DNS entries aren't food or water, but they are a country's name and address. The US may blacklist certain nations (comparison: MAPS), but it still refers to them by name so that we all know what they hell they are talking about. If all mail to Kenya actually ended up in Indonesia, people would be (understandably) pissed off.
I know that picking on the "denying government" thing wasn't a grand idea;) but we're not talking a humanatarian stand here. We're talking about someone who doesn't like the politics of someone else. Nothing gives me the right to confiscate someone's rugby ball just because I don't like rugby.
As for ICANN, they haven't got involved yet. For all you know, they're reading this/. thread to get ideas on what they should do when they DO get involved;) The bill provides for the new company to decide on the technical implementation. That doesn't happen now... so all this argument is actually quite pointless, because ICANN's view (and the "governments" technical capability) is only likely to be known in the fairly distant future.
No, I think what you've said is essentially accurate. I would think the issue from the government's side is (apart from the power hungry bit) that regulatory organisations such as this tend to ignore government policy unless they have some sort of overriding government influence.
Whether Namespace would do this or consider government policy is anyone's guess... the government doesn't want it to be a guess.
Having the government responsible of dealing with Policies of any sort is baaad.
An unubstantiated and politically biased statement. Policy creation and enforcement is a primary role of government. The fact that "geeks" don't want to see the Internet regulated, and the fact that I don't like a number of the regulations government makes, doesn't mean this shouldn't be the case.
Can you please explain how this bill will compromise free speech? The government is not put in charge of the.za namespace, nor are the given any control over the DNS records themselves. The bill enables the creation of a company to deal with registrars.
This gives the government no more power to delete/disable/redirect an individual third level domain than they have power to tell Telkom to disconnect your telephone, or SATRA to instruct all ISPs to revoke your accounts.
Even if you want to claim that there will be underhanded dealing in the licensing of registrars, you still have a difference from the arms deal in that the government is not directly involved (the minister has no direct say).
As for journalists... those in South Africa have a track record of being overly critical of authority in general. I don't like a lot of what the SA government does, but there are times when they deserve credit, and times where they have failed, but had the right idea to begin with. SA journalism in English and Afrikaans media is highly negative towards the country, which is a pity, because for all our faults we still have a lot more freedom than places like the US and the UK.
And not somone that is fast to point a finger and flame. I'll take this to mean me. Fast? No. It takes at least a read through 80 articles deriding people based on far less facts than I have -- and my facts are by no means complete or accurate -- before I decide to start getting irritable.
Anyways, thanks for your opinions mr.troll its good to know, somone of your standing has too much to say
A standing which is, even now, not so low as that of an anonymous coward...
I don't doubt that Namespace's policies are in line with RFC 1591. Unfortunately RFC 1591 is not in line with current practice ANYWHERE in the world, and that includes the US. Domains ARE property, and are treated as such. Domain registrars are afforded an enormous responsibility to ensure that that property is protected. Dispute resolution policies exist solely to ensure that disputes based on national law can be remedied in the DNS system.
In order to protect DNS name owners, it is essential that every TLD, especially ccTLDs, have a dispute resolution policy which is consistent with the law of the nation in which the ccTLD is intended to be based and/or operate. No SA national would be in his/her right mind to invest in a domain name which is backed by an SA trademark they own, when the dispute resolution process is not backed by SA law.
The current standing in SA is that, because the registrars fall under SA law, you do have recourse to the courts. Unfortunately the registrars tend to wash their hands of disputes at the moment, and leave resolution to the courts, which is a costly process.
ICANN has no requirement whatsoever that the domain manager act enact sub-domain policies which are consistent with national law. In fact ICANN makes it quite clear that TLD management is a technical issue and managers should steer clear of political issues. This unfortunately does NOT protect the "internet community", as ICANN still does not officially recognise domain names as property.
The SA government isn't TRYING to qualify to administer the ccTLD. Its passing a bill which will create a section 21 (non-profit) company, in which the government will have a stake (and thereby, policy control), which will decide on the administration. It may do the admin itself, or it may outsource it.
