Hi Lauren,
At 05:21 PM 7/26/00, Lauren Weinstein wrote:
>Jay, (feel free to forward this if you wish)
>
>We can certainly learn from the past, but we of course can't change it.
>What's done is done, and we can but look to the future. In the PRIVACY
>realm where I've spent much of my time, I've frequently run up against people
>who ignore concerns about privacy and security problems that have been
>brought up, simply because they've considered them to be mere speculation.
>Now that many of those problems have actually appeared, we're suddenly
>seeing more attention being paid to these issues--suddenly they're
>convinced, and some things are (slowly) changing at various levels.
I agree that this is likely to be true,
at least at some level less than 100%.
Would you agree that Corporatism and the
capture of our political process is also
likely to be true, at least at some level?
If so, it is important that you acknowledge
this as one of the many problems we must
consider moving forward. If not, you end
up discounting one of the main reasons that
so many egregious decisions have been made
resulting in ICANN, and you make it that
much easier for these forces to take over
the process again in the future.
>Similarly, it seems that many of the concerns you cite will carry more
>weight this time around, because the current situation has shown that many
>predicted negative outcomes *did* actually occur. A lot more people are
>convinced now that it was not done properly the last time.
We've been down this path several times before.
Each new batch of participants believe that
this time, the process will be different, fair,
and consistent with our collective mythology
about the way our political process works.
Truth is, our political process is broken.
Two years from now, you will be one of us,
repeating these words to the next batch of
newcomers :-(
>I do not accept
>that the game is "fixed" in the manner you suggest, at least not to the
>extent that it necessarily has to play out the same way this time around.
>It's much more obvious what can go wrong now.
"Fixed" was not a good word.
I should have said broken.
How can we expect a broken political system
to establish a new political system that isn't
as flawed as the original?
>Your input *is* much appreciated, and I hope you'll participate in the
>ongoing discussions in all manner of venues. We will obviously not always
>agree, but that's an important part of what discussion is all about...
Agreed -- and thanks again for entering into
this dialog.
I share your appreciation for this process,
as it goes a long way toward building bridges
between the islands of communities that exist
on the Internet.
>--Lauren--
Respectfully,
Jay Fenello,
New Media Strategies
------------------------------------
http://www.fenello.com 770-392-9480
Aligning with Purpose(sm) ... for a Better World
-------------------------------------------------------
"We are witness to the emergence of an epic struggle
between corporate globalization and popular democracy."
http://cyberjournal.org/cj/korten/korten_feasta.shtml
-- David Korten
