IP: What is ICANN, really? (a test coming up)

[Dave Farber <farber () cis upenn edu>]

> From: "Rob Raisch" <info () raisch com>
> To: "Dave Farber" <farber () cis upenn edu>
>
>
> ICANN (The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers) has been
> asked to create several new top level domains by John Richard of Essential
> Information (www.essential.com), and James Love, of the Consumer Project on
> Technology (www.cptech.org), which will call into clear focus ICANN's own
> view of their role in Internet governance.
>
> In a letter delivered March 1, 2000 to Esther Dyson (ICANN's Chair), Richard
> and Love have requested that ICANN rubberstamp the creation of a number of
> new top level domains (TLDs) to promote citizen's rights groups and
> movements.
>
> Of particular interest will be ICANN's response to the requested creation of
> a ".sucks" TLD which "...will be used to facilitate criticism of a firm or
> organization, such as aol.sucks, wipo.sucks, or even greenpeace.sucks. We
> would not permit the organization that owned an associated domain to also
> own .sucks, so it would expand the name space in an important way. The
> domain would also be available for other uses, such as work.sucks,
> life.sucks or television.sucks." (from
> http://www.cptech.org/ecom/icann/tlds-march1-2000.html)
>
> Why is this interesting, you ask?  Because it will illustrate clearly how
> ICANN views its own purpose, as a technical infrastructure manager or as the
> arbiter of what is "correct" for the Internet as a whole.
>
> According to ICANN, its role is to "...take over responsibility for the IP
> address space allocation, protocol parameter assignment, domain name system
> management, and root server system management functions now performed under
> U.S. Government contract by IANA and other entities." (http://www.icann.org)
>
> According to Richard and Love, "These are serious proposals to use the power
> of a TLD to enable citizens to improve civil society. We believe the
> creation of domains like .union, .customers, .isnotgreen, and .isnotfair
> will create powerful mechanisms to share information and organize."
>
> --
> Rob Raisch, <http://www.raisch.com/>