There is no ICANN redelegating to the SA government... when the furore about the bill has settled and the company is created, they will have to (under ICANN's rules) ensure they meet the technical requirements, and then apply for redelegation. There is also nothing that forces the company to alienate Namespace.org (the current intended delegee of Mike Lawrie) from the process.
why *should* the za gov have control over the za domain?
Because the ccTLDs are considered a national resource, and even ICANN and the US government (since they are the ones that hinted this to ICANN in the first place) recognise that.
if I set up a name of microsoft.fyonn.net then should m$ have control over where I point that name?
Invalid comparison. We're talking about ccTLDs. These a top level domains which are INTENDED - by virtue of using the ISO country code - to be associated with a country. Should (for example, and I'm not trying to piss Australians off;) ) an Aussie have "got there first" and "registered".uk, how do you think the UK government would react?
Nominet has done a good job of administering domains in the UK. That's great. Mike Lawrie has done a good job technically for the.za namespace, but he has (in line with ICANN recommendations for the ccTLD manager) largely kept away from policy issues.
That is a major issue. Beucase it means that.za domain holders (3rd level in particular) don't have a decent policy framework to regular their dealings with the registrar, and in particular for the dispute process.
The problem with IS and zanet.org.za is a case in point. The dispute resolution policy is "we'll only make changes if the administrative contact agrees". So far no-one has served IS with a court order, but it will probably take at least that in order to get them to make a move.
computer based queries. it's "run" by ICANN (for all their faults) and they get to decide what domains get adminstrated where, it is their system and their root servers after all (in essence)... how can the za gov nationalise something which is determined overseas?
By ICANN's own rules (see my other/. postings) any change to the manager/management of a ccTLD has to be approved by the national government. Mike Lawrie's role was never approved in the first place, because the government back then (pre-democracy) was, quite frankly, not interested.
as far as I can see mike lawrie is doing his job. he has been given the task of admining the za domain to the best interests of the za internet community.
Lawrie took on that job voluntarily. Arguably he has the best technical interests of the za internet networks at heart, but he has never shown that he has the best interests of the community - policy wise - in mind.
he has decided that in his opinion, he does not want the za gov to control the domain as he thinks that it will not be in the best interests of the za internet community
Precisely... and you're supporting the decision of one man to deny the instructions of a democratically elected government?
DNS is not a nice global agreement maintained by volunteers out of the goodness of their hearts. It is a global resource, and most countries and organisations - the US government and ICANN included - recognise that. WIPO recognises domain names as property.
Much as the SA postmaster doesn't have the right to tell all postmasters around the world that the address "SOUTH AFRICA" should be sent to his offices in Namibia for sorting before delivery to SA, Lawrie doesn't have the right to administer the.za namespace against the government's will.
The governement is ignoring ICANN and our local internet community.
And who is speaking for the "local internet community"? Mike Lawrie? I don't think so... he's pissed off admins on the.ac.za networks for years with his policies. The ISPs that are members of Namespace.org? At least one is a monopolgy registrar, the others mostly don't give a shit as long as the money keeps rolling in.
But who am I but a discriminated minority who has not had the 'benefit' of apartheid but now with the bill to pay. Such is life. I like Socialism better anyway, or at least the theory.
Actually I was fully expecting to lose karma... apparently flames are being modded up today.
I agree that its about what ICANN decides, but I honestly don't think ICANN has even been brought to the table on this one. Lawrie and the SA government are at each others throats ; Lawrie is trying to throw the ICANN rule book at the SA government, who in turn claim that he actually has no right to a domain which should, if they ask, be delegated to them. Lawrie points selectively at ICANN rules and says "nyah nyah no you can't".
I think the SA governments ONLY misconception is that ICANN will necessarily listen to them. I believe it should, but there is no real requirement that it must.
The government is creating a section 21 (non-profit) company to administer the.za namespace, including policy matters and the appointment of registrars.
This does NOT affect third-level domain registration, except where those domains are in conflict with SA law.
It should be pointed out that only the ccTLD zone file is under discussion here. That file can be rebuilt without a huge amount of effort - every registrar is well known, and is unlikely to jump overboard if Lawrie is "taken down". The issue is getting ICANN to agree to changing the root server records to identify the new ccTLD zone servers.
