.gy Domain - ITPAG Position Paper

Introduction

The explosive development of the Internet has brought with it all of the familiar advantages as well as some advantages which are not yet so familiar and which we in Guyana have not yet been able to exploit to the fullest. As we attempt to take full advantage of these developments we have to begin to see the Internet as a resource and we have to effectively manage our share of this global resource for our strategic and economic advantage.

In terms of the Internet the national resource is what is referred to as the "Domain Name Space".

A domain name is what your company or organization is 'called' on the Internet - some examples include:

All of the examples above use what are called "World Wide Generic Domains. We are all very familiar with the dot coms. The full list of generic domains is com, edu, net, org, int, and gov.

In addition to these generic domains, every country is assigned a two-letter domain. (These two letters were taken form the ISO-3166 document.) For example:

These country domains allow for the easy identification of the sites (and by inference the business and organizations) which are distinctly from that particular country. This helps with the marketing of the country and its businesses and institutions and with the maintenance of distinctiveness on the cluttered Internet.

So for example the British Broadcasting Corporation is found at www.bbc.co.uk with the 'uk' being the country domain name.

The generic domains and the two letter country codes are known as "top-level domain names". There is a global organization (ICANN, formerly IANA) that has overall responsibility for domain names on the Internet. At the national level, ICANN appoints an appropriate organization to manage the domain name space for that country.

Problem

It is all but impossible to get commercial .gy domain names, inhibiting the growth of Guyanese businesses that wish to participate fully in the global opportunities offered by the Internet.

Proposed Solution

Have SDNP-Guyana, with a proven track record as registrar of .gov.gy, .org.gy and .edu.gy domains take full responsibility for the .gy top level domain.

Technical Issues

Each domain has an administrative and a technical contact.

The actual management of the assigning of domain names, delegating sub domains and operating name servers must be done with technical competence. This includes keeping the central Internet Registry (in the case of top-level domains) or other higher-level domain manager advised of the status of the domain, responding to requests in a timely manner, and operating the database with accuracy, robustness, and resilience.

In the case of the .gy domain, the Administrative contact is The University of Guyana while the Technical contact is an individual at the University of Puerto Rico. This situation arose because of UG's inability to handle the technical aspects of the job back in 1995. The University of Puerto Rico agreed to undertake the technical aspects of the task. Such a separation of the administrative and technical contact with the technical contact outside the country (a 'proxy' arrangement) is sometimes done as a temporary measure until someone else in the country can take over as registrar.

The top level country domain (.gy) is not the property of the registrar but is held as a public trust and the registrar has a responsibility to provide an efficient registration service. This requires running a name server with continuous connectivity to the Internet plus good technical expertise and experience with name servers. Given UG's lack of technical capacity and SDNP-Guyana's proven track record, it is clear to ITPAG that the role of Registrar for all .gy domain names should be assigned to SDNP-Guyana at the present time.

In order to permit SDNP-Guyana to become registrar for the .gy domain, the agreement of both University of Guyana (Administrative contact) and the University of Puerto Rico (Technical contact) must be forthcoming. While Puerto Rico have indicated their agreement, UG have not. ITPAG believes that UG sees a revenue opportunity in retaining Administrative control of the .gy domain and this is the reason they are opposing SDNP-Guyana's appointment. ITPAG believes that it is not realistic to expect a large income from this service in the foreseeable future.

Conclusion

While we may never be able to quantify it, we must accept that Guyana has lost value and direct income as a nation and economy because of our inadequate Internet activity. The effective management of our Domain Name Space, therefore, has significant strategic importance for Guyana. More particularly, it has significant commercial and economic importance as it facilitates the use of the internet for commercial activities by local businesses. ITPAG believes that there is substantial potential for Guyana in various areas of Internet activity including the burgeoning e-commerce sector. The steps to unleashing this potential for Guyana must be taken sooner rather than later.

ITPAG therefore requests that UG be urged to agree to SDNP-Guyana becoming Registrar for the .gy domain allowing for effective management of the resource and the creation on conditions for developments in e-commerce.

The Information Technology Providers Association of Guyana, May 2000

Footnotes:
(1) RFC1591 - http://www.isi.edu/in-notes/rfc1591.txt
(2) IANA Top Level Domain Delegation Practices Document (ICP-1) http://www.iana.org/tld-deleg-prac.html 

Ronan McDermott, ronan@mcdis.com on 05/19/2000
Alex Graham, tagman@networksgy.com

ITPAG