Reaching Unsanctioned TLDs With A Plug-In 125
An anonymous reader writes: "Wired is running this article about Idealab
creating new TLDs. They propose to do it with a browser plug-in. Many people are upset with ICANN, but is having an incubator distribute new code any better?" If it makes ICANN nervous, I think I'm all for it. If it won't work with browsers besides the Top Two, though, then I guess I'll miss out on dot-duh ...
Nothing new (Score:1)
Two things... (Score:3)
They just can't agree with anything [opendvd.org], can they?
Idealab first entered the domain-selling business when it acquired the rights to the dot-TV domain from the country of Tuvalo.
But this is totally diffrent.
The only thing that would make a lot of users upgrade is the temptation of
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Re:We need to replace the system altogether (Score:1)
Besides which, how is a domain TLD going to take off if the only access to it is via a browser, and a small set of supported browsers on supported platforms at best? What happens when you want to use telnet, ssh, a decent ftp client, etc?
The browser plugin idea has to be the most clueless idea to get around ICANN I've heard in a long time. It doesn't solve any problems with the minor exception of allowing that handful of people who cannot administer their own machine and aren't stuck behind a firewall to access (for reading) webpages, as long as they're using Netscape or IE, and aren't running some obscure version on an unsupported processor.
There are, what, 2 people in the entire world like that?
The real problems continue. It continues to be difficult to publicise information about how to get to the new TLDs, so people who have the new TLDs can expect not to be reached except by an elite few who know "where to get the plugin" (or what DNS server to point their system at.) And there doesn't appear to be a way of validating a particular TLD and associated registry. Who really owns .biz? There are two outfits who claim to, one of whom has been operating it for years, the other of which was just handed it by ICANN.
I can't see how this proposal can possibly work.
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Keep attacking good things as "communist"
The rarely used .int (Score:3)
sounds like a plan for microsoft to dominate TLD's (Score:1)
Broken solution. (Score:3)
CCC also wanted to make this... (Score:3)
But they didn't want to write a browser plugin - their idea was just to start a new top level DNS server. People should just set the DNS server manually in their config, so they could access the new TLDs and domains.
The Chaos Computer Club is against the governmental control of the Internet & domain-grabbing of huge companies, so this was their alternative. Read about it here [heise.de] (German).
I haven't heard anything about it after that article though.
Re:Replace DNS (Score:1)
And of course, if you changed this right now, nobody would be able to find any web sites. Everyone would need to look up each address. Not to mention, it's easy to remember a lot of dns names. microsoft, apple, cnn, slashdot, nintendo, cisco, sun...I bet you can find their web servers with no effort at all.
Have fun memorizing those IPv6 addresses!
OpenNIC is still alive.. (Score:2)
Re:I'm hardly what you would call a guru... (Score:2)
Subdomains (Score:2)
we would need to say goodbye to slashdot and freshmeat!
We would need to say goodbye to calling them slashdot.org and freshmeat.net, but Andover already owns slashdot.com, and OSDN could buy freshmeat2.com. Or they could just move everything to slashdot.osdn.com, freshmeat.osdn.com, etc. SourceForge could probably keep its .net though, as it does provide hosting services for free software projects.
All your hallucinogen [pineight.com] are belong to us.
Re:Browser Wars (Score:1)
We need to bring administration of at least some TLDs into the hands of an accountable group. I don't know how USENET is regulated, but probably there are several models that could be built upon. Does anyone know of a good article that describes how USENET is run? Does anyone know about other governance models which could be applied to the control of the TLDs?
Dontcha just *love* Idealab...? (Score:2)
One more thing. Check out F*ckedCompany [fuckedcompany.com] and search for Idealab. Somehow I dont think they're going to make this work...
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Re:The rarely used .int (Score:3)
Why this is a publicity ploy (Score:2)
1) You want as many people as possible to be able to access your web site.
2) Therefore, you have to have a way for those who don't have the plugin to find you and get it.
3) Therefore, you have to have a conventional domain name, and advertise it.
4) Therefore, why bother to have the new name at all? People are going to associate you with the normal one.
This is similar to the problem Clear Channel Communications is facing with the
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Re:Get rid of TLD!! (Score:1)
What you're proposing is that we change the entire internet to a keyword system. Translation: You're looking for AOL.
A Joe-Sixpack any-half-trained-monkey-can-use-it internet is one of the worst nightmares of geeks everywhere. The harder things are to use, the less chance there is of intelligent discussions being lost in a sea of mindless drivel. If you had to telnet into slashdot and recieve some sort of globally unique message ID every time you posted, there would be very few goatse.cx/All your base/hot grits/etc posts. With things as they are now, you just click the nice shiny button, type "FP!" and off you go.
