Literal addresses in URLs - 'splain to me

[bound@zk3.dec.com]

>However the fact is that when there is a catastrophic operational
>problem with DNS, there can be cases where the *only* way to
>repair the network is by using literal addresses, either to
>send mail to another site, or to access remote systems -
>and URLs are one of the ways we access remote systems these days.
>So while I stick to the deprecation of literal addresses that is
>in RFC 1900, I regretfully feel that we need them as emergency backup.

A valid point.  But I don't see repairing DNS using URLs.  No one is
saying you can't use IPv6 addresses in this input.  Just we don't need
them for URLs.  They work fine now with FTP, Telnet, etc..

/jim