nettime: in brief: public vs. private

[mf@mediafilter.org (MediaFilter)]

In Brief: Public vs. Private

The current perception war that name.space is engaged in is about
the public domain vs. private property.

The Alternic, or "newdom" movement wants to privatize
top level domains and sell them exclusively as a product.

Name.space, conversely, views the toplevel as public.
Generic words like "art" "web" "sex" and others should not
become private property.

Name.space is in the process of testing a front end to BIND
which enables totally dynamic updating of the toplevel database,
and the decentralization of registries which all share the
dynamically updated toplevel database.

This model is about empowering local registries and freeing
up supply of available names, and treating them as a shared
public resource, not as products or private property.

The Alternic/"newdom" movement is about creating micro-monopolies,
like lots of little internic/network solutions.  They argue for
exclusive, private ownership of specific tld's, and a limited
supply.  They are in a mad rush to become "fait accompli" before
the issue can really be presented to an informed public for
consideration.

Name.space, in development for over 1 year,
has been conducting its services to the public for
5 months, and has learned through its interactions with the public.
The number of times the dns switcher applications have been downloaded,
the positive email comments, and the overwhelming support and
acceptance for the public-domain toplevel model is evidenced by
the number of requests for public rootnames--outnumbering the
private requests by 20 to 1.
This indicates strongly the popularity of the name.space model
for expanding directory service on the net.

These benchmarks are the result of the actual process of use
and not the result of some behind-closed-doors committee or
special interest groups who want to stake their claims to
properties in the toplevel namespace.

The public's choice is clear:  the toplevel namespace is
a public resource to be operated in the public trust.

Don't be railroaded into accepting the micro-monopolies
being forced into being by the newdom movement.


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