nanog mailing list archives
Re: Why is .gov only for US government agencies?
From: "Fred Baker (fred)" <fred () cisco com>
Date: Mon, 20 Oct 2014 16:50:28 +0000
On Oct 19, 2014, at 5:05 AM, Matthew Petach <mpetach () netflight com> wrote:
Wondering if some of the long-time list members can shed some light on the question--why is the .gov top level domain only for use by US government agencies? Where do other world powers put their government agency domains? With the exception of the cctlds, shouldn't the top-level gtlds be generically open to anyone regardless of borders? Would love to get any info about the history of the decision to make it US-only. Thanks! Matt
The short version is that that names were a process. In the beginning, hosts simply had names. When DNS came into being, names were transformed from “some-name” to “some-name.ARPA”. A few of what we now all gTLDs then came into being - .com, .net, .int, .mil, .gov, .edu - and the older .arpa names quickly fell into disuse. ccTLDs came later. I’ve been told that the reason God was able to create the earth in seven days was that He had no installed base. We do. The funny thing is that you’ll see a reflection of the gTLDs underneath the ccTLDs of a number of countries - .ac, .ed, and the like.
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Current thread:
- Re: Why is .gov only for US government agencies?, (continued)
- Re: Why is .gov only for US government agencies? Paige Thompson (Oct 19)
- Re: Why is .gov only for US government agencies? Rubens Kuhl (Oct 19)
- Re: Why is .gov only for US government agencies? David Conrad (Oct 19)
- Re: Why is .gov only for US government agencies? Jim Popovitch (Oct 19)
- Re: Why is .gov only for US government agencies? William Allen Simpson (Oct 19)
- Re: Why is .gov only for US government agencies? David Conrad (Oct 19)
- Re: Why is .gov only for US government agencies? Nick Hilliard (Oct 20)
- Re: Why is .gov only for US government agencies? ITechGeek (Oct 20)
- Re: Why is .gov only for US government agencies? Rob Seastrom (Oct 20)
- Message not available
- Re: Why is .gov only for US government agencies? Bryan Fields (Oct 20)
- Re: Why is .gov only for US government agencies? Warren Bailey (Oct 20)
- Re: Why is .gov only for US government agencies? Bryan Fields (Oct 20)
- Re: Why is .gov only for US government agencies? Fred Baker (fred) (Oct 20)
- Re: Why is .gov only for US government agencies? John Orthoefer (Oct 20)
- Re: Why is .gov only for US government agencies? Fred Baker (fred) (Oct 20)
- Re: Why is .gov only for US government agencies? Andrew Sullivan (Oct 20)
- Re: Why is .gov only for US government agencies? Sandra Murphy (Oct 20)
- Re: Why is .gov only for US government agencies? manning bill (Oct 20)
- Re: Why is .gov only for US government agencies? Bill Woodcock (Oct 20)
- Re: Why is .gov only for US government agencies? Jared Mauch (Oct 20)
- Re: Why is .gov only for US government agencies? Bill Woodcock (Oct 20)
- Re: Why is .gov only for US government agencies? shawn wilson (Oct 20)
- Re: Why is .gov only for US government agencies? Valdis . Kletnieks (Oct 20)
- Re: Why is .gov only for US government agencies? John Orthoefer (Oct 20)