SFR: Semantic-Free Referencing

At a logical level, the Web requires a Reference Resolution Service (RRS) to map from references (also known as links) to actual network locations. In the current Web, references are URLs with a hostname/pathname structure, and DNS serves as the RRS by mapping the hostname to an IP address where the target is stored. The premise is that the Web would be better served by a new RRS, one that does not impose the limits of the current DNS. As others, most notably those in the URN community, have pointed out, an RRS for the Web should have at least the following two characteristics (neither of which DNS-based URLs have):

(*) Persistent object references: Reference persistence implies (a) that references should not be tied to particular administrative domains or entities, as they currently are in DNS and (b) that references should be at the level of objects rather than entire sites. If someone creates a Web page at one institution then changes his affiliation or network provider, then maintaining persistence would require that the first institution continue to serve the individual's Web page (or provide an HTTP redirect) for all time, which is an impractical expectation. Also, without resorting to HTTP redirects, the current Web infrastructure has no way for individual objects to separate from their sites and migrate cleanly: today, if an object moves, everyone linking to the object must update their references.

(*) Contention-free references: DNS has become a branding mechanism and, as a result, fights over domain ownership are common. Social problems include name squatting, typo squatting, and lawsuits over trademark infringement. Although disputes over human-readable names are inevitable, we believe the reference resolution infrastructure is a poor place to resolve those disputes. In fact, we believe the infrastructure should force references to be inherently human-unfriendly. Of course users must be able to associate meaning to references, but the binding between opaque references and human-friendly names should be done outside the referencing infrastructure. Such a separation would (a) free the RRS to focus only on technical concerns and (b) permit multiple, competing solutions to human-friendly naming.