http://www.icann.org/announcements/announcement-04jan08.htm "First-of-its-kind agreement recognizes mutual responsibilities, supports enhanced Internet stability" The management of root name servers have always been a dark spot of Internet governance. Nobody knows about it and nobody cares (there have been a few papers by Karl Auerbach and that's all). Incredible as it may seems, a function which is so essential for the DNS (and therefore for the vast majority of Internet uses) have always been done without any sort of formal agreement. Nobody knows why Verisign manages two name servers and Neustar zero, what could be done if a root name server operator provides a bad service, how root name servers could be added, retired or changed. In practice, the set of root name servers is now cast in stone. Some persons believe it is better that way and that the service is better done by the present volunteers than by a mono-governemental bureaucracy (ICANN) or a multi-governemental one (ITU). So, this move is important. As ICANN says, it is indeed the first formalization of the relationship between ICANN and a root name server operator. I see what ICANN obtains. I'm very unsure about the gains for ISC. Was it a necessary condition to obtain the announcement of ISC IPv6 addresses in the root-servers.net zone? (http://lists.oarci.net/pipermail/dns-operations/2007-December/002192.html) ____________________________________________________________ You received this message as a subscriber on the list: governance@lists.cpsr.org To be removed from the list, send any message to: governance-unsubscribe@lists.cpsr.org For all list information and functions, see: http://lists.cpsr.org/lists/info/governance