[governance] IGC workshops

[William Drake]

MM,

On Jun 8, 2009, at 9:45 PM, Milton L Mueller wrote:

> Bill,
> the disconnect is that NN is not "part of" NGN; on the contrary NGN  
> is a trend that runs counter to it. Your phrasing was confusing.

Sorry, I meant the issue of NN (preserving it) arises in the context  
of the NGN transition, not that NN is a favored approach of carriers  
pushing the transition, which is obviously not the case.

> There's no resistance here to "assessing the potential impacts of  
> trends in the telecom industry..." on the contrary, this is why we  
> proposed and offered to organize an NN panel and why IGP introduced  
> NN into the global IG debate two years ago. So please, climb down  
> from that hobby horse.

Uh, you kinda urged me to climb aboard with the 'Geneva-centric' bit,  
shades of debates past.  So ok, now that we're done talking past each  
other, do we agree it'd be useful to contextualize NN a bit more?

Cheers,

Bill


> Milton Mueller
> Professor, Syracuse University School of Information Studies
> XS4All Professor, Delft University of Technology
> ------------------------------
> Internet Governance Project:
> http://internetgovernance.org
>
>
>
> From: William Drake [mailto:william.drake at graduateinstitute.ch]
> Sent: Monday, June 08, 2009 3:42 AM
> To: Milton L Mueller
> Cc: Governance List
> Subject: Re: [governance] IGC workshops
>
> Hi Milton,
>
> Not sure what the disconnect is here.  NGN is a term used in  
> industry and policy circles world wide to characterize the shift  
> underway from PSTNs to IP-based convergent nets with new  
> architectures and service provisioning models.  An important part of  
> those new models, if the carriers get their way, is to abandon NN,  
> ergo my characterization of the issues as part and parcel of the NGN  
> shift.  Some observers say that NGNs could provide the technical  
> means to monitor and manage traffic in such a manner that all  
> applications are treated on a nondiscriminatory basis, but that  
> doesn't appear the to be preference of the carriers making the  
> investments.  And they're getting their way in various places;  
> governments like the UK's have specifically rejected NN as a barrier  
> to NGN development.  So I was simply suggesting we might want to  
> consider NN in the context of the larger transformation underway.
>
> I've moaned here on and off for years about the apparent aversion to  
> assessing the potential impacts of trends in the telecom industry,  
> including its global governance, on the Internet and IG.  It really  
> puzzles me that we would treat a katrillion dollar industry that  
> controls much of the underlying infrastructure as somehow  
> irrelevant, particularly after all the (semi-coherent) discussions  
> of international interconnection charging and such in WSIS and  
> beyond.  The singular obsession with ICANN---not so much what ICANN  
> actually does, the issues it addresses, but rather what it is or  
> represents institutionally---seems to blot out interest in other  
> issues and leaves the ministries and industry to merrily go there  
> way without any public interest advocacy as a countervailing force  
> beyond purely national discussions.  Since we can't or don't  
> participate in most of the international spaces where this stuff  
> goes on, why would we not want to use the opportunities provided by  
> the IGF to explore these dynamics, especially when they're directly  
> relevant to the focus of the workshop?
>
> Whatever...dead horse duly beaten, back to our regular programming...
>
> Cheers,
>
> Bill
>
>
>
> On Jun 8, 2009, at 6:04 AM, Milton L Mueller wrote:
>
>> No, I just misunderstood your statement that Net Neutrality is  
>> “part and parcel” of the NGN trajectory. What you apparently mean  
>> is that phone companies may be using NGN to _avoid_ being neutral,  
>> which may be true, and is certainly important if it is. I still  
>> don’t know what you meant by “…of which it is part and parcel.”
>> From: William Drake [mailto:william.drake at graduateinstitute.ch]
>> Sent: Sunday, June 07, 2009 12:38 PM
>> To: Milton L Mueller
>> Cc: Governance List
>> Subject: Re: [governance] IGC workshops
>> Hi Milton,
>> On Jun 7, 2009, at 4:49 PM, Milton L Mueller wrote:
>>
>>
>> I agree.  We might want to consider widening the lens an little and  
>> placing NN in the context of the whole NGN trajectory, of which it  
>> is part and parcel.
>> It is???? I hope not. That’s a peculiarly Geneva-centric view of NN
>> Are you saying that carriers around the world are not in fact  
>> making the investments and pursuing the strategies they say they  
>> are---replacing PSTNs with IP core and access nets, trying to move  
>> to QOS and differentiation, etc?  Or that because they adopt the  
>> standards and coordinate on the policies in Geneva, it doesn't  
>> matter that they are doing these things? Or that because in Geneva  
>> they use terminology they may not use as much in the US, it doesn't  
>> matter that they are doing these things? Or that taking note of the  
>> global trends is suspect if one is based in Geneva?  Or...?   
>> Perhaps a peculiarly US-centric view of NN at work here...:-)
>> But forget the term, forget the ITU.  The question is, in the IGF  
>> context, would it be optimal to continue talking about NN as a  
>> stand-alone issue, or might it be useful to view it as part of a  
>> larger set of dynamics in the telecom industry that could affect  
>> the net going forward?
>> Cheers,
>> Bill
>
> ***********************************************************
> William J. Drake
> Senior Associate
> Centre for International Governance
> Graduate Institute of International and
>   Development Studies
> Geneva, Switzerland
> william.drake at graduateinstitute.ch
> www.graduateinstitute.ch/cig/drake.html
> ***********************************************************

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