[governance] USG on ICANN - no movement here

[Carlos Afonso]

As usual, a well done summary of the situation by Karl. I have been in 
favor of a "network model" for the DNS, since I started dealing with 
these themes in the early nineties, as opposed to the centralized one we 
have today (considered by the powers-that-be as irreplaceable paradigm, 
to the point that many techies with plenty of post-docs in their CVs 
tremble at the mere mention of challenging it, like "the world is 
obviously flat!"). But it is clear to me that extra-technical factors 
impose the continuity of the current paradigm (with technical 
explanations conveniently seduced to defend it).

BTW, Verisign is traded in NASDAQ and is pretty small (it recently 
dropped from the Fortune-1000 companies' list) compared to the 
multibillion-dollar transactions we see today among transnational 
conglomerates. It could very well be controlled by a financial 
speculator from Qatar, China, Russia, or even Brazil :) A curious way of 
moving power over ICANN away from the USA. After all, those "aliens" are 
buying other US companies, including some US banks! Who knows, maybe 
they already own Verisign, which is attractive not necessarily because 
it is a gTLD near-monopoly which keeps its regulator on leash, but 
because it has a relevant e-certification business.

--c.a.

Karl Auerbach wrote:
> Michael Gurstein wrote:
> 
>> It seems to me that the issue here is whether the term 
>> "neo-imperialism"...
> 
> Or, to be more in vogue, "i-imperalism" or "e-imperalism". ;-)
> 
> As my mailbox fill and overflows with the gnashing of teeth and 
> shredding of garments about the US Dept of Commerce statement certain 
> "facts-of-life" come to my mind:
> 
> 1. It is not at all clear that the US Dep't of Commerce has the legal 
> authority to bind the US to any path in this area whatsoever.  (But my 
> government has over the last couple of decades rather lost the notion 
> that legal authority is a prerequisite for anything, sigh.)
> 
> 2. But even if the US Dep't of Commerc does not have the legal 
> authority, certainly the US gov't as a whole *does* have the power to 
> impose its will on ICANN, which exists as a legal entity in California 
> which, last time I looked, is still part of the US.  And even if ICANN 
> were not a creature of US law there is still the fact that Verisign, 
> which currently has the contract to do the root zone, isn't going to 
> move from the US any time soon.
> 
> 3. The political situation here in the US makes it pretty much 
> impossible for any political animal in gov't to advocate, or even simply 
> overlook, any path that would take the ultimate lever of control out of 
> US hands.  The 1950's may be a long time ago to some of us, but the US 
> gov't still wonders "who is the man who lost China" and fears being 
> labeled as having "lost the internet".  Yes, our gov't needs adult 
> supervision, but that's been true ever since 1789.  Nobody should expect 
> that situation to change soon no matter what happens in our fall 
> election this year.
> 
> 4. There *is* a solution that simply causes all of this to vanish - and 
> that solution has, like Dorothy in the Wizard of Oz, always been at our 
> fingertips (or in her case, her toe-tips):
> 
> There is no reason whatsoever that the internet can not have multiple, 
> consistent root systems, each offering up its own perception of the 
> proper set of top level domains (disputes over conflicts of names of 
> TLDs would be handled by exactly the same international mechanisms used 
> today to deal with global brand names, and besides, if you or your ISP 
> don't like what one root zone offers you can simply use one you like 
> better.)
> 
> That system can work, and work without chaos, and it is quite in line 
> with the way that we work as humans in a multi-lingual world.  It is 
> only our own mental blocks that prevent this from happening and 
> obviating any single overlord of names on the internet.
> 
>         --karl--
> 
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