[governance] The End of the Internet in 2012?
JFC Morfin
jefsey at jefsey.com
Fri Dec 19 09:17:16 EST 2008
Dear "Isolated",
I fully agree with you. The most balanced and authoritative
evaluation of the problem is what IAB writes in RFC 3869. They states:
"The principal thesis of this document is that if commercial funding
is the main source of funding for future Internet research, the
future of the Internet infrastructure could be in trouble. In
addition to issues about which projects are funded, the funding
source can also affect the content of the research, for example,
towards or against the development of open standards, or taking
varying degrees of care about the effect of the developed protocols
on the other traffic on the Internet. At the same time, many
significant research contributions in networking have come from
commercial funding. However, for most of the [IAB R&D priorities
listed] in this document, relying solely on commercially-funded
research would not be adequate."
This is why after having urgently contained at IETF and ISO a set of
poor commercial initiatives endangering languages and cultures in
cyberspace, I:
- have initiated the IUCG iucg at ietf.org mailing list,
https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/iucg
- am concerting with IESG over the organisation and charter of the
http://iucg.org site,
- wait for an IAB decision,
- and submitted an IETF Draft on IETF precautionary duty and the
necessary participation of users and people
(http://www.ietf.org/internet-drafts/draft-iucg-precaution-00.txt).
It is necessary to take advantage from past experiences. However,
history never repeats and the lesson is not only what as happened and
the eventual (necessarily accidental and technical layer dependent)
results, but the level where that kind of things happened and were
decided. If we really want to understand the today's situation we
also have at least to remember things before we were born such as:
the telephone/TV/press history, most of the Cybernetics societal
impact (technical and most of all political, from where date (50's)
the dichotomy between "engineers" and "users", who are not the people
but a new brand of the next epoch (60's) "consumers"), the Internet
architecture as documented (and not documented) in RFC 1958, and the
IETF Internet technology core values (RFC 3935) since the technology
is not what it could be but what respect them [and we have good
reasons why to disagree with their 80's vision].
Lessig is correct. The Internet (hence the virtual and part of the
real world) constitution is in the code. The source code, i.e. what
decides of it: the RFCs. For too long we believed we unable to write
RFCs. This cannot because IETF tries to keep a consistent/coherent
set of the 5.500 - to many for CS - of them. But, we can specify, in
our own visions, words and languages, what the RFC framework should
be. In the exact way you say it: not in opposing but in helping,
guiding, cooperating with other IGF poles. This has a huge advantage
for the IETF: their mission (RFC 3935) is to make the Internet work
better for us. But the only way they have to know if they succeeded
or not, is when we use their propositions or disregard them long
after. Already 15 years for IPv6, 10 for DNSSEC; 20 for some DNS
extensions. The IUCG is about us to telling them _before_ - so they
can work on something more concrete, more along our need and ideas;
and dialog with us, in their own way of thinking.
The difficulty, where I need help now the Charter is finished
http://iucg.org/wiki/IUCG_Charter - is to work-out a site, a method
which can act as an interface between the civil and the engineering
society. To translate our own words (in every languages) into
technical contributions the IESG and IAB can understand and the IETF work on.
This also call for us to determine what HR, privacy, Net neutrality,
spam, names, development, access, etc. technically require. Please
let us not tell we do not know: most of what we legally discuss are
contractual [ICANN], legal [GAC] or application layer [IETF, ex.
IDNA]) patches to a few major lacks of the Internet technology:
no-built-in security, no session and presentation layers. We can
decide to continue that way in better technically organizing it (this
is at least necessary for any transition), to change that (this has a
cost and constraints), and how to change it (there are several
possible architectures and "network contracts"). This only is that we
cannot continue for ever to overload a 1983 prototype academic system
with everything _and_ its contrary.
jfc
At 06:21 19/12/2008, Sivasubramanian Muthusamy wrote:
>Hello Karl Peters,
>
>On Fri, Dec 19, 2008 at 12:16 AM, Karl E. Peters
><<mailto:karl.peters at bridgecompanies.com>karl.peters at bridgecompanies.com>
>wrote:
> Very well stated! I might just comment that in many areas very
> soon, and in more later, it will not even be cable, but rather
> wireless providers that carry most of the freight and are best
> positioned to capture their markets.
> In a brief moment of fairness to the cable TV companies though,
> they brought us MANY stations we would never have had, even in
> major broadcast markets, and for some more rural markets where even
> "local" stations were not clear, vastly improved viewing ability
> and convenience. Unlike the internet, however, what preceeded cable
> is still available for free if you live where you can recieve it
> and are satisfied with the limited choices.
>
>
>That is a fair observation. Often in presenting the Civil Society
>views most of us focus only on challenging the negative moves by
>business or government that what we write reads like an attempt to
>depict business or government as evil. The focus was in correcting
>what is wrong so the good things that needed to be said about cable
>companies did not feature in my comment, it is very fair on your
>part to have brought that up.
