In a message written on Sun, Jan 04, 2004 at 05:51:40PM -0800, Randy Bush wrote:
pedantic point:
no, they are not 'owned' by anybody. they are *reserved*, and should not be used by anybody.
To be really pedantic, from http://www.faqs.org/rfcs/rfc2606.html: ] 2. TLDs for Testing, & Documentation Examples ] ] There is a need for top level domain (TLD) names that can be used for ] creating names which, without fear of conflicts with current or ] future actual TLD names in the global DNS, can be used for private ] testing of existing DNS related code, examples in documentation, DNS ] related experimentation, invalid DNS names, or other similar uses. I don't think I'm going out on a limb to suggest that names like example.com should be used by _everybody_ in documentation examples, least they pick something that might actually be used in the future. To wit, the point is not that they "should not be used by anyone", as you suggest, but rather, like RFC 1918 space, should be used by everyone for documentation, example configurations, and the like to insure they never conflict with a real service. The idea that if someone tries to use them they are presented with an intelligent error message that seeks to educate them is pleasing. -- Leo Bicknell - bicknell@ufp.org - CCIE 3440 PGP keys at http://www.ufp.org/~bicknell/ Read TMBG List - tmbg-list-request@tmbg.org, www.tmbg.org