[governance] ccTLD regulation [WAS Re: Statement made in Plenary]

[Jeanette Hofmann]

Lee McKnight wrote:
> Hi,
> 
> I agree with Michael.

Hmm.
> 

> In sum, we should figure out a position that gives governments what
> they legitimately deserve, 

Do they?
And what happens when governments find out that what actually matters 
are numbers and not names? Would you be wiling to hand them over to the 
ITU too?
While I don't mind governments in the position of "shadow hierarchies", 
I do mind policy organizations that exclude civil society. We said this 
in Geneva again and again: the management of the Internet should be 
organized as a multi stakeholder process. I can't see why this wouldn't 
apply to ccTLDs.
jeanette

even if they don't actually own their TLD as
> Michael notes.  But CS should know better than to expect reasonable
> treatment of CS interests if the game is given to governments, as recent
> experience demonstrates yet again. Even if CS is outside the locked
> doors of government negoiators, by sorting out a reasonable compromise
> that works, CS can as we have seen, have impact on the government
> negotiators who will have a couple days in November to reach closure, or
> walk away with everyone grumbling about the failure to achieve raised
> expectations.  Not that the game will end in November, but it hopefully
> can move on to a different playing field with a new set of guidelines.
> 
> Lee
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Prof. Lee W. McKnight
> School of Information Studies
> Syracuse University
> +1-315-443-6891office
> +1-315-278-4392 mobile
> 
> 
>>>>froomkin at law.miami.edu 10/03/05 11:10 AM >>>
> 
> Well, since you ask...
> 
> Goodness knows that no one is currently more removed from what is
> really 
> going on behind the scenes at WSIS than I.  But from a distance, the
> most 
> meritorious concern that governments have is the idea that regulation
> of 
> 'their' ccTLD would in some way be constrained by US/California law.
> 
> Let me start by saying that in fact I don't accept, as a theoretical 
> matter, the idea that a ccTLD 'belongs' to a government.  Details are
> in 
> When We Say US(TM), We Mean It!, 41 Hous. L. Rev. 839 (2004), available
> at 
> www.law.miami.edu/~froomkin/articles/ccTLDs-TM.pdf, so I won't repeat 
> those arguments here.
> 
> But, working from realpolitik considerations, it seems to me that 
> giving ccTLD regulation to the ITU or some purpose-made body makes a 
> degree of sense.  Certainly more sense, anyway, that it does for gTLDs
> (a 
> group that in my view of the world includes so-called sTLDs). The
> issues 
> about recognition of appropriate delegates of ccTLDs (cf. .iq) are
> often 
> very different from the issues of what company is qualified to run a
> TLD 
> and what the string might be.  They involve very difference
> competencies 
> and have different sorts of political and even economic implications. 
> Arguably, they require different sorts of accountability mechanisms
> too, 
> and those are primarily either internal to the country that claims the
> 
> 2-letter TLD, or truly international.  And both those things are very 
> different from a gTLD.
> 
> I could say even more if you required, but I think that's the essence.
> 
> It also seems to me that as a compromise position this offers something
> 
> for almost everyone...
> 
> On Mon, 3 Oct 2005, Veni Markovski wrote:
> 
> 
>>At 10:44 03-10-2005 -0400, Michael Froomkin - U.Miami School of Law
> 
> wrote:
> 
>>>Isn't the best solution to split off the regulation of ccTLDs for
>>>just this reason?
>>
>>Can you say more on that, please?
>>
>>
> 
> 
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