Recently, the overlaping space among DNS, the design of browsers and search engines, international, national, and local trademark interests andlaw, have come to a head. A sprawling organization dubbed ICANN has taken over what used to be a task that sat squarely on one man's shoulders. The tensions are largely the result of ignorant (and purposeful) confusions of the purposes and functions of the various Internet name and resource locating systems. In this talk, we will discuss what a DNS root fundamentally IS, and the factors that keep a unified name service root in place despite many pressures to decentralize DNS root services. We'll then look at the ways in which decentralized or alternate roots could be (and have been) implemented, and their implications for trademark and software politics and design.