koan - 7:42 am on Jul 6, 2011 (gmt 0)

For anyone who is not American, It's quite troubling to have seemingly global TLDs like .com or .net, the foundation of many online businesses, under control of another country like the US, at the whim of any local flaky politician trying to win votes in a region that doesn't concern those companies, or may not share the same values at all. Sure, everyone is in favor of enforcing copyright infringements, we're publishers in one way or another, so we can understand. But what about other unforeseen events in the future? What if the US fall under some theocratic spell and decide to close down all .com domains that promote "impure" literature and pictures? Or "unamerican" political ideology? Or "forbidden" scientific research? I mean for a while there it felt pretty close ten years ago.