You just described AOL again.
Really, the rest of the internet would have no grounds for pulling the plug on an alternate TLD service. Anyone using that network as opposed to any other would be doing so by their own choice, and the alternate provider's TLDs, or lack thereof, would have no effect on the internet as a whole. ICANN's TLDs flow downstream into AOL and the ORSC root, but neither AOL's keywords nor ORSC's alternate TLDs flow upstream into ICANN's A-root registry.
Stop the platform-specific nonsense! (Score:2)
This will require changes to the resolvers out there, in the form of a table or similar which instructs it where to find the root for these alternatives.
Let's say you want a ".slashdot" TLD and you have domains called dom1.com and dom2.com. First you map it in this future resolver:
slashdot. = dom1.com, dom2.com
What this means is that requests for 'foo.slashdot' get one of those "real" domains tacked on, and the query proceeds as before, only to the real zone: 'foo.slashdot.dom1.com' or 'foo.slashdot.dom2.com'. This is done down in the resolver and is not exposed to userspace.
The real trick here (besides making resolvers support "deep roots") is establishing which domains will vouch for the new style TLDs. This is the beauty of the design - anyone can try to create a TLD with a given name. Nobody else will honor it unless it's worth their time and effort. So, people behind this scheme will have to do something useful or their particular version of a TLD will wither.
Another cool thing is that dom1.com and dom2.com can go away and be replaced with other "supporting" domains. Obviously you would want to use PGP or similar to verify that the changes are in fact from the right people, but that's a matter of trust and can be covered elsewhere.
Steal and spread as necessary.
RFC1591 & INT TLD (Score:4)
It is not very well known because it is restricted to organizations established by international treaties, according to the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties (1969), and international databases, which are defined as non-commercial entities that provide services of direct relevance to the operation of the public Internet. Clearly not as big a market as COM
Some examples are UN.INT, ITU.INT, WIPO.INT.
Re:Theres already an alternate registry!! (Score:1)
Re:The rarely used .int (Score:2)
Re:We need heirarchical namespace back (Score:2)
Actually, I think it's a bad one. There is no single hierarchy into which you can fit everything and make sense to everyone.
Rather than a tree, I think a multidimensional web is a better physical model. Let things exist in the context of their relationship to other things. Sure, that eliminates the possibility of true random access, but on the other hand, it makes everything a few steps from something you know.
Looking for a hardware store? Go to any store. Zoom out to "all types of stores". Zoom in to "hardware stores". Zoom in to your neighborhood.
Or find it a different way. Start at your house. Zoom out to "my neighborhood". Zoom in to "stores". Zoom in to "hardware stores".
Or find it a different way. Start with any old object sitting on your desk (presumably it will have a barcode or something). Zoom out to "all consumer products." Zoom in to "hardware".
Or find it a different way. Start with "my trusted places". Zoom in to "better business bureau". Zoom in to "hardware stores".
And so on.
With a conceptual mapping, on as many different levels and criteria as people can imagine, you can find anything quickly, rather than having to guess your way around a fixed, rigid one-dimensional hierarchy that is clearly showing its inability to scale.
Re:Typical American disrespect for the law. (Score:3)
One of the few smart things they did was reject these proposals. They are pointless. It is very clear (as evidenced by sites such as whitehouse.com) that porn operators perceive a disadvantage to pigeonholing themselves in obviously-porny domains.
So creating .xxx would achieve one thing and one thing only: Make it easier for people at unfiltered locations to find porn. Meanwhile, it would still proliferate at other domains (there is, after all, no real cost to making the same content available at multiple addresses).
The real answer is for people to grow the fuck up and stop worrying about it. At a certain age kids develop an interest in this stuff, and all the filters in the world aren't going to stop them from finding it, whether online or off. Before that, they don't care, they think it's gross, and they won't dwell on it or look at it any longer than they need to figure out that it doesn't interest them; no harm done.
Wrong solution (Score:2)
Re:Why is ICANN so bad? (Score:1)
Victor
Re:Idealab - the favorite of FuckedCompany.Com (Score:1)
Yeah, tell that to the people giving their time and/or money to Amway!
