Note: Many of these no longer appear to be in operation. This information has been reproduced here for historical purposes.
These are the Alternate Root systems about which OpenNIC has formed an "official" opinion. Any member, of course, may challenge this decision and bring the issue up for reevaluation, as the history of the alternate roots tends to be very murky and difficult to untangle. Despite our commitment to not conflict with pre-existing active namespaces, many of those namespaces already conflict with each other and many claim TLDs which are not , or may never have been, in active use.
AlterNIC TLDs
Note: No longer appears to be in operation.
AlterNIC was among the first independent responses to the centralization of control over the DNS system. They have declared the following TLDs (as of 2000-06-01), which OpenNIC will respect:
- exp
- llc
- lnx
- ltd
- med
- nic
- noc
- porn
- xxx
The one quirk in respecting these 9 TLDs, it seems, is that there are other conflicting historical claims to some of the same names. OpenNIC, regardless, will not impose on these domains with our own, though in the course of arranging the peering agreement we may be forced to decide on the legitimacy of these claims. Until we finish our survey of the alternate namespaces or are convinced of a better claim during that survey, however, we will peer these nine entire from AlterNIC. Users of OpenNIC's DNS servers can therefore resolve domains in these TLDs as served by AlterNIC.
Free Community Network TLD
Note: No longer appears to be in operation.
From the Free Community Network web page:
Free Community Network was founded in 1996 by Gard Abrahamsen and Bob Allisat with the assistance of Graham Buller. FCN was the International branch of what was then planned to become a comprehensive Community Network Program here in Toronto.
Though the FCN has ceased publishing then .fcn TLD, OpenNIC will neither publish it nor support an alternative publisher without FCN's approval.
Pacific Root TLDs
Note: No longer appears to be in operation.
The Pacific Root is probably the most inclusive of the functioning alternative roots. Bradley, who operates PacRoot, has made considerable effort to check the claims of various TLD operators and to include any who do not conflict with others and to make a reasoned decision of precedence when they do. They (and their operators) have declared the following TLDs (as of 2001-03-10), which OpenNIC accepts
- ais
- bali
- belize
- bio
- cal
- career
- chem
- children
- costarica
- ind
- job
- lib
- medic
- nomad
- npo
- ppp
- sat
- satcom
- satnet
- scuba
- socal
- stream
- work
- www
The following TLDs are recognized to conflict with others' claims, and are accepted only contingent on PacRoot and the TLD operators working in good faith to resolve these conflicts or provide us with documentation of their claim to demostrate prior and continuing service (the basic criteria for authority to serve a TLD):
- biz
- cars
- corp
- etc
- family
- food
- jobs
- ocean
- men
- ngo
- not
- online
- wine
- women
The Pacific Root also serves one further TLD which the OpenNIC does not accept, as we do not support self-named or private Top-Level Domains (though we are aware that is a fine line between a strictly Chartered TLD and a private one):
- pacroot
