.xxx domain: US Gov Tells ICANN To Wait

.xxx Domain For Pornos ApprovedBack in June this year, the .xxx domain appeared to be have been cleared by ICANN (Internet Corporation For Assigned Names and Numbers), the organisation that has control of domain names with world over.

Now Michael D. Gallagher from the US Department of Commerce (DoC) has now written to ICANN asking them to delay the ICANN Board of Directors wait for a week in what was to be a rubber-stamping of the final approval. Involvement of the US government with ICANN at this level is without precedence.

Gallagher sights nearly 6,000 letters and email from ‘concerned families’ that have been received to the DoC. In a country of over 296m people (assuming only US citizens have written in), 2.027e-5 is beyond a rounding error. It’s the rounding error of a rounding error.

We all know how easy it is to send an email – it takes seconds. And as the BBC found out when they received a flood of over 20,000 emails objecting to the showing of “Jerry Springer The Opera”. It’s no concern that very many of these mails were identical – as ‘the faithful’ from various religious groups were rounded up to form a virtual lynching posse.

.xxx Domain For Pornos ApprovedThe Bush administration doesn’t appear to have taken in to account any of this, and all of a sudden are interested in the views of the people. Wouldn’t it have been great if they’d listened to the view of the people before invading Iraq.

Gallagher’s letter draws to a close with, “Given the extent of the negative reaction, I request that the Board will provide process and adequate additional time for these concerns to be voiced and addresses before any additional action takes place on this issue.”

The Bush administration say that they have a concerns that the .xxx domains become a virtual red-light district, reserved exclusively for pornography.

Which way do you want it? Protecting those who don’t want to view porn, or not?

Porn on the Internet is a fact, and will not go away – just as porn in print will not vanish.

Surely it’s better to know where the porn is, rather than those not looking for it stumbling across it by accident.

Others see the creation of a separate TLD for ‘objectionable’ material as a step towards censorship of the Internet. Their concern is who becomes the arbiter of what is and isn’t ‘objectionable’, would a pencil drawing of nude be lumped in with hardcore porn, or would a slightly racy story be forced into the same category.

Is it just us, or do you feel that the steadily increasing involvement of Governments in areas which they really shouldn’t been getting involved with is a concern?

ICANN