Re: [ga-roots] Re: ICANN Policy -- revised version

["Milton Mueller" <Mueller@syr.edu>]

Kent:
Please cite the relevant portions of the White Paper, where
ICANN is directed to ignore alternate roots in making new
TLD assignments.

Regarding your reference to the IAB statement (RFC 2826),
this is helpful because it shows you do not grasp the issue we
are discussing. As has been noted in several instances, 
the IAB statement that the root should be coordinated does not
say how it should be coordinated, who should coordinate it,
or what to do if and when a competing root gets bigger or equal in
size to ICANN root.

In short, a technical statement about the need for coordination
tells us nothing of value about the policy decisions that would define
ICANN's relation to other roots. 

Indeed, RFC 2826 could be construed as an argument to include all the 
TLDs from alternate roots in the ICANN root, in order to ensure complete
coordination at the root level.

Working Group C was chartered to select specific TLD names if
it wanted to. It was well within its jurisdiction to decide that it
would, or would not, make assignments that conflicted with 
alternate roots. It did not address the issue.

As for the "long and continuous history of rejection of alternate
roots," anyone who consults the REAL history — e.g., the Newdom
archives, the interactions between IANA, NSI, and NSF over the
pgmedia lawsuit, the gTLD-MoU actions and Postel's root
redirection exercise of January 1998 - knows that control of the
root and the contents of the root zone file were unsettled and
in play from early 1997 (release of IAHC draft) to the beginning of
1998 (Postel's temporary split of the root). 

There simply was NO settled policy. The absence of authority over the 
root is what led to the creation of ICANN. Like it or not, alt.roots are as
much a part of the history of DNS as IANA. And since you, as a
player in the gTLD-MoU, participated in an alternate root venture,
it would not be wise for you to deny that.

>>> Kent Crispin <kent@songbird.com> 06/14/01 06:42PM >>>

Yes, it did.  There is a large load of policy inherited from history,
and official rejection of alternate roots is one.  Moreover, whether you
like it or not, the IAB *is* the the most authoritative technically
competent opinion available, and ICANN simply cannot ignore that fact,
no matter how much you would like it to. 

> Working Group C
> did not address it.

Of course not.  Neither did working groups A, B, D, or E, because that 
wasn't in *any* of the WG charters.  You could just as well note that 
President Bushes latest speech doesn't address the issue.

> Nor did the Names Council resolution passing on 
> WGC's recommendation to create new TLDs.

Of course not.  See above.

> In your unilateral policy statement known as the "discussion draft,"
> you made it clear that you do not like alternate roots. I would ask 
> you to look beyond that, as it is irrelevant to the question I am raising. 
> We must not confuse the question of whether there is a prior
> policy with the question of WHAT the policy should be. We may agree
> or disagree on the latter. But the only conclusion an honest person 
> cam come to about the former is that it is a policy question that has
> not been carefully defined and explored. 

Sorry, that is utter nonsense, and please don't cloak yourself in the
"honest person" flag -- an honest person would notice that there are
many more possible and likely interpretations of past events than the
facile one that you propose.

It is undeniable fact that there is a long and continuous history of
rejection of alternate roots, a history that preceeded ICANN by years. 
And it is I believe completely obvious that what the Tucows
representative said is true: any deference to any alternate root would
instantly open the floodgates, and worldwide there would be thousands of
new alternate tlds immediately insisting on recognition.  

-- 
Kent Crispin                               "Be good, and you will be
kent@songbird.com                           lonesome." -- Mark Twain
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