Re: ICANN to allow commercial gTLDs

[David Conrad <drc () virtualized org>]

Jay,

On Jun 17, 2011, at 4:40 PM, Jay Ashworth wrote:
> and the root operators may throw
> their hands up in the air if anyone asks them to have anything in their
> zone except glue -- rightly, I think; it's not a degree of complexity
> that's compatible with the required stability of the root zone.

I believe the root server operators have stated (the equivalent of) that it is not their job to make editorial 
decisions on what the root zone contains.  They distribute what the ICANN/NTIA/Verisign gestalt publishes.

> Especially since the root zone actually lives in 14 different places.

It lives in _far_ more places than that.

> No, anything that requires the root zone to be fluid[1] is going to cause even
> more fundamental engineering problems than I've been positing so far tonight.

http://www.icann.org/en/topics/new-gtlds/summary-of-impact-root-zone-scaling-06oct10-en.pdf

Folks of varying levels of technical, business, and political expertise have been working on the expansion of the root 
zone for more than a decade.  I might suggest that instead of assuming people haven't thought of the issues you are 
raising, you might want to take the opposite approach and ask for pointers for the analyses.

> [1]requiring updates in anything smaller than days.  How often does the
> root zone actually change; anyone got a pointer to stats on that?

The root zone is updated two times a day. Relevant folks have stated this will not be changing.

Regards,
-drc