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.'"

Comments

Pot? Is that you?

[ObviousGuy]

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.

Kind of like... the government??

Re:Pot? Is that you?

[YanceyAI]

Yes, except the government knows less about the Internet, technology, and what's at stake.

Re:Pot? Is that you?

[SirSlud]

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.

Re:Pot? Is that you?

[evilviper]

You do have a point... However, it should be obvious that private entities are subjected to our laws, while the Government is not.

First, if a company is able to legally lie, and back stab, etc, it's all due to the inaction of our government to properly govern and regulate the businesses. Businesses are there to make money by doing anything they have to within the confines of law.

Second. There are two things that make Governmnet corruption very dangerous. 1. They are an entity that is designed to do nothing but watch out for us. When they start watching out for each other, or a corporation, then people get harmed. 2. They have more power than any company on earth. Microsoft will not carpet bomb your neighborhood just because you didn't read your license agreement. The Government, however, can ammend the constitution, make laws, repeal laws, use force, and CAN essentially do what they please. Currently, all the corruption is kept low-key, however, it won't take a huge leap to allow our officals absolute power over us. I'm not a diehard NRA member, but if the government takes away out right to bear arms (which they sure as hell can), then we have little recourse against our own government, should to worst-case senario happen.

Re:Pot? Is that you?

[SirSlud]

> The government can have you locked up with all of ten minutes notice-- Intel can't.

But Adobe can!

Anyhow, sure, the government can have me locked up with all of 10 minutes notice. People would notice, noise would be made. Realistically, *somebody* has to protect your property rights, or else your car might be getting stolen every other week until material wealth disparty is nearly eliminated. Unfortunately, capitalism does not work without a body that enforces and protects property rights in order to keep the motivations for gaining in material wealth in check. Otherwise your 'right' to gain and become weathier would be judged by your immediate peers and community, and youd have to physically defend your property yoruself from people who feel you dont deserve it.

Ironic, isn't it? The government is the only body that allows companies and humans in general to gain disproportionate amounts of wealth other their peers, the very driving force of the most american system of all, free market capitalism!

Re:Pot? Is that you?

[adam613]

Yes, a company most certainly can get away with imprisioning you. How quickly we forget what Adobe did to Dimitry Skylarov...

Re:Pot? Is that you?

[Reziac]

The difference is that even tho business may be more inherently devious than gov't, the gov't can come charging in with guns and there's not much you can do about it. The worst business can do is sic their lawyers on you. (Well, unless they're the mob :)

Re:Pot? Is that you?

[MartinG]

private companies have infinately more legistlation

And who was it who passed that legislation?

Also, this isn't just about good vs bad intentions. It's about competence. A body whose only business is operation in one specific operational area (ie provate companies) tend to be better in that area than a body who involves themselves in all and everything going on around them (ie, govermnents)

Re:Pot? Is that you?

[neocon]

With due respect, of course the government is subject to our laws. That's what it means to live in a constitutional republic with rule of law and specific limitations on government. I'm not saying there aren't abuses, and we must always be vigilant to fight them, but to say the government is not bound by law is simply incorrect, and is a way of knuckling under to such abuses as do occur.

By the way, take a look at what is required in order to ammend the constitution. This isn't something that government can `just do'.

Re:Pot? Is that you?

[SirSlud]

> the gov't can come charging in with guns

Yes they can. At which point you could fight against them, and nobody would protect them other than themselves. You know, this is when its time for a new government.

> The worst business can do is sic their lawyers on you

Or sell you a product that kills you. The rough part about this is, they are protected by the government in this case. Procedure, laywers, etc. Companies are sued all the time for releasing dangerous products to the public, and yet, you cannot retaliate in a like-minded manner.

Which is why, to me, companies are inherently more dangerous. They have the freedom, leverage, and power to do shit and then influence their body gaurd to protect them. When the body gaurd (government) charges, alone, without its funding partner (companies) joining the fight, I think youd be in a much better situation to protect yourself because all bets regarding what constitutes allowable forms of defense would be off.

Re:Pot? Is that you?

[Vortran]

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.

Of course they're in a better position. The United States of America has the best government money can buy!

What worries me is the idea of "unaccountable to Internet users, businesses and other key interest groups." How in the blazes can you be accountable to both Internet users and businesses? The interests of individual users and businesses (not to mention "key interest groups" - read: 'corporate sponsored lobbies') are diabolically oppposed at the most fundamental level.

Vortran out

Re:Pot? Is that you?

[Spamuel]

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.

Maybe it's for the simple reason that most people work for private companies and they provide a source of income. The government is an organization which simply takes a chunk of that income away. :) At least I can argue with my boss over how much I get paid, there's little wiggle room when dealing with the tax man.

Re:Pot? Is that you?

[ahde]

Jeez--theft does not even out a "material wealth disparity!" Is that the kind of shit do they teach you in those re-education camps these days? It's the other way around. John Gotti and Joseph Stalin and Che Guavera and Adolph Hitler were not Robin Hood! They weren't poor and they did nothing to egalitarianize wealth.

Re:Pot? Is that you?

[ahde]

and within .com. .net, .org, .edu, .mil, .gov
and .cz, .tv, .museum, etc.
and all the other domains run on the US goverment root servers.

Re:Pot? Is that you?

[Phanatic1a]

The reason some of us are more concerned about abuse of government power than about abuse of corporate power is that Coke very rarely sends fighter planes to strafe villages full of Pepsi drinkers.

Re:Pot? Is that you?

[slow_flight]

I understand your point regarding the private ownership of firearms, but I don't agree that you would have any recourse at all against our government no matter how many guns you own. They have tanks, planes, smart bombs/missles, chemical and biological weapons, and nukes. Your 30-06 isn't going to intimidate them at all, IMHO.

Re:Pot? Is that you?

[slow_flight]

Adobe did not lock up anybody. They pressed charges using laws written and passed by the government. The government enforced those laws. Nobody has forgotten, they just understand that Adobe may have requested the enforcement, but they did NOT lock anybody up.

Re:Pot? Is that you?

[Danse]

Yeah, but at least we have a shot at voting the bums out if they fuck things up. Don't have that ability, even in theory, with ICANN.

Re:Pot? Is that you?

[tswinzig]

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

Because a private company can't [legally] break down my door, lock me up behind bars, and confiscate all of my material possessions?

Re:Pot? Is that you?

[Lemmy Caution]

Right. Why pay good money for goons when you can have the taxpayers pay the goons for you?

Re:Pot? Is that you?

[evilviper]

You're seeing it rather one-sided. If THEY were OVER THERE, and WE were OVER HERE, then those kinds of large weapons would make guns ineffective. However, that's almost never the case. When they have a large mob on their front steps, guns are just as effective now as they ever were, and to which ever party posesses them.

Re:Pot? Is that you?

[evilviper]

Executive order #1: Bomb Congress.
Executive order #2: Bomb the federal courts

Yes, yes, an exaggeration... My point is that the government is not regulated by anyone but themselves. Enough corruption, and they can essentially throw the constitution out. Not to mention that widespread corruption in small corners of our government can have great impact... Just ask President Al Gore... Hmm.

And, of course, the people's willingness and ability to fight the government (as a VERY last resort) was mentioned.

Re:Pot? Is that you?

[SirSlud]

> theft does not even out a "material wealth disparity!"

No, but without the government to back property rights, theft would rise as wealth disparity rose. I never suggested it would equalize due to that kind of behaviour - simply that people are more prone to commit theft (or simply property damage for that matter) the worse off they become to their neighbour. I'm not saying its right or wrong - its just human nature and psycology that suggests that wealth disparity will cause people to feel their system is unfair and force them to action (as wrong, unethical, illegal, useless, mob-like that action might be.)

Heck, it even makes mathematical sense - whats the use of stealing (aside from those who commit theft for the psycological thrill rather than the social/material ends) from someone who doesn't have anything more than you do?

Re:Pot? Is that you?

[SirSlud]

I think that argument stopped holding water once companies became fundamentally more powerful and influential than governments, maybe around the early 80s when the like of foreign investor settlement laws began sneaking into trade agreements and such. The rules may be signed by the government, but it is companies, and companies alone, that have the might and influence to purchase laws. DMCA is a perfect example. Take away the money from the companies that lobbied for it, and the government would have never passed it.

Frankly, when I talk about the government, I'm talking about what it SHOULD be, not what it IS. The fact that people are disillusioned with governments having no choice but to be bought out (after all, since companies own most if not all of the media pipelines, where do you think people get their impressions and ideas of whos at fault in all of this?)