Re:How did they implement this? (Score:1)
all I want is email (Score:1)
Re:Theres already an alternate registry!! (Score:1)
commercialization (Score:1)
Sure many can be upset with ICANN, but as stated it is a non profit organization, so it makes due with whatever resources they have at their disposal. In comes company xyz with all the funding (think about these irrate issues such as Microsoft [microsoft.com], Sprint's [sprint.com] garbled Terms of Agreement, etc.), and you have to wonder if it really such a good idea.
As for the top two browsers, how many people DON'T use the top two browsers, why should they be forced to switch to another method of communications on the net to accomodate Idealab's idea?
Just my non important thoughts.
Just what the doctor ordered [antioffline.com]
Re:Replace DNS (Score:1)
Hey, why don't we just use random 1024bit addresses, huh, this would be fun.
Get real, changing _anything_ in DNS and or the way people use it takes huge amounts of $$$ and time. Won't happen! Plain as this, and if something will happen, then it's going to get more comfortable (read: IPv6), then more complicated.
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Get rid of TLD!! (Score:1)
There should only be root servers that answer for "." as the TLD. The .com .net .blah is only a source for confusion for newbies, which is an obstacle to their acceptance of the Internet. It's also unregulated, so you have .orgs that are not .orgs, etc. Too much duplication; what is the purpose of having a mcdonalds.net and a mcdonalds.com. This is a result of the lack of organization. Now they have .tv being touted as something great, and it is just as open, adding to the stupidity. The TLDs must go.
In either case, this needs to be driven by a large ISP or someone is going to decide to cut the pipes of one of these "renegade TLD" or "non-TLD" sites and end them at that. The /. effect on these sites when they appear will swamp them and draw attention from the current ISP who will see the traffic as bad. An ISP could make a nice name for themselves by calling this a benefit of their service while other ISPs are not supporting it.
USENET regulation? WAS Re:Browser Wars (Score:2)
There is no CABAL.
A host is a host from coast to coast, but no one uses a host that's close
Re:Replace DNS (Score:1)
Re:Wouldn't a better solution... (Score:1)
Sounds like something I'd really want to invest in... != (of course, when you look at Idealab's track record, most of their other investments have the same merit and performance).
*scoove*
To make this idea work..... (Score:2)
root servers are the key (Score:2)
If the way of the net was that everyone who ran a DNS server ran it with a root zone and pointed to the TLDs they wanted to have (and from where they wanted to get them), and left out the TLDs they didn't want (like religious groups leaving out .sex and .xxx), then ICANN would just be irrelevant.
Re:Wouldn't a better solution... (Score:2)
I thought it was pretty decent, and the proper way to circumvent ICANN's stupidty.
-Ben
mac dns. (Score:1)
How do you change this on a Mac?
use the "name server address" box in the tcp/ip control panel. that's how i've got my imac using the open root servers.
--saint----
The problem with this: NO SEARCH ENGINES (Score:4)
Let's suppose I did. OK, now lets suppose there some site, www.deepthought.42, that has all the answers to my life. Unfortunately, I don't know it exists. How do I find it?
This is the biggest problem with any of the alternate root servers IMHO: there is nobody indexing them! Now, suppose that Google set up to index that domain, and just to keep people from being confused set their system up so that they wouldn't list any Alternic domains in a search unless you were querying search.google, rather than www.google.com. Then, maybe I'd be motivated to use them. But until I can find these new domains, they are no good to me.
Now, what I keep waiting for: AOL gets pissed with InterNIC. AOL configures their DNS to resolve off AlterNIC (remember, you don't LOSE the current set of TLDs, you just gain new ones), and sets up a
Now, what a jumpstart THAT would provide for Alternic.....
Re:Plugins for _all_ browsers? (Score:2)
Idealab - the favorite of FuckedCompany.Com (Score:2)
If you follow FuckedCompany.Com [www.fuckedcompany] you can get a rundown on all the companies that IdeaLab owns - and the fact that damned near all of them have failed or are failing as of late. In fact, I can't think of any of them offhand that is anything more than a spectacular failure, costing between $20 and $100 million each. These include: eToys.Com, Referer.Com, Cooking.Com, CarsDirect.Com, PetSmart.Com (yes, that's an IdeaLab funded one), Modo.Net, FIrstLook.Com, eve.com, and more...
Heck, here's the FuckedCompany search results on IdeaLab based companies - the funniest being the fact that IdeaLab owns the domain DogCrap.Com. Go fig.
FuckedCompany search for IdeaLab [fuckedcompany.com]
In other words - this is move by IdeaLab to look like some sort of industry leader. Don't expect it to happen, or of it does, don't expect it to last very long - or for IdeaLab to last much longer. You can only pump so much money into a loosing situation before people completely give up.
