[governance] Re: [bestbits] need for regulation ....

[Lee W McKnight]

Hey Guru,

As I have previously stated, competition policy is a purview of states, and at global level, organizations like the WTO; and draft treaties like the TPP, like it or not.

ICANN can set its own - subsidiary - policies in that arena but it is far more likely the Chinese, Indian, French, EU, and US relevant government agencies will have oversight of Google search effects on market competition - and what a coincidence, all of them have a variety of competition policy inquiries into Google search and other practices going on right now.

Of course Best Bits and IGC are free to weigh in on the specifics in each of those cases, and make recommendations for new global public policies, for the global Internet economy also in the competition policy arena broadly speaking.

But, I am more than a little unclear, OK I am seriously confused, if you now are suggesting ICANN should weigh in and be a place that can set that level of competition policy. In a hypothetical future out-of-California state? 

I suggest we are confounding levels of political, and regulatory authority, if we are suggesting that ICANN should substitute, or even have a place at the table, with competition policy matters before the WTO, OECD, TPP, and Indian, Chinese, French, EU, and US governments - to just list the competition policy/regulatory arenas I am aware of where Google practices are in question, there might be more.

To end on a positive/speculative note, if you are suggesting a new UDRP-like arrangement whereby ICANN provides/channels multi-stakeholder input into say WTO/EU?/national competition policy inquiries...well, that would be - different : )

Lee

________________________________________
From: bestbits-request at lists.bestbits.net <bestbits-request at lists.bestbits.net> on behalf of Guru गुरु <Guru at ITforChange.net>
Sent: Monday, March 17, 2014 11:29 AM
To: bestbits at lists.bestbits.net; governance at lists.igcaucus.org
Subject: Re: [governance] Re: [bestbits] need for regulation ....

On 03/17/2014 08:20 PM, Adam Peake wrote:
> On Mar 17, 2014, at 11:05 PM, Guru गुरु wrote:
>
>> David,
>>
>> On 03/17/2014 11:16 AM, David Cake wrote:
>>> On 10 Mar 2014, at 6:26 pm, Guru गुरु <Guru at ITforChange.net> wrote:
>>>
>>>> Dear all,
>>>>
>>>> Not clear, how in Multistakeholderism, where the private sector has an equal footing in public policy making, we will get Google to agree that its search algorithm, as the key factor organising the worlds information/knowledge for all of us, needs to be public knowledge, not a commercial secret. The need for it to be public knowledge stems from privacy/surveillance concerns, because such fundamental knowledge ought to be available as 'cultural commons' that others can take/re-use/revise, fostering competition etc.
>>>   Indeed. It is particularly unclear because many in civil society, or government for that matter, might oppose it becoming public knowledge. Such a course of action would almost certainly lead to many Google searches returning results ranked according to the most industrious search engine optimisation service customers, rather than having at least a reasonable chance of being ranked in a useful way.
>> Adam also mentioned the issue of searches being gamed and I did give a response ...
>
> Hi Guru,
>
> Apologies, I took your reply as agreeing with the points I made, so I didn't bother to reply further.  You agreed to a high probability of gaming occurring... and suggested research.  I took this as you agreeing that you had been too enthusiastic when stating that Google's search algorithm needs to be public knowledge.

Hardly Adam, for any public policy, there will be innumerable
issues/challenges.  the challenge of gaming is obvious and I have no
doubt it needs to be and can be  addressed.

By the same logic, free and open source software should have the maximum
viruses since it the source code is freely available. Paradoxically,
while Windows is plagued with viruses, GNU/Linux is not. One of the
reasons given is that, the open source allows many people to study and
identify issues and help resolve it... whereas this is not possible with
proprietary software.

Do you accept that Google keeping its search algorithm has dangerous
public interest implications - we really dont know what is hidden in the
code used by millions of users and how it may have malignant code that
can serve its commercial (and post Snowden we know how many US IT
companies are hand in glove with the USG) political interest of its
masters.? If yes,  then you need to think of a public interest based
response to this ...  the ball is in your court as well..

Guru

> Best,
>
> Adam
>
>
>

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