It is somewhat of a coincidence that the .COM TLD Name Servers just happen to have the same owner/operators as the legacy Root Name Servers. In fact, even the same hardware is used. In this discussion one can set that minor detail aside and imagine that the following 13 servers support the .COM zone which has millions of entries.

1. A - Network Solutions, Inc. (A) 2. B - University of Southern California (ISI2) 3. C - Performance Systems International Inc. (C-NYSER) 4. D - University of Maryland (UMD-TERP) 5. E - NASA Ames Research Center (NS-NASA) 6. F - Internet Software Consortium (ISC) 7. G - DOD Network Information Center (DIIS-NS) 8. H - Army Research Laboratory (B) 9. I - [No name] (NORDU) (Sweden) 10. J - Network Solutions, Inc. (J) 11. K - European Regional Internet Registry/RIPE NCC (K) 12. L - University of Southern California (L) 13. M - WIDE Project (M) (JAPAN)

With the end of the U.S. Government involvement with the InterNIC and the .COM zone, how do the above companies plan to transition to industry self-regulation ? What company will be handling the .COM registrations ? Has the IETF arranged for a transition ? With less than 30 days, has the IETF thought about this ? One last topic. Apparently NSI does not want the .COM zone contents to be freely transferred to other companies. The above organizations obviously have to have a copy to operate their servers to support NSI. In some cases above, people apparently can copy the .COM data base freely and in other cases they are blocked. Is there a common policy or RFC that directs the companies above to prevent the transfer of the .COM data base to other parties ? If the parties above allow people to freely copy the .COM data base to other parties, then are they not helping to encourage companies to develop mailing lists for SPAM ? Jim Fleming Unir Corporation - http://www.unir.com