The problem _is_ the system, but I personally feel its more in people's disillusionment with democracy, and their fear of limiting the power and scope of enterprise to turn democracy into a reality, rather than the smokescreen in front of the plutocracy we have now.

I personally feel that the problem is were are simply too dependant on the corperate economic machine to maintain the western world's dominance (though we'd be fools to dismantle this power structure without first diffusing the anti-western sentiment common around the world), so while, I think, many people understand and are willing to accept that the government has become the puppet of *large* corperations, they fear what will happen if we begin to try and diffuse or distribute some of that power again. We might lose our precious SUVs, video games, and lattees (or whatever your thing is.) .. or worse yet, get flogged, economically if not militarily, by the next super-power in waiting.

Re:Pot? Is that you?

[bnenning]

But Adobe can!

No, they can't. Nor can MPAA agents haul you away for writing a Linux DVD player. In both cases, they depended on government force to achieve their desires. This is the problem with giving government more power for "noble" purposes like regulating corporations; it is a virtual certainty that that power will not be used in the way that you want it to be.

Re:Pot? Is that you?

[markmoss]

I can boycott a business that I dislike, but it's pretty hard to boycott the government. (It sure didn't work out for Randy Weaver or those people in Waco.)

OTOH, have the government legislate a monopoly for a business over an essential service, and you get monopolistic behavior with no accountability. Like the US Post Office. Or maybe ICANN...

Re:Pot? Is that you?

[Noel]

The interests of individual users and businesses (not to mention "key interest groups" - read: 'corporate sponsored lobbies') are diabolically oppposed at the most fundamental level.

That's exactly why someone needs to step in to balance the interests of all involved parties, and make sure that no party is allowed to exploit the rest. Ideally, that's what a government ought to do. Practically, on the other hand...

Re:Pot? Is that you?

[markmoss]

The Post Office is a monopoly?
Definitely.

What about UPS and FedEx? And Airborn Express?
They are not permitted by law to compete with the regular mail. If you send a lot of letters or lightweight packages, the PO may audit you to see if these were actually "urgent" or could have gone by snail mail...

Re:Pot? Is that you?

[mpe]

With due respect, of course the government is subject to our laws. That's what it means to live in a constitutional republic with rule of law and specific limitations on government.

Laws are only as good as their enforcement. Unless there is a credible threat of force then sooner or later laws will be ignored.

I'm not saying there aren't abuses, and we must always be vigilant to fight them.

So when was the last time the US government was fought?

By the way, take a look at what is required in order to ammend the constitution [cornell.edu]. This isn't something that government can `just do'.

The US federal government has managed to do quite a few things the US constitution would appear to prevent it doing. Including some things they are explicitally denyied the power to do. The way things are going why would they need to ammend a document they can just ignore anyway...

Re:Pot? Is that you?

[mpe]

Well - hold on there! The US Government cannot summarily alter the Constitution - the government is defined and limited by that Constitution.

Do they need to? Consider what happens when the US congress passes a blatently unconstitutional law?

However, if the courts and people are prepared to turn a blind eye to abuses, then the Constitution becomes a worthless piece of paper.

Or worst it becomes a "religious" icon where the words can be quoted without understanding of the meaning.

Re:Pot? Is that you?

[mpe]

Companies can't get away with imprisoning/killing you. The government can have you locked up with all of ten minutes notice-- Intel can't.

But where a company can get the government to do it there is little practical difference between the company doing it. Except that they don't need to accept any responsibility.

Re:Pot? Is that you?

[mpe]

When they find that the majority of people DO NOT VOTE (and the majority regularly do not), government no longer can state it reflects the majority; the majority has not spoken. The voters simply assume the non-speaking did not want to speak and hence can be cowed into a categorical corner, when if they don't speak, you don't know what they said at all.

The thing is that voting isn't exactly "speaking". It's endorsing a person to speak on your behalf. The smaller the number of candidates the more likely it is that voters will consider that none of these candidates are worth voting for. Maybe ballot papers should have a both "none of the above" and "no-one from the political parties of the above"....

Re:And...?

[dirvish]

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?

Change? But how

[littlerubberfeet]

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?

Re:Change? But how

[gergi]

ICANN should be revised into a democratic body of some sort.

Like, uh, the government?

Re:Change? But how

[ahde]

The US goverment is what happens to democratically elected bodies when the people electing them are stupid and wrong.

New Top-Level Domain

[mixbsd]

How long will it be before ICANN are forced to release the .bush TLD?

Re:New Top-Level Domain

[DarkZero]

I'll take its "sister" (heh heh) site, www.showusyour.bush.

Need some context

[The Slashdolt]

"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."

So the government can take this over so they can exceeded their authority, not operate in an open fashion, be dangerously unaccountable to Internet users, businesses and other key interest groups. This sounds like the government is just jealous that another entity has similar incompetence.

Um...

[adam613]

"Dozens of other governments have charged ICANN with being too dominated by U.S. interests"

So the solution is to put it under control of the US government. Does this sound as dumb to everyone else as it does to me?

When I hear stuff like this, I start to wonder what the real motivations are...

Re:Um...

[Alsee]

So the solution is to put it under control of the US government.

This is not any sort of grab by the US govt. The US Department of Commerce gave ICANN a contract to do the job. The contract is up for renewal. If ICANN does not meet certain requirements the contract will not be renewed. The job then falls back to the US Department of Commerce, or whoever they assign the task to.

The US tried to give control away to what was supposed to become a responsible cooperative international body. If ICANN had met it's requirements it would have graduated into an independant international status.

-

Better the Government than a Corporation

[dfn5]

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.

Re:Better the Government than a Corporation

[SirSlud]

> if given to the gov't it would just add to thier already too great power.

Oh yeah, and that power is available to all arms of the government at any time.

[Branch A of US Government:] Hello, the Navy? I dont like my neighbour. Could you send over the Navy SEALs to take him out?

[Navy:] Sure. Want us to get the FBI to erase his life savings, just to add insult to injury to his family?

[Branch A of US Government:] Sure! Man, I love being in the government, we're so darn powerful! We can do anything! Anything, I tell you! Bywuahahahaha!

Dilemma

[lindsayt]

This is a real dilemma. Consider that all the claims the US government makes about ICANN are correct: they're unaccountable, monopolistic, and they certainly don't run things the way they were supposed to. Almost everybody in the /. community can agree that ICANN needs to be reined in.

The US government used to do this job, and back then, it was fine. But of course then the internet was a small space for researchers and academics to exchange ideas.

Our current administration is authoritarian and too concerned about what's moral, correct, and in the best interest of scaring the populace. Free speech == bad in the eyes of the Bush regime.

Add to that the fact that the internet is now worldwide, and the US shouldn't be patrolling the world (though they do it in physical space already - cyber space is a small leap), and it puts us all in a real dilemma.

I guess the real question is, with which stick would you rather be beaten?

Re:Dilemma

[gorilla]

I don't think the government every really did it. Jon Postel did, and he was paid by the government to do so, but it was really just Jon doing the right thing, and the government not having any interest in it.

Re:Dilemma

[lindsayt]

Disclaimer: you may not agree with my leftist views.

A government that holds its own citizens indefinitely without charges on the brig of a ship in South Carolina because of a supposed plot to set off a "dirty bomb" in D.C., despite Constitutional requirements for due process, is what I call an authoritarian regime. A government whose Attorney General feels the need to cover the breast of Lady Justice because it makes him "uncomfortable" is not a group I want censoring my free speech.

Now, you may say that this evidence does not prove my claim. I say it does.

Re:Dilemma

[ryanvm]

Our current administration is authoritarian and too concerned about what's moral, correct, and in the best interest of scaring the populace. Free speech == bad in the eyes of the Bush regime.

Oh bullshit. Where do you think legislation like the CBDTPA (formerly the SSSCA), DMCA, CDA (Communications Decency Act), et al. come from? Hint - it aint the Republicans, it's Hollywood (or as it's known as in Washington - the Democratic Party).

Historically, Republicans have been against legislation that invades privacy. It's the fucking nutballs like Fritz Hollings that you have to worry about.

Re:Dilemma

[karmawarrior]

Oh bullshit. Where do you think legislation like the CBDTPA (formerly the SSSCA), DMCA, CDA (Communications Decency Act), et al. come from? Hint - it aint the Republicans, it's Hollywood (or as it's known as in Washington - the Democratic Party).

You do know that, until last year, the Republicans have had a majority in both houses since 1994.

None of the above bills, those that were put to a vote, could have been passed without the complete support of the Repubs.

Just saying.

What's chilling about the Republicans is not what they do when they're in someone's back pocket, as Hollings is, but what they do when they are not.

