Fwd: [governance] Verisign seizes .com domain registered via foreign Registrar on behalf of US Authorities

[Milton L Mueller]

> -----Original Message-----
> but ... it also amounts to a certain authority paradox where ICANN
> delegates TLDs to entities that are jurisdictionally bounded which seems
> to imply a change in authority for the duration of the contract onto the
> jurisdiction where the registry is located (or onto the registry).

 [Milton L Mueller] I don't see any paradox. A global root registry delegates control of a resource to a TLD registry. The TLD registry is located somewhere, and thus subject to that somewhere's jurisdiction. 
 
> It seems to me that by subjugating global public goods (remember my
> proposition re:principles ==> *what* are domain names) 

[Milton L Mueller] remember my proposition that domain names are _not_ public goods. They are rival in consumption and one can exclude. End of story.  

> change in DNS zone file. The bodog.com example is very important in that
> respect. It is a gambling site. Legit. Candian. I hear ads everyday on
> my local sports radio about it. I couldn't careless that Maryland
> doesn't allow gambling, we do!

[Milton L Mueller] bodog should register bodog.uk or bodog.name, or something not in this crazy jurisdiction

> dns zone files
> have to be globally accessible, so the justification for ICANN's
> authority assertion is straightforward: stability of the root. 

[Milton L Mueller] Sorry, you are revealing an imperfect understanding of DNS. Removing or seizing a SLD has utterly no effect on the stability of the root zone. The root zone tells you where .com is. Verisign, the .com registry, has the information about who and where bodog.com is. Whatever drek happens to the bodog.com zone at the .com registry has no effect on .com in the root zone, much less .net or .org or .info or .whatever

Also, let me warn against trying to erect "stability of the root" into some overarching excuse for extending global authority into local matters. That argument can really, really backfire.