[governance] How cooperation could be defined ?

[Suresh Ramasubramanian]

In Congo's case I do appreciate their intent in making domains free to use for local citizens and severely restricting its use as a vanity domain or as an instrument of speculation

While I defer to McTim's far more detailed on the ground knowledge of africa, I am glad to see he agrees here

--srs (iPad)

On 17-Dec-2012, at 5:38, McTim <dogwallah at gmail.com> wrote:

> On Sun, Dec 16, 2012 at 4:32 PM, Dominique Lacroix <dl at panamo.eu> wrote:
>> Dear McTim,
>> 
>> I'm going to answer also to a former post where you said that you saw how
>> Isoc makes great efforts to help developping countries, in the field of
>> capacity building and GIX creation.
>> I beg your pardon. I could not find time enough to answer earlier.
>> 
>> Please, don't understand what I'm saying as a personal reproach. A big part
>> of my family was colonial actors in Vietnam at the beginning of the XXth
>> century. I can insure that the most part of the colons were absolutely sure
>> that they were helping the country where they were living.
>> 
>> US IT companies do have great interests in the growth of the African market.
> 
> Well, I would say that they used to (and some still do), but that market is now
> (to a great extent) dominated by the Chinese.
> 
> Having said that, ISOC is not a US company.  They are a global
> non-profit with local staff in
> South Asia, Africa and South America, as well as their EU and US offices.
> 
>> 
>> After all these efforts to help African countries to get into a connected
>> way, how is it that Africa connected people number is 15,6% compared to
>> 78,6% in North America?
> 
> 
> Perhaps it is a better question to ask what the pen rates were before
> ISOC started their efforts.
> 
> I'm not sure penetration rates are the best metric to use in
> calculating the effects of folks like ISOC, but you could try.
> 
> In fact, you would find that they have risen a great deal in the last
> few years.  I'm not claiming cause and effect tho.
> 
> 
>> You can verify the stats there: http://www.internetworldstats.com/stats1.htm
>> 
>> It's not incompatible with a handful advanced countries, some great IT
>> companies and a lot of excellent researchers.
>> Plethora of graduates is actually a sign of contemporary "underdevelopment".
>> 
>> Did you ever try to subscribe an Internet connection at an African ISP?
> 
> 
> yes, several, and I worked at one as well.  I can give you chapter and verse on
> why Access is so expensive in parts of Africa, and it's not because of
> the greed
> of Northern companies!
> 
> In fact, my WISP in Nairobi was faster and cheaper than my current DSL
> link in the USA.
> 
> Progress is being made on pricing, mostly in mobile access.  Aluta
> Continua, as they say.
> 
> 
> Or
>> to buy African domain names?
> 
> yes, in several ccTLDs
> 
> 
>> 
>> Send me 693 €, I'll buy for you a mctim.cg. Sorry, mctim.cd is cheaper: only
>> 115 €.
> 
> 
> I don't think it is ISOCs mission to make ccTLDs cheaper.  They do
> however train
> ccTLD managers in their workshops (for free), so in that sense, those
> domains should
> NOT go up in price because their staff need tech transfer training.
> 
> In fact, you can't blame ANYONE in the North/West for this pricing,
> you have to talk to these folks:
> 
> https://www.dnsafrica.net/cgi-bin/pricing.pl
> where:
> 
> "The registration of a domain is free of charge for the citizens of
> Congo, who are resident locally. "
> 
> "For foreign entities :
> 
> First Year 225 Euros per domain
> Next Year 225 Euros per domain"
> 
> 
> 
> And for .cd:
> 
> http://www.nic.cd/company_info/CD/aboutCD.jsp?about=price
> 
> Price list
> 
> "Pricing for applications and renewals
> 
> 1 year:     65 USD
> 2 years: 130 USD
> 3 years: 195 USD
> 4 years: 260 USD
> 5 years: 325 USD
> P.S: The above prices are for normal domain ONLY. For premium domains
> (3 Characters and less):
> 
> 3 characters/year: 325 USD
> 2 characters/year: 650 USD
> 1 character/year: 1300 USD"
> 
> And now I see Suresh has weighed in with
> "pricing distortions introduced by government enforced monopolies,
> possibly combined with lack of market demand that pushes up costs by
> not allowing the provider of such services to leverage economies of
> scale.  Which are both a significant factor in the high Internet
> access and domain name prices that you see across large parts of
> Africa."
> 
> which is the answer in a nutshell.
> 
> 
> -- 
> Cheers,
> 
> McTim
> "A name indicates what we seek. An address indicates where it is. A
> route indicates how we get there."  Jon Postel
> 
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