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ICANN's Time Is Up, According To John Gilmore
EyesWideOpen writes: "Salon has a lengthy interview with Cygnus Software co-founder John Gilmore about why he feels it's time for ICANN, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, to go. Gilmore, along with the Electronic Frontier Foundation, is currently helping to fund a lawsuit filed by ICANN director Karl Auerbach against ICANN. ICANN has denied Gilmore access to its financial information, providing the basis for the lawsuit. Gilmore states: 'I believe it's because there is information in there about how ICANN has misused its money, and/or has favored people who lent or gave it money.'"
After that last EFF Fair Use Game debacle, I have lost complete faith in those clowns.
I have been pwned because my
Goatse is 404. What's up with that?
I have been pwned because my
The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) is the non-profit corporation that was formed to assume responsibility for the IP address space allocation, protocol parameter assignment, domain name system management, and root server system management functions previously performed under U.S. Government contract by IANA and other entities.
So who is going to handle that then? The government?
If you're religishitty, KILL YOURSELF!
NEW YORK (Reuters) The beloved Martha Stewart has just sold all of her ICA...
What was your username again? -BOFH
He's right on the money with ICANN, too, although I'm sure I don't need to go into a spiel as to why. But if you aren't familiar with him, you might want to take a look at his other work if you want to see some cutting-edge concepts that are in need of an innovator.
Try not. Do or do not, there is no try.
-- Dr. Spock, stardate 2822-3.
There's a saying that's popular with defense laywers ... "When you don't have the law, you argue the facts. When you don't have the facts, you argue the law. And when you don't have either, you persecute the prosecutor"
Do you even lift?
These aren't the 'roids you're looking for.
---"These people are the Internet equivalent of the Nike-store-smashing-anarchist juveniles. They need to grow up and realize how the real world works."
I wouldn't say that the first sentance is true, but the second certainly is. EFF is a so-called polictical activism committee. Well, they whine for money for court cases that usually are doomed to the very start. Why dont they usually win? Well, they don't give enough money to overturn the laws as they're made. All other PAC's do heavy lobbying and giving of heavy amounts of money to opposing officals.
The EFF is a reactionary orginazation. These do NOT work. Instead, I'd rather put money (from anon sources) into a pool requesting program X to be written. So what if the program is deemed "Illegal". If it's out there (source and all), no company/government/grassroots campaign can take it away. For my example, look at the 200K being offered to hack the X-Box for Linux. That's exactly what I'm suggesting.
The time should be up for many financial entities such as Microsoft. But they'll continue existing. Why? Because money is power, and the people are ignorant and self-centred.
Nothing will change, at least, not any time soon.
In addition, Gilmore has some particularly spooky things to say about the history of Network Solutions, and what he estimates the *real cost* of maintaining a domain's registration to be (less than 1 cent/year).
For my example, look at the 200K being offered to hack the X-Box for Linux. That's exactly what I'm suggesting.
Funny you should mention that. The current leading candidate for the anonymous contributor is... John Gilmore.
---"That might be a nice way of doing things, but I don't think it would work. People might pay up a fair amount of money once or twice, but not after that. (I, for one, think the Linux-XBox thing is a hoax.) Call me a cynic."
Actually this isn't the first time money has been ante'd for free stuff. There was a guy (not anon, just forget name) that was offering 10K for soft-modem drivers. Still, nobody's made it.
And yeah, the Linux X-Box does seem hoax-ish.. But it's a great way to get on Slashdot. But still, if Linux on XBox is possible, the 200K might pay for a little of the legal fees. I bet, though that he does have the money (whoever it is), but bets that nobody will be able to.
The only way see that Linux can get onto the XBox without hardware mods, is by hijacking a legit program with unsecured binary code. Smash stack, gain control and run Linux. Then you have to deal with infringement of the hijacked game. All in all, a platform I'd rather not buy, or touch.
Getting rid of them involved listening to whining and screaming about the death of the Internet, too.