>
>Most participants of the Civil Society are moderate, balanced
>people. I haven't seen many with a "holier than thou" attitude -
>holier than business and holier than governments.
>Multistakeholderism does not work by asking all other stakeholders
>to stay out of the room. Cable companies have done a lot of good
>work, telcos have done a lot of good work, proprietary business
>corporations in IT and Internet have done a lot of good work, but
>the problem is that many of these companies still fail to see how
>the magic works on the Internet.
>
>At a point of time when hotmail, yahoo and several email services
>were running email services with rules such as log in at least once
>a month to keep your account alive and pay $240 a year for a premium
>account with TEN M E G A B I T S of storage, Google went online
>with most so called premium features inherently bundled in (pop
>access, 9 months between log ins, message forward) and threw in a
>Gigabit of storage for free. Why did google do something so foolish
>as to give away the equivallent in a tiered storage model of a
>possible $1000 or $2000 for free? Fools? Rather intelligent, very
>intelligent entrepreneurs. Just that what did not reach the minds of
>msn and yahoo reached the Google entrepreneurs and they had figured
>out that it probably cost them less than a dollar or some amount in
>that realm to per user to offer all this to the user. Even if it is
>a dollar per user it was still foregoing the 'preemium' revenues
>that were perfectly justifiable under the established norms of
>Internet business at that point of time. But those who continued to
>follow the yahoolike models progressed at a rate that paled in
>comparison with the revolutionary Google model. That is Internet's
>magaic business model that caused the likes of Google and Skype to
>climb way above the traditional enterprises with narrower models.
>(Here I have refrained from commenting on some finer aspects of the
>Google model that requires to challenged)
>
>The Civil Society isn't asking the bandwidth providers shut down
>shop and disappear. All that it is asking them to do is try and
>figure out how the magic business models work on the Internet.
>Thuraya, by the traditional model ought to have been the richest
>telco in the world today, because by far its revneue model was
>superficially the most lucrative model - the user had to be
>something in the realm of $6 per minute even if he or she was
>calling the person next door. What happened? A more visible example
>is that the phone companies progressed to much higher levels of
>inherenet networth and market capitalization as they slided proices
>from a dollar or two per minute to a cent or two per minute (India).
>
>We are pro-business in our suggestion that the business corporations
>move to the Internet model. The magic is intriguing but I can say
>that it works and works well. If you don't belive in the Internet
>magic and instead believe in archaic business practices and assume
>that you will have an internet with free access to eBay and Amazon
>(who will pay to you in bulk backdoor) and charge us to access
>anything worthwhile, the models will fail so miserably that it would
>hurt your own fortunes.
>
> Bringing this analogy back to the internet, now; can you
> imagine a discounted internet service that only brings you ".org"
> access, for example, but for a cheaper price? Of course not! This
> foolishness evident in limiting access for cheaper services in the
> internet is exactly the battle the TLDA is waging for open access
> to bring quality-run non-legacy TLDs to a wider audience, as well.
> We will provide a carefully researched "recommended root" and the
> information needed to make the simple and free changes to recieve
> and offer "more channels" for the same price. Just as with cable
> networks, some will carry better programming or content than
> others. Some may well never be "watched" by most people; but
> everything will be available for those that need or desire it. The
> only resistance will come from those with a vested interest in a
> narrow and controlled market that funnels more of the money to
> fewer end profit makers. ICANN, with its relationship with NetSol
> and a few others is the perfect example of this narrow approach,
> solely in the interest of capturing more dollars.
>
>
>Without going into the nuances, in general, it is NOT unfair on the
>part of ICANN to 'capture' a share of the money from names and
>numbers. The trade reaps revenues from names and numbers and if
>ICANN charges at source a dollar or two, it would help ICANN
>financially sustain itself in the face of a growing administrative
>(or co-ordinative) burden. But in the process it should exercise all
>the caution not to revert the Internet back to the era of DNS war
>and cause the Internt to be an Internet of mutliple Network Solutions.
>
>It may well be this kind of narrowness that makes the "more
>channels" a feature the "renegade" providers can use as a lure to
>draw people from the traditional providers. ICANN has the choice to
>open up to the many well-run TLDs already operating as the initially
>intended "test beds" or to try to grasp ever tighter onto what it
>holds. It is the exactly that very tight grasp, though, that will
>force an ever increasing portion of their subjects to escape to
>fulfill their needs. ICANN can either lead the way as it was
>supposed to do, or get left behind with a few grains of sand in
>their tight grasp and their once controlled empire scattered all
>around them, running free.
>
>Sincerely,
>Karl E. Peters, President
>Top--Level Domain Association, Inc.