Re:Dilemma

[ahde]

I'm waiting to see when the Republican party starts calling itself the Republicanic party.

Re:Dilemma

[slow_flight]

You are of course right about Mr. al-Mujahir not even being imprisoned for 48 hours yet, but it still presents a dangerous precedent.

According to CNN, he was captured on May 8. It is now June 11. Am I missing what you're saying, because it looks like he has been imprisoned for a hell of a lot more than 48 hours!

Re:Dilemma

[Rakarra]

The guy is an enemy combatant, imprisoning him is perfectly legal.

Please, tell me exactly what an 'enemy combatant' is supposed to be. Be specific. Mr. al-Mujahir was a US citizen who was imprisoned. He has not been charged with a crime. The government was quick to point out that there was no plan to detonate a bomb, but that he was 'starting to think of a plan,' and he 'had knowledge of Washington.' Those are the reasons for his imprisonment. In the United States, we do not legally have 'preventative jailing.' That is, the government cannot legally say "you haven't done anything, but we're a little worried that someday you might do something, so we'll toss you into jail just to make sure everyone's safe." That is unconstitutional, and reasonably so. Of course, unconstitutionality is irrelevant if the courts ignore the law (as it did in WWII).

There is a saying to the effect of in time of war, the Constitution is silent.

The Constitution should never be silent, even when we are at war. Besides, since Congress hasn't declared war, we cannot be at war yet.

Re:Dilemma

[Rakarra]

The government didn't want to release the information until now.

Re:Dilemma

[DNS-and-BIND]

Ahem.

Link.

Re:Dilemma

[DNS-and-BIND]

Oh, yeah, forgot. Anyone who swears an oath to a foreign organization and takes up arms against the Constitution automatically loses their U.S. citizenship. It's a law that hasn't been enforced in some time (French Foreign Legion veterans don't have any problem, for example) but just wait.

Everything old is new again...

[DLWormwood]

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.)

Back-door land grab by Big Money, Inc?

[swb]

dangerously unaccountable to Internet users, businesses and other key interest groups.

Any chance that Big Money, Inc. hasn't gotten what they thought they bought with ICANN and is instead deciding that its money goes a lot farther with the Government instead?

Hey. Remember.

[mindstrm]

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.

Re:Hey. Remember.

[Glytch]

One of the problems is trust. How do you trust that the IP you got from "Gnutella, DNS Edition" for randombigsharewaresite.com is actually the right one? Imagine some blackhat setting up a fake site of their own that looks exactly like the real deal, but has a few thousand trojaned apps waiting for download by the unsuspecting. Or those checksums on kernel.org? Are you sure that's the real kernel.org?

Maybe there could be a system where the most common result in a p2p-dns query is used, or maybe pgp-style webs of trust. I dunno. I'm just talking out of my ass. I'm no expert.

Re:Hey. Remember.

[mpe]

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.
But simply handing it back to the US government won't do much to solve the problems. Maybe it's time to start treating DNS domains as being analagous to telephone numbers, thus have the ITU handle all TLDs.

Re:Hey. Remember.

[jrp2]

But simply handing it back to the US government won't do much to solve the problems. Maybe it's time to start treating DNS domains as being analagous to telephone numbers, thus have the ITU handle all TLDs.

I think you are correct, or at least on the right path. I am not so sure I trust the UN (the ITU is a UN entity) anymore than I trust the US gov't or the EU for that matter, but this is at least putting it in the right scope. I am surprised this is the first post I have seen with a UN entity mentioned. The logic certainly stands that such an important international system (the Internet, DNS in particular) should be operated by an international governance body.

The ITU certainly has the credibility, and the ability to put together the technical competence, to tackle this job. Don't get me wrong, the ITU has politics, and the UN has politics, but I think avoiding politics totally is not possible.

I am sure this was considered (at least casually) at one point, I wonder why it did not happen? In theory this seems like the right entity to handle it.

gov't control

[larry bagina]

I'm sure the gov't will do for ICANN what they did for Amtrack.

Re:gov't control

[jea6]

Stop subsidizing them and expect them to be self-funding? Kinda like the US Postal Service?

Bad Analogy. Abort? Retry? Fail.

Re:gov't control

[bnenning]

Stop subsidizing them and expect them to be self-funding? Kinda like the US Postal Service?

I'd say a guaranteed monopoly on delivering first-class mail is a pretty decent subsidy...

That's the catch with ICANN

[jht]

ICANN may be an international body, but much of their authority came courtesy of the US government. It would take a major consensus from virtually all ISP's (in the US and the rest of the world as well) to allow a different body to take control of DNS. Since ICANN's authority came via the US government, theoretically it can be taken away as well. Given the way ICANN operates, that may not be a Bad Thing. It might be nice to have a "do-over" with ICANN and try and get it right this time.

Of course, if Jon Postel hadn't passed on far before his time, we wouldn't be having this discussion.

One interesting point in the article: the GAO rep said that domain name registration had fallen from about $50 to $10 due to ICANN. Check me if I'm wrong here, but I very clearly remember that when NSI started charging for domain names (I also still remember when they were free) they charged $35/year. Not $50. And that's still the price from them today (though they offer longer-term discounts) - other registrars are free to charge what they want and generally undercut NSI.

Re:That's the catch with ICANN

[marxmarv]

Check me if I'm wrong here, but I very clearly remember that when NSI started charging for domain names (I also still remember when they were free) they charged $35/year. Not $50.

Originally they charged $50 per year, $15 of which was deposited into the Intellectual Infrastructure Fund for the use of the National Science Foundation. That $15 was found an unauthorized tax in 1998 in Thomas v. Network Solutions.

-jhp

The stupid thing is...

[mindstrm]

The DNS problem is a simple one to solve.

There are two choices.

1) We are going to keep adding TLDs.
2) We are NOT going to keep adding TLDs.

Period.

The only other time to change a TLD is if the geopolitical world changes, and we need more (or less) cctlds.

Other than that, maintain the root servers, and leave it the hell alone.

Re:The stupid thing is...

[Sloppy]

3) We are going to add TLDs, but very slowly in a controlled manner, in order to create artificial scarcity, thereby creating a sustained market for names. This results in lots of money to be at stake, so that we can both 1) seem important 2) wield power over others 3) skim a little off the top or get kickbacks.

Re:The stupid thing is...

[ahde]

There is one other (small) issue:

1) We are going to allow domains registered under those TLDs to be maintained by their owners
2) We are going to take back domains and give them to those who bribe us or share our political views.

Re:The stupid thing is...

[DNS-and-BIND]

You couldn't be more right. I had the horrible experience of working with Jeremy Porter, ICANN member, and he exquisitely enjoyed wielding power. I saw him use profanity on an internal mailing list when cussing out someone who had made a rather common error. When someone pointed out that wasn't the way we were used to being treated by our coworkers (our company had just acquired his), he retorted that the cussee in question was not his coworker, but his employee, and he would do whatever he liked with an employee. Shocked me, at the time, to see an attitude like that in a happy-go-lucky internet company.

Needless to say, Jeremy Porter is a big-time BSD fan (no joke).

No need to panic just yet

[wiredog]

He "said he likely would introduce a bill". Hmmm. First the bill has to be introduced to the Senate. Then he needs co-sponsors. Then it has to get through committee where it may be amended, and he's a Republican and the Democrats control the Senate. Then the it has to be scheduled for a vote. Then the Senate debates (and possibly amends) it. Then it's voted on. Then the same process in the House. Then the House ans Senate versions have to be reconciled, and the reconciled version has to be voted on. Then the President has to sign it.

This all has to happen during this session, which only has 50 working days left, and which has much else (such as the Department of Homeland Security) on its plate.

Re:No need to panic just yet

[Diabolical]

Perhaps just the reason to BE afraid of this. It could be treated as just a small bill which has some credibility so just sign the damn thing and begone with it, move over to the big stuff...

Re:No need to panic just yet

[karmawarrior]

It'll probably be tacked on to a Farming Subsidies bill, together with a few new draconian copyright laws and a top tier tax cut.

Re:No need to panic just yet

[dcgaber]

or it could just be rolled into an omnibus approps or supplemental emergency, or the new supplemental terror bill (which is laden with pork) in conference. WireDog, you live in the DC area, so I am sure you know how a lot of stuff gets swept into those corners at the last minute under the cover of darkness in a 1000 page bill that no one except the staff that wrote it (and the lobbyists who request it) knows is in the bill. That said, i don't have any opinion of this specific bill.

Re:No need to panic just yet

[markmoss]

You mean they might have to choose between working on this bill or actually reading one of the others to find out which of our rights they are violating this time?

