[governance] UN controls the country code part of the Internet root, not US

[Mawaki Chango]

Re. the subject line and the very thrust of the first message in this
thread, my first thought right away (a week ago as the message came in) was
that George was being too cute/clever by half (Note: please choose between
'cute' and 'clever' which is more respectful than the other, as my
familiarity with that idiom is probably limited compared to that of a
native English speaker, thanks.) I don't know where the need to make that
point came from (from the message content, it looks like coming out of
nowhere), and there we were again with another unnecessary conversation
started with a message on the defensive and which might very well result in
yet another exercise of cross finger-pointing. So I disengaged... until
today.

The reasoning by which anyone would get to the conclusion that UN controls
ccTLDs in the DNS root because they have had a process (in place well
before the Internet) to decide on two-letter codes to represent
geographical entities for their own purposes different from the DNS
management is beyond my thinking ability. Someone in the early Internet
technical community (Jon Postel, if my information is correct) decided to
rely on that list for the DNS purposes without the UN playing any
deliberate role in that specific decision. In my realm of rationality, the
UN cannot bear any responsibility for any consequence that might ensue from
that specific decision concerning the DNS. That's really a stretch to make
a defensive point -- and again, I'm not even sure we needed to have that
debate at this point.
Thanks,

Mawaki

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*Mawaki Chango, PhD*
Founder & Principal, DIGILEXIS Consulting
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m.chango at digilexis.com
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On Thu, Dec 19, 2013 at 5:19 PM, Carlos A. Afonso <ca at cafonso.ca> wrote:

> The ISO codes were adopted as any other could have been adopted, not by
> a treaty or formal agreement with ISO. Milton is correct.
>
> --c.a.
>
> On 12/19/2013 03:10 PM, David Conrad wrote:
> > Milton,
> >
> > On Dec 19, 2013, at 8:42 AM, Milton L Mueller <mueller at syr.edu> wrote:
> >> The UN does NOT control the "country code part" of the DNS root.
> >> A UN agency makes up two-letter alphabetic character strings and
> uniquely assigns them to geographic entities (which are not necessarily
> "countries" by the way). When or how those codes get into the DNS root and
> matched to an IP address is entirely in the hands of ICANN/IANA, which
> means that it ultimately has to be approved by the US government.
> >
> > Not entirely.
> >
> > ICANN/IANA does not make unrequested changes.
> >
> > In the past (before the root zone automation software), anyone could
> request a change to a TLD. ICANN/IANA would vet the change request,
> ensuring the request came from an entity authorized to request the change
> (that is, it came from one of the TLD administrators) and that it made
> sense syntactically and technically, then seek confirmation from all the
> administrators (technical and administrative) for the TLD.  Once all
> parties approved the change request, it would be sent on to NTIA for
> authorization and then on to Verisign for implementation.
> >
> > I believe the root zone automation software now limits who can request
> changes to the TLD administrators (that is, the folks who have log in
> credentials to the system), but not positive. My understanding is that
> everything else in the process is essentially the same.
> >
> >> Furthermore, there is no such thing as a "country code part of the
> Internet root." There is a DNS root, full stop.
> >> A country code is a top level domain just like any other, in technical
> terms.
> >
> > Yes. From the perspective of IANA staff, a TLD is a TLD.
> >
> > Regards,
> > -drc
> >
>
>
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