Ronda, > The Committee on Science subcommittee on BASIC Research hearing on > March 31 [1998] had some statement to the effect that the U.S. Govt > officials couldn't set up a corporation like the FCC-Schools and > Libraries Corporation. > > That this was in violation of the Government Corporation Control Act. > > Were the Green and White paper issued to try to go around that law? > You have to go by 'the letter of the law.' It doesnt say USG cant simply give assets to a private corp, only that it cant *create* the corp to give them to. Conflict? What conflict? Its interesting reading, nevertheless: ======= http://commdocs.house.gov/committees/science/hsy090140.000/hs y090140_0.htm [Mr MAGAZINER: W]e proposed the adding of five names, and then a second question came, which was, in the CORE proposal, for example, there is one group, essentially one organization that would manage the databases for all registry top-level generic names, and it would be a nonprofit organization, I think in the public trust, is the way it's described? There are good arguments to go in that direction, but the concerns were that if you have just one organization managing all the registration databases, that you wouldn't have the benefits of competition and the kind of innovation that competition can bring, and the efficiencies that competition should bring. So, what we proposed, based on those arguments, was that you would allow five new organizations to come into existence, each of which was managing a name, a generic top-level name, and you would have NSI continuing to manage the database for .com, although it would have to allow anybody to register into it. And then you would have at least six competitors, and that would exist only during an interim period. After the interim period, once the new organization gets up and going, it will review all these policies so that what we were doing was just for a transition period, to get competition moving. And in that sense, I guess what's being said is that it sets up monopolies because you'd have only one organization managing the database for a name, a specific name. That's true. On the other hand, the CORE proposal would have only one organization managing all names, nonprofit. [...] Chairman PICKERING. Thank you. There are two objectives that have been raised in the panel discussion. One that we need to make this transition as quickly as possible, and we need to remove the government involvement, and get a new structure in place, a new protocol, new dispute mechanisms in place as quickly as possible. As many of you know, the NSF/NSI cooperative agreement expires today. I believe, at least my understanding is, that it will automatically extend 6 months. Mr. Magaziner, do you think that we can have a new system in place by September 30? Can we have the consensus? Mr. MAGAZINER. Well I though our goal is to get as close to that as possible, and what we've done as a safeguard in our proposal is to say that the contract would not be renewed as of September 30, and that there would be some oversight of the Commerce Department, which would continue for a limited period of time, until the new organization and the new system were fully up and going. It would be our desire for that to be as limited a time as possible, but if we're concerned about stability, we've got to make sure that we just don't pull the plug on this system before the new system is in place. That would be, in our view, irresponsible. Chairman PICKERING. To that end, is there any legislative authority that you may need, for example, if there's a new nonprofit entity that will help in the organization or setting up the new structure? There is a ruling within the FCC that when they tried to set up a similar program to administer the links to schools and libraries, that they�it was a rule that they did not have the authority to do so. From your interpretation, do you have the authority, currently, to establish a nonprofit entity to do this, or do we need to take some legislative action in this regard? Mr. MAGAZINER. Let me ask the Commerce Department about this. Ms. BURR. Thank you. I think there are two questions of authority here, but the Green Paper does not call for a government- chartered corporation or for the government to establish a corporation. Rather, it calls for a private-sector developed not-for- profit corporation based on membership associations. And under that plan, government authority would not be needed to create that corporation. Chairman PICKERING. How would this be different from the FCC- created nonprofit corporation for schools, referred to as the Schools and Libraries Corporation? GAO recently issued a legal opinion stating that the nonprofit corporation was created without statutory authority and in violation of the Government Corporation Control Act. Ms. BURR. The FCC actually established those corporations. The FCC incorporated them, worked to draw up the bylaws and charters and all of that, and was involved in the creation. And that is not what is proposed in the Green Paper. This Green Paper calls for a private sector established� Mr. COURTER. Can I comment on that, Mr. Chairman? Chairman PICKERING. Yes, Mr. Courter. Mr. COURTER. Thank you. The private sector has established one and it's CORE. I mean, I guess that's my major point. We don't have to wait to do it. It took 18 months, cooperation of everybody involved with the Internet around the world, and it's done. The one major criticism or concern that Mr. Magaziner had with respect to the CORE proposal on this whole issue�and we, obviously, are the most free-enterprising, competitive of the proposals I've seen�is the fact that he would like more than one registry. And we would invite that, as long as those other registries have standards, as CORE has imposed its own internal standard, that would not be a problem. So I would hope that we could sit down, Mr. Magaziner, the Commerce Department, perhaps you, Mr. Chairman, and resolve this thing in a very short period of time. Chairman PICKERING. Thank you. Dr. Kahn. Mr. KAHN. Yes, if I could just briefly comment. I think that the fundamental issue here, ultimately, is governance of the Internet, and that the essential element that's going to show up here is not whether this is private sector versus government, or even whether there's a need for oversight; everybody agrees that that's the case. | And I suspect | that almost everybody would agree that that oversight ought to be | in the private sector, too. The question is what happens when the | oversight doesn't work properly. And that's the place where I think | there's been very little discussion. If you look at the different | plans, they're not very clear about that�both of them. In the case of the CORE plan, the ITU is a holder of an MOU, but my understanding is that the plan is not for the ITU to be able to weigh- in in any significant way, and I think many people would probably raise some objections if they tried to, for a variety of reasons. And the same thing will have to work out in the Green Papers, exactly what that oversight mechanism is. So, until you can resolve that, it seems to me it's really hard to know exactly what the right structure and plan and process is to put in place. [...]