Senator Burns is right but this is a poor solution

[sam_handelman]

Everyone knows ICANN is scum. See also this and this.

And of course the UDRP is dreadful.

However, this proposal reads to me less like a solution to ICANN's well documented track records of cronyism and broken promises, and more like a US powergrab, orchestrated by Republicans who oppose international institutions on principle - a position which has certain merits but which ought to be promoted honestly. Of course, I may be jumping to conclusions since no specifics of the bill are yet available.

For all u eurotrash: In the US, instead of Eurosceptics, we have Republicans, who, instead of hating the EU, hate the UN. American leftists generally support the UN and oppose the WTO. We don't have an international umbrella organisation for both ends of the political spectrum to despise (unless you count the federal guvmint.)

Great, how noble of them

[Uttles]

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.

Perfect. So when the government takes over, it still won't be accountable to internet users, it will be slightly accountable to the businesses that contribute the most, and it will be at the whim of the special interest groups. This is just what the internet needs.

yeah right

[keithmoore]

people seem to forget that the US is becoming a fairly small portion of Internet users. but some folks in Congress think that we own the Internet.

if ICANN is corrupt we can at least take some comfort in realizing that it has very little power. I wish we could say the same about the US government, which is corrupt but has tremendous power to do harm.

Re:yeah right

[ahde]

the US is becoming a fairly small portion of Internet users...but is currently still the overwhelming majority.

Give it to Amish...

[whitelabrat]

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

Just Go To The Meetings

[m_evanchik]

I've had enough of you whiners and complainers. ICANN operates in a fair and free fashion. Their meeting are open to the public.

Just because you missed their last meeting in Ghana, doesn't mean it's not too late catch the bus over to Romania.

I understand that the next meeting will be on the dark side of the Moon. They don't want the pale Lunarians feeling left out of the loop.

Re:Just Go To The Meetings

[Nygard]

my statements here are inteded to be entirely jovial and not serious whatsoever

Which is not to say that they are Jovian. 'Cause they would be just as pale as the Lunarians, but a heck of a lot tougher.

Don't mess with a Jovian.

More US unilaterism

[Jeppe Salvesen]

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.

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 .com, .net and .org domains.

Re:More US unilaterism

[Rogerborg]

• If we really want a good ICANN, reform UN and then put ICANN under their control

I realise that you said "reform", but bear in mind that UN-WIPO is the domain dispute resolution body of choice for large companies wanting to squash individuals with the temerity to tread on their turf.

Is there much wrong with having a global body run entirely by referenda of individual users, administrated by a minimal beaurocracy with the sole function of verifying one-voter-one-vote? I know that fraud would be tricky to prevent, but bear in mind that you started by saying "reform [the] UN". ;-)

Re:More US unilaterism

[ahde]

That's what we need, a minimum of beaurocracy with the sole function of deciding what the outcome of every vote.

It's called a dictator, and it's much more efficient if he dispenses with the pretense of counting ballots and just pronounces decrees.

Re:More US unilaterism

[DNS-and-BIND]

Reform the UN?? Bahahahahaa LOL LOL LOL Baaahhhahahahahahaaaahahaa!!#@#!#@!!!!

LOL LOL LOL LOL

Re:More US unilaterism

[Jeppe Salvesen]

Currently, UN is rather ineffective, as far as I can tell. Part of the reason for this lack of results may be the current administration's dislike for UN.

Part of the reason why I think the UN needs reform is that theere is too much voting going on. Frankly, I think some more leadership may very well be the way to go. If you elect a leader, you get leadership. If you elect a representative, you get someone to represent you. Too many representatives is not necessarily a good thing, if no clear coalition holds the majority.

The EU is also struggling with some of the same issues. Respecting the national identities and rights of the members while also being an efficient international body that can lead when needed is a very difficult undertaking. Can you think of any international political body that truly works?

The reason why it is important to establish effective international organizations is that the big corporations are already quite effective at working internationally, and we as consumers stand to lose ground against the corporations unless we make sure the international trade is properly monitored.

And, please, don't argue that corporations are benevolent bodies that seek to serve us as efficiently as possible. Corporations are money-making entities. However, most of them would rip you off without blinking given the chance. We as consumers must be educated. If we are not educated, we will never have a true market economy since competition will not be based upon merit, but rather upon presentation.

What's the problem?

[OgdEnigmaX]

The US is operating well within its rights in this situation. It's a simple case of eminent domain... Unlike other sigs, I can speak with an English accent!

Re:So it is OK for US govt, but not for S-Africa ?

[SirSlud]

Hey, I agree with that logic. I'm in no way advocating that the US Government should have a dominant role in the domain-name infrastructure.

The above poster took at shot at government, using examples of behaviour that are infinately more reflective of the dealings of corperations. Thats all. :)

From what I gather from this specific issue, the US government would not be a popular choice given that it should be indepenant of countries (I'm in Canada, for instance), but it seems that anything would be better than ICANN in its current state.

Goverment: The bodythat brought the DMCA to you

[zh3n]

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.

Re:Goverment: The bodythat brought the DMCA to you

[SirSlud]

Dont know much about the FCC, but your DMCA and SSSCA laws wouldn't even be in existance (or on the burner, respectively) were it not for the interests of large companies. They drove the 'demand' for those pieces of legislation, and we've nobody but ourselves to blame for allowing companies to become weathier (and thus more influential than the government) than the interests of the government and people.

> how about trusting neither and using intellect to figure out what in the world is going on.

Of course! I simply meant my 'default' state is to trust the intentions of government, more than the intentions of companies. Most of the stupid shit my government does is at the behest of companies, and most of the good stuff they try to do is denounced by companies. Thus, by default, I think the government has generally good intentions - when it does shit not in the interests of the people, you can usually find a corperate lobby-tank behind it.

Re:Goverment: The bodythat brought the DMCA to you

[mpe]

I agree wholeheartedly with your point about the corporate lobby-tanks. I ask myself the question, is this capitalism gone wrong? This question leads to my next point. I do not believe it is totally the people's fault that the corporations have grown so powerful. I think that the government, while trying to serve the corporations, forgets about everyone else.

There is actually a fundermental problem of how do you create a system which allows people to address concerns to government. But which cannot be hijacked by corporate lobbying, either big business or political/religious zealots . Once the latter happens the chances of most people being even heard are minimal to non existant. Once a lobby group has become extablished they will also defend their "turf", so even organising counter lobby groups may not work.

Yes and No.

[mindstrm]

Yes, and No.

Without central control, where is the guarantee that someone isn't hijacking your namespace.

Why is central control a problem?

And keep in mind, every single individual decides how they want to peform dns resolution. Either by choosing which nameservers to use, or if you are a nameserver, by choosing which root servers to use.
The only reason DNS works now is because the vast majority of people use the same root servers.
I think the real question, though, is why is central control bad? What is it that we would like to see in the DNS system that icann won't do now?

Our real problem is that DNS became the way to find web pages. That's not what it was designed for. It was designed as distributed, heirarchial system. You register a .com, you have authority to hand out names below that. Same for every single other domain.

The idea was to give your organisation or network a name, and then use that heirarchy to organise all your resources.

My point is, the only reason it's such a big deal is because of the Web.

What we really need is a distributed lookup service that is more effective, and hence, more desireable, than using dns.

Re:Yes and No.

[dthable]

Why is central control a problem?

Central control really isn't a problem execpt that it can lead to corrupt decisions that only have single sided benefits. By making everyone an equal, their is no single controller of DNS information or DNS policies in the world.

I'm not a DNS expert by any means, but why let a single orginization control the .com TDL? Why not allow a distributed database of .com TDLs through. Once an entry is out their, only the orginiating service can remove it. If it's taken, too bad. You should have been quicker to register the name. I thought that was the plan for some of these TDLs.

Once we work on that, why not look at allowing any number of TDLs? If you want to create your own TDL, you can do it. No need to play to the ICANN group or anyone else. But with the new TDL, comes the responsibility to make sure that you support and manage the TDL. No matter how many TDLs you add, people will still look to .com as the main TDL.

Re:Yes and No.

[mpe]

Our real problem is that DNS became the way to find web pages. That's not what it was designed for. It was designed as distributed, heirarchial system. You register a .com, you have authority to hand out names below that. Same for every single other domain

I really don't see how webpages make a difference one way or the other. URL's don't care what the DNS names actually are.

The idea was to give your organisation or network a name, and then use that heirarchy to organise all your resources.

Effectivly it's like an address or telephone number. Except that it is logical rather than physical, so you can quite easily have "Department X, Building Y, site Z".

