[governance] Russia plans to create independent web / internet

[Milton L Mueller]

> -----Original Message-----
> From: venimarkovski at gmail.com [mailto:venimarkovski at gmail.com] On Behalf
> Of Veni Markovski
> 
> I think it is more important for the Internet world the fact that .ru
> has an Accountability Framework agreement with ICANN, that www.rans.ru
> has good  working relations with ICANN, ISOC, ITU, and is now getting
> the information about the IETF ISOC's fellowships to the Russian
> engineers, etc.... than some article about something that someone has
> said.
> 
> Hope you'd agree on that.

I do agree that the development of stronger relationships between ICANN/ISOC/IETF and the Russian ccTLD manager and technical community is important. These ties, fellowships, etc. should be encouraged.

However, these linkages could easily be superseded or broken if they start to run counter to higher-level government, military and economic interests in specific nations. So I still think this article is a potentially significant signal. True, the sourcing of the smoke signals is flimsy as you point out, and from my many years of China-watching in the mid-1990s I am familiar with all the tricks. But that experience also teaches that where there is smoke there is sometimes a developing fire, so we need to be alert.

As you probably know, there is often a disjunction between the attitudes of more cosmopolitan professional communities (scientists and engineers, for example) and what plays politically in specific nations, especially authoritarian nations. 

A Ph.D. student here at Syracuse, YJ Park, has done a study about the way different countries participate in the ICANN regime. The pattern revealed by ccTLD managers' participation in ccNSO is quite different from the pattern of governments' participation in GAC. That paper will be presented at the GigaNet symposium Nov. 11th. 


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