[governance] a very grounded and divergent perspective on Net

Sat Dec 27 19:56:07 EST 2008

Hi & best wishes to all for a Happy New Year.

I must agree with Avri & Parminder: TCP/IP as a public/non-proprietary protocol i.e. owned by noone and hence everyone is the defining feature of the Internet. 

That noone owns the Internet, and it is maintained by a volunteer group of protocol gardeners, makes it similar to a rose garden in a public park near campus here in Syracuse. The garden is more scenic in summer, while the Internet can bloom year round, so I guess the analogy doesn;t quite hold. But I'll dig a bit deeper anyway.

That this thin public layer, maintained by many private individuals, enables private (as well as public including governmental) innovations above in applications and services and below in physical network technologies is what makes it valuable and useful.  There I agree with Milton. So yes the 'Internet' exists across many private, and some public networks and that is a most beneficial feature - but the thin line is all of ours.  Even if we stay out of the protocol dirt.

And we can tip our caps to the IETFers who have maintained and extended the Internet over the years through excellent protocol gardening, without automaticaly agreeing with McTim that that is all that is needed for the Internet to grow in 2009 and beyond. 

Lee

________________________________

From: Parminder [mailto:parminder at itforchange.net]
Sent: Sat 12/27/2008 8:07 AM
To: governance at lists.cpsr.org; Milton L Mueller
Cc: Michael Gurstein; Brian Beaton; steveinfos at gmail.com
Subject: Re: [governance] a very grounded and divergent perspective on Net

>>We need to develop and anchor such basic principles that maximize the possibilities of the Internet as a new revolutionary network - whose central >> characteristics  (mentioned in social rather than technical terms) should be that

>>1.   In terms of ownership - it is public

>As I have explained numerous times, the essential characteristic of the internet is NOT that it is public; the networks and most of the investment are private........ >So >the  critical feature of the internet is in many ways precisely the opposite of what you are asserting.

Milton

First of all, it is clear from my usage above, and the background of this issue in the 'publicness of the Internet' concept, that I speak of Internet being public not in strict legal ownership terms, but in socio-political terms. So you think the essential characteristic of the Internet is that it is private ?? I do suspect so from your views on network neutrality, but I will come to that in a seperate email. 

Your counter-arguments to my propositions are a bit slippery, and shifting. When confronting the 'ownership' issue (not legalistic-ally, but as everyone having in principle full and equal right to) you speak of the Internet as the physical networks. And when I speak of the 'purpose' of the Internet, you switch to speaking of the Internet as its essential protocols. Thats a bit, shall I say, disingenuous :-). Because if we speak of Internet as its essential protocols it is easy to agree about the publicness of the Internet. On the other hand, if we speak of it as physical networks built with private investments it is easier to speak of its purpose - which is private gain, with no guarantee of public interest and gains. 

This brings us to the essential issue which my email dealt with - trying to figure out the essential nature of the Internet, as we would like to have, and from their possibly derive the basic public policy principles for it. Would you not agree that this will be the logical way to go about it. I know you too are quite interested in developing the basic public policy principles for the Internet. Would you then state what you think are the essential characteristics of the Internet, and then we can debate it. 

>The STANDARDS are open and nonproprietary, but they are useful only because they allow any and all private networks and privately owned equipment to be >interconnected. 

Any public system - roads, infrastructure of the market, laws, etc - are useful only because they facilitate private individuals. Everyone knows that. This does not obliterate the difference between the public and the private, does it!

>However, because the TCP/IP protocol suite's ability to connect networks initially outstripped the understanding and capacity of governments to regulate....

and the understanding and the capacity of the corporates to appropriate.

> one could say that its effect was more libertarian than egalitarian. But its uniform, open nature did indeed level the playing field and afford those interested in >communicating more equal rights than they have ever had before.

This is interesting. You say that the socio-political impact of the Internet was incidental. Fine, I may accept that, but you also seem to be non-committal about how it should be, hereon. Don't you want the Internet to have any (socio-political) directions and purpose. If you do want to it to have any, would you please state it. The whole debate is about that. That is what we all are where about.

>more libertarian than egalitarian.

Now, this is fair turf. This is really what we are discussing, the above was mostly avoidable red-herring. (Though the term 'libertarian' is used by so many different types, that it often confuses me. I understand you are professing views more of what may be called as right-libertarian kind. Please correct me if I am wrong, in India we are still not very used to these terms). Since we want to keep our discussion practical, and purposeful, I think a very good instantiation of the above political difference is in our views on network neutrality. Will discuss in another email. 

parminder 

Milton L Mueller wrote: 

	Parminder:

	Happy holidays, all. Sorry for the slow response. 

	It seems that we have had this conversation before, and you always have to agree that I am right but it never seems to make an impression on your political rhetoric. So I will try again (because
	I am just as persistent as you, and will not allow policies or principles that are incorrect to be established simply because someone keeps repeating them.

	We need to develop and anchor such basic principles that maximize the possibilities of the Internet as a new revolutionary network - whose central characteristics (mentioned in social rather than technical terms) should be that

	1.   In terms of ownership - it is public

	As I have explained numerous times, the essential characteristic of the internet is NOT that it is public; the networks and most of the investment are private. The STANDARDS are open and nonproprietary, but they are useful only because they allow any and all private networks and privately owned equipment to be interconnected. It is, in other words, the correct mixture of private and public elements, in their respective roles (to quote the TA) that makes it a success. The open protocols allow private initiative to flourish, and enable people to offer content and services without asking the public for permission. So the critical feature of the internet is in many ways precisely the opposite of what you are asserting.

	I know that this does not conform to your ideology, but it's a fact. 

	2.   and in terms of its key purpose, and orientation - it is egalitarian (definition of 'egalitarian' from The American Heritage Dictionary - "Affirming, promoting, or characterized by belief in equal political, economic, social, and civil rights for all people")

	Again I think you've got it wrong. 

	Strictly speaking, the internet protocols do not have a "purpose" other than to establish compatible data communications among any and all networks. However, because the TCP/IP protocol suite's ability to connect networks initially outstripped the understanding and capacity of governments to regulate, one could say that its effect was more libertarian than egalitarian. But its uniform, open nature did indeed level the playing field and afford those interested in communicating more equal rights than they have ever had before. 

	Once we agree to these highest level principles as those most essential to what we call as the Internet - their contextual elaborations can always be done, in different circumstances and as related to different issues and aspects. No doubts, such elaboration will itself be a political process, subject to political trade-offs. The question is, are we as a world community - and to start with as a group of progressive civil society - able to agree to these (or any other) social and political principles to be the highest constitutive principles for the Internet. 

	I can agree on principles when they are articulated with a full, exacting respect for the technical and historical facts. 

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