Ok... YOU, and every other fuckwit who suggests that a government can create its own root servers, or that taking over a ccTLD involves creating its own root servers, or that government has no right to be involved in ccTLD administration... LISTEN UP.
4.1 The delegee of a ccTLD is a trustee for the delegated domain, and has a duty to serve the residents of the relevant country or territory in the context of ISO 3166-1, as well as the global Internet community (as that term is interpreted in the Preamble to this document). Its policy role should be distinguished from the management, administration and marketing of the ccTLD. These functions may be performed by the same or different entities. However the delegation itself cannot be sub-contracted, sub-licensed or otherwise traded without the agreement of the relevant government or public authority and ICANN.
You can read "Principles for Delegation and Administration of ccTLDs" on ICANN's site.
RFC-1591 and IANA don't apply - the RFC washes its hands of ccTLD determination and administration, placing the determination in ISO's hands, and ignoring policy issues.
Because the (old) government was not interested in DNS at the time, and ICANN wasn't even around, Mike Lawrie was given the job of managing the.za namespace. He has never received government sanction for this. He never even received industry sanction, because there was only an academic network at the time he started managing the namespace.
PLEASE try to get a clue. The bill provides for a non-profit company to be created to administer the.za namespace. The miniter gets to nominate some of the board. The government's concern is to ensure that namespace policy follows SA policy and law.
For those of us who have to deal with the SA registrars, this is a good thing, though not many realise it. Mike Lawrie's behaviour is quite typical of techies who think they run the place. There have been several "domain snatches" by administrative contacts of.za sub-domains (third-level), and the entity who really owns the domain cannot get it back because the dispute resolution policies of most registrars are "transfers only with the permission of the administrative contact".
So if you are a non-profit organisation which has registered a.org.za domain, and you're admin contact decides to "defect", you're fucked. Have a nice day, say goodbye to your domain. And unless you're a section 21 company and can take the matter to court, you're never going to see it back.
This is the sort of bullshit the current registrars cause, because there is not a sufficient policy framework backed by SA law... and the sort of bullshit the bill will clear up.
You're absolutely right. Lawrie doesn't want to give it to the government because of the laws they want to put on the.za domain. Unfortunately there are 60%+ of the population who democratically elected the government to represent their interests, and Lawrie doesn't actually have a fucking say in WHAT laws government intend to make.
The SA government has to abide by ICANN rules, yes. ICANN rules require that the ccTLD administrator has the blessing of the national government, which Lawrie does not, and never did have. Apart from that, they do not require that SA not apply its national laws to domain ownership, dispute resolution, policy formation, etc, etc.
As usual, a since person sprouting bullshit and claiming the support of everyone. A few facts? Try to get them straight:
The bill will set up a section 21 company to control the.za domain. The government won't be doing it, or handing it to the incompetent IT division. They will be dictating policy to a company board.
The quotes about prosperity and Internet access are a media fuckup because they are completely out of context. They refer to the bill in general, which provides for better access to the underprivlidged, and recognition of the legal status of Internet communications. The comments do not apply to section X.
The "local internet community" you refer to are Namespace ZA, who are: 1. backed by industry interests, who don't want to see their monopoly as registrars threatened or be made to do more work by having to replace their shitty dispute resolution policities with something which is actually fair and legally sound; 2. represent a community of mainly technically oriented individuals, who are known to have an anti-government stance when it comes to regulation, and don't really give a shit about apply ZA policy and law to domain ownership.
You didn't need to mention you were a journalist: your complete lack of factual information or the ability to tell media hype from actual evidence make it obvious that you are one.
Yeah... I think it will work. At the very least I know that my productivity will drop to zero as I try to stay abreast of and comment on local, regional, national, international and Slashdot news. Bugger.
This is premised on the legal relationship between an organisation and its members (whether employees, members, volunteers, etc). This legal relationship varies from country to country - in some places it is not valid to assume a contract/license which is binding on the organisation is binding on individuals, unless they explicitly agree to the contract as well.
