Root Authority
An interesting question I've dealt with a few times: >From whom do the root nameservers derive their authority? Doug
Re: Root Authority
> From whom do the root nameservers derive their authority? from me bzzzt! next troll please
Re: Root Authority
See Form and Substance in Cyberspace, 6 J. Small & Emerging Bus. L. 93
(2002), available online
http://personal.law.miami.edu/~froomkin/articles/formandsubstance.pdf
(especially pp. 119-122 ("The role of the root server operators"))
and more generally
Wrong Turn in Cyberspace: Using ICANN to Route Around the APA and the
Constitution, 50 Duke L.J. 17 (2000), available online
http://www.law.miami.edu/~froomkin/articles/icann.pdf
On Mon, 15 Dec 2003, Doug Luce wrote:
>
> An interesting question I've dealt with a few times:
>
> >From whom do the root nameservers derive their authority?
>
> Doug
>
>
--
http://www.icannwatch.org Personal Blog: http://www.discourse.net
A. Michael Froomkin |Professor of Law| [EMAIL PROTECTED]
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.<--
Re: Root Authority
> > > > From whom do the root nameservers derive their authority? > > from me > Sorry Mr Bush. We derive our authority from the old IANA, who assigned out the exiting roots. --bill
Re: Root Authority
On Mon, 15 Dec 2003 14:28:05 PST, bill said: > Sorry Mr Bush. We derive our authority from the old IANA, who > assigned out the exiting roots. No, that's who *appointed* you. However, you derive your actual authority from all the named.ca hints files that point to you. pgp0.pgp Description: PGP signature
Re: Root Authority
On 15 Dec 2003, at 21:31, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: On Mon, 15 Dec 2003 14:28:05 PST, bill said: Sorry Mr Bush. We derive our authority from the old IANA, who assigned out the exiting roots. No, that's who *appointed* you. However, you derive your actual authority from all the named.ca hints files that point to you. Actually from the NS set in the root zone served by the first server in the hints file to respond to a query, and thereafter, as cached records expire, from the nameserver in that NS set that happens to be queried for an update, and responds. In general, coherent and stable authority results from both the fact that the same NS set for root is carried by all the root servers, and also the fact that hints files don't include the addresses of servers which respond differently. Coherency in the root's NS set as served by all root nameservers is derived from the replication procedure which distributes a single zone specified by IANA. Coherency in the hints file is derived from the fact that most (all?) DNS server vendors ship with data derived from IANA, combined with the fact that the hints file doesn't change much (and hence rapid field-updates are largely unnecessary). So, Bill's IANA answer sounds pretty good to me. Joe
Re: Root Authority
> An interesting question I've dealt with a few times: > > From whom do the root nameservers derive their authority? we (i'm speaking for f-root here) have no "authority". nobody has to listen to us, we are the most powerless bunch of folks you'll ever meet. now if you'd asked where we derive our *relevance*, i'd say the same as mr. bush and mr. kletnieks -- from all the root.cache files that point at us. and as long as we don't do anything stupid i guess (and hope) that this state of affairs will continue. (relevance trumps authority.) that having been said, f-root got its start as NS.ISC.ORG and the man who said it was ok for us to be a root name server was jon postel. i'm not sure he had any "authority" either, but folks "pointed at" him and so what he said was relevant in spite of any authority he mightn've had. -- Paul Vixie
Re: Root Authority
On 16.12 07:14, Paul Vixie wrote: > we (i'm speaking for f-root here) have no "authority". nobody has to > listen to us, we are the most powerless bunch of folks you'll ever meet. > > now if you'd asked where we derive our *relevance*, i'd say the same as > mr. bush and mr. kletnieks -- from all the root.cache files that point > at us. and as long as we don't do anything stupid i guess (and hope) > that this state of affairs will continue. (relevance trumps authority.) > > that having been said, f-root got its start as NS.ISC.ORG and the man > who said it was ok for us to be a root name server was jon postel. i'm > not sure he had any "authority" either, but folks "pointed at" him and > so what he said was relevant in spite of any authority he mightn've had. Amen! This also holds for k-root and is so well put that I will not paraphrase it just for the sake of putting it differently. It is worth reading again! Daniel
Re: Root Authority
>> Sorry Mr Bush. We derive our authority from the old IANA, who >> assigned out the exiting roots. >No, that's who *appointed* you. However, you derive your actual >authority from all the named.ca hints files that point to you. Valdis is right. I suppose I could repeat my post about the free market economy of ideas, but if anyone missed it last time, it's in the NANOG archives here: http://www.merit.edu/mail.archives/nanog/msg00294.html The root servers are yet another area in which authority grew on its own rather than being handed down from above. If the explanations of this seem confusing it's because, like the Tao, what can be spoken is only a one-sided view of what really is. --Michael Dillon
Re: Root Authority
Paul Vixie wrote: > > > An interesting question I've dealt with a few times: > > > > From whom do the root nameservers derive their authority? > > we (i'm speaking for f-root here) have no "authority". nobody has to > listen to us, we are the most powerless bunch of folks you'll ever meet. > > now if you'd asked where we derive our *relevance*, i'd say the same as > mr. bush and mr. kletnieks -- from all the root.cache files that point > at us. and as long as we don't do anything stupid i guess (and hope) > that this state of affairs will continue. (relevance trumps authority.) > > that having been said, f-root got its start as NS.ISC.ORG and the man > who said it was ok for us to be a root name server was jon postel. i'm > not sure he had any "authority" either, but folks "pointed at" him and > so what he said was relevant in spite of any authority he mightn've had. I think that testimony belongs in a collection of Jon Postel characterizations. I long for the days when people did things simply and only because they were the right thing to do. Thanks for the reminder, Mr. Vixie.
Re: Root Authority
Trying to remember back that far is quite a task , the greatest authority of the time was Jon Postal since he had the uncanny ability to remember all of the things that made it work, so when he spoke it was like Moses coming down from the mountain presenting the 10 commandments and everyone agreed it was good, at that time corporate greed and scheming scamming little weasels were not part of the community, and everything was based on trust because you really were a professional and you could trust the guy on the other end of the connection to be the same as you. By precedent over the years of use,the root home-servers established their own authority and everyone agreed it was the most stable approach, and is still the most stable approach since it does not require and use of resource to point routers and switches and router servers in any other direction which would impact business globally and cause a plethora of other problems that I would want to imagine -henry"Laurence F. Sheldon, Jr." <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: Paul Vixie wrote:> > > An interesting question I've dealt with a few times:> >> > From whom do the root name servers derive their authority?> > we (i'm speaking for f-root here) have no "authority". nobody has to> listen to us, we are the most powerless bunch of folks you'll ever meet.> > now if you'd asked where we derive our *relevance*, i'd say the same as> mr. bush and mr. kletnieks -- from all the root.cache files that point> at us. and as long as we don't do anything stupid i guess (and hope)> that this state of affairs will continue. (relevance trumps authority.)> > that having been said, f-root got its start as NS.ISC.ORG and the man> who said it was ok for us to be a root name server was jon postel. i'm> not sure he had any "authority" either, but folks "pointed at" him and> so what he said was relevant in spite of any authority he mightn've had.I think that testimony belongs in a collection of Jon Postelcharacterizations.I long for the days when people did things simply and only becausethey were the right thing to do.Thanks for the reminder, Mr. Vixie.