No Email ?!?!? (Score:1)
Re:We need to replace the system altogether (Score:2)
A program that changes whatever the Windows version of resolv.conf is, could also be a program where they click on an icon and it says, "Ok." Yes, on multiuser (e.g. Unix) systems, it would have to ask for a password. But in cases where the user (e.g. you) knows better than to give root access to whatever program asks for it, the user probably already knows how to change resolv.conf himself.
So is a web browser plugin.
The reason the root servers aren't going to change anytime soon, is that most people don't use them directly anyway. For performance reasons, they use their ISP's recursive resolver / cache. Thus, it becomes a problem of either getting users to accept a performance hit (which no one wants), or getting the ISPs (not the users) to change.
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Re:Why don't you just do what I do... (Score:1)
Idealab is full of BS (Score:3)
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Did you just fart? Or do you always smell like that?
We need to replace the system altogether (Score:2)
Re:Great ideas implemented poorly (Score:1)
I sort of envision a small group of people (open to the public) that keep track of who registers which TLD's and doesn't take 300 years to actually do something that people notice.
Personally I don't really want to become a registrar myself, but it would be great to have an organization that makes the process work more efficiently.
Looking at the OpenNIC's pages it looks a lot like what I'm talking about. The real question is how to gain wide-spread use?
end-of-line
Theres already an alternate registry!! (Score:5)
Browser Wars (Score:1)
We'd have to be careful that this doesn't start another browser war. You could just imagine: sorry, this tld is only reachable by IE users. Netscape users can get stuffed.
So who would regulate them then? I'd guess there would be a .aol fairly quickly, and if this continues what's to stop every company from getting into bed with one of the big two and creating their own tlds?
Maybe a USENET-style regulation thing?
Why plugin? (Score:1)
Plugins for _all_ browsers? (Score:1)
Wired states that "New.net would distribute a small browser plug-in", so I conclude that those will not be open source. That makes me wonder what will happen to alternative or simple (lynx) browsers.
Re: (Score:1)
Re:Great ideas implemented poorly (Score:1)
1) talk to your favorite OS distro about including OpenNIC and other alternate roots as an install option
2) bring in content sites on alternative domain names, and put an explanation on those sites for how to access them by their non-ICANN
3) a monthly OpenDNS Day, where all participating sites with non-ICANN names will only server a page explaining this to folks who acess them by their ICANN names; I personally love this idea
4) whenever folks get together to rant about how much ICANN sucks, mention that there are alternatives (as in this article
5) get it in the mainstream press; OpenNIC has been discussed in several tech sites (here, K5, TheRegister), but also in some mainstream media (the Wall Street Journal, BBC Online and, next week, The Village Voice)
6) distribute an easy-to-use application that reconfigures a user's personal computer to use an alternative DNS system (in the works for *nix, MacOS and BeOS)
7) to speak to your interest, get the many alternate roots to cooperate in presenting a single collaboratevely managed namespace; if you think the other ones looks difficult, this is by far the hardest of the things I've mentioned
So, we are working on it. The commenters on this article are right, though, that it's a really big task and our percentage of the Net is quite small (and not growing as quickly as the general Net population, either). But the momentum is gaining and ICANN's antagonists number more every time they get any news coverage at all, so it's still positive.
Nil desperandum.
Cheers,
-robin
Re:Why is ICANN so bad? (Score:1)
ICANN are bad because they're corrupt. Don't know the full details, don't want to. I'd rather not know.
BTW, you know there's a .us tld? Oh, and .net is supposed to be for service provides IIRC, so banning commercial activity there would be OTT. On the other hand, kicking commercial stuff from .org would be good.
I'm hardly what you would call a guru... (Score:3)
Why is ICANN so bad? (Score:2)
I just wish ICANN had the authority to babysit the domains already here. Kick all commercial activity out of .org and .net, keep .com for the american/international companies and enforce national companies to register under their national domains.
The net is a chaotic place already, why make it even worse?
Re:Plugins for _all_ browsers? (Score:1)
Well it would be easy enough to change Konqueror, since the source is available... You probably wouldn't even need to do it through a plugin, just edit the URI resolving code to recognise the new tlds and get whatever it would have to from there.
As for minority browsers, well, I thought we were supposed to ignore them. Seriously, there would have to be some way for them to get at the new names -- some portalish thing maybe?
Re:Why is ICANN so bad? (Score:1)
we would need to say goodbye to slashdot and freshmeat!