I've put a lot of time into investigating KM and how people can derive benefit from it. Here are some things you should look out for:
Accept that people are knowledge, stuff on disks and screens is data (unfiltered) or information (filtered).
The most important criteria for benefitting from KM is getting people to use it - both to retrieve AND to store information that they know. If you don't get buy-in, forget it.
The value of KM is best realised when people know what sort of information they can find in the knowledgebase, and how to find it. This means structure and education/buy-in.
Hierarchical contents (book-style ToC) and cross-references (Wiki style) are orthogonal, and BOTH are required for successful KM. Information should also be able to appear in multiple places in the ToC.
Make templates, and use them. Template structure individual pieces of information and make it easier to determine if they are relevant, as well as to absorb them. The template can be a simple text document with headings and "(add your info here)" statements.
Related to the last point, try to have a title, summary, and list of references / similar information for every piece of information. An author, date/time and keyword list are also good ideas.
You MUST have the ability to do a free-text search, giving preference to matches in keywords, titles and summaries.
Take a look at KeyNote, its a free note manager, and unfortunately not networked, but has many of the requirements for a really good knowledge manager.
The bill is not about grabbing the ccTLD. That makes up sections 60-65 of 80. The bill makes is encumbant upon the government to provide means to facilitate Internet access to everyone (the government views the Internet as a basic communications medium... which is a heck of a lot more progressive than most countries), and sets up regulatory frameworks for e-commerce, including the recognition of digital signatures as being legally binding.
Start by understanding the process. This bill has been in the making since 1998. Nine technical committees were set up to research various aspects of the bill, and their membership was, indeed, technical, and not political. The bill has gone through three periods of public comment, and eventually made it to parliament and been passed.
The comment about "internet availability" are, as is usual for the media, somewhat out of context, and refer to practices by registrars which have been considered discriminatory. Some registrars have no published dispute resolution policy, and will not act except on a court order. Others, like the.org registrar, make no attempt to consider status - either you are a section 21 company (non-profit) or you pay a full commercial fee (and can be anyone, including companies). These practices are inconsistent with the law AND the intent of the domain system.
ICANN runs the DNS system, it doesn't own it. Furthermore it has come to an agreement with country representatives that there will be TLDs corresponding to ISO-standard country codes, which shall serve as a root namespace for that country, so that the generic TLDs (.com,.org, etc) are mostly used for the US and multinationals.
This is not about SA wanting control over some arbitrary area of the DNS namespace. It is about an area of the namespace specifically reserved by ICANN for SA, which is currently being run by a single person with no sanction from the government or any legal institution, and who has at many time been at odds with the industry.
It is also about an industry which has been granted a monopoly on 2LDs, and has on several occasions abused that monopoly.
ccTLDs are, and must be considered as, a national resource. This gives the government every right to dictate regulatory policy to the extent that they can within the framework afforded by ICANN, both technically and politically.
The issue here is that the one person currently maintaining the.za namespace does not want to hand over the namespace to the body which will be appointed by the govt., because he has issues with the new law. And he is using ICANN's rules regarding transfer of ownership to block that handover, and threaten destabalisation of the SA internet in order to bolster public support.
Of course, this statement is entirely at odds with the way DNS is run in practice, anywhere in the world. Domain names are property, and suitable regulation is required to prevent abuse of that property.
The SA government is taking a bold step in political and legal regulation, but not technical regulation. The gov. is unlikely to run the nameservers itself, but will contract a suitable institution. Its primary concern is the regulation of the.za hierarchy to ensure licensed registrars (not monopolies over various 2LDs) and that there is a uniform dispute resolution policy, which is consistent with SA law.
The ccTLDs were an agreement between representatives of various countries and ICANN, in order to split the root namespace according to country, and allow each country a namespace to administer independant of ICANN.
If the.za ccTLD was administered by someone whose dispute resolution policy was "if it has money, it wins", you would be singing a very different tune.
The point is that no one person or organisation has the right or authority to assume control of a ccTLD, where a representative authority exists and is capable of doing the same thing. That authority is the government.
