Re: [ICANN-EU] IDN or: Are users Unicode-aware?

[Alexander Svensson <svensson@icannchannel.de>]

Dear Thomas!

> [...]
> Here's why: Domain names are displayed to and memorized, recorded,
> and typed by human beings.  However, this is only possible if the
> human beings in question are able to read and distinguish the
> characters used. 

And that's exactly why I understand the pressure especially
from Asian countries to introduce internationalized domain
names. Turn it around for a while and pretend that all 
domain names were in Simplified Chinese (because the Chinese
had invented the Internet). The whole Internet infrastructure
would be based on Simplified Chinese, and adding another
character set (such as US-ASCII) would be a huge burden
(and probably a threat to global adressibility).

> [...]
> I do believe that domain registries should make sure that global
> addressibility in the DNS is preserved - and be it by forcing
> equivalent us-ascii domains upon users.

I think it's obvious even to non-techies (such as me) that 
there are numerous questions to be solved by IETF, ICANN and
all the others involved. But please note that this issue is
taken very seriously especially in Asia. I have spoken some
time ago very briefly with an ICANN board member on this, and 
his reaction was very hands-off; my impression was that he
tried to ignore it as much as possible. If it is ignored,
companies will come up (and are already) with propietary 
'solutions' that may create even more problems. On the other
hand, int'l DNS may also boost Unicode usage.

It would be very interesting to hear from IETF people 
involved in this how they view ICANN's role here -- should
ICANN step in to prevent NSI implementing rash solutions
(while they still have the gTLD registry monopoly)? 

Best regards,
/// Alexander