The NTIA is requesting information from potential bidders to perform the IANA tasks. The IANA contract expires at the end of March 2006. The timeframe is only surprising in that this should have happened earlier.
The IANA function of ICANN is the part that has been the less crontroversal, with the notable exception of some key missing cctld reports. We should keep in mind that the IANA is responsible for a lot more than just country code allocation in the DNS. It manages the very critical IP address space. It is also in charge of keeping and allocating many other things from TCP and UDP port numbers to SNMP entreprise UIDs. As such, the IANA is the numbering secretariat of the IETF. In the end, it should return where it belongs, ie under the ISOC/IETF umbrella.
But the one main question of course is if the DoC is allowed to do what it does at all. Does the US government “own” the Internet ? Is there an undisputed proof of ownership ? An international treaty granting this right to the US government ?
If not, it is not in a position to launch such a process on a good it does not own.
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