Domain name service is an absolutely vital part of the Internet’s infrastructure. Unfortunately, the U.S. government has given a monopoly on registering names to the biggest bunch of incompetent asses in the history of the Internet, namely Network Solutions. NSI has two roles in the world of the Internet, to smoothly manage the root name servers, and register domain names in the .net, .com, and .org namespaces. Their monopoly on the registration of domain names gives them a license to make bales of cash, and yet they fail to successfully fulfill their vital role in every way imaginable. Just this weekend, they turned off the old Internic web site and consolidated everything under their brand in some sort of pathetic preemptive strike against their soon-to-be competitors. This is an awful situation, and it’s only getting worse.