Re:Why is ICANN so bad? (Score:2)
Although it may not be generating a profit it was certainly *meant* to after the buyout...
Why else would Andover pay a squillion dollars for Slashdot?
Guaranteed First posts?
Re:Yeah this will be cool. (Score:1)
Re:We need to replace the system altogether (Score:2)
The ability to change name resolution is platform dependent, and requires administrator/root level access. You are sure as hell not touching that on my machine. How do you change this on a Mac?
The root servers aren't going to change any time soon. They're well established, and their addresses are distributed with DNS servers, for which there are millions of copies already distributed.
Re:Typical American disrespect for the law. (Score:1)
I'm sure that you're wrong about this. There is nothing illegal about it at all. In fact there is no law in any country ( as far as I am aware) to prevent *anybody* designing/building/deploying a system to allow for an alternative method of reaching resources on the internet.
Imagine if you will that ICQ decided to allow you to reach their users websites by entering icq://uin1234567890 in your browser, would that be illegal? I doubt it. (Btw, if anyone at AOL/ICQ wants to use that idea... please remember to contact me first and pay me a token amount
The ICANN may not be perfect, but it has worked up to now. It ain't broke, so don't fix it.
The same could be said about the Linux Kernel, but people continue to improve it. The difference here is that they have been given control of many things which affect every internet user in the entire world and are not directly accountable. No body seems to be able to extert pressure on them to do anything. We do not appear to have made any progress since they came along.
I for one agree that material which is obviously pornographic and unsuitable for minors should be placed within a seperate name space which could be easily blocked such as:
If ICANN had got off their butts and allowed for such a TLD ages ago I would have less contempt for them.
Re:commercialization (Score:1)
Just because a organization is not commercialized does not mean that the people who run it can not be jack asses.
Replace DNS (Score:1)
Or even get rid of the current domain name system completely and replace it by using 'raw' IP addresses. An IPV4 address (especially if expressed as 8 hex digits rather than dotted quad), is no longer than a phone number and people are quite happy to use phone numbers rather type the person/company name into the phone dial.
For loookup you could have white and yellow pages, which could be indexed in many ways. Also companies and individual users could create their own private address books, in the same way that people do for telephone numbers.
Re:Typical American disrespect for the law. (Score:1)
I understand that the US Congress authorized ICANN, but I don't recall that they ever passed anything that said everybody needed to pay attention to them.
The internet has always worked under rough consensus, where people generally agree on how things are going to work. The ICANN changes that model, really without consent.
heh...idealab.. (Score:1)
We need heirarchical namespace back (Score:3)
I think that this particulary implementation of the idea, as it stands, is going to flop big time.
Why? ... because it requires work ... and the goal isn't good enough... do we really want to do all this just for some stupid domains like .film ???
It doesn't solve the basic problem, flat domains. Why should chicago.il.us be nonexistant? It could be the root for every business and person in the city. Geography makes a very good dimension to base domain names on, and should be taken advantage of. A tree structure that lets you walk down to a city or neighborhood is a very good thing.
What we need are domains that actually make some sense... and use the heirarchical namespace properly for example:
- CHICAGO.IL.US could actually be open to businesses and people in Chicago... with the home page having information about the city... so if a business was in Chicago, it would be (for example).... goldcoastdogs.chicago.il.us, or ibm.chicago.il.us, government.chicago.il.us, etc.
- .soft could be people who make software, with each language having a sponsor (or two).... delphi.soft would be run by borland
- .rating could be used to host sites that rate the equvalent sites without the
.rating at the end.... thus ibm.com.rating would give feedback about IBM's services, etc.
- .anon and
.free could be used for dynamic hosted information that needs to be anonymous because of persecution.
- .act could be for activities.... with examples such as photography.act, runner.act, hiker.act, etc.
Each level in the heirarchy as the "price" of getting the domain name would be required to host a list (in XHTML) of all the available subdomains that were registered, so that search engines, etc.. could make life easier, and serve as a convinent way to show what's available to everyone. A look at the chicago.il.us site would allow you to discover new businesses available, etc.The load of mirroring could also be distributed up and down the heirarchy in a uniform manner, since the data is structured in a uniform manner, the chicago.il.us domain could be mirrored between a group of servers that are members of the domain, such as IBM, the City Government, etc.
