Policy and Coordination in Multilingual Internet Names Tan

Policy and Coordination in Multilingual Internet Names Tan Tin Wee Vice Chairman Multilingual Internet Names Consortium (MINC)

Framework of Authority-I IANA US Govt Names Numbers Protocols Legal Govt Contract g. TLDs cc. TLDs SRI NSI Verisign Country NICs/ Mngrs APNIC ARIN RIPE IETF

Framework of Authority-II US Govt Legal Govt Contract Stakeholders: Constituencies At Large etc GAC ICANN “Inc” Legal Contract DNSO ASO PSO Names Numbers Protocols g. TLDs cc. TLDs Verisign/NSI Registries Registrars IANA Country NICs/ Mngrs APNIC ARIN RIPE IETF

Framework of Authority-III Names ICANN “Inc” DNSO g. TLDs cc. TLDs Verisign/NSI Registries Registrars Country NICs/ Mngrs . “root” Top. Level Domains TLDs. us. com. jp. org. cn. net. tv. int etc example. com geneve. ch www. example. com elections. org. sg

Framework of Authority - IV • US Government Dept of Commerce • IANA original authority • ICANN is in charge of the “Root” inter alia • ICANN coordinates Insertion of TLDs in the Root • Delegates authority to g. TLDs and cc. TLDs

Justification for authority • US Government funded the original research, operation of IANA, Jon Postel – Precedence • Delegated Authority from USG • Universal Acceptance • Government Involvement through GAC • Contractual Agreements between authority and delegee – Commercial Contract law • Universal Representation from Stakeholders • Hierarchy of authority – ICANN – SOs – Stakeholders • Universal Suffrage of current Internet users?

Multilingual Name Space - I • New Name Spaces extended from ASCII • New Technology Originated from Asia Pacific 1998 • Testbed pioneered in Asia 1998/1999 • New Standards with Strong Asian Input in IETF processes 1999 • New Complexities of Languages and Scripts

Multilingual Name Space - II • New Scenarios of TLDs – language TLDs? cc. TLDs and g. TLDs in other scripts? • New Names – IDNs and Keywords • New User communities of non-English speaking users • New authority/expertise framework nascent – MINC-INFITT-AINC-CDNC-JDNA-etc 20002001 • New Companies – I-DNS. net (1999) Neteka, Netpia, Realnames, Nativenames etc

ICANN ++ response • IETF Internationalized Domain Name IDN Working Group end 1999/ 2000 • IDN Committee 2001 • Names Council/DNSO IDN WG 2001 • Since 1998 to date.

Different Premises may necessitate Review of Authority Framework • Is any change required of existing framework of authority? • Can existing framework be extended to include the new multilingual namespace? • Can the existing stakeholder base be extended to the new multilingual stakeholders? • Can the g. TLD/cc. TLD ICANN authority structure work for the new multilingual multiscript IDN namespaces?

Authority Matrix in IDN Language Script Country/ Economy Example 1 1 M 1 Hebrew, Greek Japanese 1 1 M M 1 1 0 Russian, Mongolian Ascii, Han, Arabic Tamil 1 M M Korean

Matrix of Language-Script-Country I • Many. Languages-One. Script-Many. Countries – - Latin script-ASCII; - Arabic/Farsi/Urdu/Jawi-Arabic->20 countries; -Chinese/Japanese/Korean-Han. China/Japan/Koreas/Taiwan/HK/Macau/Singapore etc. • One. Language-One. Script-One. Country – Ancient Icelandic-Iceland; Hebrew-Israel Greek-Greece • One. Language-Many. Scripts-One. Country – Japanese-Hiragana/Katakana/Kanji-Japan

Matrix of Language-Script-Country II • One. Language-One. Script-Many. Fonts-No. Country – - Tamil-Tamil. Nadu State+>12 countries with Tamil minorities; - American Indian languages; - Indian Languages such as Gujerati, Marathi, etc. • One. Language-One. Script-Several. Countries – - Mongolian-Mongolia/China; - Russian-Cyrillic-Russia/post. Soviet. Union states • One. Language-Several. Scripts-Several. Countries – - Korean-Hanguel/Hanja-North. Korea/South. Korea • Other combinations

Current Status - I • • IDN Technologies available Strong IDN demand is proven IDN Service providers already present IETF IDN standards imminent