Well said. For all those who misunderstand the intent of this bill (the govt. is NOT hi-jacking all domain names in SA - it is creating a regulatory framework for the.za domain, which inter alia requires the licensing of registrars for second level domains, independant of government), you can find the bill online here (section 60).
There is a lot of misinformation about this bill, primarily coming from the people who don't like it, who we usually respect as honest, upstanding, technicall competant, and above talking bullshit.
The SA government has passed a bill to nationalise the.za namespace, NOT to take control of subdomains. The bill explicitly forces the government to license registrars to administer subdomains. It does not call for or force the actual technical maintenance of the.za root nameserver to be done by the government - it can be outsourced.
The bill only puts overall policy control in the hands of the government. This means that the creation of new second-level domains is not restricted by a single person, but decided by a committee. It also means that the government is forced to (by the bill) create a dispute resolution policy, which must be consistent with other SA laws -- something which other countries haven't got right yet.
The bill is online, so please know what you are talking about before shooting your mouth off.
When it comes to managing binary files, you may want to look at a configuration management system instead of or in conjunction with your source version control. Aegis is one such product.
Slashdot Mirror
DNS entries aren't food or water, but they are a country's name and address. The US may blacklist certain nations (comparison: MAPS), but it still refers to them by name so that we all know what they hell they are talking about. If all mail to Kenya actually ended up in Indonesia, people would be (understandably) pissed off.
I know that picking on the "denying government" thing wasn't a grand idea ;) but we're not talking a humanatarian stand here. We're talking about someone who doesn't like the politics of someone else. Nothing gives me the right to confiscate someone's rugby ball just because I don't like rugby.
As for ICANN, they haven't got involved yet. For all you know, they're reading this /. thread to get ideas on what they should do when they DO get involved ;) The bill provides for the new company to decide on the technical implementation. That doesn't happen now ... so all this argument is actually quite pointless, because ICANN's view (and the "governments" technical capability) is only likely to be known in the fairly distant future.
No, I think what you've said is essentially accurate. I would think the issue from the government's side is (apart from the power hungry bit) that regulatory organisations such as this tend to ignore government policy unless they have some sort of overriding government influence.
Whether Namespace would do this or consider government policy is anyone's guess ... the government doesn't want it to be a guess.
An unubstantiated and politically biased statement. Policy creation and enforcement is a primary role of government. The fact that "geeks" don't want to see the Internet regulated, and the fact that I don't like a number of the regulations government makes, doesn't mean this shouldn't be the case.
Can you please explain how this bill will compromise free speech? The government is not put in charge of the .za namespace, nor are the given any control over the DNS records themselves. The bill enables the creation of a company to deal with registrars.
This gives the government no more power to delete/disable/redirect an individual third level domain than they have power to tell Telkom to disconnect your telephone, or SATRA to instruct all ISPs to revoke your accounts.
Even if you want to claim that there will be underhanded dealing in the licensing of registrars, you still have a difference from the arms deal in that the government is not directly involved (the minister has no direct say).
As for journalists ... those in South Africa have a track record of being overly critical of authority in general. I don't like a lot of what the SA government does, but there are times when they deserve credit, and times where they have failed, but had the right idea to begin with. SA journalism in English and Afrikaans media is highly negative towards the country, which is a pity, because for all our faults we still have a lot more freedom than places like the US and the UK.
And not somone that is fast to point a finger and flame. I'll take this to mean me. Fast? No. It takes at least a read through 80 articles deriding people based on far less facts than I have -- and my facts are by no means complete or accurate -- before I decide to start getting irritable.
A standing which is, even now, not so low as that of an anonymous coward...
I don't doubt that Namespace's policies are in line with RFC 1591. Unfortunately RFC 1591 is not in line with current practice ANYWHERE in the world, and that includes the US. Domains ARE property, and are treated as such. Domain registrars are afforded an enormous responsibility to ensure that that property is protected. Dispute resolution policies exist solely to ensure that disputes based on national law can be remedied in the DNS system.
In order to protect DNS name owners, it is essential that every TLD, especially ccTLDs, have a dispute resolution policy which is consistent with the law of the nation in which the ccTLD is intended to be based and/or operate. No SA national would be in his/her right mind to invest in a domain name which is backed by an SA trademark they own, when the dispute resolution process is not backed by SA law.
