
Kroes will want answers about proposed domain rights for the new dot.wine and dot.vin top level domains (TLDs)
I call bags on the s.wine domain.
Europe’s digital chief Neelie Kroes will reiterate her commitment to “international governance of the internet” later today – that’s code for a smaller role for the US. The European Commissioner will represent the EU at the ninth Internet Governance Forum (IGF) in Istanbul, Turkey, next week and will push for a more “global …
The US has recently asserted their control over the .com .org and .net domains in several court cases. So I don't see ICANN's role changing much. There are also agreements in place which guarantee continued US government involvement. Making changes to that aspect of the internet is just going to be more talk.
As it stands now, the way the US is controlling the net doesn't seem so bad. I'm certainly no fan of the US, but in this case it's certainly better than some alternatives - at least in actual practice. US dominance of the net is another story. I don't see that changing until we all start learning Chinese. In other words, not for a while yet.
The reason it doesn't seem so bad is that no viable alternative has been suggested. If I saw something good on the horizon, I'd get behind that. The UN is US controlled, and the ITU is UN controlled. Besides the ITU is beholden to the telcos and not the people. With things like the "affirmation of commitment" between the US Dept of Commerce and ICANN, there doesn't seem much hope for that aspect of the net to change in the immediate future. Any (realistic) suggestions?
The "Snowden thing" is another issue. I think we can do something about those problems.
"The US has recently asserted their control over the .com .org and .net domains in several court cases."
Can you please give specific citations to prove this statement?
"So I don't see ICANN's role changing much."
Since NTIA has specifically said that it wants to drop its existing contract with ICANN next year, there is certainly a good chance of significant change in ICANN's chain of accountability. And its role is mainly independent of its agreement with NTIA anyway.
"There are also agreements in place which guarantee continued US government involvement."
Again, please give specific citations.
I quite like the idea of being well-paid to sit and talk about how we can talk less. Even better would be to be well-paid to pretend to listen to people talking about talking less while "taking notes" (doing my own thing) on a laptop. Three jollies per year to all kinds of interesting locations. I'd subcontract the actual, mundane, talking notes and "doing stuff" to my lovely and well-paid assistant, of course.
One of the European Commission’s targets at the IGF is to move it on from being “a mere talking shop”.
“The time is ripe to produce outcome documents, such as policy recommendations for voluntary adoption,” said a Commission source.
So rather than making statements that nobody pays attention to, they'll be producing documents that nobody pays attention to. PROGRESS!
Well at least in theory, governments are supposed to represent their people. Are you saying that the majority of users of the internet (i.e. not US citizens) don't deserve a say in how they use it?
I sympathise that governments often do a crap job of meddling, but what else are you suggesting, anarchy?
The U.S. has done a wonderful job of creating the internet. CERN (Centre for European Nuclear Research) has done a wonderful job of creating the world wide web.
It's time to grow up and share your toys boys.
The problem with sharing is that it assumes both of the parties involved will at least somewhat cooperatively which certainly isn't the case in practice. Time and again we see the bad actors maneuvering to the bodies which, in theory, are critical of those state's bad acts. Rights bodies being the case on point. I would expect no less than seeing China, Russia, Saudi Arabia and all of their cohort plopping down on whatever regulatory body arises to "manage" the internet.
This completely discounts those that would want to plop down to get an revenue source from the 'net to fund all of their activities.
"If they want control of something, then they are more than welcome to make their own network."
The network is already autonomous - it's the DNS that the US control - though if they did something really mad, a split could be made - the infrastructure is already in place [non-US run root servers all over the world] - the sticking point would be to get everyone to stop using the US root-servers, which you may argue is a virtual administrative impossibility.
"Last March, the US announced that it would work towards a multi-stakeholder model of governance by autumn next year."
"The Commission will also want to talk about future funding for the IGF secretariat, whose mandate runs out in 2015 and which relies on voluntary funding."
Let's review this in, say, ten months. No? You won't exist then? Pity.
I can see this taking a very very long time to change and get right. We have institutions like NATO and WHO that bring together a reasonable number of countries with a common agenda but I can't think of anything where there is world wide ownership (or I suppose more accurately governance) which is what the Internet needs.
It's interesting because if they can find a model that works something similar could be applied to other world wide issues like climate change and mercury pollution. At the end of the day we're going to have to do something about all of these problems so getting the model right with something people care about is a good place to start.
I know this is a seriously radical idea but one way to tackle this issue might be to build a massive floating island that is kept out in the middle of the ocean. I can see one of the biggest sticking points being where the governing body is based and putting it on neutral ground would be a good start. Failing that stick in in Belgium ;-)
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Naw, the solution is easy. An AI internet which will handle its own governance. Just don't piss it off!
No joke, it's already happening.
Robo Brain Project Wants To Turn the Internet into a Robotic Hivemind
The creation of new TLDs is becoming silly, and is obviously just a money-making scheme. If we need a .wine TLD, then we will no doubt also be needing a .beer domain, .tea, .coffee - and while we're at it how about a .burger and .kebab TLD as well? Obviously the major retailers and producers of those commodities will feel they have to buy a domain or lose market share, and so instant money for almost zero work for the TLD administration organisation.
Dear Sir,
would you care to dig out which actors are pushing those radical changes, and which radical changes these are?
I would like to propose radical changes to the way acting is performed as well. Less of the multi-million dollar payouts (so that I can go to the cinema for a fiver rather than a tenner) and more time spent in class while not acting (so as to keep these people off the streets). I have no notion whatsoever about acting. I am assuming that actors have no notion about governance of the world wide web or internet.
Regards,
Guus