Why is DNS so complicated?

[TcM]

Maybe this is just a stupid thought... and I did not learn much about the DNS and stuff, but I know the bare essentials.. anyways, what is instead of having the servers to resolve the domain's ip, and this can take up to 48 hours.. why not just have a server somewhere that contain all the domains (like there already is) and besides just that, it will also contain the server ip.. and instead of inserting the nameservers, the webmasters will have a login on this server and update the ip into their databases.. so browsers will connect to this server and just resolve the ip straight away by submitting a query to this server and this server will forward the ip to the browser according to the ip in the database... this way, as soon as the webmaster will update the ip, it will change straight away into the database, with no DNS delay..

Maybe I'm missing a lot of stuff.. but it is just a thought that just went through my head.

[Orjan]

it was like that in the beginning, with a replicating hosts-file, but it became unpractical as it grew. and the delay is not depending on the server, but only that it is a time to live value set to reduce traffic, so your computer don't have to access the nameserver every time, and let the computer trust the info for that time. before a change, you could lower ttl to just one hour if you are planning to do changes, and set it back to default when the changes are set.