The current standing in SA is that, because the registrars fall under SA law, you do have recourse to the courts. Unfortunately the registrars tend to wash their hands of disputes at the moment, and leave resolution to the courts, which is a costly process.
ICANN has no requirement whatsoever that the domain manager act enact sub-domain policies which are consistent with national law. In fact ICANN makes it quite clear that TLD management is a technical issue and managers should steer clear of political issues. This unfortunately does NOT protect the "internet community", as ICANN still does not officially recognise domain names as property.
The SA government isn't TRYING to qualify to administer the ccTLD. Its passing a bill which will create a section 21 (non-profit) company, in which the government will have a stake (and thereby, policy control), which will decide on the administration. It may do the admin itself, or it may outsource it.
There is no ICANN redelegating to the SA government ... when the furore about the bill has settled and the company is created, they will have to (under ICANN's rules) ensure they meet the technical requirements, and then apply for redelegation. There is also nothing that forces the company to alienate Namespace.org (the current intended delegee of Mike Lawrie) from the process.
Because the ccTLDs are considered a national resource, and even ICANN and the US government (since they are the ones that hinted this to ICANN in the first place) recognise that.
Invalid comparison. We're talking about ccTLDs. These a top level domains which are INTENDED - by virtue of using the ISO country code - to be associated with a country. Should (for example, and I'm not trying to piss Australians off ;) ) an Aussie have "got there first" and "registered" .uk, how do you think the UK government would react?
Nominet has done a good job of administering domains in the UK. That's great. Mike Lawrie has done a good job technically for the .za namespace, but he has (in line with ICANN recommendations for the ccTLD manager) largely kept away from policy issues.
That is a major issue. Beucase it means that .za domain holders (3rd level in particular) don't have a decent policy framework to regular their dealings with the registrar, and in particular for the dispute process.
The problem with IS and zanet.org.za is a case in point. The dispute resolution policy is "we'll only make changes if the administrative contact agrees". So far no-one has served IS with a court order, but it will probably take at least that in order to get them to make a move.
By ICANN's own rules (see my other /. postings) any change to the manager/management of a ccTLD has to be approved by the national government. Mike Lawrie's role was never approved in the first place, because the government back then (pre-democracy) was, quite frankly, not interested.
Lawrie took on that job voluntarily. Arguably he has the best technical interests of the za internet networks at heart, but he has never shown that he has the best interests of the community - policy wise - in mind.
Precisely ... and you're supporting the decision of one man to deny the instructions of a democratically elected government?
DNS is not a nice global agreement maintained by volunteers out of the goodness of their hearts. It is a global resource, and most countries and organisations - the US government and ICANN included - recognise that. WIPO recognises domain names as property.
Much as the SA postmaster doesn't have the right to tell all postmasters around the world that the address "SOUTH AFRICA" should be sent to his offices in Namibia for sorting before delivery to SA, Lawrie doesn't have the right to administer the .za namespace against the government's will.
And who is speaking for the "local internet community"? Mike Lawrie? I don't think so ... he's pissed off admins on the .ac.za networks for years with his policies. The ISPs that are members of Namespace.org? At least one is a monopolgy registrar, the others mostly don't give a shit as long as the money keeps rolling in.
Welcome to the club.
Actually I was fully expecting to lose karma ... apparently flames are being modded up today.
I agree that its about what ICANN decides, but I honestly don't think ICANN has even been brought to the table on this one. Lawrie and the SA government are at each others throats ; Lawrie is trying to throw the ICANN rule book at the SA government, who in turn claim that he actually has no right to a domain which should, if they ask, be delegated to them. Lawrie points selectively at ICANN rules and says "nyah nyah no you can't".
I think the SA governments ONLY misconception is that ICANN will necessarily listen to them. I believe it should, but there is no real requirement that it must.
FUCKWIT RESPONSE SERVICE REPLY #20895:
The government is creating a section 21 (non-profit) company to administer the .za namespace, including policy matters and the appointment of registrars.
