September 13, 1999
If ICANN can't navigate Web politics, it might be time to replace it
Unless you've been spending the last year meditating in the Himalayas, you probably know that the Internet's DNS is due for an overhaul.
The DNS was long administered by Network Solutions Inc. (NSI), under special contract to the U.S. government. But last year, the government directed the nonprofit Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) to develop a new, more decentralized, competitive DNS.
In the past year, ICANN hasn't been able to accomplish much of substance, caught as it is in the middle of conflicting global demands. If ICANN can't fix the DNS, the whole system may wind up being replaced by some clever or rapacious private interest. But that might be a good thing.
It's clear that the current DNS has problems. There's little protection for trademarks, and it's far too easy for profiteers to snap up and then resell desirable names. What's more, the whole system is in the hands of a single, mostly unaccountable company.
Even at its best, the DNS is hardly a user-friendly system. While the rest of the Internet has gone completely graphical, we still spend too much time typing DOS-like command lines, complete with slashes and colons, into the URL bars of our browsers.
RealNames may have the most credible DNS replacement in its Internet Keywords, a distributed database of words that point to Web sites or pages within those sites.
Using RealNames, instead of typing a URL such as www.tweney.com, you just type "Dylan Tweney," and you'll be whisked right to my home page.
RealNames claims it's not trying to replace DNS, just augment it with a simpler addressing system. Don't believe it for a second. DNS hasn't replaced the numerical IP addresses that it supplements, but what human actually uses IP addresses to locate Web sites? Similarly, RealNames -- if successful -- will essentially replace DNS in usage, if not in fact.
RealNames hopes to extend its system so that Internet keywords can be used to address not only Web pages but also e-mail boxes, chat groups, multimedia files (such as movies), and even cell phones.
Fortunately, RealNames has already put in place some safety mechanisms. For example, it's got a 40-person department devoted to vetting new keywords and making sure they're appropriate before assigning them. The company has also created an independent board to review and resolve keyword disputes.
But some real obstacles stand in its way. RealNames charges $100 per year for commercial keyword registrations -- three times what NSI charges for domain names. (However, so far, RealNames hasn't actually charged for most of its name registrations, including my own.)
RealNames keywords are recognized by only certain search engines, such as AltaVista, and Internet Explorer 5.0. You need to install a plug-in if you want to use Internet Keywords with any other browser. By contrast, domain names work for 100 percent of browsers.
The real key to RealNames' success may be getting its keywords integrated into America Online's (AOL's) Navigator browser, perhaps alongside the AOL service's Jump words. But so far, AOL has shown no interest in working with RealNames -- after all, its Navigator already has a keyword database of its own.
If RealNames lands a deal with AOL, will it spell the end of the DNS as we know it? Write to me at dylan@infoworld.com.
Dylan Tweney is the content development manager for InfoWorld Electric. He has been writing about the Internet since 1993.
Previous columns by Dylan Tweney
PCs and notebooks don't add up to easy Net access at school
September 6, 1999
Ticketmaster: You'd better put down that Web link or we'll sue you
August 30, 1999
Web technology is no substitute for customer service
August 23, 1999
The `e's have it: learning to spell the new economy
August 16, 1999
Every column since August, 1997
