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US Govt Wants to Control ICANN?
blankmange writes "ZDNet is covering a new piece of legislation that may be introduced by Sen. Conrad Burns that would give the US government more control of ICANN - the independent corporation that controls the domain-naming system of the internet. 'In a statement released two days before a Senate subcommittee is scheduled to hold hearings on the global body, Burns said the change was necessary because ICANN has exceeded its authority, does not operate in an open fashion, and is dangerously unaccountable to Internet users, businesses and other key interest groups.'"
As messed up as it is I still don't think we want the government to take control of it. Doesn't ICANN deal with international business and domains? Why should our government have control over it?
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ok, we all realise that ICANN needs to be changed, but the US government? HELL NO. It would make things worse. Instead ICANN should be revised into a democratic body of some sort. It would be difficult to set up, but necciasary. The ISPs, internet users, and buisnesses would all have to be fairly represented. Any ideas?
The US government should not control ICANN, it would be dumped into the FCC and regulated to hell. The internet would become even more difficult to use. Its already hard enough to start a small local ISP, what else will this screw up?
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ICANN is more evil than the Government. Granted it would be better if it was transfered to an international body to better reflect the international community that the Internet has become, but the US government is certainly a step in the right direction. Our government is supposedly of, by, and for the people. ICANN doesn't have such obligations. God I hate them.
-- Thou hast strayed far from the path of the Avatar.
Talk about coming full circle. ICANN was spun off of the U.S. government so it could be more independant and directly accountable to the Internet's user base; now the latter reason is being used to confiscate ICANN's independance.
I think we of the Internet community have been reminded of a tragedy of human existance... Where you have idealism, you have politics. In trying to de-politicize ICANN, it ended up being an excessively political body instead.
ObTroll: I'm now waiting for the protests from the UN, China, et al, that the U.S. is trying to exercise soverignty over the 'Net. (And the current U.S. administration using the War On Terror(TM) as the justification for doing so.)
Those who complain about affect & effect on
When the US Govt. gave up what power they had over the domain system, it went to shit. Netsol messed it up, ICANN is messing it up even worse.
I say let the NSF do it again.
Oh please. You know, for all the corruption, backdoor deals, conspiracies, etc, etc private companies have infinately more legistlation in place to protect their ability to do shit behind your back. I will never understand why people fear/dislike their government more than private companies who never even have to let you know anything strange is going on unless they get caught.
Kinda hard to knock the government when the problem in this case is clearly that the body is operating more like a company than a regulatory body as it should be.
Government 'n business may be in cahoots, but at least there are still some laws that force the government to be open about its dealings, even if its not always effectively enforced or followed. Aisde, there doesn't seem to be much public push for making soft donations 'n influence of that nature public, so we can lay the blame there on ourselves.
I'm not saying the government is perfect, but it seems to be that private, even public companies, are in an infinately better position to manipulate your opinions and consent, and not be held accountable for it. Hell, MS's potentially illegal OEM agreement is/was marked as a trade secret, so nobody could look at it. What a joke. I'll trust my government more than companies any day of the week.
"Old man yells at systemd"
Great! Just what we need. The Govt and it's beauracracy and politics. How about just slapping ICANN around a bit, so they get their act together.
I'd rather see the Amish in control of ICANN
They're only trying to maximize US control of the internet. If you consider the history of the current administration on international matters, you could argue that they certainly do not represent the world opinion any more than the ICANN does.
.com, .net and .org domains.
If we really want a good ICANN, reform UN and then put ICANN under their control. That way, the rest of us won't be f*cked if the next administration decides only US Citizens can control
Stop the brainwash
The reason that people fear and dislike the government is because the government doesn't care about the implications of what they do. Remember, this is the government that passed the DMCA, is behind the FCC on the broadband mess, and is trying to pass the SSSCA. It is obvious that the government (1) Does not have any idea about technology and the internet (as previously stated) or (2) they don't care and they are looking for short term power and regulation. ICANN *may be* operating outside of its authority, but at least they are not the caniving senators who are trying to pass legislation inhibiting the growth of technology. As for trusting the government more than companies any day of the week , how about trusting neither and using intellect to figure out what in the world is going on.
Me: We need to look at expanding and upgrading our infastructure. Boss: Wart is dar interweb? Write me a report.
Dubious, and I don't mean George.
Through law, one way or another there is government control (ours or someone else's govt.) of just about everything, now.
What we need are some serious lawsuits to clarify the rules or non rules.
I for one want to go back to some rules that should never have been changed and another that should have always been.
Rule one - First come first served.
The heck with who owns a copyright or trademark, this is a seperate space.
You want it, get in line, get in line early, if you miss out try to buy it, if you can't buy it, rent it or come up with something else.
Rule two - One Domain name per customer.
dove.unilever.com is just fine, the space for dove.com should belong to someone else.
'www.' should be depricated.
Rule three - The name must be in active use.
The lack of this rule has created squaters, and ties directly into the previous two rules.
Somebody had the rules system pretty close to right in the begining, too bad they wrecked it.
And last the rule that never was, but should have been.
You should register once, only once.
Renewal is a form of extortion at worst, taxation at best, and really creates a situation in which the root registrar is the actual owner.
This is a public database, registration fees are understandable, but after it is registered, administration is trivial and should be financed by the folks who are pulling daily feeds for the BIND servers that are actually routing it commercially.
Off the soapbox.
Didn't the government give it to ICANN in the first place? And now they want it back? Come on guys, make up your mimds... or was it a different part of the government that originaly had it? I don't understand why ICANN isn't just given to the canadians.
-- OMFG = Oh My Floatse Goatse
A net without US script kiddies, self-important housewives, the NRA, the US arms of the MPAA and RIAA spamming P2P networks... Mmmm. :)