:p
We'll hear the same from ICANN, and we'll hear all sorts of idiocy on their way down, but when they're gone, not much will change - at least, nothing that anyone notices on a day to day basis
It is about time they go. They made a big mess that will take years to fix.
Just a minor correction. It's not Gilmore who can't see the books that's the issue, rather that Karl Auerbach (the NA elected representative) can't see the books. Check out Karl's saga at http://www.cavebear.com .
Damn... Every time I run into something that John Gilmore has done I get this shivery feeling down the back of my neck. Here's a guy who has just got it all figured out, way ahead of the rest of us... or at least way ahead of me.
Err, but yeah. The reason I'm posting is because anyone who hasn't read Gilmore's letter to Vint Cerf really should... it's intelligent, funny and scathing. It's at http://www.icannwatch.org/article.php?sid=763 and it's brilliant.
I am the king... of No Pants! www.penny-arcade.com
Those dreamy eyes.
Those wisps of hair.
Who's he trying to fool?
I have been pwned because my
I shouldnt reply to this obvious flame bait But it's amazing how ignorant and rasict people can be.
This is (one of) the exact reason Linux is not taking off in the mainstream. Time to innovate, NOT COPY!
I wish we could get a president with brains...
BTW: Join the EFF!
The antidote for misuse of freedom of speech is more freedom of speech.
-- Molly Ivins
I CAN, U CAN, we all CAN get rid of ICANN!
We need a P2P version of DNS. Of course it would be much worse in terms of performance but it's harder to buy thousands of people than it is to buy a dozen.
Any ideas?
Well, that was certainly more information than we wanted to know! We don't care if you're in desperate need of a blow job.
"New lawsuit against sucky corporation" is more of a news story than "Mussaoui adores Osama" [CNN.com]. Also someone is predicting the downfall of ICANN. Now, personally, I think that's a pretty stupid, when all he has is speculation and no facts. It has a slight cult-delusion aspect also prevalent with Mussaoui. Can you tell that I just came back from reading CNN and that I am sleep deprived?
"ICANN is going down, one way or another. Either it will go down like East Germany, with a peaceful transition to governance responsive to the public will, or it will go down like Japan, with big bombs dropped on it."
Somehow I don't think statements like that are going to go over to well.
That said, the rest of the letter is as the original poster said, intelligent, funny, and scathing. I used to have alot of respect for Vint Cerf too. I wonder what happened...
What you are saying makes perfect sense, but you fall a bit short, IMHO. Hell, as long as you *own* both the console and the unsecured game, what you are doing is legal. Assume someone does exactly that - takes that code, smashes the stack, and takes control of the box. How much work would it be to go from there, to setup some output device and find out exactly where and what the bootup sequence is? After you do that, it's only a matter of time until the thing is completely reverse engineered.
To make laws that man cannot, and will not obey, serves to bring all law into contempt.
--E.C. Stanton
What can one man do?
Probably he can move on in life.
First, though, give him a lot of money. He'll have friends of his create Shockwave Flash cartoons that nobody outside a rarified little community will view.
The Office Equipment needs paying for. Donate to the EFF.
Sometimes I think I should have picked out the Demosthenes!Tecumseh as a slashdot handle. But anyway...on to this ICANN stuff. If ICANN is breaking the law by withholding information from a board member, then they are breaking the law plain and simple. It seems as though this is a fairly obvious case to me. Even if ICANN isn't doing something illicit with their income, the practices that are described in the Salon article and in Gilmore's original email to Vint Cerf are despicable. In regards to whether they have their hands in the cookie har, I have this thought...a quote from Independence day sort of..."Does anyone really believe a hammer costs 50 dollars?"
I should have picked out the nickname Demosthenes!Tecumseh.
We have rights?
This is quite possibly the biggest snoozer of an article I've ever seen. *Passes out from boredom and whacks head on mouse* #%&@!$
1) Get control of internet addressing.
2) ???
