I have been passed on the following message and would like to comment on it:

Subject: Re: domain name for european parliament

Cc: dns-wg@ripe.net, Pierre.Verbaeten@cs.kuleuven.ac.be Date: Mon, 18 Jan 1993 12:29:54 +0100 From: Piet Beertema <Piet.Beertema@cwi.nl>

If you think thats funny then check this one out:

whois -h nic.ddn.mil "ec.org" Commission of the European Communities (EC1-DOM) Directorate-general Telecommunications, Information Industry and Innovation. Rue de la loi, 200 B-1049 Brussel, Belgium

Domain Name: EC.ORG

Administrative Contact: Mullender, Sape (SM3383) Mullender@cs.utwente.nl +31 53 89 3709 Technical Contact, Zone Contact: Vogels, Werner (WV33) werner@inesc.pt +351 1 3100316

Record last updated on 20-Feb-92.

Domain servers in listed order:

FREYA.INESC.PT 146.193.4.36 HELIOS.CS.UTWENTE.NL 130.89.15.6

Yes - we told them it might not be a good idea in the long term but what can you do....

Not much. It's a bit surprising though that the NIC did accept this registration from people outside DG.

We have been funded by the CEC/BRA to set up an support infrastructure to help researchers in Europe exchange information and to supply support for issues like storage, naming, etc. The infrastructure is based on a large number of fileservers throughout Europe using AFS as main technology. Although in the startup phase aiming to support the nodes covered by the three first Networks Of Excellence: ELSNET, CaberNet and Compulog, the infrastructure is supposed to be the blueprint for an infrastructure also covering the new NOE's formed last year. In the framework of naming we wanted to enable resolution through the DNS. As there was no top domain available that would cover a general CEC organization, under which the infrastructure could be placed, we requested (with full knowledge and appreciation of DG) a domain name for a top domain ec.org. This domain was to be managed by the Infrastructure Task Force of the proposed infrastructure for a startup-period, after which the management of the top domain would be handed over to an institution selected by DG. The subdomains dedicated to the research infrastructure would still be managed by our own people. (Instead of calling it "funny", Dave, you could have explained all this as you are aware of most of the details of the infrastructure provision, including the naming part)

And as far as the nameservers are concerned:

.....

So not to be taken serious.

I do not think that is a remark to be made without any further consultation of the people involved. At the time of registration of the ec.org name, the machines to run the servers were not yet delivered. The two names were supplied to the NIC as being "temporary", to be replaced as soon as the initial part of the research infrastructure was in place. The first two servers (INESC and Univ. of Twente) are running now, while this week the servers at the Univ. of Newcastle and at LAAS will be added. Our first concern is to have the AFS servers properly running, after that the NIC will be informed about which machines will provide the DNS service. If there are any other areas related to the CEC that want to make use of the ec.org name they are happily invited to cooperate in managing a possible subdomain of ec.org. In our planning we aim to provide DNS service starting half of February. Hope this clears up the confusion. Werner Vogels Distributed Systems and Industrial Automation Group INESC - Instituto de Engenharia de Sistemas e Computadores Rua Alves Redol, 9-6o - 1000 Lisboa - Portugal Tel: +351 1 3100316, Fax: +351 1 525843, e-mail: werner@inesc.pt / C=pt;A= ;P=inesc;S=werner