ICANN Meeting off to Shaky Start in Uruguay

JoeGee writes: "Reuters is reporting that the quarterly meeting of ICANN got off to a very shaky start in Montevideo, Uruguay on Friday September 8th. Protesters claim that ICANN's domain registration policies are creating a "digital divide". A special telephone party line created for members who could not be present at the meeting went unused. ICANN seems to be internalizing the turmoil that has surrounded the non-profit corporation since its inception in 1998."

Comments

Re:telephone line?

[geomcbay]

VoIP just isn't a particularly viable medium for mass communication yet. Its good in certain niche markets, but installing the software, setting up speakers and microphone, etc, is so much more of a pain than just using a phone (though VoIP is, generally, cheaper).

In any case, I'd guess that if their 'call-in' line was VoIP other people would bitch and moan that they were shutting out members from less-industrialized nations who might not have the Internet infrastructure to support decent VoIP.

Not that I'm defending ICANN. Does ANYONE actually support the existence of this group of people? Have they actually accomplished ANYTHING in practice, other than alienating Internet users? They seem to exist solely for the purpose of holding useless meetings in exotic places -- good work if you can get it, but a waste of our time and money in the long run.

Legislating the divide, indeed

[NMerriam]

"It smacks of potentially legislating the digital divide," Levin said.

Bildt took offense at the charge. "There are limits to the amount of rubbish I can take," he said. "Close to half the world has never made a telephone call. I would not tear down the telephone system of the U.S. because of that."

After the meeting, Levin and Izumi Aizu of the Asia Network Research described Bildt's attitude as "paternalistic" and said they were not sure if his committee would take their concerns into account.


Paternalistic, indeed -- nobody is suggesting we "tear down" the internet simply because most people on earth are too poor to afford domain names. They are suggesting that the poor be able to vote or run for office -- hardly a notion I would consider shocking.

Bildt seems to think that instituting a poll tax with only landowners able to vote is the way to increase participation in this democracy? Which version of world history did he study that led him to believe this was at all acceptable in the 21st century?

Stupidest?

[mwillems]

It seems to me that you are overreacting. Socialists ^H^H^H^Hliberals? Not sure it's not just ordinary marketing, not politics.

Sure, in the uk a .co.uk domain is not unusual. But that is becuase it's easier and cheaper, not becuase they prefer it that way. The .com domain is preferable for very good marketing reasons.

• The browsers default to .com. Are you aware how many people start IE or netscape and type "sears" or whatever and wait for the browser to do the rest?
  
  
• You are Aceme building and a competitor gets acmebuilding.com - does that make you havepy to have your .co.za domian or whatever? Methinks not.
  
  
• .com is shorter and hence easier to remember. In marketing terms this is very important.
  
  
• Unlike in the US, many companies abroad do not market locally. A typical Dutch company, for instance, sells to 5 or 6 countries. Holland is so small you can literally drive across it in 90 minutes. What good is a .nl domain? Think Germans know what that is? No way. But .com they understand.
  
  

So, before you (maybe from a luxury position of being American?) tell others they do not need .com domains, perhaps allow them to decide this for themselves. I always thought it odd that some unelected company in Virginia doles out domains, 9-5 EST USA time.

Cheers,
Michael

What's that brown stuff?

[Anonymous Coward]

What a complete load of crap.

But at least the critics are paying attention. Participants here conceded that the issue of public involvement has failed to capture the public's attention.

ICANN had set up a conference-call line so those not in Montevideo could participate, but an operator reported that no one had dialed in.

Hello? McFly? I'm an at-large member, and I never heard of this... Of course no one called an unlisted, unadvertised number. You have to preregister to get the number. It took me a fair bit of searching to find that little nugget of information after reading this article. I'm on the announcement list they say has so few subscribers; I haven't seen any useful announcements.

And if public participation is so low, why do they want to lower it? How many of the current at-large members will remain at-large members once they accept their internal version of the world? The At-Large Study draft doesn't give an estimate. Fancy that.

Flamebait? You bet. They deserved to be roasted alive. This Bildt guy worked for RAND Europe. Hm. Niles is a US ex-Ambassador. Hm. Dandjinou is responsible for the African domain names mentioned in the article. Hm. Many have backgrounds that make me go Hm. Many of the agencies and groups mentioned throughout have ties that give conspiracy theorists major woodies.

At-Large Membership is a sham

[securitas]

I've been an At-Large member since ICANN started the project. Although I am on the announcement list I haven't received a single e-mail about meetings, initiatives or what-have-you in months (at a minimum).

I, for one, am tired of Esther Dyson's self-righteous elitist cronies telling the rest of us how the Internet should be.

I was skeptical but had hopes when the At Large initiative started. I've now come to see it as it is: a sham that gives the illusion of openness and the air of democratic legitimacy to those who willingly turn a blind eye to the autocratic, business-as-usual attitude of the ICANN Board. By the way, here's the text of a relevant rejected post I sent in:

Studies: Public Participation in Internet Policy (Your Rights Online, Internet)

The New York Times informs us that two new reports from ICANN and the Center for Democracy and Technology both say that more public participation is required in policy-making. DUH! The ICANN report says only domain name holders should have rights, while the CDT report says the process should be open to all interested parties. We'll see what happens on Nov. 14 when the reports are tabled at the next ICANN meeting.