[Iana-transition] What form of supervision is needed?

[Andrew Sullivan]

Dear colleagues,

On Fri, Oct 17, 2014 at 06:08:04PM +0000, David Huberman wrote:
> B) The .arpa TLD needs to move to the NRO.  Then one of the RIRs should step up and take responsibility for its administration.

Last I checked (and a quick whois --
e.g. http://www.iana.org/whois?q=arpa -- makes me feel more confident
of this), arpa. was not something that is strictly under ICANN's
control.  Moreover, not everything in arpa. is related to numbering.
Perhaps David Huberman's is a suggestion that in-addr.arpa. and
ip6.arpa. need to move to NRO control?  That would be
less-eoncompassing than all of arpa.

On Fri, Oct 17, 2014 at 06:51:23PM +0000, David Huberman wrote:
> 
> But ICANN is working behind the scenes to solidify their position.  For example, I'm told
> that they want ownership of the IANA trademark and website in perpetuity, in writing
> from the IETF.  

As nearly as I can tell, neither of those desires (which I've not
heard expressed, FWIW) are things the IETF could satisfy anyway.  As I
understand it, there is a trademark in "IANA" held by ICANN
(http://tmsearch.uspto.gov/bin/showfield?f=doc&state=4807:omznph.2.11).
And ICANN is also the registrant and admin contact of iana.org (a
simple whois query will reveal as much).  So, the IETF (and for that
matter the IAB) has no existing claim on either of those bits of
"intellectual property", unless one is asserting that there is some
such claim outside the existing contractual arrangements or legal
registrations.

It is my personal (I emphasise personal) opinion that nothing in the
current discussion should disturb existing facts unless that
disturbance could be different without the NTIA's involvement in the
arrangements.  In the case of the things under discussion, NTIA
disappearing would not alter the control, and therefore I'm not sure
what you want.  Anyway, ICANN doesn't need IETF's opinion in this
case: they own the trademark and hold the domain registration.

IANAL.  And this is my personal opinion, and not one of a member of
any body I can name.

Best regards,

A

-- 
Andrew Sullivan
ajs at anvilwalrusden.com