Re: [ga] New wine in old bottles

[Joanna Lane <jo-uk@rcn.com>]

Bill,
First, this post has made the last 45 worth the time. Thank you. You are
right on target in my opinion. While I am inclined to favor option 3,
reducing ICANN back to a technical coordination function, this does raise
concerns.

ICANN would readily agree to put the first part of the plan into action and
rid itself of the bottom up fiction you describe, while delaying the
founding of the new organization to look after international social policy
aspects, which are already under-represented in the existing structure.

A "clean sheet study" which conveniently forgets the requirement to report
back to ICANN quarterly meetings (ala ALSC), is what we could expect, and no
doubt, VeriSign would be more than happy to fund it.

In the intervening period, the window of opportunity for ICANN to ignore the
already weak DNSO voice would be increased, if not shut down altogether.

Then where will the public voice be? In never never land.

Regards,
Joanna

on 6/17/01 1:56 PM, William S. Lovell at wsl@cerebalaw.com wrote:

> William X. Walsh and I have been engaging in a debate over
> what are the responsibilities of persons joining into this whole
> ICANN process, and what are those of the long time participants
> who are familiar with the process, the internet, the technology, etc.
> Let me say for the record that given Mr. Walsh's premise, his
> citations to the ICANN documents are totally accurate, his logic
> is impeccable, and his conclusions are exactly right. I want to
> respond more generally here, though, because this subject matter,
> at least to me, happens to pinpoint a central reason why there is
> and must be, profound decisions relating to the basic structure of
> ICANN.
> 
> The problem with Mr. Walsh's conclusions is that the Internet,
> and the ICANN, to which those original ICANN documents
> referred, no longer exist.  If one has a "technical coordinating
> body" that sees to IP allocations and all of the rest of the work
> that is fundamental even to having an Internet, of course one
> must show some technical expertise and qualifications in order
> to have a right to be heard.  One cannot carry out that kind of
> work -- the work defined in the original ICANN "charter," if
> every ignoramus on earth can jump in and spout utter nonsense
> and thus effectively bring the real work to a halt.  However, that
> was the old ICANN; this is the new, and the documents to
> which Mr. Walsh refers have been bypassed by events.
> 
> Commencing with the Network Solutions decision to stick its
> nose into domain name issues -- NOT in the sense simply of
> ensuring technical compatibility, etc., but as to who gets which
> one, the Internet has been co-opted by the trademark and
> commercial interests, and the fears of the original scientific
> community which said that "commercialization" of the Internet
> would corrupt its value have been realized many times over.
> To everyday users, and registrants of domain names, it is not
> necessary to know an IP from a DNS to have a right to speak
> out on those kinds of issues.  The tradition within the technical
> community, however, is to deprecate the "clueless newbie" and
> try to chase that poor soul out of the process -- even while
> others are trying to generate some real body of people (i.e.,
> more than 305) so that a functioning system that could reach
> a consensus on at least something could be shown.  Thus,
> there is not just one ICANN, there are two, and they are both
> incompatibly trying to follow the same set of rules.
> 
> There thus seem to be three possible solutions:
> 
> 1) Restructure ICANN
> 
> 2) Start over with an entirely new organization
> 
> 3) Re-direct ICANN back to its sole and only
> technical coordination function and form a
> second organization -- not an ICANN (since
> the function of this organization would not be
> about "assigned names and numbers" at all
> -- the function of such new organization to be
> that of addressing matters of international
> social policy that fill the pages of these lists
> and have nothing whatever to do with the
> original ICANN function. Read "The Internet
> Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers"
> I don't see anything in there about any UDRP
> or other such abominations, nor do I see, or
> have I ever seen, any document that gives either
> ICANN, the USG, or anyone else even the
> slightest legal basis for making up rules on the
> subject. International law (excluding the traditional
> (common law) has but two possible legitimate
> foundations: treaties, or     the consensus of
> individual people, and ICANN (and WIPO, etc.)
> have neither.
> 
> I myself would suggest option 3.  Someone just
> posted something which said that as a matter of
> cold, hard fact, ICANN is the only body that has
> even the slightest chance of gathering in the approval
> of the entire international community to carry out the
> technical function of running an internet, so while its
> abolishment is simply out of the question, at the same
> time it has shown itself utterly incapable of dealing
> with social issues in a manner that will be acceptable,
> and that is not likely to change. The opinion has been
> expressed that we now have not an ICANN but an
> ICANN/NSI-Verisign duopoly -- the capture has
> been complete, and the $$$ will not allow the kind
> of restructuring that ICANN would require. Power
> is power, regardless of whether it has any legal basis.
> 
> The issue of having a new organization and abolishing
> ICANN was just answered.
> 
> With no. 3, a first step would be to restructure ICANN
> to get rid, if possible, of the "bottom-up" fiction.  In the
> technical running of an internet, the policy SHOULD be
> "We're the experts, we'll do it the way we decide it
> should be done based upon our best judgments, and if
> you are not prepared to contribute substantively to
> the reaching of those judgments, based upon a real
> understanding of the issues involved, go away." The
> USG documents that call for "bottom-up" governance
> should be re-negotiated, with that requirement removed.
> (Or alternatively, ICANN could be seen as supporting
> the development of an "Internet Policy" organization,
> that runs on (roughly) democratic principles and allows
> everyone with a concern to have a voice, thereby
> actually fulfilling that mandate.)
> 
> Bill Lovell
> 
> 
> 
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