Re: gTLD-MoU Related News (August 19, 1997)

[Duane Little <aadn1@nwi.net>]

Chip Cooper wrote:
> 
> >
> I'm a nobody with only an interest in registering a name... someday.
> You guys are not amusing... you're scary!
> 
> >But, Adam Todd wrote:
> > I'm really sick of these gTLD word games being played to distract people
> 
> I got on this newslist to get what I hoped would be relevent information
> on when
> I could register a domain name ...
...
> others of the masses like myself will go to these people "of the list"
> in good faith expecting to
> obtain a domain name which will be used on the internet.  Viable
> capacity, not visable capacity is what counts. Gobbledegook aside.
> 
> Unless, of course, you guys scare the crap out of us and we lose faith.
> 
A strong possibility, Chip, especially given the strangely- motivated
and poorly-executed nature of the domainant effort so far -- the
gTLD-MoU (http://www.gtld-mou.org ).

> On another note: Maybe we could do away with the name stuff altogether
> and just use links built by search engines.  A person could go to yahoo
> or infoseek or, or. and get a link to say 200.xxx.xxx. whatever.  Once
> stored as a bookmark... that's all I need right!  Same for e-mail!
> 
> <sigh> what do I know...

Well, in a sense you're traveling a beaten path with such reasoning. 
The essential thing to recognize is that the Domain Name system is not
and for practical purposes probably cannot be, a directory service.  Nor
can it be replaced by one.  It's a technical necessity that there be a
system for addressing every machine on the Net with a unique
moniker/number.  This is quite aside from the convenience of users
finding those machines.

Others can better articulate the technical conflicts than I, but suffice
it to say that those in the know are virtually unanimous, so fas as I
have seen, in the conclusion that those are separate issues with
necessarily separate solutions.


Duane
pres@domains.org
http://www.domains.org