Re: [Membership] The People's Republic of ICANN?

[Joop Teernstra <terastra@terabytz.co.nz>]

At 23:43 7/02/99 -0800, Rus Postel wrote to the DNSO.org list:
>i do not qualify for any of the categories of membership suggested, yet i use
>the internet and believe i have a right to participate in democratic decision
>making. probably i am in a very small minority of users. why exclude us? 

Rus,

Why not introduce yourself.    ;-)
What I propose isn't an exclusion. Just a light barrier, easy to overcome
for those who really want to participate.
It is a lot more than you get as a user of FCC regulated utilities.

aren't
>basic end users entitled to have a say in issues effecting how the
technologies
>we use are governed? admittedly this is somewhat revolutionary, and it
should be
>as it is clear that other models of governance/regulation that are removed
from
>popular participation (as the FCC in the US, example) develop eventually to
>serve industry with few crumbs thrown to users, who are nevertheless
paying for
>the service. in fact, the technical creators historically are removed from
>decisionmaking, ultimately limited to serving industry thru innovation. i
>believe that those of you that have a technical/scientific interest would be
>well advised to encourage inclusion of the masses, as they will probably
support
>openness and new creativity while business/industry interest usually is:
control
>in order to maximize profit.

I have deeply considered this argument, because it is made so often and it
sounds popular.  But the masses that will support openness are the millions
of individual DN owners, with a real stake in the DNS. If businesses own
Domain Names, they still get only one vote. (one vote per admin contact)

>furthermore how can you turn away from the possibility, even if it is
REMOTE, of
>encouraging the spread of participatory democracy?

Perhaps you adressed this question to George Conrades who can answer for
himself.

My humble view is: On the contrary, instead of turning away from it, I
believe that the participatory democracy of ICANN has the best chance of
being born alive and surviving , when it starts off with a large mass of DN
owners.
It is having your own Domain that makes the internet user like you
independent from the (connectivity) industry that otherwise would use it's
"control" over your address "to maximize profit" .

One step at the time, that's how your ideal can succeed. 




--Joop--
http://www.democracy.org.nz/model.html