非営利団体のための「.us」スペース

Benton Foundationをはじめとする22の団体が2000年8月に、DOC(米国商務省/U.S.Department of Commerce)の傘下であるNTIA(National Telecommunications & Infrastructure Administration/National Telecommunications Information Administration/米国通信情報局/米国情報通信庁)に、「.us」スペースについて、2001年2月1日に「.com」が定着している現状から、「.us」を米国のトップレベル・ドメインではなく、非営利団体の公共ドップレベル・ドメインとする提案書を提出した。詳細情報はURL(http://www.benton.org/Policy/US/)で知ることができる。米国商務省のNTIAは2005年2月2日に、インターネット・ドメインの管理会社ニュースター(NeuStar)社に対し、顧客ユーザーがプロキシサービスを使って匿名で「.us」ドメインを登録する行為を禁止するよう命じた。その後、2005年2月16日に、ネットワーク・ソリューションズ(Network Solutions)社やイーノム(enom)社、ゴー・ダディ(Go Daddy)社などにプロキシサービスによる「.us」ドメインの登録をやめるよう通告した。

[2001年2月1日に提出した提案書]
February 1, 2001

John F. Sopko
(Acting) Assistant Secretary of Commerce
U.S. Department of Commerce / NTIA
Room 4898
1401 Constitution Ave., N.W.
Washington, D.C. 20230

Dear Assistant Secretary Sopko:

The undersigned broad coalition of nonprofit organizations and academics who share an interest in the future of the .us country code top level domain (ccTLD) write to urge the National Telecommunications Information Administration (NTIA) to take immediate steps to prevent the giveaway of this public resource.

First, we request that NTIA prohibit the current administrator, Network Solutions, Inc. (NSI), from entering into any binding contracts or arrangements that would encumber the space, or alter the space in any fashion. In addition, NTIA should prohibit NSI from charging new fees or introducing new services, such as a modified WHOIS Directory, which might adversely affect or impose new obligations on the existing registrants -- primarily municipal governments, public schools, and public libraries -- in the .us space.

Second, NTIA should conduct a broader discussion on the future of .us that focuses squarely on the public interest, not merely on technical competence to run the .us registry. As discussed in detail below, the primary stakeholders -- municipal governments, public and private schools, and public libraries -- have, for all practical purposes, had little or no opportunity to weigh in on this issue. Furthermore, the broader public interest community, and the American people as a whole, deserve more than one shot at discussing the disposition of America's beachhead in cyberspace.

Accordingly, NTIA should announce a new proceeding focusing explicitly on the public interest issues raised by the disposition of .us. This new proceeding would include outreach to affected stakeholders and at least one public forum. This would be consistent with NTIA's approach in other DNS proceedings, such as that which culminated in ICANN, the current ENUM proceeding, and other proceedings of public importance, such as the proceedings on 3G wireless spectrum.

As the Department of Commerce has recognized in the past, NTIA administers the .us ccTLD on behalf of the American people. The .us ccTLD holds the possibility of serving a host of yet unexplored important public purposes, whether as a source of revenue to further public goals, a cyberspace identity for other uniquely American activities online, or a ''digital commons,'' for democratic debate or American culture. At the least, NTIA must not allow .us to become another windfall for NSI or any other single company or interest, as happened with the ''generic'' top-level domains of .com, .org and .net.

No one would seriously propose that the United States government simply give away the .us domain, the collective cyberspace identity of the American people, without a full examination of the implications of such an action. Yet, if the questions posed by the Request for Comment provide any indication, NTIA may simply dispose of this valuable national resource with little public debate or consideration of more than technical proficiency. At the least, NTIA has a responsibility to ensure that the American people recoup at least some of the vast potential revenues by a direct payment to the Treasury, as happens when the Federal Communications Commission auctions public spectrum. Further public proceedings to consider these issues fully must take place before any changes take place in the .us space, whether by assignment of the contract by NTIA or by unilateral action on the part of the current administrator, NSI.

The .us Rulemaking

The .us ccTLD has served an important role in putting municipal governments, public and private schools, and local libraries on the Internet ''map.'' It facilitates local, U.S.-based community-based activity in ways the more generic ''.com'' or even ''.org'' cannot, and it has the potential to do much more. But because the registrants and other interested parties lack resources, they have largely remained unaware of the recent NTIA proceeding to dispose of .us.

On August 17, 2000, NTIA issued a Request for Comment and Proposed Statement of Work on ''Management and Administration of the .us Domain Space'' (Docket Number 980212036-0235-06), with comments due October 6, 2000.

Few of the existing registrants in .us, or in the public interest community at large, knew of the proceeding or its significance. The announcement appeared in August, a time when the vast majority of staff take vacation. The announcement appeared only in the Federal Register and on NTIA's website, with passing reference in a few specialized publications. Unfortunately, in contrast to some proceedings conducted by NTIA, staff undertook no outreach to the existing stakeholders and the broader public interest community.

