Comments on: US government gets a Net kick in the teeth

by: Ed Phillips

Fri, 28 Jul 2006 08:15:04 +0000

Two points.
1. To the person who was taking the ‘if you don’t like it, found your own internet’ - this rather misses the point. Many of these discussions have been entered into precisely to avoid that eventuality. There are economies in the world which can, and quite possibly will, set up ‘internets’ entirely separate to The Internet (with captital letters) - China is the most obvious example, with their noises about making new top level domains. There are plenty of people in the US (and ROW or RotW) who believe that that would actually be extremely damaging, and are seeking to avoid that. You can refuse to listen to someone on the same internetwork (as China does with its Internet restrictions) but you cannot listen even if you want to if they are on a totally different internetwork.
2. To the question of ‘x number of responses is not representative’ - no, you’re absolutely right. Of course, given that the potential “stakeholders” in the Internet are every person who might use it in the next 10 years, i.e. over 2-3 billion people, there is no mechanism on earth that will get you their views, not least because many of them are non-english speaking, poor, and/or in the developing world. Those sorts of people do not make coherent responses in English to US Government bodies. The more accurate question has to be, (a) are the people who responded in possession of enough of the facts to be able to make a useful response (Kieran clearly has doubts), (b) are those responses in answer to the question asked (again, not always ‘yes’) and (c) do those responses set out a coherent suggestion/critisism? If they do, then they should be read, considered, and added to the debate, if only to remind those in the debate that retaining 100% of the status quo may not be what the wider world will accept. The Internet is about communication (increasingly also, telecoms), and what good is a phone system if the people you want to ring up aren’t connected to a system that you can connect to?

by: Kieren

Wed, 19 Jul 2006 10:27:36 +0000

You really should read some of the comments on the NTIA website. They cover the ground extremely well. And that’s because they’re written by the people that know most in the world about both the politics and the technical side of the Internet.

I put links to some of the best in my original post above. The IGP and Network Solutions are to my mind the best two to read if you don’t have time to go through the 100 or so in-depth responses submitted.

Kieren

by: TS

Tue, 18 Jul 2006 22:31:01 +0000

Thank you, but I am not talking nonsense. A poll like that where anyone could contribute in no way is reflective of expert opinion. Anyone could post a comment there and as you could read from the comments, there weren’t many experts there.
Anyway, enough about the poll.

Very good.
We both agree that ICANN should administer the internet (top level domains). It can do this better than the US Department of Defense and the US Department of Commerce that used to do it.
There should be no misunderstanding. Technically, the USG has control of ICANN by having the power of not renewing its contract to do its work. ICANN must abide by the laws of the California where it is incorporated. It is accountable to the Attorney General of the State of California. This arrangement has worked well in the past. I see no urgent reason to break it and create a new one under some as yet undefined global entity.
Do you see any urgent problems that ICANN is not addressing and would be better solved by an international institution?
Are the UN, ITU, International Monetary Fund, Word Bank etc… really good at what they do?

Problems with ICANN? Plenty
They need to be more transparent in their decision making process.
They need to setup a charter on how they deal with issues that arise so a framework for decision making can exist.
They need to stick to dealing with technical issues and not go into political ones.

By the way, did you notice all the concern about net neutrality?
That seemed more of a concern than who ICANN is accountable to.

by: Kieren

Tue, 18 Jul 2006 20:08:25 +0000

Okay, writing “ridiculous” in caps in the first sentence may have prejudiced my answer.

Oh, but hang on, you are still talking nonsense. Let me make this as clear as I can: 87 percent of people that know what they are talking about say that the US government would do best to move to an international governance model.

As for ICANN, I have lots of issues with ICANN. I also believe that ICANN is the best possible organisation we have - and will ever have - that will be able to find a middle path through a seemingly overwhelming number of technical, political and social issues. I really want ICANN to succeed.

The problem is that people try to connect ICANN with the United States government. If that connection becomes irreversible, the whole Net system as we know it will fall apart and everyone will suffer as a consequence.