Re:dumbass americans

[neocon]

There are two problems with this post:

First off the popular vote `in most areas' didn't go for Gore, or he would have had more electoral votes. The total popular vote was very slightly more for Gore than for Bush, but this was because some of the very populous states, such as California went for Gore.

And this brings us to the actual reason for the Electoral College, which is very different from what you suggest in your post. The founders were quite rightly worried that a few large states would be able to control federal elections in such a way that smaller states would have no voice at all, so they reached a compromise. The existence of the Electoral College requires that a presidential candidate build a broad base of support accross a range of states, thus ensuring that he better represents the entire nation.

In the absence of the Electoral College, no presidential candidate would ever have incentive to listen to any but a few of the largest states -- and would be much more the president of New Yorkifornia than of the United States.

Dubious

[oldstrat]

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.

Re:Dubious

[n3bulous]

Good ideas. My only comments are:

1) Define Customer. If you are only going to get one domain, it requires you to exist as separate org entities. The domain name defines you, so something like mozilla.org under your plan would be mozilla.netscape.com. Mozilla.org would be owned by someone else and confusion would arise because people would go to mozilla.org looking for a browser.

(Mozilla.org was originally registered by JWZ, but I don't know if he did it in his name or Netscape's. He also had jwz.org at that point which would have prevented him from doing this.)

2) dove.com should be required to provide a list of alternate sites (name, brief description) the user may have been looking for, within reason. E.G., dove ice cream bars could could get listed at dove.com as an alternate by just asking.

3) Your renewal rule makes sense, but w/o renewal, who will maintain the domain databases? It costs too much money to maintain large, important servers for a company to be responsible for without some means to pay for the service.

Personally, I feel the gov't should have continued to maintain them in the public's interest. However, certain laws would need to be put in place to make sure other countries get fair and equal treatment.

Re:Dubious

[ahde]

Lawsuits are not supposed to create laws. In that case, you have individuals who were appointed (not elected) for life, who have no consequences for their actions, who are *very* easily bribed, making the laws. The single greatest innovation of the US constitution was the separation of powers. The judiciary DOES NOT make laws.

Re:Dubious

[oldstrat]

ahde wrote - 'The judiciary DOES NOT make laws'.

True the judiciary only determines the meaning of the laws.

You tell me which is more important.

Also remember that the judiciary also has the power to destroy laws.

And that we are talking about the United States of America's legal system and US trademarks and copyrights, other countries are free to pass laws, and that the NET (not just the web) is a global system.

I would prefer a policy neutral to non internet issues.
Court fighting over trademark and copyright should never be a part of running the DNS.

Re:Dubious

[Just Some Guy]

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.

OK, I'll bite. What do you consider 'active use'? I have a website that I work on quite often, but really only process HTTP requests on that domain. I also have a little dinky website on a domain that I use constantly for email, DNS, NNTP, etc. Are either of those active enough for you? What combination of open ports makes a domain active? What if I use 'foo.bar.com' but not 'www.bar.com' - most of the world expects to go to www.bar.com on the web, but that's "inactive"? What if I have a hugely dynamic site that noone ever visits? What if I have a static site that gets 10,000 hits per month?

I posit that there is no metric that can satisfactorily decide whether a website is active, let alone a whole domain of services.

Re:Dubious

[mpe]

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.

Actually this is what has caused most of the problems in the first place. With whatever.com the first thing which needs to be asked is if "whatever" is a commercial entity which operates in more than one country.

Rule two - One Domain name per customer. dove.unilever.com is just fine, the space for dove.com should belong to someone else.

No actual need for this if you have a rule in .com that domains are only issued to a transnational commercial entity where the SLD is their legal or trading name. n.b. anyone not a transnational commercial entity should not be able to get a .com domain, even if the one they wanted was not in use.

Somebody had the rules system pretty close to right in the begining, too bad they wrecked it.

The problem was turning everthing into .misc and ending up with the same entity using foobar.*, which negates the point of having different TLDs.

Re:Dubious

[oldstrat]

1) Define Customer... something like mozilla.org would be be mozilla.netscape.com...confusion would arise because people would go to mozilla.org.
No, they couldn't go to mozilla.org - unless there were an independant entity, say a true not for profit named mozilla.org.
This is actually an improvement, not a detraction, and would probably be mozilla.netscape.aol.com if done within the corperation that holds netscape/mozilla. Really AOL should want it that way, and so should sun (mozilla.sun.com) for the sake of brand idenitification.

2) dove.com should be required to provide a list of alternate sites...
No, they could as a courtesy, but not a requirement. Dove is a cross product, cross industry brand name and really does not need to be refered by each entity. Things like Google, Yahoo and the open directory are good for that sort of 'find it' use.
Some of the generics should probably be taken back and supported by industries for indexing.
soap.com could be paid for by industry members who want to be listed, if they don't pay, they don't get listed, and customers would have to hunt.

3) Your renewal rule makes sense, but w/o renewal, who will maintain the domain databases? It costs too much money to maintain large, important servers for a company to be responsible for without some means to pay for the service.
The DNS system is in honesty a large P2P application. The master databases that are located in a few places are at risk even now.
There really needs to be a massive overhaul in concept, and implimentation.
I have no specific recomendation at this time, but feel that the traffic carriers, ISPs and backbone should provide the automated systems and servers, and that the system should work on a thumbs up or thumbs down type moderation like /. does.

Perhaps an endowment plus registration fees could fund 80 to 90 percent, if sticky fingers could be kept out of the endowment.

Really?

[Irvu]

But the Dems are the ones who have been taking money from Di$ney and co. That means that they will likely jump at this chance. Imagine an internet controlled by media companies, no publishing or recording of your own thank you, your goal is to consume, consume, consume...

Granted it may not be this obvious but keep in mind that the Senate is Fritz's domain.

Re:Really?

[Danse]

I'm not sure how it could be any worse than ICANN. It is already becoming more and more controlled by corporations. They're going to do away with the At-Large seats on the board and simply appoint whoever they see fit to appoint. This begs for massive abuse. Especially since they never made a convincing argument for why the At-Large representatives should be done away with in the first place. It would have boiled down to the fact that they don't share the interests of those already on the board, which is promoting the interests of big business over that of everyone else. So, everyone serving on the ICANN board will have a nice, cushy, well-paid job as a rubber stamp for the desires of big business. I think we need to realize that ICANN is already lost. Anything that Congress does can only help to make them more accountable. Any accountability is better than none at all.

NO!!

[Anonymous Coward]

This is a *real* dilemma. I mean really. Think about it. Really. Consider that all the claims the US government makes about ICANN are correct: they're unaccountable, monopolistic, and they certainly don't run things the way they were supposed to. Almost everybody in the /. community can agree that ICANN needs to be reined in. Really.

The US government used to do this job, and back then, it was fine. Really. But of course then the internet was a small space for researchers and academics to exchange ideas.

Our current administration is authoritarian and too concerned about what's moral, correct, and in the best interest of scaring the populace. Free speech == bad in the eyes of the Bush regime.

Add to that the fact that the internet is now *reall* worldwide, and the US shouldn't be patrolling the world (though they do it in physical space already - cyber space is a small leap), and it puts us all in a real dilemma.

I guess the *real* question is, with which stick would you rather be beaten? Mine...or theirs?

The Gov's beak is dry on this one...

[gosand]

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.

I think the key here is "businesses and other key interest groups". In other words, the government doesn't get any kickbacks because they don't have any control over what ICANN does. Seriously, if the government had the "internet users" interests at heart, MS wouldn't be in the position it is in now, and they would have come down on them like a ton of bricks. And arguing that the government is more/less corrupt than businesses is like shopping for dildos - you aren't looking for the one that feels the best, you are looking for the one that hurts the least.

All your names is belong to US

[Mandelbrute]

It had to be said!

I fear the gov't because. . .

[Bastian]

It may not be a private corporation, but it thinks it is.

I can boycott corporations, but the closest thing to a boycott of the US gov't is illegal.

The US government is the prime facilitator of most of the things coprorations do that we see as Evil. (DMCA, military action in Guatemala & Nicaragua, Saipan, heck, the amount of time copyrights are good for magically gets longer every time Disnay's copyright in a certain mouse is about to expire.)

History has shown that these limits on the power of the government that you speak of are fungible. Usually, they are only funged a little bit, for example with limitations on free speech w/r/t certain four-letter words in public. Sometimes, they're funged a lot more. For example with the WWII internment camps.

I'm still not convinced that the US government values me as anything other than a contributor to the GDP, in the same way that I know large corporations only care about me as a chump that may have a few loose dollars in his pocket.

