Re: [discuss] Individual representation

[william@dso.net (William X. Walsh)]

On Sun, 27 Jun 1999 21:58:15 -0700 (PDT), Randy Bush <randy@psg.com>
wrote:

>>>> One of the other key issues for this entire constituenbcy model is htat
>>>> there can be only one for a constituenbcy group. What is one vehemently
>>>> disagrees with the formulation of the constituency group htat they fall
>>>> under?
>>> probably what happens to minorities in all democracies.
>> They become Road Pizza. This is exactly what we should avoid.
>
>well, the demagogues of democracy (folk who scream for democracy as long as
>it is they who set the rules) who flood mailing lists like this will force
>the lowest common denominator system available in our culture.  sorry if you
>don't like it.  they won't either.
>

The "rules" for a democracy are not that difficult.

They involve openness and fairness to all.

Those that scream do so because the current process is only adhering
to those principles in a token fashion.

Unlike you, I believe there is room for both your viewpoint, and my
own.  I see there being room for the viewpoint of proprietary tlds and
non-proprietary TLDs.  

Unlike you, I don't want to force the entire internet to fit into my
own narror view of how it should be run.

The internet, by definition, is a network of interconnected networks.
These networks are not a "uniform" set of networks. They are diverse,
and the attempt to force on them a set of policies that are "uniform"
in nature, when there is no compelling technical or legal reason for
doing so, is difficult to understand.

The ultimate consensus of the internet stakeholders will be letting
the market decide which models will work and succeed.  Those that do
not, will be forced to change their models or die off.  

The interesting part is that most of the people who advocate this type
of open market program are individuals, the very people the trademark
interests, and the CORE/ISOC factions, are trying to minimize and
trivialize, in an effort to prevent them from presenting a serious and
strong opposition to the adoption of their narrow and "uniform"
policies that do nothing towards giving users a real choice and
freedom.

We should not pass policies for the sake of having policies.  

There are five questions that need to be addressed when considering
new proposals/policies :

1) Is this an area in which we have authority over/charter to address?

2) Are there harms that exist that warrant the creation of a policy?

3) Is there a lack of existing policy/law/rules that address these
harms sufficiently?

4) Does this proposed policy sufficient address solving the problems
addressed in Question #2?

5) And finally, spell out the advantages and disadvantages of the
proposed policy, and and answer the question "Do the advantages of
this proposal outweigh the disadvantages of this proposal?"

If the answer to question 1 is no, then you toss the proposal.  If the
answer to question 2 is no, then you toss the proposal.  If the answer
to question 3 is no, then you toss the proposal.  If the answer to
question 4 is no, then you toss the proposal. If the answer to
question 5 is no, then you toss the proposal.

In an open and democratic system, these questions will be addressed to
the satisfaction of the community before any policy/proposal is
adopted.

These five simple burdens of proof provide a type of safeguard that is
needed in any system that creates wide spread policy.



--
William X. Walsh
General Manager, DSo Internet Services
Email: william@dso.net  Fax:(209) 671-7934

The Law is not your mommy or daddy to go crying
to every time you have something to whimper about.