On: Automattic Purchases .blog TLD for $19M

[snuxoll]

To be fair, someone has to be responsible for deciding which TLD's should exist. Since the modern internet as we know it came from the ARPANet, the US government (specifically the USDoC) formed the ICANN to privatize the management of the public DNS system (they also sit over the IANA by contract from the US government at this time) - everyone else just fell in line and went with it.

[fosk → snuxoll]

> someone has to be responsible for deciding which TLD's should exist

Why? Why can't we have as many custom TLD's as we want? Or why can't my blog just end with .helloworld if I decide to do so?

[cynix → fosk]

You can. But if you want it to be resolvable by everyone in the world, it needs to be added to the root servers, which are controlled by US DoC/ICANN.

[yaur → fosk]

> Why? Why can't we have as many custom TLD's as we want? Or why can't my blog just end with .helloworld if I decide to do so?

You can do whatever you want, but the internet runs on consensus and if consensus devolves into everyone doing whatever they want then DNS doesn't add anything beyond just using raw IP addresses.

[jsjohnst → yaur]

my.stupid.web.s.i.t.e

Is ridiculous and an example of something I think should be avoided, but even it has added value beyond a raw IP address

[ch4ch4 → fosk]

If you really want to stick it to "the man", you should just use the raw IP address for your blog and forgo the domain name! ;)

[profmonocle → ch4ch4]

Ah, but your provider got those IPs from one of the regional registries* (ARIN, RIPE NCC, etc.), who got them from the IANA, which is a division of...ICANN!

(* Unless it's a legacy IPv4 allocation that predates the RIR system.)

[bitJericho → fosk]

someone needs to manage a tld just like and for the same reasons someone needs to manage a domain...