The dispute resolution process would then go down to the local level, and namespace saturation could almost disappear. If two businesses had the same name, in the same city, they would be differnetiated by the services offered. Sams.plumbing.chicago.il.us wouln't get confused with sams.publisher.chicago.il.us, for example
So if someone can put together a heirarchical, locally administered namespace, that routes around the existing ICANN endorsed mess, I'll sign up... I've got a list of little nodes in the big tree I'd like to run, including:- amateur.photographer.chicago.il.us
- apcu.computer.usergroup.chicago.il.us
- amateur.photographer.us
- etc....
My choices for domain names in a tree would tell you far more about me, and be far less random than a contrived name like http://basicsoftware.com [basicsoftware.com] ever could.A nice side benefit to all this heirarchy is that it could serve to remove money from the domain registration system, for a lot of people, that WOULD be worth the cost.
Re:Why is ICANN so bad? (Score:1)
Uh, I believe they're attempting to (see The Register [theregister.co.uk]), and it would have been a good idea if the distinctions between .org other TLDs had been maintained from the start, but what do you do with the many people who own .org domains, and have established a presence on the web, but are not non-profit organisations? The problem is that VeriSign (Network Solutions) were willing to sell .org domains to anybody who would pay, but now VeriSign are giving up control of .org (in return for continuing their monopoly over .com and .net adresses), and now ICANN are talking about requiring all owners of .org domains to be registered non-profit organisations. Many .org owners would have to register new names, perhaps readvertise their sites etc.
One of your other points (keep .com for American/International companies) has similar problems - there are many companies worldwide which have .com domains, but under this description would be forced to change. Unless American-only companies were also forced to change to the .us domain, this would be interpreted as pro-US bias and be widely criticised around the world. (Yes, I know the internet originated in the US, but you can't ignore the fact that it's now worldwide).
Basically, the idea of enforcing the naming conventions for TLDs now, while desirable in practice, has the problem that it can't really be seen as fair - requiring owners of domain names registered in good faith to rename as a result of ICANN/VeriSigns' flawed policy in the past. I can see a better argument for allowing no new registrations in violation of the naming conventions, but then you have to ask wether there's much point, given the number of existing 'misnamed' domains.
Why would a browser plugin be needed for linux? (Score:2)
The last word on this. (Score:2)
Re:We need heirarchical namespace back (Score:2)
The idea of hierarchical domains is a good one, but it is obviously only geared to local businesses. How many people are going to remember "ibm.armonk.ny.us", versus "ibm.com"? Furthermore, if a company moves or establishes a new branch office, the old address is useless.
This is the right solution to the wrong problem. Many people and businesses have identical names -- look at the Yellow Pages in any sizeable city. Until you want to use, say, Tax ID's or phone numbers as URL's, there will always be conflicts. Always. Always. Always. Always. Always.
Always.
Always.
Re:More then browsers? (Score:1)
Re:Replace DNS (Score:1)
name.space - over 500 generic TLDs (Score:1)
You have to change your root.zone or name server. It is possible to access the "new TLDs" also via
Use OpenNIC for this (Score:2)
All your hallucinogen [pineight.com] are belong to us.
Why can't we do both? (Score:1)
Re:Wouldn't a better solution... (Score:2)
Or use superroot.org [superroot.org]'s root servers. DJBDNS [cr.yp.to] users can simply put
199.166.24.1
195.117.6.10
199.166.24.3
199.166.31.250
199.166.31.3
199.5.157.128
204.57.55.100
204.80.125.130
205.189.73.10
205.189.73.102
207.126.103.16
216.13.76.2
216.196.48.66
into their {mumble}/dnscache/root/servers/@ file. BIND users use these instructions [superroot.org] instead.
The hack gives your access to all the usual TLDs AND SuperRoot's plethora of TLDs without sweat.
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Re:The internet != WWW (Score:1)
Re:Wouldn't a better solution... (Score:3)
Idealab's stroke of genius (IMHO) is that they are going to offer a way around this. Sure, they'll offer traditional DNS, but in the meantime they'll build market and mind-share by allowing folks to just download the plugin and do the name resolution that way. If they distribute enough of the plugins, they'll be able to demonstrate interest to the ISPs- and then the ISPs might get off their butts and incorporate the alternatives into their systems. It's a neat way around the chicken-and-egg problem that has plauged past alternatives.
Now, I'm not claiming that this will work; certainly all past attempts at this have failed miserably. But if any of them have had a chance, this appears to be the one. Now they just have to convince folks that it is worth their time to put up content on these new domains, and (as someone else wisely pointed out) you need to convince Google to index it. If those two things happen, they've figured out a work-around to the one other problem that has always plagued alternative registries, so it just might work.
