[governance] [Fwd: China To Launch Alternate Country Code Domains]

[Joe Baptista]

Twits in the know - or NOT.  The chinese root was launched years ago.  
Went public this past year - which see Public-Root press release:

http://www.inaic.com/index.php?p=chinese-tlds

People - please get a clue.  The chinese have been at it for a long 
time.  And how many of you also know the chinese root causes major 
traffic to the USG root system.  Roots that remain static and don't see 
what other roots see are vulnerable to error.

regards
joe baptista

Robert Guerra wrote:

>Thought this might be of interest .....
>
>---
>
>Begin forwarded message:
>
>From: Michael Geist <mgeist at pobox.com>
>Date: February 28, 2006 9:24:09 AM EST
>To: dave at farber.net
>Subject: China To Launch Alternate Country Code Domains
>
>Dave,
>
>China is preparing to launch what appears to be an alternate root.
>Starting tomorrow, they will establish four country-code domains.  In
>addition to the current dot-cn, they will offer Chinese character
>versions of dot-China, dot-net, and dot-com. As one article puts it,
>this "means Internet users don't have to surf the Web via the servers
>under the management of the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and
>Numbers (ICANN) of the United States."
>
>Coverage from China is at
>http://english.people.com.cn/200602/28/eng20060228_246712.html
>
>I've got some quick commentary at
><http://michaelgeist.ca/component/option,com_content/task,view/id,1130/Itemid,85/nsub,/>
>
>which includes:
>
>"The alternate root has always lurked in the background as a possibility
>that would force everyone to rethink their positions since it would
>enable a single country (or group of countries) to effectively pack up
>their bags and start a new game.  The U.S. control would accordingly
>prove illusory since a new domain name system situated elsewhere would
>be subject to its own rules.  While the two could theoretically co-exist
>by having ISPs simply recognize both roots, the system could "break" if
>both roots contained identical extensions.  In other words, one root can
>have dot-com and other other can have dot-corp, but they can't both have
>dot-com.
>
>It is with that background in mind that people need to think about a
>press release issued yesterday in China announcing a revamping of its
>Internet domain name system.  Starting tomorrow, China's Ministry of
>Information Industry plans to begin offering four country-code domains.
> In addition to the dot-cn country code domain, three new Chinese
>character domains are on the way: dot-China, dot-net, and dot-com.  As
>the People's Daily Online notes this "means Internet users don't have to
>surf the Web via the servers under the management of the Internet
>Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) of the United States."
>
>In other words, the Chinese Internet becomes a reality tomorrow. With
>it, the rules of the game may change as 110 million Internet users will
>suddenly have access to a competing dot-com (albeit in a different
>character set) and will no longer rely exclusively on ICANN for the
>resolution of Internet domain name queries.  This change was probably
>inevitable regardless of the status of ICANN, however, the U.S. position
>can't possibly have helped matters.  Indeed, some might note that while
>Congress has been criticizing U.S. companies for cooperating with
>Chinese law enforcement and thereby harming Internet freedoms, those
>same Congressional leaders may have done the same by refusing to even
>consider surrendering some control over the Internet root to the
>international community and thereby opening the door to an alternate
>root that could prove even worse from a freedom perspective.
>
>This week's announcement certainly doesn't mark the end of a global
>interoperable Internet.  It does move one step further toward that path
>since in Internet governance terms, the credible threat is now real."
>
>MG
>--**********************************************************************
>Professor Michael A. Geist
>Canada Research Chair in Internet and E-commerce Law
>University of Ottawa, Faculty of Law
>57 Louis Pasteur St., Ottawa, Ontario, K1N 6N5
>Tel: 613-562-5800, x3319     Fax: 613-562-5124
>mgeist at pobox.com              http://www.michaelgeist.ca
>
>
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>

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