Re: Thread 5: Defining the namespace

[Einar Stefferud <Stef@nma.com>]

Hello Paul -- Your reactions are very interesting.  
I have removed text related to our areas of agreement.

>From Paul Ezra Kautz's message Fri, 27 Dec 1996 10:43:19 -0500:
}
}Einar Stefferud wrote:
}
[SNIP]...
}
}>2.  It has to be self deploying...  
}>
}>    All good Internet Technology deploys itself in the sense that it
}>    is independently adopted and used by the mass of Internet users
}>    who do so by their own autonomous decisions and actions.  There is
}>    no central Internet systems configuration authority.  So, the IAHC
}>    is not in a very good position to be making deployment decisions
}>    based on centralized authority.  
}>
}>    What we need is a decentralized scheme.  There is not enough
}>    authority in the world to centrally control the Internet or the
}>    names it uses.
}
}This is naive. Look at the current system in two ways:
}
}(1) It is centralized. IANA, InterNIC, and Paul Vixie make all the
}    TLD decisions. You just never noticed because they kept pretty
}    benevolent about it. Last year, NSI made itself noticed.
}    AlterNIC proved this - they have very little penetration.
}
}(2) It is decentralized. Like global power, it's mostly about
}    recognition. (Unlike global power, there's no cross-domain
}    military force.) AlterNIC proved this - they got some people
}    to recognize THEM. I liken AlterNIC to the Republic of China
}    on the island of Taiwan - they have 1/60th the population and
}    and 1/250th the land, but they did get the UN to recognize
}    them for a while...
}
}Despite being decentralized in the abstract, decisions DO come 
}down from above. This is a bit like the TV network affiliates, 
}who have the ability to not run any program, but actually do 
}anyway, for economic reasons. It's more practical for all of us 
}to use IANA-sanctioned root servers, but we don't have to.
}

You are writing orthogonally to my point;-)...

The current situation is a direct result of the original IANA scheme,
and its failure is that it has instilled a sense in the community that
central authority is needed to solve the problem.  So, the IAHC effort
is focused on finding ways to apply central global authority to solve
the problem that was caused by the assumption that central authority
is the right solution.  

This is oddly circular, don't you think?  
And, you have clearly bought into idea of needing central control.

}
}The proposed system is exactly the same. I hope that it will be
}more democratic, with elected community representation having
}as much say as the registrars or the IANA. Something few 
}"anarchists" realize is that they're placing the actual power
}in the hands of the few who are unelected and certainly don't
}have public interest in mind (IANA may have, but the new
}registrars won't).
}

Exactly, and I say that is the problem;-)...  There is no way for your
desired central authority to be anything other than dictatorial about
many many detailed decisions, unless it opens up the name space and
solves the problem with a Simple Internet Root Synchronization
protocol that does not depend on some agency unilaterally deciding
what TLD names must be used.  Even the US Democracy becomes
dictatorial when it decides on local details, which is what US
politics are about these days.

}
}>3.  It has to be self organizing...
}>
}>    This is related to #2 above.  What is needed is a way to
}>    facilitate robust name service with a distributed set of root and
}>    subroot name servers which self synchronize themselves at the top-
}>    and sub-levels using the Simple Internet Root Synch protocol (SIRS).
}
}I don't see how this contradicts the draft's principles.
}

I never said anything about my point #3 contradicting the draft!  I
think it would be very nice if the draft does not contradict my point.
However, the central notion of reliance on central authority to
control the use of names in the Internet begs for some external force
to save the Internet from itself by organizing it from the outside.

}
[SNIP]...
}
}>In case you do not get my drift, take note that I expect that this
}>IAHC thing shall also pass, and that the Internet will once again
}>collectively work around the problems in some self organized manner.
}>Just stand back and watch.  It was a mistake to ever think in terms of
}>relying on central authority to solve the Internet naming problem, and
}>it is still the wrong way to proceed, but the Internet will solve its
}>problem in some other way, as it must.
}
}I admire your idealism, but I think you are losing track of where
}real power lies and will lie. You are wrong to think that the draft 
}presents any danger to the "Internet Way" because it's simply 
}impossible to exert real force. It will always be decentralized 
}recognition of centralized authority.
}

Au Contraire!  I am fully aware of the Internet's ability as a
collective entity to control its own destiny without regard for
various authorities who may assert themselves in an effort to control
the Internet.  I know where the power of the Internet resides, and it
is not in Governments, Corporations, or AD HOC COMMITTEES with global
sounding charters.  My prediction is that any body (Govt, Corp,
Non-Profit, Treaty-Org, or Individual) that tries to get control of
the Internet will instead find itself in tow of the Internet.  This
has already predictably (I predicted it) happened to Microsoft, and it
will happen also to NSI and to the IHAC.

It is only a matter of time, which is what I mean to imply by saying
"This too shall pass!".

}
}We have found NSI to be an unacceptable centralized authority, so
}we are trying to design a better one.
}

To repeat, the NSI debacle is the natural outcome of the original idea
of the IANA (where-in Jon Postel became known as the Numbers Czar),
that the solution required that there be a singular naming authority
for assignment of all names and numbers used in the ARPAnet.

Well, it is time to recognize that the ARPAnet was a Network, and not
an Internet, though it spawned the research that led to formation of
the Internet, in which the ARPAnet was but one of its components, and
not a survivable one at that.  A network tends to work best when there
is a single central configuration authority.  Not so of an Internet.
So, the fact of central IANA control is a hangover from the ARPAnet.

The critical history of the Internet is that it is a self organizing
collection of interoperating networks, based on a simple technical
concept of "routing around damage".  From this root concept, which was
more or less accidentally adopted by the original ARPAnet developers,
things have evolved into a global community that regards central
control as a problem to be routed around.

Consider the collected energy now being applied to working around the
problems caused by NSI having central control.  It is too bad that NSI
does not fully realize that It Is The Problem, and not The Solution.
But, in due course, the Internet as a living social entity, will
simply route around NSI and make it irrelevant.  Long Live InterNic!

So, the dominant behavior of the living breathing Internet can now be
seen to be "Working Around Problems".  This is the root source of
power in the Internet, and no appointed body is ever going to control
the Internet by virtue of being chartered by some governing body of
some kind that feels that it should take control, or set up some kind
of central control by forming some kind of "democratic" committee.

	If God wanted the Internet to have a central control point, 
	She would have arranged for Internet Protocols to use one!

I suggest that you read the book "At Home in the Universe" by Stuart
Kauffman, where the concepts of such self organization of bounded
chaos are quite nicely developed.  The Internet is a region of bounded
chaos, and its behavior is that of maintaining a boundary layer of
chaos that is at the edge of order, but never truly ordered.  In this
context, order is the root of extinction, and the Internet has a huge
instinct for survival.  It will never submit to being well ordered.

Cheers...\Stef