On Sat, 1 Feb 2003, elliot noss wrote:
> TIME OUT******
>
> Great discussion. I don't want to intrude. I just want to give you all
> my position (which may or may not be the "official" Tucows position,
> but is pretty close to it currently) on four things:
>
> - I believe in a single, authoritative root within which all tlds exist
> for the public good and that all registry operators are contractors
> operating in that context (implicit here is a complete rejection of
> first-come-first-served);
>
> - My personal experience has been that ICANN is open and transparent,
> in fact it is by far the most transparent generalist organization I
> have ever seen and I say this both as the CEO of a public company (in a
> world of Sorbannes-Oxley) and as someone who has been quite involved in
> ICANN since its inception. It has been my experience that people who
> are not agreed with or not (in their view) adequately listened to tend
> to then complain about openness and transparency.
Elliot,
I think that you'll find some of the loudest critics have likewise been
involved in the process for quite some time and do not render their
opinions without experience or merit.
I followed the IAHC and it's aborted attempt to gain control of the root.
I submitted comments to the Department of Commerce on the Green Paper. I
participated in mailing list discussions. I attended numerous IFWP
meetings around the globe at a significant cost in time and money to both
myself and past employers, also serving as a steering committee member.
I spoke to Ira Magaziner. I met with Esther Dyson. I was part of the Boston
Working Group. I submitted comments to the D.O.C. on the White Paper. I
authored a letter to Ralph Nader&James Love in response to Esther Dysons'
response to questions posed by them which is recommended reading for at
least three law courses that I'm aware of. I attended several ICANN meetings,
including the one where new TLDs were decided on.
I participated.
Throughout all of this participation, I watched a small group of insular,
manipulative, back-room players succeed in gaining and solidfying control of
what is arguably one of the most important resources on the Internet
using the very openness and input offered by those participating in good
faith against them. This is no better exemplified by the fate of the only
real attempt at global dialogue and development of consensus-based
organizational documents, the IFWP. It was successfully tanked in large part
due to the masterful efforts of Mike Roberts who in his capacity as an
IFWP steering committee member voted to kill further drafting efforts, while
failing to disclose that he had already been selected to run an ICANN
based on a set of organizational documents already created by that same small
group(hi Joe Sims and friends.) That should speak volumes about the
character of the person chosen to head ICANN.
Given sufficient interest, I could fill several pages detailing examples
of such malfeasence, and that's just the stuff I know about. We could
talk about how the board was selected, we could talk about how the
organizational documents were developed and by whom, we could talk about
the countless revisions to the by-laws made after ICANN gained D.O.C. approval,
we could talk about the domain dispute policy, we could talk about the TLD
selection process, we could talk about the board squatters, we could talk
about the laughably named "Internet Consensus Policy" manifestos, we could
talk about one of the few elected board members having to sue to gain access
to basic corporate records, we could talk about the contract for running
.com, we could talk about the killing of the General Assembly, we could talk
about the reduction of publicly elected board members from nine to ZERO. The
list goes on, and on, and on.
For the sake of argument, lets assume for the moment that all of the
issues mentioned above don't exist or that I'm just a lone malcontent.
What then is the current relationship of this obstensibly open,
transparent organization to it's subordinate organizations?
Well, there's the continuing inability to secure contracts with the
majority of ccTLDs who claim a lack of representation and appropriate
consideration of their positions of all things, we have the RIRs issuing
statements challenging ICANNs authority over them, and we have the
IETF/IAB making "ICANN evolution recommendations" that if implemented
would reduce control as well.
It seems then that beyond us mere domain-registrant serfs, there are
individuals and organizations under the ICANN umbrella itself that are pretty
darn unhappy with how things are run.
ICANN to its' credit has recognized this unhappiness and this paragon of
openness and transparency has taken drastic action to address these
concerns which to date has included killing the General Assembly, the
only possible organized voice within ICANN for individuals, and of course
completely eliminating publicly-elected directors.
What input was the public afforded on the issue of eliminating elected
directors? What input was the GA afforded in deciding if it wanted to be
killed or not? The answer to this like so many other issues is: NONE.
That's not the workings of an open, transparent organization. It's a
farce.
> They never say "not open compared to....". TO what? To congress/parliament?
> To the ITU? To the UN? To a public company? To a private company?
Yes "they" have, but people continue to argue about the most
applicable label. ICANN itself has significantly altered it's charter in an
attempt to pass itself off as a "technical coordination body" vs. a
governance organization which would be held to higher standards of
openness, transparency, and representation.
With respects to just domain names, ICANN is potentially empowered to
determine wholesale cost(for any non-cctld,) the supply of names(what
tlds), the terms under which I can register a name, and the terms under
which it can be taken away. Also as a component of these terms ICANN
decides what rights I have related to the privacy of my personal
information.
IP addresses are even more important. As the RIRs are subordinate to
ICANN, ICANN theoretically has control over IP address pricing, terms, and
allocations. This means they potentially control the ability of people to
access the Internet at all.
Making decisons about my rights and my privacy is not the hallmark of
a "technical coordination body." By it's actions it is a
governance/regulatory body, and should have a structure appropriate to such a
role, except that ICANN decided to move even further away from that structure
as part of it's (de)volution. But you know something? None of what I'm saying
is new, or isn't something that has been pointed out repeatedly over the past
several years by far more impressive and eloquent speakers than me.
> Many people complain about the meetings being held in remote locations and
> refuse to see this as being global, but choose to instead infer this is
> about hiding from the public. I hope ALL of those folks (that means you
> Michael Froomkin) will be in Montreal in June for the first ICANN meeting
> ever on the East Coast of North America. There is no excuse for any of the
> shrill critics to not test openness (and please don't compare this to
> the IETF process, which I respect and admire, but which is EXTREMELY
> narrow in scope and subject matter. Try and "access" the IETF as a
> non-geek);
Dave Farber made an observation at one of the early IFWP meetings that
proved to be prophetic: "This is all window dressing." It is truer
today than ever. While there may indeed be value in some of the
constituency meetings for members of those constituencies, no one
otherwise needs to be excused from what is otherwise a complete charade.
Fool me once shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me. Fool me ten or more
times and I should consider professional help for terminal stupidity.
/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\
Patrick Greenwell
Asking the wrong questions is the leading cause of wrong answers
\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/
