-------------------
/discussion
>
> Date: Thu, 11 Feb 1999 00:50:13 -0800
> From: "Roeland M.J. Meyer" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> Subject: [IFWP] Re: Trademarks vs DNS
>
> >
> >Could we think of it as a tree, with subsections branching into other
> >lists?
>
> 1) Too hard to follow,
> 2) The other lists are decidedly NOT neutral,
> 3) breaks thread filters,
> 4) Not all participants are members of all lists (most of them are on
> IFWP)
> 5) Breaking the thread risks being ignored.
> 6) Please quit being "funny".
>
> This list get a few hundred messages per day and we want to keep to the
> thread.
>
"The" thread has a way of being hard to pin down in c-space,
doesnt it?
A response simply by introducing a new word can lead to
branches; discussion raises new slants, related issues,
precedents or parallels form other fields, etc etc.
One might say the question of subject lines is the entire DNS
mess writ small: whether it 'says it all' or not, the SL *stands for*
the content of its message. We may be used to the general
rambling of issues that go on 'underneath' a SL once it has been
declared, but that's not to say SL management couldnt be
considerably improved -- in the same way that www.second-level-
name.com might accomodate multiple registered owners of SLN if
only we could get our heads around how to manage it.
My suggestion was therefore not meant to be 'funny' at all, but a
reminder that the verbal confusion (to use as broad a term as
possible) that prevails here might actually be indicative of a 'meta-
problem': is trademark reconciliation *intrinsically* difficult to
resolve, or it is our manner of proceeding that makes it seem that
way?
I note that in your enthusiasm for a single consistent SL, you
abandoned the 'branch' I offered (~/discussion). Was it hard to
follow? Did it break your filter? By 'funny,' are you saying that you
cant conceive of using such a variation on your theme under any
circumstances? Does that *therefore* extend to never allowing
anyone else to do it? -- and at this point we're back 'on topic,' are
we not: how, precisely, do you propose to 'enforce' your 'imposed'
system?
> >> >... many people do not see the TLD name
> >> >as serving this role of differentiation among uses of the same TM
> >> >name.
> >> >
> > In fact, it seems as tho the DN tree is being inverted, as if (e.g.)
> > NMA.COM and NMA.ORG are branches of some NMA root!
...
> > What [*]could[*] be gained by that inversion is clear to me, at least.
>
> Good, then why not state it?
>
Because it is evident from the context.
-------------------
/namespace
> >But it also leads me to wonder if we have been too literal in
> >construing the *third level namespace. Is there a functional problem
> >if www.nma.com was one ownership, and xxx.nma.com was
> >another? (Each one of course could register whatever space they
> >needed for their own network, but really, would such a list be bigger
> >than *two* characters could deal with?)
>
> Could you clarify this?
>
I used xxx.nma.com as a simple example of a more general
concept of 'borrowing' low(est) level namespace for *DNS-level
resolution of a domain-name. As long as there is only one
registrant for a given SLD, clearly there is no problem with
trademark or otherwise; it is only when there is *contention* for the
SLD that questions arise. To date, ad hoc (read NSI and trademark
law) solutions have accepted that only the SLD need be considered
(thus the ambiguous standing of nma.org versus nma.com), and
proposals for (a finite number of) other top-level domains, while they
do have other justifications, do nothing to solve this *conceptual*
problem (as someone pointed out, tradename-space is not cut and
dried either).
I accept that *by the present hierarchical rules* lower-level names
have been solely the concern of the SLD owner -- but if we 'back
up' to look at *multiple SLD ownership, isnt the third (etc) level a
*logical way to accomodate them all, to an approximately infinite
extent?
Or was it the implication that *all sub-domains could be
accomodated by two-character 3LDs which surprised you? That
was not my intent; I was simply trying to continue the example of a
three-letter 3L to suggest that this 'innovation' need not *supplant*
present usage (without knowing the combinatorial math to
determine hoiw many two characters would accomodate). But
obviously (to me ;-)) a three characters string is arbitrary in the first
place; if MHSC has millions of clients, there is certainly no reason
why wwwwwww.mhsc.com cant cope with them *as well as* the
myriad of folks who would also like to use MHSC as their SLD.
As Greg commented, in fact this is already done in practice. I can
only say Im amazed that this had never been mentioned earlier.
kerry
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