3) Profit.
As was said in a previous slashdot comment,
ICANN will now be known as UCANT
(Universal Controller of All Network Traffic)
To make laws that man cannot, and will not obey, serves to bring all law into contempt.
--E.C. Stanton
Actually, it sounds very similar to the shenanigans at FIFA where the CFO went up against the CEO on the basis of some very dodgy payments and accounting practices that he had authorised. The CFO was forced to resign, alledgedly through the use of bought influence (In FIFA, Tonga has the same number of votes as Germany).
Lets just forget that it is the Internet and just look at other organisations involved in coordinating things internationally. I mentioned FIFA, we also know about the Olympics committee. Other organisations closer to home, such as CCITT tend to be bureaucratic and inefficient but not particularly corrupt.
Is it possible to have a minimalist organisation that is cheap, efficient and honest that can manage something like the Internet?
ICANN't, Can you?
In Australia we used to have the benevolent dictatorship of Robert Elz. He was the instigator of the .au domain until he was thrown out by the ICANN lap dog that is auDA. There was a huge amount of negative press about his 'unnaccountability' and the 'arrogant' way he dealt with people. There were press stories that if he refused to give up the name then they would have to force him via the courts. Throughout this Robert kept a dignified silence. When he released the name to auDA ICANN released this statement
.au.
"Whereas Robert Elz has devoted over 15 years of selfless and dedicated service to the global Internet community as the registry founder and operator of
Resolved that the ICANN Board on behalf of the global Internet community extends its deepest thanks to Robert Elz for his profound
countributions to the evolution and stable performance of the global Internet."
We are like dwarfs on the shoulders of giants
You call me a pedant? I prefer the term "correct"
EFF does "usually" win. The reason you might think they dont is that when they don't win, they keep trying, so the majority of the messages from the EFF are about something that they haven't won yet.
hello
The evil bastard who runs an open gateway?
autopr0n is like, down and stuff.
http://www.icann.org/financials/.
Shutting down free speech with violence isn't fighting fascism. It IS fascism!
Comment removed based on user account deletion
FWIW, here is a transcription of the statement that included the publication of Gilmore's e-mail to Vint Cerf, transcribed from the PDF image from the link linked to by the article.
It looked to me that Vint was doing everything he could legally do, to do the right thing.
-----------
I, Vinton Cerf, declare:
1. I am the Chairman of the Board of Defendant Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers ("ICANN"). I have personal knowledge of the matters set forth herein and am competent to testify to those matters.
2. Mr. Auerbach has never, pursuant to Section 6 of the ICANN Inspection Procedures, requested full ICANN Board review of the Audit Committee's determination regarding the arrangements for his inspection of the corporate records.
3. On March 18, 1002, I received an e-mail from John Gilmore, in which he asserts that he "contributed significant funding for" this lawsuit. Mr. Gilmore is one of the founders of the Electronic Frontier Foundation, the organization providing representation for Mr. Auerbach in this lawsuit. A true and correct copy of the e-mail from Mr. Gilmore is attached hereto as Exhibit 1.
I declare under penalty of perjury under the laws of the State of California that the foregoing is true and correct.
This declaration was signed on April 16, 2002 at Washington, D.C.
[ Signature ]
Vinton Cerf
[ Attached e-mail ]
-----------
I seems to me that Vint is pointing out that the decision was made by a subset of the Board of Directors, the "Audit Committee". It also points out that there is recourse available to Auerbach that he has not exercised, prior to filing the lawsuit.
It also seems (to me) that the statement numbered "3" was minimal, in not drawing any conclusions based on it. Thus the "terse statement" condemnation of Vint Cerf's statement in the article isn't really a very strong condemnation; it looks to me that, by leaving out the social context, Vint allows for interpretation favorable to the case.
This interpretation is bolstered by the fact that the statement numbered "2" seems to go out of its way to point out a way around the "Audit Committee", as if it were a tightly controlled minority clique of the full board, and in pointing out seems to imply success might be achievable via that route.