~luge
What aboutt .dot? (Score:1)
Idealab! == FC (Score:1)
How did they implement this? (Score:2)
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Redirecting the local DNS client to use their root servers. This is what the AlterNic, etc. crowd do. Bypasses most DNS caches, so these guys had better have a big root server.
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Modifying the browser's lookup. That's what the "RealNames" and "Internet Keyword" people do.
Only affects the browser, of course.
Neither of those ideas has obtained any traction, although both have been operational for several years.Now all they need is a virus that installs their plug-in. Maybe a web bug based on the exploitable hole in the Flash plug-in, coupled with hidden disclaimers in the terms of use on sites deploying it.
Besides, we don't need more TLDs. The number of Internet businesses probably peaked months ago. At the beginning of this year, there were 5021 ticker symbols on the NASDAQ. Today, there are only 4929.
Re: Idealab is full of BS (Score:1)
eToys was not trying "to rob etoy.com of their domain name." They were trying to resolve complaints from parents about the adult content on the etoy.com site and were unable to reach an agreement with the etoy people who asked for an outrageous sum of money.
You say tomato, I say tomahto (ok, that expression doesn't work well written).
This very well may be the truth but it doesn't give eToys the right to attempt to bully etoy.com our of what's rightfully theirs (and was theirs long before eToys existed).
--
Turn on, log in, burn out...
Re:We need heirarchical namespace back (Score:2)
Re:We need to replace the system altogether (Score:2)
It's more than just that. I don't want any of the users on my network doing something as stupid as changing their dns resolution methods. That's why they don't have priveleges to do this. If they change this, they don't get to resolve any of the names of the servers their daily work depends on.
They can install a browser plug-in. I couldn't care less if they do this. If it breaks their Internet Explorer when they install the program, they know they get no support because they installed an unsupported program.
A program that changes whatever the Windows version of resolv.conf is, could also be a program where they click on an icon and it says, "Ok." Yes, on multiuser (e.g. Unix) systems, it would have to ask for a password. But in cases where the user (e.g. you) knows better than to give root access to whatever program asks for it, the user probably already knows how to change resolv.conf himself
This is only realistic for home PCs. No corporate environment allows users to touch this stuff. So, by choosing this method, you are creating TLDs that only work at home.
If the idea of this excites you: (Score:5)
RealNames and AlterNIC have been around for a LONG (internet that is) time. How often do you run into these? (I bet about as often as a Cue Cat sound on a TV that takes you to a web site)
2) The enemy of my enemy is my friend makes for a nice warm feeling for a few minutes, but is not good long term strategic planning. If you don't like ICANN, going off and embracing some alternative just BECAUSE it is an alternative and "would piss off ICANN" isn't good technical logic.
And the gods of the 'net like LOGICAL arguments.
3) Hate to tell you this, but the Internet goes beyond web browsers. Uniform Resource Identifiers need to be addressed. As the 'idea' here is 'we are gonna do this with browser add-ons', this shows these people are not thinking in terms of the big picture. Just a small, http: view.
This could get messy (Score:1)
Re: Idealab is full of BS (Score:2)
Rich
Re:Typical American disrespect for the law. (Score:2)
Then why don't I get a faceful of pr0n every time I type in some random URL like www.whateverifeelliketyping.com? Why can I be guaranteed of coming up with a pr0n site if I type in www.somevariationontits.com, but not somecombinationofrandomwords.com?
The internet != WWW (Score:5)
I think the whole DNS things needs to be restarted from scratch: the only possible TLDs would be country codes, .intl (for anything international), and .net (for network systems). Within the country codes, it's up the country on how to split it up (This means that trademarks that apply in one country cannot be used to grab a domain from someone in a different country where the trademark may not apply, such as the Corinthians case). The US, of course, would probably just replicated .com, .org, etc, which is fine, but restrict these, and make sure that there are enough TLDs that are NOT related to e-commerce so that nearly every current site can be classified into one of these. If done right, then there would be no reason for a company X to own X.net, X.org, etc in addition to X.com, which makes trademark problems even more limited between two companies and not being a large company and a small-time webmaster. A system should be opened up to allow anyone to introduce an idea of a new TLD, with a public comment period before granting or accepting it, as long as the TLD does not replicate the function of any other TLD and provides a namespace that would have sufficient size to be useful.
Wouldn't a better solution... (Score:3)
Of course another solution would be to provide a hack that sits at resolver level that allows all "normal" DNS lookups to go through your ISP, but these special requests get filtered at the OS level and forwarded to the new system.
