[discuss] Real world Impact of multiple roots

Tue Jan 28 16:01:02 UTC 2014

On 28-Jan-14 07:51, Milton L Mueller wrote:
> Interesting pre-emptive move for David to
> suggest that something he doesn't want
> cannot and should not even be studied.

I have been told that by various people for about a decade.

The issue as I understand it, if we condone studying then that will be 
seen as condoning the idea of multiple root and make it more likely to 
happen.

I have always maintained that it can and will happen and that we need to 
be ready with the way to heal it and create the next order Internet 
before it happens.  But I never had either the convincing power or money 
to do anything about it.

So here we are 10 years later still having the same arguments, though on 
a more global scale.  That is a change.

I also still maintain that it is the addressing and routing that 
determines whether we have one Internet or more.  And we even seem to be 
finding ways to heal the actuality of having two internets at the IP 
level (v4 & v6) and in routing for v4 and v6, enough so most think of it 
as a single Internet still to this day.

I admit it is not as clean and as easy for incumbent businesses to deal 
with multiple roots and it will affect their bottom lines in some short 
term and temporary way. But there will also be multiple businesses that 
starting up in response and, while I don't pretend to be economist, it 
seems they might offset each other to some degree.  Not that this is my 
greatest concern - maintaining global discovery and reachability is.  I 
am curious to see if ICANN's blue ribbon panel on naming, or whatever 
they call that one, is actually going to face the realities of multiple 
roots or are going to stay true to the world view that "There can be 
only one"  and require that all solutions adhere to that article of 
faith.  As the incumbent authority, that would certainly be to ICANN's 
advantage.

As long as name authorities can be isolated so as to make references 
globally unique, the naming systems is just business, like the people 
competing over which phone book I use in Rhode Island.  Strangely enough 
I still have the same telephone connectivity, despite having multiple 
phone books. And incidentally there are names in each of these books, 
that don't show up in the other books and sometimes my search needs to 
drop down to the next favorite look-up mechanism.

avri