Behalf Of John C Klensin
Ultimately someone has to operate the keyboard that puts
lines/ records into what ultimately becomes the root zone
file. And someone has to supervise that person/ entity.
This has to happen. But ultimately backbone carriers have to decide to
route IP packets in certain directions.
The 'root' is a consenusal construct.
Now, for better or worse, that evaluation process,
particularly for ccTLDs, has been the source of an immense
amount of controversy. Those who get most excited about the
status quo don't acknowledge that ICANN is a legitimate,
international, multi-stakeholder, private-sector organization
but, instead,
refer to it simply as "the US Government Contractor". They
point out that the US Government has asserted responsibility
for, and control of, the root zone and that it clearly has
the ability to overrule ICANN in determinations about root
zone entries.
This is certainly true in theory. In practice any attempt to do this
would lead to the root being fractured. It would lead to a monumental
diplomatic incident.
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