The biggest problem in this whole debate - and even ICANN and the USG will agree with this - is that only a tiny percentage of the people that need to know about the Internet works really understand how the Internet works.

I have become firmly of the belief that until the controversy of one government having overall control is removed, we will find ourselves in an ever increasing circle of misunderstanding.

Once no one believes that there is some secret discussions going on, the emphasis will be on the real forums and from there the Internet will find stability.

Kieren

by: TS

Tue, 18 Jul 2006 16:21:25 +0000

I am not writing ill-informed and aggressive nonsense as you say that I am.
I may be writing a bit sarcastically, but that is how I am. So I apologize

My reply

I agree, a little knowledge is dangerous thing.

The “experts” views to the NTIA were really enlightening.
My favorites experts were Brian Dick, Slappy McHappy, Mad Chaz and Next.
These guys really seem to know what is going on.

I did not comment, so I guess that does not make me an expert like the others.

You say the upshot is that “Everyone wants the USG to hand over control.”
But
From your own statistics, the majority of the 623 comments say nothing about wanting the US Gov to give up control.

I am not looking for a flame war.

But again, what is your specific problem with ICANN?

by: Kieren

Tue, 18 Jul 2006 08:27:04 +0000

A little knowledge is a dangerous thing.

How many experts do you think you need saying the same thing before it become an expert view? Or, put it another way, when 87 percent of experts say the same thing, should you believe them, or it is reasonable to assume that you know better simply because you have a gut feeling you know better?

You clearly know nothing about ICANN or Internet governance and while I would normally be happy to point you in the direction of good summaries of the complex situation, for some reason you feel comfortable writing ill-informed and aggressive nonsense on my blog so I don’t see that there’s much point.

I’m sure I must be wrong though - could you please provide a link to your own comment to the NTIA?

Kieren

by: TS

Mon, 17 Jul 2006 22:55:40 +0000

First
I find you using 632 people’s comments to extrapolate the whole internet’s general view… as RIDICULOUS.

Second
What do you have against ICANN? The US government exercises very little control over them.
Do you think Jon Postel was doing a better job?
The tremendous success of the internet has been due to the lack of regulations placed on it.
It is an “open” network, no one owns it. The internet is network of networks. If you don’t like it, start your own.

Third
I’m sure the US government is really hurting from the “kick in the teeth”.
After all, they really get upset when the world disapproves of their actions.

by: Kieren

Mon, 17 Jul 2006 21:53:56 +0000

As soon as I hit “add comment” with the $50m figure, I regretted it. I’ve since been wondering how to get at an accurate - or even rough - estimate of how much money the US government put into building the Net prior to 1998, at which point it became an international medium.

I wonder if someone has compiled that information: Milton Mueller or Ellen Rony or Michael Froomkin. Or even if the DoC has a figure.

Anyway, the point is the same: saying that “the US taxpayer paid for the Internet and so the USG should stay in control” is about as accurate as saying Marconi should be in overall charge of mobile phone companies because it invented the telegraph.

Kieren

by: Lee McKnight

Mon, 17 Jul 2006 21:15:43 +0000

To agree and disagree, first the USG has put way way more than $50m into the Internet, does no good to minimize that - but we can start with the $1bn in under the ‘Gore bill’ which pumped the net up to the point of commercilization 1990-1995.

But Kieren’s broader point is well taken, that the whole world and private industry by now has exceeded USG investments many times over.

Lee

by: Kieren

Mon, 17 Jul 2006 17:37:42 +0000

:-)

Yeah. That would make a good article: The Top Ten of Xenophobic Legislation from the past 1,000 years. I wonder how the UK would do. Better than Italy or France I suspect.

I was pondering the US’ strange habit of leaping from one extreme to the other last night and it struck me that it is crystal clear why: the two-party system.

If the Internet could do one powerful and wonderful thing to the country that invented it, it would be to make it viable for more than two political parties to survive. After all, all politics is about is persuading enough people of your point of view.

Kieren