[governance] limits of technical jurisdiction

[Karl Auerbach]

Dan Krimm wrote:
> At 6:39 PM +0100 12/23/07, Michael Leibrandt wrote:
> 
>> ... The core function of ICANN is that of a technical co-ordination body,
>> and wherever possible, it should stick to that role.
> 
> Indeed, this rhetorical statement seems to be universally agreed in
> principle by all associated with ICANN and IG in general.  So, why do we
> continue to have such persistent disagreements about it?

Yes, it is Christmas eve.  Whether one celebrates this holiday or 
another, the sentiment - peace and good will - are universal.  As the 
moon rises tonight, slightly past full, my wish is that in 12 months 
time that we have an internet that reaches and serves every person, 
whether that person can pay or not, that the net begins to obtain a 
reality of internet governance in which all feel they have a voice that, 
if used, will be heard, and that those aspects of the internet that do 
require governance become, in fact, become well governed.

Now, pertaining to that last part of the wish, I reach back to our issue 
at hand: the issue of fitting bodies of governance to things that do 
require governance:

One way to shape our appreciation of ICANN's (or any other body of 
internet governance) is to ask the most fundamental question of all: why?

For example: ICANN's "UDRP" - ICANN's dispute resolution policy that 
affords trademarks an elevated position among uses of domain names and 
creates an accelerated, and from may perspectives, a rather trademark 
favorable, process outside the legal system to enforce that elevated 
position.

Is the UDRP "technical coordination"?

If so, why?

Let us look to ICANN's mandate that domain names be rented for periods 
of 1 to 10 years in 1 year increments:

Is that technical coordination, if so why?

Or ICANN's mandate that there be registries who only sell via accredited 
registrars?   Is that technical coordination, if so why?

The same question can be asked about ICANN's deep and expensive 
examination of those who wish to operate a TLD, an examination that is 
almost entirely about business matters.  How is that "technical 
coordination" (and I emphasize the word "technical"), and if so, why?

And so forth.

Yes, many of these things are "coordination".  But where is the 
"technical" part?

I have proposed a relatively bright line standard:

A matter is "technical coordination of DNS" if the matter has a direct 
and compelling effect on the rapid, efficient, and accurate 
transformation of DNS query packets into DNS response packets at the top 
two tiers of DNS (root and TLD) without bias for or against any query 
source or queried name.

		--karl--
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