As for the laws that limit the gov't, the constitution and laws in this country only hold water because our governing body agrees they do.
Abraham Lincoln blatantly ignored the Constitution and a few other major laws, I'm sure. The gov't can do that just as easily today. At least corporations have a government standing above their heads waiting to put them in their place (or at least make a pathetic attempt to do so) every random interval unit of time or so. That may not be worth two shits in a can, but it's a psychological comfort.

Who's going to stop this abulatory conglomeration of tinker toys and assault rifles we Americans like to pretend is a government if it stretches things too far?

Re:I fear the gov't because. . .

[gaj]

As for the laws that limit the gov't, the constitution and laws in this country only hold water because our governing body agrees they do.

Um...

The constitution "holds water" because we, the people agree it does. The govmt has exactly the powers we as a people allow it. No more, no less.

Who's going to stop this abulatory conglomeration of tinker toys and assault rifles we Americans like to pretend is a government if it stretches things too far?

If they were to really go too damn far, that same we, the people will. It is our right and responsibility as a free people. OTOH, I really don't expect it to get to that point in my lifetime ... as fucked up as our govt can get, it's still "the worst form of governemt, execept for all the others".

Re:I fear the gov't because. . .

[mpe]

The constitution "holds water" because we, the people agree it does. The govmt has exactly the powers we as a people allow it.

Left to their own devices governments tend to attempt to gain power. The US constitution is a very nice document, but it assumes a population which is cynical about government and activly watches that government. Problem is that a great majority of the current US population appears to both blinding trust government and not ever know most of the things members of the US government get up to in their name. (Especially things which happen outside of the US.)

Re:Why US???

[Mandelbrute]

Dude, when you guys build your internet, we promise we won't try to control it. As long as your using ours, you'll just have to deal with things like this.

That's right - Al Gore invented it didn't he?

Oddly enough, almost every bit of the net that exists outside of the US was built by others, and each seperate network was joined to each other and to the US network - giving an international network (hence the name internet). Even a backwater like Australia had a nationwide computer network run by the universities before it was connected to the US network. It is not a US network - it is an international network. Currently the US has a great deal of financial control of the internet (it costs others to get data both to AND from the US, while the US mainly only pays for internal traffic), and I can only see this increasing.

What happens when Bill G. registers linux.com?

[dave-fu]

Simplicity can be elegant, but it isn't in your case. Isn't there actual case law (not UDRP) granting copyright holders preferential treatment when it comes to overlapping web site names?
Also, good luck getting "www." deprecated, champ.

Re:And...?

[LinuxCumShot]

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.

Re:And...?

[ahde]

because the US government owns and operates the internet, maybe?

If you don't like it, start your own network. And I actually encourage you to do so. If this could really happen (hint, it's only one senator, ICANN can afford the other 99), it would be the best thing that could happen for the internet, if the US government actually had any sense left. Not so long ago, it was the fairest institution in existence. As it is, it might nudge us toward a less centralized DNS, which would be a good thing.

But in reality, he might just be shaking the tree, possibly unwittingly, to fill the party coffers.

Changes in the TLD system i'd like to see

[steve.m]

The current system is getting abused - the TLD's are getting used for pretty much everything other than their original purpose.

ccTLD's should be for entities that actually reside in that country, not because for example .tv happens to resemble television (this in itself speaks volumes about how badly we need new TLD's)

.org was for non-profit organizations

.net was for internet infrastructure

.com was for US companies

I know that .com, .net, .org, .gov and .edu are for US entities, but now the internet is bigger and a bit more important, there should be a rethink:

everything should get a 2 letter ccTLD *unless* it's a global entity.

rules on what type of entity is being registered should be strictly enforced:

e.g. slashdot is a (mostly) US centric, for profit organization, so it's assigned slashdot.com.us

a *lot* more 2nd level domains are required - lets start with:

xxx, name, film, music, food, med(ical), tech, fun, sport, etc.

well, you get the idea...

Re:Changes in the TLD system i'd like to see

[Christianfreak]

The problem with that is that it would create chaos.

First off, there are tons of people who aren't going to want to give up their domains. They bought it first, how does anyone else have the right to it. Its like saying I have to own an American made car because I live in the US.

Personally I have 4 domains. I don't want to give them up, I like them and I like to build websites it ridiculous to suggest that I have to confuse my userbase and tack 'us' to the end.

Secondly even if everyone who owns a domain now agreed to it then it would create mass confusion on the Internet. Nobody would be able to find any of their favorite sites any more. DNS would be broken for a vast majority of people since tons of people have their nameservers specified with their ISP which has a .com or .net. /.ters like you and me would be able to fix it but tons and tons of people who are clueless about computers would be in the dark. It would be tech-support nightmare.

I agree with an above poster: lets get rid of this trademark/copyright crap and make domains first come, first serve. Adding cc TLDs to everything would be confusing and would make the Internet more geographically fragmented. Not to mention you would need more laws to police it and make sure no one cheats. And it seems to be a consisous on /. that we don't need more laws.

Re:Changes in the TLD system i'd like to see

[mpe]

First off, there are tons of people who aren't going to want to give up their domains

And people never have addresses, postal codes and telephone numbers changed due to the actions of third parties?

I agree with an above poster: lets get rid of this trademark/copyright crap and make domains first come, first serve. Adding cc TLDs to everything would be confusing and would make the Internet more geographically fragmented.

When it comes to commercial entities trying to sell physical products having a clear identifier of where it actually is would be a good thing.
There would also be things like sites reviewing movies and TV programmes, since these are "fragmented" by geography in the first place.

Re:Changes in the TLD system i'd like to see

[Christianfreak]

And people never have addresses, postal codes and telephone numbers changed due to the actions of third parties?

Of course they do but we aren't talking about a grand scale, where at least a vast majority of people would have to change.

Re:And...?

[qorkfiend]

The US government does NOT own and operate the Internet, unless you think that the government owns and operates all the companies, organizations, and universities whose computer networks we can connect to to retrieve information, not to mention all the private computers. The government actually has very little to do with the Internet as a whole. Internet standards are set by an international committee.

What ICANN does is match names with numbers, akin to a telephone book. Domain names are matched to IP addresses. And to be able to access something over the Internet, you need an IP address.

And as for starting your own network...how would you get onto the Internet without an IP and/or domain name?

Can anyone see a flaw with

[Rogerborg]

A minimal beaurocracy with responsibility for nothing other than running user supplied referenda on which one internet user gets one vote?

Sure, tricky to administrate, but I'll pick a flawed democracy to a perfect dictatorship any day.

Re:dumbass americans

[T.E.D.]

And this brings us to the actual reason for the Electoral College, which is very different from what you suggest in your post. The founders were quite rightly worried that a few large states would be able to control federal elections in such a way that smaller states would have no voice at all, so they reached a compromise. The existence of the Electoral College requires that a presidential candidate build a broad base of support accross a range of states, thus ensuring that he better represents the entire nation.

That sounds nice, and things perhaps work out that way now, but that's not what they were shooting for.

The folks who wrote up the constitution were elitists who were deathly afraid (some might say rightly so) of the "mob-rule" mentality that might set in with a straight democracy. The idea behind the electoral colledge system was that states would appoint their "leading citizens" (in a way left up to the state governments, often by fiat) who would gather and jointly pick a president. It was figured that most of the time candidates would be regional (no mass media back in the 18th century), so no one candidate would get the majority, and it would be thrown into the sentate. Electors were not meant to be directly elected by a state's people. It took a constitutional ammendment to change that.

The senate was also not meant to be a directly elected body, and was to be appointed by the states (however they felt like doing it) from among the state's "wisest men".

Also realise that even for states that had direct elections for all this stuff, they usually restricted the vote to adult white males who owned land initially. If you lived in an apartment, you weren't considered responsible enough to get a vote.

The system we have in the US now is the result of slow and contunial evolution, not some divinely inspired document.

This must be...

[AugstWest]

...that "smaller government" that the Republicans are always spouting on about.

You know, how they all want to get the government "off our backs" or "out of our hair."

Re:No big brother

[GypC]

True, but that same inefficiency has also been known to cause large amounts of flaming death to be dropped in the wrong place...

Re:Who is this guy?

[ahde]

It's in Oregon. Matt Groenig is from Springfield, Oregon. He went to Thurston High School and then to Evergreen State college in Olympia, Washington.

Re:What this really means

[ahde]

ICANN has been particularly effective in suppressing domains like that. That is, in fact, the number one complaint against them.

Re:As a non US citizen I find this quite disturbin

[ahde]

The US government is the only reason you have, or have even heard of free speech.

Consistency?

[nick_davison]

A couple of days ago, we hear how South Africa is trying to take power from ICANN and, as a result, may well get removed from the internet. Does this mean that ICANN will disconnect all of the US domains too?

