Domain registration

Most things Internet have short, but convoluted, histories. Take the domain name system. Network Solutions Inc., with support from the U.S. government, has monopolized Internet domain name registration for five years-that's the short component. The convoluted part has unfolded during the last year.

No one has been pleased with NSI's stronghold on the registration process, and the Commerce Department stepped in a couple of years ago to re-evaluate the system. On Jan. 30, 1998, the National Telecommunications and Information Administration released its green paper, which proposed an end to NSI's exclusive agreement and asked for the creation of a new, not-for-profit corporation to assume control of Internet names, addresses and some protocols.

In June 1998, the NTIA asked the private sector to submit proposals for the formation of the new corporation. In October, after considering proposals from several groups, the NTIA chose the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, as suggested by the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority, a government-funded organization that runs the servers handling the 12-digit addresses that correspond to domain names.

After bitter disputes among the various factions about the best way to handle the DNS, ICANN has garnered much support. America Online, NSI, the European Internet Business Association, the Council of Registrars and the Internet Society have agreed to endorse ICANN.

Much of the credit for making allies of these groups goes to ICANN's eagerness to include proposals and suggestions from the various factions and to former IANA head Jon Postel. His cachet in the Internet community let Postel form a proposal that was acceptable to all the interests. Postel died in October, days after the NTIA accepted the ICANN proposal.

Unfortunately, with all this accommodation, ICANN has put itself in the sticky situation of trying to be all things to all people.

"In addition to support, a lot of people have expressed sympathy for me. I don't have a governmental decree that spells out what the people want," said Michael Roberts, interim president and CEO of ICANN.

Establishing a competitive system for registering domain names, settling trademark disputes over domain names and deciding when and how to add generic top-level domain space are at the top of Roberts' project list. "Part of the process includes figuring out how to keep from creating any more monopolies," he said.

Starting in April, NSI's exclusive trust will be broken and five new players will enter the domain name game to begin competing with NSI to register new domain names. After ICANN approves these companies, NSI will give them licenses to its system and software and access to its backend systems.

Two months later, the process will be opened up to more accredited registration companies. It is critical that these changes be done in a way that allows the Internet's performance to remain stable, said Don Telage, NSI's senior vice president of Internet policy. "The schedule we're on is ambitious because there are so many policies that must be made in the intervening time," he said.

Most agree that for ICANN to achieve its ambitions, it must keep the support of the netizens and remain autonomous from the government. "ICANN will have to show that it is representing folks in the United States and in the international community. The key to the Internet's expansion and growth is confidence in it being independent and removed from government intervention," said Ken Stubbs, chairman of the executive committee for the Council of Registrars.

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