Einar Stefferud wrote:
> It is my observation that every time any such user requests a root
> server name resolution, that they are in fact "voting," in the real
> sense of the word, for their choice of root service.
>
> So, I conclude that the Internet is inherently democratic without any
> central controls, or any need for central controls of where the users
> look for DNS root service. Every user has a free choice, and the freedom
> to exercise that choice.
Unfortunately, freedom of choice in the Internet, like freedom in other
realms, is restricted by the availability of information. No one can
make a free choice who is unaware of all possible choices. The
government has succeeded in gaining enough control over the means of
informing the public to control its awareness of its choices in national
politics, and it has done the same with the Internet root servers,
through its tacit support of the legacy root servers, and then of ICANN.
Unless all the users with the root server power you describe are made
aware of the alternatives they have, there is no freedom of choice.
M.S.