This does NOT affect third-level domain registration, except where those domains are in conflict with SA law.
It should be pointed out that only the ccTLD zone file is under discussion here. That file can be rebuilt without a huge amount of effort - every registrar is well known, and is unlikely to jump overboard if Lawrie is "taken down". The issue is getting ICANN to agree to changing the root server records to identify the new ccTLD zone servers.
Ok ... YOU, and every other fuckwit who suggests that a government can create its own root servers, or that taking over a ccTLD involves creating its own root servers, or that government has no right to be involved in ccTLD administration ... LISTEN UP.
You can read "Principles for Delegation and Administration of ccTLDs" on ICANN's site.
RFC-1591 and IANA don't apply - the RFC washes its hands of ccTLD determination and administration, placing the determination in ISO's hands, and ignoring policy issues.
Because the (old) government was not interested in DNS at the time, and ICANN wasn't even around, Mike Lawrie was given the job of managing the .za namespace. He has never received government sanction for this. He never even received industry sanction, because there was only an academic network at the time he started managing the namespace.
PLEASE try to get a clue. The bill provides for a non-profit company to be created to administer the .za namespace. The miniter gets to nominate some of the board. The government's concern is to ensure that namespace policy follows SA policy and law.
For those of us who have to deal with the SA registrars, this is a good thing, though not many realise it. Mike Lawrie's behaviour is quite typical of techies who think they run the place. There have been several "domain snatches" by administrative contacts of .za sub-domains (third-level), and the entity who really owns the domain cannot get it back because the dispute resolution policies of most registrars are "transfers only with the permission of the administrative contact".
So if you are a non-profit organisation which has registered a .org.za domain, and you're admin contact decides to "defect", you're fucked. Have a nice day, say goodbye to your domain. And unless you're a section 21 company and can take the matter to court, you're never going to see it back.
This is the sort of bullshit the current registrars cause, because there is not a sufficient policy framework backed by SA law ... and the sort of bullshit the bill will clear up.
You're absolutely right. Lawrie doesn't want to give it to the government because of the laws they want to put on the .za domain. Unfortunately there are 60%+ of the population who democratically elected the government to represent their interests, and Lawrie doesn't actually have a fucking say in WHAT laws government intend to make.
The SA government has to abide by ICANN rules, yes. ICANN rules require that the ccTLD administrator has the blessing of the national government, which Lawrie does not, and never did have. Apart from that, they do not require that SA not apply its national laws to domain ownership, dispute resolution, policy formation, etc, etc.
As usual, a since person sprouting bullshit and claiming the support of everyone. A few facts? Try to get them straight:
The bill will set up a section 21 company to control the .za domain. The government won't be doing it, or handing it to the incompetent IT division. They will be dictating policy to a company board.
The quotes about prosperity and Internet access are a media fuckup because they are completely out of context. They refer to the bill in general, which provides for better access to the underprivlidged, and recognition of the legal status of Internet communications. The comments do not apply to section X.
The "local internet community" you refer to are Namespace ZA, who are: 1. backed by industry interests, who don't want to see their monopoly as registrars threatened or be made to do more work by having to replace their shitty dispute resolution policities with something which is actually fair and legally sound; 2. represent a community of mainly technically oriented individuals, who are known to have an anti-government stance when it comes to regulation, and don't really give a shit about apply ZA policy and law to domain ownership.
You didn't need to mention you were a journalist: your complete lack of factual information or the ability to tell media hype from actual evidence make it obvious that you are one.
Yeah ... I think it will work. At the very least I know that my productivity will drop to zero as I try to stay abreast of and comment on local, regional, national, international and Slashdot news. Bugger.
This is premised on the legal relationship between an organisation and its members (whether employees, members, volunteers, etc). This legal relationship varies from country to country - in some places it is not valid to assume a contract/license which is binding on the organisation is binding on individuals, unless they explicitly agree to the contract as well.
I've put a lot of time into investigating KM and how people can derive benefit from it. Here are some things you should look out for:
Take a look at KeyNote, its a free note manager, and unfortunately not networked, but has many of the requirements for a really good knowledge manager.
