(I keep thinking -- what has this got to do with North American Network Ops?)
instead we treat it as (leaving out the '<' '>' stuff out of laziness):
<w><h><a><t><e><v><e><r><.><c><o><m>
and look up like this:
ask a ROOT nameserver for M NSes
ask a M nameserver for O NSes
...
ask a <w> nameserver for appropriate info
That's an implementation detail; the protocol won't (I mean, wouldn't :-))
have to change at all to support this.