[ih] Question regarding history of .us ccTLD formation

[Vint Cerf]

Jonathan B Postel served at the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (and as
the predecessor "numbers czar") from 1969 to his death in 1998. He was at
UCLA for a time until joining USC/ISI probably around 1972 [you may need to
check that]. He was under contract to DARPA to perform a number of functions
among which were the editing of the RFC series and what is now called the
IANA function (management of the domain name system, allocation of IP
address space, and maintenance of the documentation of protocol parameters
associated with the Internet Protocol suite.

Jon was responsible for overseeing the Domain Name System developed during
the 1984-1986 period and instituted into operation in that time frame.

He adopted the practice of assigning country codes from the ISO 3166-1 list
that included .us.  Jon personally delegated responsibility for the
operation of top level country codes - often to universities in the
respective countries. In 1998, Jon passed away and ICANN was created to
carry out his work. ICANN has responsibility for delegation of top level
domain operation. The US Department of Commerce issued an RFP for the
operation of .US and selected Neustar to operate it. ICANN, on request of
the USG, delegated operation of .us to Neustar. 




Vinton G Cerf
Chief Internet Evangelist
Google
Regus Suite 384
13800 Coppermine Road
Herndon, VA 20171
 
+1 703 234-1823
+1 703-234-5822 (f)
 
vint at google.com
www.google.com
 

-----Original Message-----
From: internet-history-bounces at postel.org
[mailto:internet-history-bounces at postel.org] On Behalf Of William J Corso
Sent: Monday, November 27, 2006 3:36 PM
To: internet-history at postel.org
Subject: [ih] Question regarding history of .us ccTLD formation

To whom it may concern,

I am a student at Northeastern University in Boston, and I am trying to find
someone to briefly speak with or someone who can direct me to some good
resources regarding the ISI's role as well as the processes that took place
in the establishment of the .us country code top level domain. I have read
that the ISI was one of the initial organizations to be involved with the
administration of the .us names. I would appreciate any feedback regarding
this request as I feel this subject matter has been an important factor in
the evolution of internet commerce.

Thank you,
William J. Corso