Current Status II • Even more new technologies forthcoming – Growth area • New Processes available – MINC, INFITT, AINC, JDNA, CDNC • New businesses and new opportunities and new services in keywords and above-DNS services

Urgency • Multilingual masses shut of Internet because of linguistic limitation • IDN Technology/Service Vendors moving forward with proprietary software – fracturing internet • Alternative Root advocates getting stronger • Application-Dependent/ Vendor Specific Solutions – Keywords. Realnames/Verisign/Microsoft; AOL keywords; Netscape keywords • Country Authorities launching their own

MINC • Multilingual Internet Names Consortium • Coordination of IDN and Keywords • Cooperation with relevant international organisations – ICANN, IETF, ISOC, ITU, WIPO, etc • Creation of and fostering of ties with new organisations – AINC, CDNC, JDNA, INFITT, etc • Formation in 2000

MINC WGs and Other Associated Organisations • • • Chinese Domain Names Consortium – CDNC International Forum for IT in Tamil – INFITT Arabic Internet Names Consortium – AINC Japanese Domain Name Association – JDNA Urdu WG Russian WG Indian Lang WG Greek Langauge WG etc

MINC Proactive Ongoing Plan • Work with all stakeholders and relevant organisations – ICANN, ISOC, ITU, WIPO etc • Set up Interoperability Testbed for Technology testing • Foster growth of new Stakeholder communities beyond AINC/INFITT/CDNC/JDNC etc for Self Determination process in their own languages • Formulation of workable authority structures • Formulation of Inter-language group coordination and dispute resolution • Creation of level playing field for all levels

Policy and Coordination • ICANN IDN Committee mid 2001 • ICANN Names Council IDN committee late 2001 • ITU-WIPO-MINC meeting on multilingual domain names – this conference late 2001. • MINC-AINC Mo. U and meeting • MINC-CDNC meeting • MINC official support of JDNC • MINC-INFITT Mo. U • MINC fostering Russian. WG, Indian. Lang. WG, Greek. WG, Hebrew. WG etc.

What Policy/Coordination needed going forward? • Conservative Central-Control Approach • Revolutionary Liberal Free-Market Approach • Something in-between?

Conservative Central-Control Approach Unique Root With Single Authority ICANN DNSO g. TLDs Verisign/NSI others cc. SO? cc. TLDs Country NICs/Mngrs Registries Registrars ? SO? IDN-TLDs Country NICs/ Mngr ? ? Language TLDs ? ?

Revolutionary Liberal Free-Market Approach Loose or No Coordination With colliding namespaces ICANN ? ? DNSO cc. SO? ? ? Non-Unique Root With Multiple Authorities g. TLDs cc. TLDs Other TLDs Verisign/NSI Country others NICs/Mngrs Registries Registrars ? ? …. ? ? ? IDN-TLDs Other i. TLDs Country NICs/ Mngr ? ? Language TLDs ? ?

Something in Between? Unique Distributed Root With Coordinated Multi-Lateral Multiple Authorities Agreements /Coordination ICANN ? ? DNSO cc. SO? ? ? g. TLDs cc. TLDs Verisign/NSI Country others NICs/Mngrs ? ? …. ? ? ? IDN-TLDs Country NICs/ Mngr ? ? Registries Registrars Language TLDs ? ?

Past Present Future of IDN • • • Technically Impossible, but 1998 i. DNS proxy Technically Unimplementable, but 1998 APNG Testbed No Commercial Interest, but 1998 I-DNS. net Inc No Demand, but 1999 Overwhelming response No Standard, but 1999 IETF IDN WG No Organisation, but 2000 MINC No Language Support, but 2000/1 CDNC, INFITT, AINC, JDNA No Authority, but ICANN IDN Committee, NC IDN WG No Fair, Equitable, Proactive, Responsive Authority Structure to address the complexity of languages

When can the non-English speaker start to use IDN? • • • Define standards Demythologise the unique root Devolve authority and responsibility Deploy Coordination process Delimit and Delegate new IDN TLDs More work, mostly political work needed.

Please provide feedback to: • • Tan Tin Wee tinwee@bic. nus. edu. sg MINC Website: www. minc. org MINC Email: sec@minc. org MINC Mailing Lists