Alas for this rosy vision, ICANN *tried* to boss the RIRs and get them to sign contracts agreeing to pay it and obey it, but they balked. So all credit to the RIRs - and none to ICANN - on this one. On Mon, 1 Dec 2003, John C Klensin wrote: > > > --On Monday, 01 December, 2003 07:24 -0500 "vinton g. cerf" > <vinton.g.cerf@xxxxxxx> wrote: > > > karl, ICANN has responsibility to do what it can to make sure > > the DNS and ICANN root system work. It does not have to > > disenfranchise the RIRs and the root servers to do this. > > Vint, > > I would go even further than this. One of the best actions > ICANN can take, IMO, is to look at a particular situation (and > the root system and DNS operations generally are probably good > examples) and say "yep, it is working" followed by some version > of "if it ain't broke, don't fix it... or even intervene". One > corollary to this is that not only does "it not have to > disenfranchise..." but that it arguably should not intervene in > those activities at all unless there is a strong case that they > are not working in some significant way. > > In that sense, the observation that ICANN has not significantly > intervened in either the root system or with the address > registry environment should be judged as a success unless it is > argued that one or the other is seriously not working. > > john > > > > > -- http://www.icannwatch.org Personal Blog: http://www.discourse.net A. Michael Froomkin | Professor of Law | froomkin@xxxxxx U. Miami School of Law, P.O. Box 248087, Coral Gables, FL 33124 USA +1 (305) 284-4285 | +1 (305) 284-6506 (fax) | http://www.law.tm -->It's warm here.<--