In spite of these challenges, some of the undersigned groups filed comments on this proceeding. For example, a coalition of approximately 25 cosigning organizations filed comments specifically asking that the NTIA make decisions about the future of .us based on the following five principles[1]:

1. The .US namespace is a national public resource, and must be managed in the public interest of all United States citizens.

2. In managing .US domain, the government should apply its traditional principles of administering a public resource to the management of the .US namespace.

3. The management of .US should serve the vital First Amendment purpose of fostering an informed, digitally connected citizenry.

4. The management of .US should address the growing digital divide, which is separating the United States into information 'haves' and 'have nots.'

5. Management of .US in the public interest can address the digital divide and embrace First Amendment principles, without heavy-handed regulation and while encouraging commercial development.

These principles were supported by a number of other parties, including the American Library Association (ALA), and the Walt Disney Company. ALA, joined by two educational organizations and thus representing a significant percentage of the existing stakeholders, observed that ''the regional structure needs to be retained at this time as part of any new system,'' and urged the NTIA to move forward cautiously and slowly on this issue.

Several organizations filed specific proposals. For example, The Benton Foundation and the Media Access Project proposed that funds raised from commercial development of the .us ccTLD should go into a trust designed to address the Digital Divide.

These limited submissions from existing stakeholders and the public interest community, however, cannot take the place of the more robust debate that must happen. While the signatories to this letter recognize the need to act expeditiously, it would ill-serve the American people to allow the laudable desire for finality to stampede the NTIA into a course of action that has little support from existing stakeholders and squanders an opportunity to develop .us for the benefit of all Americans.

The Unexamined Issues

No robust discussion of the public interest possibilities for the .us space on the Internet has taken place as a result of this proceeding. Such a dialog must precede any NTIA change to the governance of the .us top-level domain, in order to ensure that the future of the .us ccTLD truly benefits the American people. Although some of the undersigned groups may have different visions of the ultimate outcome of that discussion, we share the following views:

●The .us ccTLD is a valuable public resource that should not be given away for purely private benefit. In 1993, the National Science Foundation entered into a cooperative agreement with a small company, called Network Solutions, Inc., to provide domain name services. Over a mere seven years, NSI grew to a multi-billion dollar company, and it required a lengthy government-led process to break NSI's monopoly on .com.

NSF's failure to foresee the value of DNS registration services in 1993 is understandable. But in 2001, it would be inexcusably lax of NTIA not to learn from the NSI experience. NTIA should therefore consider not merely the technical qualifications of a potential administrator, but how best to serve the public interest. For example, funds generated from the registration of .us domain names could be targeted to support digital opportunities for underserved communities, to facilitate community-based based programs to improve technological education and literacy, to provide for electronic civic engagement, or even simply to enrich the United States Treasury. This resource should not be given away to a private contractor without any quantifiable public benefit.

●Recent changes in the registrar responsible for the .us top level domain should not change current practices. Although NSI has had the direct contract to manage .us name registry for years, it previously subcontracted this function to a California non-profit. NSI assumed functional control of the .us registry late in 2000. NTIA should prohibit NSI from altering the management practices of the .us space while this proceeding remains pending. Specifically, NTIA should prohibit NSI from charging new registration fees, prohibit the introduction of new naming conventions or new services (including modifications of the existing WHOIS function), and should prohibit NSI from entering into binding commitments with any party (including the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN)) which would prejudice the outcome of this proceeding.

●Any result must protect the current .us registrants. At present, the .us ccTLD primarily serves state and local governments, libraries, and schools. Any development of the space should ensure that existing .us domain names are protected, if for no other reason than that these entities would face substantial migration costs. For example, the State of Pennsylvania has put its domain name in the form of a web address (e.g., URL(http://www.state.pa.us)). A change in the namespace which forced Pennsylvania to migrate would incur tremendous costs to the State of Pennsylvania; it would also disrupt the thousand of others who have linked to Pennsylvania websites.

●The nature of ccTLDs means that .us domain unalterably identifies American space, just as .fr identifies France's national extrusion into cyberspace, and .jp identifies Japan's. While some countries, notably countries in need of cash revenues and with little connectivity for their own citizens such as Tuvalu and Moldavia, have chosen to market their country's space as ''generic'' competitors to the ''generic'' top level domains of .com, .org, and .net, others have chosen to imbue their country codes with national values. This ranges from limiting registrations to citizens or businesses based in the country (France), to prohibiting speech in violation of the Koran (Turkmenistan).

The NTIA should encourage discussion and analysis of the implications of proposals that recognize the unique nature of the .us domain, as distinguished from generic TLDs or other ccTLDs. These proposals could range from simply providing revenues to the United Sates Treasury to providing opportunities for free speech to encouraging use of the .us domain space by American citizens and businesses.

