Domain

Full Title or Meme

For Identity Management a domain is a walled off collection of resources that can be preferentially accessed by members of the domain.

Context

• The Domain Name System was the first attempt in the digital age to create a set of Identifiers that could be associated within a trusted domain. It was a binding between an alphabetic name and an IP address.
• The next step was to address individuals at one computer system using the mailto: scheme that is now universal for email address. The address that once identified a user at a computer, now identifies a user at a "domain" of computers.
• The next step for Identity Management was to create domains that were dedicated to identifying users like tom@hotmail.com. Those user felt like they "owned" the name, but that was not strictly true.
• First Card-space, and now the DID-core spec were created to give the users complete control of their own identifiers. Now we are engaged on a great struggle testing whether those sell-issued identifiers, so conceived and so dedicated can long endure. We are met on a great battle-field of that struggle to show the world that such a scheme can succeed.

Problems

• The domain served a purpose: to bind together a set of users and computers in a domain of trust. There was a need for that then. And so there is a need for that today.