I'd love to understand domains as anonymous speach. Is it the domain that is speaking or the content. Must the SLD be anonymouse or could someone use anonymouse-host.toad.com to publish their free speach. Could third or 4th leverl domains be used to publish speach?

I just don't get how SLDs are related to free speach. Wendy, could you provide me some clue?

its funny that your blog requires one to post their personal information to you; it would be nice if your blog allowed free and anonymous speech.

thanks,

-rick

Thanks for catching me in the tyranny of defaults, Rick. I never meant to disallow anonymous posting here, and I've now made sure that's enabled.

I'd say that domains themselves can be a limited form of speech, but they're more important as an enabler of speech. Someone who wants a stable online location for communication should be able to control his or her own domain name, not be forced to depend on the good graces of a third party (even one as good as toad.com). An anonymously-registered SLD can serve as a pseduonym -- such as to say that anything posted at anonymous.com comes from the same source, even if that source is not identified with a named individual -- and the anonymous registrant can be assured that no one else has the power to silence his speech or unmask him without the power of law.

my point is -- what requires a SLD to enable anonymous speech. Infact why does ICANN police the TLD space and prevent me from my anonymous speech under the XXX TLD.

for some reason the logic just doesn't seem to work with www.anonymous-free-speech.toad.com

3rd and 4th level domains provide free and anonymous speech. Could you clue us on why second level domains are so important and why the same argument does not apply to TLDs?

thanks,

-rick

Rick,
Wendy explained the difference in her comment at 11:25am. Users should be able to manage and control their own domain names so they don't have to rely on someone else to maintain an anonymous site. 3rd and 4th level domains only provide as much free/anonymous speech as the manager of the 2nd level permits.

K,

Domains are not the sole identifier in a uri and with the advent of search engines may not even be relivant to this discussion.

My points is that a.stupid.name is a valid 3rd level FQDN that has privacy protections, if you could explain why a.stupid.com is any different. I would appeciate the clue.

-rick

Rick- Domains are not always the sole identifier in a URL, but they can be, and it is often more useful for everyone when they are. Maybe I'm the one confused, because it seems entirely obvious to me what the difference is between having a 2nd level and 3rd level URL. If I want a website, I have a choice: 1) register my own domain name, i.e. K.info, or 2) use a third level domain on a) someone else's domain, i.e. K.anonymity.info, or b) my own domain, i.e. A.K.info.

Options 1 and 2b give me control of the domain and the content, but are not anonymous, as the whois will show who I am and where I live. Option 2a may provide anonymity but I am subject to the will of the owner of anonymity.info. That person/organization can shut me off at anytime. This is why a 3rd level is different than a 2nd level, and it is entirely relevant to the issue at hand. I'm not familiar enough with the .name's anymore to compare the .name scheme to the standard com, net, org, info, etc.

But where's the connection between H.R.3754 and anonymity? The bill speaks of knowingly providing material and misleading false contact information. Those who use legitimate anonymous registration services (Domains by Proxy etc.) enter truthful contact information of a third party (namely, the registrar in its capacity as proxy). So they don't run afoul of H.R.3754. Admittedly they pay a few dollars extra for domain registration, but it's hard to think these costs present a major deterrent since they're so small relative to the costs of hosting (not to mention content development).

The Unlimited Freedom blog is published on the Invisiblog site, which provides cryptographically protected anonymity. Writers email their posts through a network of anonymous remailers, using PGP signatures to assure authenticity.

http://invisiblog.com/1c801df4aee49232/article/a88db099b5d8146ae20bb21331c7cac1 describes the author's history with anonymous posting. His support for Trusted Computing and Digital Rights Management would make him a pariah in the online privacy community if his identity were known. As Lawrence Solum observed of his law students, "It is socially unacceptable to take the position that unlawful P2P filesharing is morally wrong." ( http://lsolum.blogspot.com/2004_01_01_lsolum_archive.html#107464058060655049 ) The same prejudice applies to those who argue that Trusted Computing is morally acceptable.

By providing a resource where anonymous views can be presented without fear of negative repurcussions, services like Invisiblog improve the quality of public discourse. It's sad that our community accepts the kind of close-mindedness identified by Solum, but those are the realities. Given these facts, we should all support the availability of critical commentary and analysis which could not exist without the protection of anonymity.