●The process must explore the full range of possible uses for the .us ccTLD that directly benefit the public interest. These include, but are not limited to:

o Making .us the ''public commons'' space for civic discourse on the Internet;

o Branding .us as a reliable source of information about civic information, closer to .gov than .com. For example, the NTIA could direct the .us registrar to create .election.us and allow only official candidate and local election official web sites to register domains within such a second level domain. Indeed, Congress has already explored such a possibility, and considered including it in the Anti-Cybersquatting Act of 1999. Although Congress ultimately failed to require NTIA to take such action, this interest by Congress demonstrates one way the shortage of .com names (and the fear of confusing sites registered by opponents) could be remedied by names in .us;

o Using funds from registrations of .us domain names to develop targeted Internet educational programs for communities without those resources;

o Developing a true non-commercial space within the Internet;

Ideas such as these, and other creative expansions of .us as a resource that benefits the American people, deserve consideration and debate within a public forum before the NTIA promulgates rules governing the future of the .us ccTLD.

The Need for Urgent Action

First, we ask that the NTIA prohibit NSI from altering the nature of the .us space. In particular, we ask that the NTIA prohibit any action that would prejudice the interests of current users or others seeking to participate in this space.

Second, we ask that the NTIA take a number of serious steps towards creating a robust discussion of the future of .us. NTIA should reach out to all of the current users of the .us top level domain, and should encourage them to participate. NTIA should also reach out to the broader community and request input beyond the narrow focus of the previous request for comment. Rather, NTIA should explicitly request input on a broad range of subjects, including concrete proposals on how best to manage .us in the public interest. NTIA should conduct at least one public forum to more fully explore how to manage and administer the .us top level domain in the public interest.

We look forward to working with you to ensure that the future of the .us top-level domain is managed in such a way as to benefit all Americans.

Sincerely,

Katharina Koppd
Senior Associate
The Benton Foundation
950 18th Street, NW
Washington, DC 20006
202-638-5770
kk@benton.org

Harold Feld
Associate Director
Media Access Project
950 18th Street, NW
Washington, DC 20006
202-454-5684
hfeld@mediaacess.org

- Robin Layton,
(Acting) Associate Administrator, Office of International Affairs

- Karen Rose,
Telecommunications Policy Specialist, Office of International Affairs

3. Alliance for Community Technology (ACT)
Daniel Atkins
Executive Director
University of Michigan, School of Information
3078 West Hall
Ann Arbor, MI 48109
atkins@umich.edu

4. Alliance for Community Media
Bunnie Riedel
666 11th Street, NW
Suite 806
Washington, DC 2001
202-393 1026
briedel@alliancecm.org

5. American Library Association
Emily Sheketoff
Executive Director
Washington Office
1301 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW
Suite 403
Washington, DC 20004
202-628 8421

6. Center for Media Education
Jeff Chester
Executive Director
2120 L Street, NW
Suite 200
Washington, DC 20037
202- 331 7833
jeff@cme.org

7. Center for Policy Alternatives
John Wilcox
Staff Attorney
1875 Connecticut Avenue, NW
Suite 710
Washington, DC 20009
202-387 6030
jwilcox@cfpa.org

8. Common Cause
Scott Harshbarger
President
1250 Connecticut Avenue, NW
Washington, DC 20036
202-833 1200

9. Community Technology Centers' Network (CTCNet)
Karen Chandler, Acting Executive Director
372 Broadway Street
Cambridge, MA 02139
617-354 0825
kchandler@ctcnet.org

10. Computer Professionals for Social Responsibility (CPSR)
Hans Klein
Chair
P.O. Box 717
Palo Alto, CA 94302
650-322 3778
hklein@cpsr.org

11. Consumer Federation of America
Mark Cooper
Research Director
1424 16th Street, NW
Washington, DC 20036
202-387 6121
markcooper@aol.com

12. Consumers Union
Chris Murray
1666 Connecticut Avenue, NW, Suite 310
Washington, DC 20009-1039
202-462 6262
murrch@consumer.org

13. Council of Chief State School Officers
Art Sheeky
One Massachusetts Avenue, NW
Suite 700
Washington, DC 20001
202-326 8689
arthurs@ccsso.org

14. Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC)
Andrew Shen
1718 Connecticut Avenue, NW
Suite 200
Washington, DC 20009
202-483 1140
shen@epic.org

15. A. Michael Froomkin
Professor of Law
Miami School of Law
P.O. Box 248087
Coral Gables, FL 33124
305-284 4285
froomkin@law.miami.edu

16. The George Mason University Instructional Foundation, Inc.
Michael R. Kelley
President
Mail Stop 1D2
George Mason University
Fairfax, Virginia, 22030-4444
703-993 3100
mkelley@gmu.edu

17. Independent Sector
Avi Schaeffer
1200 18th Street, NW
Suite 200
Washington, DC 20036
202-467 6100
Avi@IndependentSector.org

18. National Association of Independent Schools
Chris Collins
1620 L Street, NW
11th Floor
Washington, DC
202-973 9715
Collins@nais.org

19. National League of Cities
Juan Otero
Principal Legislative Council
1301 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW
Washington, DC 20004
202-626 3020
otero@nic.org

20. OMB Watch
Ryan Turner
Director, Nonprofits' Policy and Technology
Washington, DC
202-234 8494
turnerr@ombwatch.org

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[1] URL(http://www.ntia.doc.gov/ntiahome/domainname/usrfc2/comments.html)