A net without US script kiddies, self-important housewives, the NRA, the US arms of the MPAA and RIAA spamming P2P networks... Mmmm. :)

Re:us control over an international body

[ahde]

ICANN is not an international body. The four international representatives (along with the elected american one) were dismissed by the incumbant board. the last remnants of the old republic, etc. -- oh yeah, there wasn't an old republic to start with

Re:Great. Just what we need.

[ahde]

Because the entire rest of the world (including you) would rather have the US goverment governing them than any other existing goverment, including their own.

The reason the US is so powerful is because they are so highly regarded.

Re:Great. Just what we need.

[ahde]

and that is a sad state of affairs, indeed.

The beauty of it is, that you can vote for Al Gore in a couple more years, and if he gets enough votes, he'll be president, and then you can feel comfortable jacking off while you have a president who can pronounce technologically savvy. Even if he sounds like a wind-up toy swallowing a codfish when he's saying it.

I almost took over the domain system

[Animats]

Many years ago, when SRI International ran the domain system, I was at Ford Aerospace, which did some Internet R&D. At one point, SRI's contract to run the Network Information Center was up for rebid. We happened to have a large database machine lying around idle, left over from a completed project. So I proposed that we bid the NIC contract.

We went through some prebid planning. It didn't look profitable enough. The contract only supported about five to ten people. In retrospect, no-bid was a good decision; the Internet boom was a decade in the future.

These rules make little sense.

[Ars-Fartsica]

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.

This is idiotic on too many levels to bother enumerating, but primarily it favors the same domain squatters you want to rub out.

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.

Also makes no sense. This wouldn't cut out domain squatters - you could create a corporate entity basically for free in some offshore country and assign domain ownership to it.

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.

That one I agree with, though obviously it has limits too.

Plus ...

[karb]

It's kind of disingenous to say "The U.S. government wants X" when one senator has expressed interest in introducing a bill that says X. If the Secretary of Commerce came out and said X, then that means "The U.S. government wants X." But congresspersons introduce legislation all the time, and to take the opinion of one of them as the creed of the entire government is a bit innacurate.

Failure of Democracy

[pjrc]

A good conceptual model is that of a small territory, given independence with the condition that an interim gov't establish an conventional democracy by holding elections.

That is what ICANN was supposed to do, but it's a simple fact that they elected only 5 board members instead of 9 as originally agreed. They have subsequently disbanded elections and put in place a "nomination" process which concentrates power in the hands of the original rules.

Similar to the common stories of democracy failing to establish itself in small countries, the original rulers have made some abuses of power. They've played favorites, made arbitrary spending decisions (even blocked inquires from an elected board member for spending records), and they've shown a lack of principle regarding the rights of citizens to whom they should be accountable (witness the unfair domain name dispute policy).

Comments that "the USA does not own the internet" will abound... but ICANN, like a former territory, was given its authority by the US, with a very clear charter that clearly called for a transition to democratically elected officials to make the decisions. Had they followed their charter, had they ernestly held elections, had the original board members stepped down as they had originally agreed, there would be much more tolerance for some bad decisions.

But that's not the case here. Unelected interim officials held on to their power and disbanded elections. Abuses have been made by unelected ICANN board members who do not deserve the power they have improperly siezed for themselves. That's a much different situation that poor decisions on the part of elected officials who should have felt accountable to their constituants who will re-elect them.

Like a developing nation where the interim rulers siezed power and refused to establish democracy as originally chartered, someone needs to step in. The US was both the country that originally granted ICANN its authority, and the US has the clout to demand ICANN's restructing.

This abuse of power and refusal to transistion to democracy are inexcusable. The US would never tolerate it in a former territory (where there's an economic impact on the US at least), and there's no reason that ICANN should be treated any differently.

Re:Failure of Democracy

[mpe]

Like a developing nation where the interim rulers siezed power and refused to establish democracy as originally chartered, someone needs to step in.

Then what's stopping the US from presenting a resolution to the UN general assembly?

The US was both the country that originally granted ICANN its authority, and the US has the clout to demand ICANN's restructing.

A nation taking back a former colony would look very bad. It immediatly raises the issue of how sincere the idea of independance was in the first place

This abuse of power and refusal to transistion to democracy are inexcusable. The US would never tolerate it in a former territory (where there's an economic impact on the US at least)

In the case of an actual territory would the US allow independance in the first place? Considering that the US has an interesting interpretation of article 73 of the UN charter...

Re:And...?

[Lemmy Caution]

A lot of organizations can use deadly force to accomplish their goals. The Mafia, a group of soccer hooligans, just about anyone whose pissed off enough. Corporations do, too - but they do so through governments and local police forces, as a rule. In all cases, of course - including the governmental use of force - there may be a consequence to that use of force (or there may not be).

The US Government has stricter reporting requirements than corporations do, unless national security is involved. I can't imagine any situation involving ICANN that would require the use of deadly force.

For every bureaucratic nightmare that comes out of the government, there are dozens of well-organized, effective services that quietly do their jobs, address the problems for which they were chartered, and do fine. Of course, it's not fun to talk about them.

Re:dumbass americans

[T.E.D.]

this only explains the indirect-election aspect of such an institution. It tells us nothing about why the Founders chose to make representation in such an institution not strictly proportional

It says nothing about that, because it isn't a particularly interesting issue. All they did was give each state the same number of electors as they have congressmen. Anything else would have required redoing the painful compromise worked out for congressional representation. They didn't really care about opening that can of worms, because they thought elections would usually end up in the house (there's an extra stipulation that there will be only 1 vote per state in House elections).

My problem with your posts is that you seem to think the system is working now according to its original design, and thus the conceptions of the designers in this matter are important. This is complete bunk. The electoral college system of today doesn't even remotely resemble what they envisioned. A good discussion of how it has changed over the years is available on the Federal Election Commission's website. This is incidentally a great place to point people who think the wierdities of the last election were somehow unprecidented.

I'm not saying I think its a bad system. I'm just saying that it is significantly different than the one the original constitutional authors thought they were giving us.

Two Words...

[Pollux]

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.

Eminent domain.

The government has the exclusive power to confiscate (for "fair compensation") property for whatever reason. Now, I'm sure you'd love to believe (as you say you do) that when the government does take something, it's all for an important purpose (aka public works...roads / utilities / etc.). Not always is that the case.

About five years ago, my college wanted to build a couple extra residental buildings for the campus, but some "old houses" stood in the way. The college asked the city to exercise their right to buy out those properties. Residents complained, because of course it would lower the property value of the neighborhood. So, the residents were heard, but the college still got the land. Why? The mayor was also dean of the college.

Another good example can be found here. Nissan Automotive bought out the Mississippi Legislature to get a law passed that allowed them to take whatever land they chose to have (and disregard the land's real value).

My point is this: I don't want a governing body who can be bought out to control the internet. I'm sure someone is going to pipe in and say that "Domain names aren't physical property...the government can't exercise eminent domain!" Anyone who wishes to say such a thing apparently doesn't realize that until a law is on the books that says the government can't, the government will.

Re:Two Words...

[drinkypoo]

My point is this: I don't want a governing body who can be bought out to control the internet.

So you don't want icann in control either, huh?

united nations

[OpenMind(tm)]

I'm sure I'll get flamed to hell and back for this one, but here goes:

We want ICANN to act like a decent international regulatory body. Having it act no more evil than ANSI of IEEE would be nice. Unfortunately, ICANN has a bit more going for it, mainly:

1. It has the power to force people to follow its will. Unlike most standards organizations, it doesn't have to be democratic to elicit buy-n.
   
2. It's regulatory consessions are worth a great deal of money to some people.
   

So, to make sure it acts like a public group and not like a business, we feel the need to place some sort of authoritarian control over it. Since its domain is the world, however, the US government makes little sense for this. How about the UN?

Now I know that many see the UN as either useless or evil, but in certain cases (the World Health Organization, UNICEF, ...) it can do a lot of good while keeping things under world-wide semi-democratic oversight.

Re:united nations

[mpe]

On top of which, the ITU is not an operations organization at all--it runs standards bodies, things like that. I'd be very hesitant to hand it control of such a crucial thing.

It manages telephone country codes perfectly well. (Apart from the obvious exception, which predates it.) Which is not that different from how how DNS root servers really should operate.

Re:Who is this guy?

[Lxy]

The other major clue is the "flaming Homer" episode, where Steven Tyler mistakenly yells "heloooo St. Looouuiss!!!" Which makes me also wonder.

What do I know, I'm just wasting karma.

[OT] Moderation rant.

