Re: [DNSOP] I-D Action: draft-ietf-dnsop-alt-tld-05.txt

[Jim Reid <[e-mail]>]

> On 27 Sep 2016, at 18:52, Warren Kumari <[e-mail]> wrote:
> 
>> Meh. I wish the WG could stop the shed-painting on a frankly pointless detail and concentrate its efforts on producing a viable problem statement.
> 
> .... we have two of them --

Indeed Warren. That’s one too many.

They both come up short as problem statements IMO. I’m struggling to find words to succinctly describe what problem the WG is expected to solve - sorry about that -- since it appears to be a layer 9+ matter. Both drafts seem to be concerned with treating (some of?) the symptoms rather than the root cause(s). Excuse the pun.

> ALT doesn't solve any of the major issues, but it *does* create a safe
> place for those people who want to experiment and build alternate
> resolution systems -- and takes some of the pressure off while we
> discuss solutions....

True. But that seems to be putting the cart before the horse. Where’s the demand from experimenters and why do they need a dedicated TLD for their alterate resolution systems? That’s a rhetorical question BTW. Answering it may well distract the WG from its quest for that one true problem statement to rule them all. So please don’t do that. :-)

FWIW I’m sceptical about creating .alt as a playpen for experiments since it might undermine efforts to answer the question ICANN asked us, whatever that question might be, or be the start of a slippery slope. Maybe a TLD is needed for experiments. Maybe not. However that’s something to discuss once we’ve figured out what has to be done about special* TLDs in general. *For some as-yet-unclear definition of special.

I think the WG should step back from both drafts, take a deep breath and agree a problem statement. Once that’s done, we’ll be in a better place to decide what to do with both drafts.

Easier said than done I know...