Chris,
There is nothing wrong with running a ccTLD "out-of-country", especially
given the connectivity issues in much of the third world. And there are
very few cases that I know of (and I know most of them) where the government
doesn't know about, and thus tacitly acknowledge and condone, the
administrators of the ccTLDs. In fact, that is in the majority of ccTLDs -
very few are run directly by the government.
But suppose the ICANN tried to tell (for instance) the French that they had
to let individuals register directly under .FR, as corporations can, instead
of under a second-level domain, as the French policy calls for now? Or
suppose that the ICANN insists that DENIC is a profit-making,
anti-competitive cabal of ISPs? Or suppose that the insists that all
domains allow zone transfers (not now possible in Brazil, Guam, much of the
Caribbean, etc., and which RIPE is considering restricting because of
privacy concerns). All of these kinds of issues would concern ICANN in a
gTLD, and quite properly. But they are probably out of place when it comes
to ccTLDs.
In the case of France, Germany, and Brazil, what would happen if the ICANN
*did* insist is that the State Department would start getting some phone
calls, and committees would meet, and hearings would be scheduled, and laws
would be promulgated, laws which would quite probably vary quite a bit
country to country. Then ICANN would be in a real pickle, and so would any
attempt to deal with trademark disputes in a harmonized fashion.
And as a side-effect of all these governments having become interested in
domain names, the principle of government authority over "their" Internet
would become firmly established, and that would be a pity.
Antony
> -----Original Message-----
> From: owner-discuss@dnso.org [mailto:owner-discuss@dnso.org]On Behalf Of
> Christopher Ambler
> Sent: Friday, January 15, 1999 5:08 PM
> To: Antony Van Couvering; domain-policy@open-rsc.org; DNSO Mail List
> Cc: list@ifwp.org
> Subject: Re: Commentary on ICC submission
>
>
> And what of the ccTLDs that are not run by the governments? What of those
> who are operated out-of-country? What of those who are operated without
> the oversight (and perhaps even the knowledge) of the government in
> question?
>
> Just asking...
>
> --
> Christopher Ambler
> This email address belongs to a Resident of the State of Washington
>
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: Antony Van Couvering <avc@interport.net>
> To: Christopher Ambler <cambler@iodesign.com>;
> <domain-policy@open-rsc.org>;
> DNSO Mail List <discuss@dnso.org>
> Cc: <list@ifwp.org>
> Sent: Friday, January 15, 1999 2:16 PM
> Subject: RE: Commentary on ICC submission
>
>
> >I say this as a matter of practicality. Are you seriously going to tell
> the
> >Chinese how run .CN? If you attempt it, you will see the
> Chinese interfere
> >at governmental levels, making the meddling of the U.S. and European
> >governments seem trivial by comparison.
>
>
>