[tor-reg] ICANN and changes in the architecture or operation of a gTLD registry
I've written an academic paper, called *Site Finder and Internet Governance*, relating to this PDP. Here's an excerpt: The lesson of Site Finder is that there needs to be an effective institutional mechanism for protecting the domain name space infrastructure from unilateral change that bypasses the protections and consensus mechanisms of the traditional Internet standards process. The existing domain-name architecture and standards process are subject to substantial pressure from an aggressively for-profit VeriSign. Even a flawed ICANN may be better suited than any other existing institution to protect against that danger. Yet we should endorse ICANN regulatory authority only with extreme caution, and the same mechanisms should not apply to everyone. ICANN oversight should certainly not apply beyond the for-profit unsponsored registries. Even within this group, it may be that the rules should be different for "dominant" and "non-dominant" players -- perhaps, for VeriSign and all others. The full paper is available at <http://www.law.wayne.edu/weinberg/sitefinder.new.PDF>. Jon Jonathan Weinberg Professor of Law, Wayne State University weinberg@xxxxxxxx |