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["John Kozlowski \(ShofarDomain.com\)" <John.Kozlowski AT ShofarDomain.com>]

For ShofarDomain’s rootless implementation the following design goals are in place:

 

1.       The DNS resolver must return standard records.

2.       It must work with any TLD irrespective of how that TLD is implemented.

3.       It must work with ICANN, alternative roots, and ShofarDomain’s rootless TLDs.

 

ShofarDomain’s DNS diagnostic tools (http://ShofarDomain.com/@Net,DNS), domain browser (http://ShofarDomain.com/@Domain), and the DNS resolvers (http://ShofarDomain.com/DNS_Setup) are operational.  Granted there are numerous clumsiness issues, and a few bugs to resolve, but you can see that the concepts are sound and functional.

 

Interesting irony is that a current bug is preventing correctly resolving bing.com.  I can hear both the cheers and the laments.

 

ICANN is not going to disappear in the next few weeks.  Simply trying to displace them, as others have done in the past, is not rational.  It is better to be cooperative and therefore our resolver queries them.  Applying that same mentality to the various alternative roots, the objective is to be cooperative, and therefore you can see the list of roots that are resolved (http://ShofarDomain.com/@Domain?Filter=Root).  We resolve our rootless TLDs which uses a different data structure than the others, but returns standard results.

 

It is this ability to implement a TLD differently is important.  The Namecoin method has merit and we need to be open to derivations of that.  ICANN or alternatives using the established rooted technique should have an equal footing on the table.

 

It is the resolver that makes this work.  We don’t start by simply looking at one ICANN sanctioned root, but all roots as well as rootless.  This is a simple matter to implement, but will be fought by ICANN.

 

It should also be noted that the first query for a given TLD with our resolver may seem inefficient as it queries all of the roots.  However, this allow us to resolve everything and opens the door to assessment tools.  For example you can see that NameSpace’s B root returns NS records in both the answer and authority sections for “UK” (http://shofardomain.com/@Domain,UK).

 

There are those who will continue with the rental model that we see with ICANN since this is a multi-billion dollar business.  There is the other extreme of free domains with or without the renewal requirement.  In our case we are developing a one-time fee model.

John Kozlowski

http://ShofarDomain.com Email: John.Kozlowski AT ShofarDomain.com Phone: +1 (423) 716-6432 Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ShofarDomain Twitter: https://twitter.com/ShofarDomain YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/ShofarDomain

 

 

-----Original Message-----
From: discuss-request AT lists.opennicproject.org [mailto:discuss-request AT lists.opennicproject.org] On Behalf Of Jeff Taylor
Sent: Sunday, May 26, 2013 1:21 AM
To: discuss AT lists.opennicproject.org
Subject: Re: [opennic-discuss] ShofarDomain's rootless domain system

 

I also love the idea of rootless domains.  The idea of a decentralized authority sounds like a great way to go, but the implementation could be tricky...

 

The way I see it, you wouldn't necessarily need a web-of-trust model, although it might be more reliable.  Alternatively, you could work from an age model -- don't allow a new party to register or modify a domain if there is an older owner found.  (Ownership would likely have to be provided by some sort of SSL key?)

 

As for permanently lost domains, I would imagine you could get around that by requiring each domain to update their DNS record, or perhaps resign their SSL key once a year, and if it expires, the domain is removed and open for registration again.  This model would also mean that if some company let their domain lapse, their only recourse for regaining it would be to pay off whoever snagged it.

 

For storing the records, it wouldn't really be that much different that what we have now -- using standard zone files -- there would just be a lot more of them, or there could be a single large file containing the pointers to all the domains.

 

I guess the biggest trick for a decentralized authority would be getting an initial query to confirm with multiple sources before accepting an answer, and I'm not really sure how to do that without rewriting the current DNS query methods.  It would probably be easier to continue our setup with multiple T2 servers that we consider reliable, and perhaps work on a model where the client DNS servers are occasionally updated.

 

On 05/25/2013 10:13 PM, Guillaume Parent wrote:

> I liked the idea, but I don't like the pricing. To me, it defeats the

> point of OpenNIC entirely.

> 

 

 

 

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