gratitude for the research money that went into it. If the US Govt wants to run the root servers that is purely a domestic US issue. Like the GPS system (also US taxpayer financed in the billions and used by the world without gratitude or financial consideration), if people in other countries or Americans don't like the US govt administering it, go build your own.

Re:One little reminder

[fmaxwell]

LOL, so because a protocol has been 'invented' somewhere (by committees often containing people from all over the world), you can not build a new network, because you use building blocks?

What an incredibly gross distortion of what I wrote. First off, TCP/IP was not invented by a committee "containing people from all over the world." It was invented in the 1970s by Vinton Cerf and Bob Kahn. Nor did I say that you could not build a new network because it used such building blocks. But you can't paste your computers onto the Internet and say "we built a network!" No, you didn't. You just attached to an existing one.

Okay, I'll extend your statement, and say that the US has never build any roads or buildings, because they have been invented in other places.

That's not an extension of my statement. I wrote: "You just attached computers to an existing network using the building blocks (TCP/IP, Ethernet, etc.) which were invented in the U.S. at U.S. taxpayer expense." The U.S. didn't attach roads to the ones in Europe. We built a complete, standalone system of roads. Every road in Europe could be shut down and it would not affect traffic flow in the U.S.

Also the US has never build any computers or networks, because those too have been invented outside of the US.

Your ignorance is showing. The Atanasoff-Berry Computer was the world's first electronic digital computer. It was built by John Vincent Atanasoff and Clifford Berry at Iowa State University during 1937-42. Timesharing, the concept of linking a large numbers of users to a single computer via remote terminals, was developed at MIT in the late 50s and early 60s. In 1962, Paul Baran of RAND developed the idea of distributed, packet-switching networks. ARPANET, which later became the Internet, went online in 1969. So, computers were invented in the U.S. So was networking. And so was the Internet.

Again, you don't have to invent something to build an example of it. But neither can you claim that you built a network if all you built is just an extension to an existing network.

As root servers are computer too, the US has never build any root servers either.

Again, you don't seem to grasp the argument. I didn't say that the EU could not build a network because they did not invent the concept or protocols. But simply hooking into a network built in the U.S. does not constitute building a network.

Re:The ITU != the rest of UN

[Zak3056]

Don't blame UN when you own government didn't do shit.

i.e. when the US acts without the backing of the UN, we're the big, evil bully. However, when the US DOESN'T act when the UN is disinterested, we're the big, evil, unfeeling nation who could care less about the plight of the rest of the world. Right?