>
>
>Thank you
>--
>Sivasubramanian Muthusamy
><http://www.linkedin.com/in/sivasubramanianmuthusamy>http://www.linkedin.com/in/sivasubramanianmuthusamy
>http://www.circleid.com/members/3601/
><http://twitter.com/isocchennai>http://twitter.com/isocchennai
>
>-------- Original Message --------
>Subject: Re: [governance] The End of the Internet in 2012?
>From: "Sivasubramanian Muthusamy"
><<mailto:isolatedn at gmail.com>isolatedn at gmail.com>
>Date: Thu, December 18, 2008 11:52 am
>To: <mailto:governance at lists.cpsr.org>governance at lists.cpsr.org,
>"Fouad Bajwa" <<mailto:fouadbajwa at gmail.com>fouadbajwa at gmail.com>
>Hello Fouad Bajwa,
>
>It is an interesting article that explains in plain language how the
>big bandwidth providers are taking the Internet closer to the cable
>subscription model. Todd Lammle draws an analogy of how the free
>television progressed (or commercially degenerated) to an expensive
>subscription model. I recall an IGF workshop where Virginia talked
>the commercial compulsions on the user forcing the user to subscribe
>to 96 unwanted channels in order to get the four channels that he or
>she really wants to watch.
>These are narrow business models, we as television viewers were
>bought into such models even before we realized what was happening.
>But on the Internet this may not really happen because we are all a
>little more experienced and educated now.
>What sets the Internet apart is the way the user is increasingly
>becoming a formal part of the policy making process, The user is not
>going to be taken in unawares any longer. There are moves by the
>telcos and other bandwidth providers to reshape the Internet into
>one with unfair business models, but I don't feel that it is going
>to be easy for these interests to achieve what they want.
>If such efforts persist and if the user is left with a sitation
>where there are no options or with a few unpleasant options, the
>user would not take it this time submissively. The unpleasant
>outcome for business may not manifest as NEO Internetworks providing
>pirated access - that may not happen given the present trends
>towards technologies and policies for greater security. What is
>likely to emerge is a user owned, alternate network(s) on social
>enterprise models that is (are) well inter-connected, more open,
>more legitimate and even more deeply rooted in the fundamental
>internet values.
>There are business models, well within the present framework for
>neutral and affodable access, that could keep the bandwidth
>providers flourishing. Instead of focusing on such broader business
>models, some business interests lobby and even clandestinely work
>towards narrower business models, but on the Internet any progress
>by such business interests would be suicidal.
>Same can be said of Government policies that are unbalanced. What
>happens when one Government tries to maintain some form of
>supremacy? Is that working with China? Beginning with China a few
>other nationas could fully or partially protest and that could lead
>to fragmentation of the Internet which would lead to a totally
>opposite outcome : rather than enhancing a nation's hold, it would
>end up totally breaking the Internet away from any possibility of
>any further benevolent influence.
>
>It is not in the commerical interest of business coporations to work
>towards a cable-like model and it is not in the interest of
>Governments to seek to maintain an unbalanced form of control.
>Sivasubramanian Muthusamy
>India.
>On Thu, Dec 18, 2008 at 9:22 PM, Fouad Bajwa
><<mailto:fouadbajwa at gmail.com>fouadbajwa at gmail.com> wrote:
>An interesting article that has provoked me to even write a book on
>the subject. What I see here is the emergence of Local or NEOn e
>Internetworks or basically Internet NEO-Clans that will be providing
>pirated or hacked access to consumers that will not be able to afford
>the huge charges imposed by corporations?:
>The End of the Internet by 2012?
>by Todd Lemmle
><http://www.lammle.com/blog/news-and-announcements/22/the-end-of-the-internet-by-2012/>http://www.lammle.com/blog/news-and-announcements/22/the-end-of-the-internet-by-2012/
>
>C
>
>user is driven against a wall, the adverse outcome may not really be
>the emegence of NEO clans providing hacked access, but rather an
>On Thu, Dec 18, 2008 at 9:22 PM, Fouad Bajwa
><<mailto:fouadbajwa at gmail.com>fouadbajwa at gmail.com> wrote:
>An interesting article that has provoked me to even write a book on
>the subject. What I see here is the emergence of Local or NEOn e
>Internetworks or basically Internet NEO-Clans that will be providing
>pirated or hacked access to consumers that will not be able to afford
>the huge charges imposed by corporations?:
>The End of the Internet by 2012?
>by Todd Lemmle
><http://www.lammle.com/blog/news-and-announcements/22/the-end-of-the-internet-by-2012/>http://www.lammle.com/blog/news-and-announcements/22/the-end-of-the-internet-by-2012/
>
>--
>Regards.
>--------------------------
>Fouad Bajwa
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>
>--
>Sivasubramanian Muthusamy
><http://www.linkedin.com/in/sivasubramanianmuthusamy>http://www.linkedin.com/in/sivasubramanianmuthusamy
>
>http://www.circleid.com/members/3601/
><http://twitter.com/isocchennai>http://twitter.com/isocchennai
>
>
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