Good morning. You are a fuckwit.
The bill is not about grabbing the ccTLD. That makes up sections 60-65 of 80. The bill makes is encumbant upon the government to provide means to facilitate Internet access to everyone (the government views the Internet as a basic communications medium ... which is a heck of a lot more progressive than most countries), and sets up regulatory frameworks for e-commerce, including the recognition of digital signatures as being legally binding.
Start by understanding the process. This bill has been in the making since 1998. Nine technical committees were set up to research various aspects of the bill, and their membership was, indeed, technical, and not political. The bill has gone through three periods of public comment, and eventually made it to parliament and been passed.
The comment about "internet availability" are, as is usual for the media, somewhat out of context, and refer to practices by registrars which have been considered discriminatory. Some registrars have no published dispute resolution policy, and will not act except on a court order. Others, like the .org registrar, make no attempt to consider status - either you are a section 21 company (non-profit) or you pay a full commercial fee (and can be anyone, including companies). These practices are inconsistent with the law AND the intent of the domain system.
ICANN runs the DNS system, it doesn't own it. Furthermore it has come to an agreement with country representatives that there will be TLDs corresponding to ISO-standard country codes, which shall serve as a root namespace for that country, so that the generic TLDs (.com, .org, etc) are mostly used for the US and multinationals.
This is not about SA wanting control over some arbitrary area of the DNS namespace. It is about an area of the namespace specifically reserved by ICANN for SA, which is currently being run by a single person with no sanction from the government or any legal institution, and who has at many time been at odds with the industry.
It is also about an industry which has been granted a monopoly on 2LDs, and has on several occasions abused that monopoly.
ccTLDs are, and must be considered as, a national resource. This gives the government every right to dictate regulatory policy to the extent that they can within the framework afforded by ICANN, both technically and politically.
The issue here is that the one person currently maintaining the .za namespace does not want to hand over the namespace to the body which will be appointed by the govt., because he has issues with the new law. And he is using ICANN's rules regarding transfer of ownership to block that handover, and threaten destabalisation of the SA internet in order to bolster public support.
Of course, this statement is entirely at odds with the way DNS is run in practice, anywhere in the world. Domain names are property, and suitable regulation is required to prevent abuse of that property.
The SA government is taking a bold step in political and legal regulation, but not technical regulation. The gov. is unlikely to run the nameservers itself, but will contract a suitable institution. Its primary concern is the regulation of the .za hierarchy to ensure licensed registrars (not monopolies over various 2LDs) and that there is a uniform dispute resolution policy, which is consistent with SA law.
The ccTLDs were an agreement between representatives of various countries and ICANN, in order to split the root namespace according to country, and allow each country a namespace to administer independant of ICANN.
If the .za ccTLD was administered by someone whose dispute resolution policy was "if it has money, it wins", you would be singing a very different tune.
The point is that no one person or organisation has the right or authority to assume control of a ccTLD, where a representative authority exists and is capable of doing the same thing. That authority is the government.
Well said. For all those who misunderstand the intent of this bill (the govt. is NOT hi-jacking all domain names in SA - it is creating a regulatory framework for the .za domain, which inter alia requires the licensing of registrars for second level domains, independant of government), you can find the bill online here (section 60).
There is a lot of misinformation about this bill, primarily coming from the people who don't like it, who we usually respect as honest, upstanding, technicall competant, and above talking bullshit.
The SA government has passed a bill to nationalise the .za namespace, NOT to take control of subdomains. The bill explicitly forces the government to license registrars to administer subdomains. It does not call for or force the actual technical maintenance of the .za root nameserver to be done by the government - it can be outsourced.
The bill only puts overall policy control in the hands of the government. This means that the creation of new second-level domains is not restricted by a single person, but decided by a committee. It also means that the government is forced to (by the bill) create a dispute resolution policy, which must be consistent with other SA laws -- something which other countries haven't got right yet.
The bill is online, so please know what you are talking about before shooting your mouth off.
When it comes to managing binary files, you may want to look at a configuration management system instead of or in conjunction with your source version control. Aegis is one such product.