Reasons Behind Making this Map
I have a
long standing
interest in mapping the Internet. There are, however, many
different ways in which one can measure and map the Internet. Fiber
optic cables, webhosts, users, e-commerce activity, domain names, data
packet routing, etc., all provide insight on different slices of this
network. (See the
Atlas of Cyberspace for a wonderful collection of these
visualizations). Given my long standing interest and work with domain
names I decided to create a map in kmz format (deployed in Google Earth)
to create a representation of the domain name system.
The Multiple Geographies of Domain Names
Domain names are organized under about 270
top level
domains (TLDs). TLDs are subdivided between
gTLDs
(such as .com or .org) and
ccTLDs (such as .de,
.cn or
.uk). ccTLD are
based on
ISO 3166 country names and codes.
As of December 2007, there were about 153 million
domain names registered worldwide. There are 246 ccTLDs and 20 gTLDs
displayed in this visualization.
As with many things associated with the structure
of the Internet, TLDs were designed to parallel offline institutional
structures but over time these connects can become quite tenuous. For
example, gTLD domains were to distinguish between different types of
organizations on the Internet, e.g., .com for business, .org for
non-profits, etc, but in practice this association is often extremely
loose. Likewise ccTLDs were created to identify Internet use in
specific countries/territories. While the operators of many ccTLDs
require that owners of domains have some kind of territorial connection
to the country,
others operations such as .tv or .cc, function as quasi gTLDs.
Thus, each ccTLD has what I refer to as a political location or
the physical territory by which the justification for its existence
depends.
No matter what form of organization or regulation
TLDs take, they are all subject to certain technical requirements so
that that users can access and use domain names. The most fundamental
requirement is that each TLD have a
root name server
and most (if not all) TLDs operate redundant nameservers. Root
nameservers are computers that act as authoritative sources that
translate domain names into IP addresses to make sure that Internet
traffic gets to its proper destination. It is good practice to
distribute these servers across a wide geography so that any localized
disturbance (power failure, nature disaster) does not prevent the TLD
from operating. Thus, each TLD also has several technical
locations or the physical location of where its root nameservers are
located.
In other words, despite the seemingly placeless
network of the Internet, there remain strongly territorialized aspects
of the Internet. This map highlights these political and technical
locations of the domain name system.
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