But the best solution (IMHO) is for the ISP's to add the DNS Server to the named.ca file so it gets resolved (more or less) proper.
Providing a plug-in is a fine hack, but it must provide someway to resolve names to DNS Entries. It's just a question of whether the resolution comes at the application or the OS level.
Re:Wouldn't a better solution... (Score:3)
Idealab this time seems again to be Cluelesslab. DNS is a hierarchical system. Most retail end users now get their DNS service from their ISPs; commercial end users (leased lines, etc.) may have an in-house DNS but that too is hierarchical under their ISP's.
Now anybody can point to any other DNS, but it's not trivial for Joe User, so it's really best if the ISPs do the fix in their DNS servers. They can simply add these alternative roots next to
The tricky part is Worldcom's UUNET, the largest backbone ISP (upstream from a lot of retail services). Vint, the Elizabeth Taylor of the Internet (famous because he's famous, and didn't he once make a movie about a horse when he was a kid?), works for them. So Roberts gave him the hot title at ICANN, so he won't defy them. But UUNET's customers (who mostly run DNS servers) can still do the fix.
But plug-ins? Gross needs a cranial plug in.
(BTW, Idealab has put up for sublease its fancy Boston digs, occupied for less than a year. They're shrinking away with their stock portfolio)
Most browsers do NS plugins (Score:2)
Konqueror runs most if not all Netscape plug-ins. So does Opera. I am assuming Mozilla does too.
You might get the .dot after all, guys.
Looks like a privacy nightmare (Score:4)
Though the article only mentions that the plugin would resolve the new TLDs, I have to wonder what ELSE the plugin would/could do.
Where/how is the resolution going to be performed? And who will own/maintain/operate/control these resolvers?
Plugin to resolver: Hi! I've got this request from a user. Here's all the stuff I could find out about him, and could you please make a record that he wanted to access this URL? Oh, and by the way, could you also resolve this for me?
Marketers would LOVE this; privacy advocates may not be so thrilled.
Hollywood sics lawyers on entrepreneurs (Score:2)
Quick - someone patent it (Score:2)
of course, this is the favorite buzzword, but maybe it could somehow be done P2P? I can't see how right now.
Great ideas implemented poorly (Score:2)
All such attempts will fail unless they can successfully meet the needs that the InterNIC is leaving unmet.
To me they seem to be:
#1 is probably the second hardest. If the process is free, people will just run a perl script to register every word, trademark, and probably every letter/number combo their quatum computer can spit out in the time it takes to futz with a bucky-ball a few trillion-trillion times.
#'s 2 and 3 are fairly easy. Just come up with a charter that helps make those outcomes more likely. There are many internet task forces, working groups, committees, SIGs, consortiums, etc, to look towards for models. Just make a few bylaws, elect some officials, and take away all incentive for corruption. Also, don't be idealistic (ala, the FSF). Just be fair and open to all sides (like the internet tends to try to be), and you'll succeed.
#4 is the zinger... I can think of three ways to do it:
Above all else, like I already said, don't be idealistic! Democratic Name Server? Would fire have caught on if it was Democratic? DNS is a mechanism, not a way of life. If you have two mechanisms which are equal in every way except that one is neutral, it just does what it does. The other does the same things, only it goes out of its way to teach some lesson, tell you you're bad or good, or something similar, which do you think would win going head-to-head? Which would you want to win?
I'd be willing to help on a project that could repair this flaw in the internet. Any takers?
end-of-line
A call for anarchy.... (Score:2)
Here's what I propose: Open up all 3 and 4 letter combination TLD to the highest registrar bidder. Everything:
That way, the more popular new TLDs could be scooped up by the big boys,but all the crap would be left to *us*. At this point, I'd be happy to register "trevorb.llq".
Let the market choose which TLDs are cool/needed/useful....
Re:Typical American disrespect for the law. (Score:2)
I am not arguing that porn operators have an infinite supply of money with which to register every possible domain. If they had anything less than an infinite supply of money (which they do), that would be a stupid course of action, since some domains are obviously more likely to attract users than others.
What you will find, however - and this should have been clear from my post coupled with perhaps a morsel of common sense - is that given the opportunity to get some traffic at a reasonable cost, they will do so, regardless of the potential for surprise or offense.
./ers new home (Score:3)
- www.whois.cowboyneal,
- www.ilove.cowboyneal, and
- www.fsck.cowboyneal.
despite our intensive research, we couldn't find any firm named cowboyneal, and we don't expect any indiviual to exist with a name like that, so the hidden humor behind this tld will stay obscure...