[Lxy]

Ok, why is the parent post modded down as "overrated"? I post at +2. It helps to burn my karma. If you're the first moderator, how is it possible that I'm "overrated"? No one has rated me yet!!!

I have no complaints about getting modded down as off-topic for any posts I make in this thread. This one may even be a troll. I'm sick of getting modded down by moderators who don't even understand the meaning of the words they're using. That's insulting. If it has nothing to do with the topic at hand, mod it down as offtopic. If you seriously can't figure out what to mod a post as, JUST DON'T MOD IT. let someone who knows what they're doing mod it down.

Blazing Irony!

[BitGeek]

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 if this isn't exactly what the US Government has done repeatedly over the years!

They exclude us from electing the people we want to elect-- we only get to choose between two parties, and all other parties are not allowed on the ballot (really). They pass unconstitutional taxes (income tax, was supposed to be temporary to support WWI-- that's the FIRST ONE, they changed the constitution to allow it, and never repealed it.)

They regularly pass unconstitutional restrictions on freedom of religion (The drug war and any regulation of marriage fall under this category). etc. etc. etc.

ICANN for all its problems is a lot less worrisome to me than the US Government, which has absolutely NO accountability to anyone, not even its own citizens.

Re:As a non US citizen I find this quite disturbin

[Chris Johnson]

As a US citizen: are you crazy? Parent needs to be clubbed into submission with 'flamebaits' because there's no such moderation as 'psychotic'. Grow up...

You think so?

[kaladorn]

As it is, it might nudge us toward a less centralized DNS, which would be a good thing.

I can't believe you think the US Gov't controlling ICANN would be a boon overall for the small guy or that it might force a decentralized DNS. Heh, not by half! Quite the opposite!

This is the same gov't supporting the DMCA and the "War" on Terrorism (or was that civil liberties and citizen's rights?). I think you'd be well advised to look at the things the gov't is laying hands on of late when assessing how democritizing or how useful to the small guy or how open any such Gov't involved affair might be....

Unless of course you want to mark your comments with <NAIVE>....

Re:dumbass americans

[T.E.D.]

I'm curious if you would provide a source for the statement that the Founders expected most presidential elections to end up in the house -- this is certainly not the impression I had, or something I have seen claimed elsewhere.

Well, I've heard this a lot myself. The best reference I can find is Grolier's EC entry, which says this:

The framers of the Constitution regarded the electoral college as part of a procedure for electing the president by the people, at least indirectly. It seemed probable to the framers that the system of electors voting by ballot in the states would ordinarily serve also as a nominating device, with the final election frequently left to the House.

I'm not sure where online one would go to find a definitive source on this. I can't find a single mention of the electoral college in the Federalist Papers, which would otherwise seem the best bet.

That's worth +5, Funny

[kaladorn]

What a joke. I'll trust my government more than companies any day of the week.

You said you were Canadian right? And you said THAT with a straight face? You'd trust the current Canadian government beyond companies?

I have one question: Have you watched the news? What's going on in Public Works and DND and other branches of the Gov't and the shenanigans in the PMO and with the ethics and privacy councillors and (as usual) ignoring the Auditor General.... and you'd trust THOSE GUYS?

You pick some pretty poor places to place your trust, my fellow citizen.

Re:That's worth +5, Funny

[SirSlud]

And guess what. The shit eventually hits the fan and we get to prosecute. Most of that shit (most notably the Hydro bosses' handshakes) could never be punished were I a customer of corperation. At least with my government, we find out (private companies wouldn't even have to disclose that 20% of the cost of the product is going to a few suits at the top) and we nail them.

No such luxury in most corperate situations.

I probably should be been a little more articulate: I trust that my government will be held more accountable and be more prone to public scrutiny for illegal/unethical behaviour than companies. Can you argue that?

Re:dumbass americans

[T.E.D.]

I can't find a single mention of the electoral college in the Federalist Papers

Apparently I wasn't looking real hard, since there is one devoted to just that. Hamilton doesn't come out and say what he thinks the likelyhood of the House deciding an election is though (he calls it "a contingency". Thinking about it, he wouldn't, as the main point of the FPs was to convince ordinary folks the constitution is a good thing.

However, he did come damn close to saying direct election would be bad because the general public can't be trusted to make a good decision:

It was equally desirable, that the immediate election should be made by men most capable of analyzing the qualities adapted to the station, and acting under circumstances favorable to deliberation, and to a judicious combination of all the reasons and inducements which were proper to govern their choice.

The US Gov't is *trying* to shed this charge

[Fastolfe]

The whole reason the US Gov't created ICANN was to get domain name administration out of the US and into an international body. They started this with a sort of a trial, and so far, ICANN has failed in that trial. Once the US is satisfied there is an organization out there that can do what it's supposed to effectively and reliably (some might read that as "according to US interests"), the US will (presumably) wash its hands of the mess.

To be honest, I really fail to see how ICANN has these enormous expenses and little actual output. Something needs to be re-done here, in my opinion.

Re:dumbass americans

[markmoss]

But states do NOT naturally form politically significant blocks anymore. Several of the big states split almost 49-49 this time. Even though the electoral college gives a numerical advantage to the small states, did you see anyone campaigning there? They were busy in the big states, trying to get the last possible .1%, in hopes of "winning" by 49.0 to 48.9% and getting ALL the electoral votes. In my state, among others, the electoral votes were for someone 51% of us voted against and probably despised. (I suspect a lot of the other 49% despised the guy they voted for too, just less than the other one.) And the random effects of this...left it up to a chief vote-counter appointed by GWB's brother and five (in)Justices appointed by his father.

If Florida's electoral votes had been divided proportionally to the popular vote, Gore and Bush would have definitely got 12 each. I'm not sure whether Nader, Bush, or Gore would have got the 25th one, but it's unlikely that it would have mattered. I'm pretty sure that if other states did the same thing, _some_ third party would have got the last electoral college vote in Michigan, and maybe other states. If the vote was close enough for Florida's 25th vote to matter, likely no one would have a majority anyhow and Congress would have picked the winner, rather than extra-constitutional court decisions...

This is better?

[SkyLeach]

"ICANN has exceeded its authority"
And the Federal Gov. hasn't? What about the civil war?

"does not operate in an open fashion"
And the U.S. Government is all open doors?

"...is dangerously unaccountable to Internet users, businesses and other key interest groups..."
The U.S. government is only accountable to itself, unless mass public opinion takes hold. Besides, if ICANN goes to the govm't then AOL-Time Warner will just spend $1,000,000,000 on TV addspace and vote themselves exclusive use of the Internet.

Mark my words: this is worse.

Now I DO think that all the communications hardware in the US should be under Federal/State control just like roads are. I think bandwidth should be considered in the same way highways are, with nobody being able to restrict or control use of it. On the same note, we all know that only about 10% of the taxes collected for roads actually go to roads, so there should be an independant accounting firm/agency/group which makes sure that all Internet taxes go to building the internet. (Like my $40/mo going to the Internet Comission and I get VOIP service with a US Postal IP assigned to me and free national DNS. :-) )

I see your point, but...

[kaladorn]

... I suspect the gulf is not so large as you envision or one would wish.

First, corporations do operate under restrictions and do get some limited oversight. Boards of Directors have certain legal liabilities and can be sued quite effectively. Shareholders (especially large investment companies) will go after said boards if the situation warrants it.

OTOH, the government, supposedly accountable, has gone out of its way over the past few years to give itself as near to a dictatorial level of power in the PMO as is possible. Has there been any accountability for the fiasco at Public Works? Gagliano went to Denmark, not jail. Has there been accountability for the PM's meddling in Grand Mere? Nope nor is there signs of it. Part of this stems from the fact the Canadian Federal gov't has far less accountability (and I'm not talking leadership race financing...) than other Parliaments like that of the UK and less than their provincial governments. The non-independence of the various auditors is the first and most telling symptom.

In theory, a public institution or public company should both have greater transparency and greater accountability than a private company, which should still have accountability in a legal and accounting sense. OTOH, current attempts to quash the FOIA and various other obstructionist moves are really killing the transparency (such as it was) and the concentration of power in the PMO and the answering of all government officers who audit to the PM has slain accountability (party whips and PM control of nomination paperwork for candidates has really helped) or dissent. If you lose your job for speaking out or are swept under the rug... that doesn't encourage bringing problems to light.

In a perfect world, you are right. Government should be more transparent. But in the real world, the PM wastes millions of your taxpayer dollars and then says "so what?". The gulf in reality between self-interested corporations and self-interested politicos is less than in the ideal. And those politicos also shape law, process, and bureaucracy to their needs.

That clearer?