Re: [wg-c] Progress

[Kent Crispin <kent@songbird.com>]

On Fri, Mar 17, 2000 at 05:32:50PM -0800, Justin McCarthy wrote:
> My thoughts worth .02 cents US: The Trademark lobby seems to
> have recently made an effort to hijack the discussion here.

Please note that your statement is offensive and prejudicial on its
face.  Like it or not, the "TM lobby" has just as much right to
participate as you do.

> If the threat is that they will call for a vote with the new
> 100+ membership--to the best of my knowledge, they still
> don't have the deck stacked in their favor.
[...]
> Also, I think that plenty of time has been given to call for
> a vote on the issues that Jon has brought up. If subscribers
> are not responding, we should feel no obligation to withhold
> or delay a vote. I think we should hammer out The initial
> "eight principles", but other than that, let's get it
> together and act with purpose on what this group has already
> decided should happen.
> -Justin

You seem to be suffering from several common delusions:  

1) the "representation" delusion: On a purely pragmatic political
basis, the TM lobby doesn't need to "stack the deck".  The fact that the
membership of WG-C is self-selected means that its recommendations can
only be viewed as representing the self-interests of the participants. 
The ICANN board and the DOC know that full well, and therefore the
relative numbers of votes in wg-c is almost totally meaningless.

2) the "equal voice" delusion: the various polls in this WG that are
taken have as an underlying premise that all the votes have equal weight
"in the real world".  That is most emphatically not the case, and there
is absolutely nothing we can do to make it the case.  

3) the "representation" delusion, version 2: But it's even more complex,
because "in the real world" is not the same as "in ICANN".  Contrary to
popular fantasy, ICANN's primary mandate is not to represent the "will
of the people".  ICANN's primary mandate is "stability of the Internet". 
That means, for example, that if there is a conflict between "free
speech rights" and "stability", free speech rights lose.  This also 
means that if there is a conflict between "competition in the name 
registry business" and "stability", "competition in the name registry 
business" loses.

-- 
Kent Crispin                               "Do good, and you'll be
kent@songbird.com                           lonesome." -- Mark Twain