At the very least, Auerbach needs to try to avail himself of that route, so that if it fails, he can counter a motion for dismissal (i.e. it's arguable that this case is only a matter for the courts if all other reasonable recourse has been exhausted, which it has not been, according to this statement).
I have a very hard time believing that Vint would not have been as explicit or terse as this, were it not for the legal liability issue as the chairman of the Board of Directors of the Defendant.
-- Terry
> They whine for money for court cases that
> usually are doomed to the very start
> Why don't they usually win?
*cough* e-mail has as much protection as phone calls, requires a warrant to seize
*cough* Code declared free speech
*cough* CDA overturned
*cough* Dmitry freed
> I'd rather put money (from anon sources) into
> a pool requesting program X to be written.
*cough* the DES-cracker
*cough* any number of free software projects that Gilmore has personally funded.
Aim your bullets at the other side, kid. You're smoking up the mess hall.
Want to hear the other side of the ICANN story? Vint Cerf will be attending a round-table conference in my home country of Luxembourg on Thursday July 4 at 2:30pm CET (time zone convertor here) (it's just down the road from me, but I won't be able to attend to put questions to him, gotta work!). A live webcast will be available here, so tune in then. Check out the conference info page for some good links and background on Cerf.
---- scrm
The domain names debacle needs sorting out - urgently. It is completely wrong
.com, .edu, .mil, .net, or .org. The names
.us top level domain. There is, I suppose, the argument that there are a few, .net was intended for this, but it seems to have been polluted in
.org space by hobby software projects is another case in .org .gnu or .oss?
that the administration of such an important trans-national medium as the
Internet is in effect in the uncontrolled hands of just so few people.
The 'Net is something of such international importance that no national
interest, commercial or otherwise, should have any control whatsoever other
than the delegated administration of the names registries of the
individual countries.
This, in effect, means that the only organisation which should be able to change
either the underlying protocols or the top level domains is the United Nations
My own feeling about top level domains other than the country ones is that they
should be simply removed. Absolutely every legal entity has a home in some
country somewhere or other. No more
which belong to organisations based in the United States should be using the
very few, genuinely international organisations which should have domain names
not tied to any particular country. The International Red Cross is the kind of
organisation which comes to mind as the type which has the moral right to the
irc.org domain name. Similarly there is a genuine need for a single
supra-national domain for the use of the Internet infrastructure as a whole. I
thought that
the interests of commercial gain.
The pollution of the
point. While these are certainly very useful and worthwhile projects, and the
groups of individuals are frequently located all around the globe, I really
don't think they have much in the way of absolute moral right to be in the
namespace. Perhaps they should have a fully international top level domain name
of their own. Is it
The administration of domains which have been given away or sold by their
countries should revert to the UN until the countries in question can do it for
themselves. The very idea that the whole address space for an entire country
can be traded away for the personal profit of an idividual is, in this author's
opinion anyway, just plain wrong, and should be corrected as soon as possible.
Similarly, while the enhancement of Internet security is sorely needed at the
moment, no particular commercial interest should ever be able to hijack the
whole exercise by introducing secret protocols protected by draconian
intellectual property laws. The overall effect of this will be to give the
particular patent holder the right to tax every Internet user, or indeed every
single message.
Is this really what we want?
--
Christopher Sawtell
...ICANN is secretive, slow, inefficient and, worst of all, firmly in the pocket of special interests...
.ZA issue maybe onto something.
Many International organizations lack transparency and accountability.
e.g FIFA, The Hague, IOC, you name it. It will be secretive, slow, inefficient and usally in the pocket of groups with sinister motives.
That's why the US wants nothing to do with the Hague and the S.African government despite their bumbling of the
The key is increase openness.
Did it ever occur to you that he was lying about his "principles"?
People keep talking about what the US Government should do about ICANN, but even the US Government is just a dubiously-implemented indirect representation of a small fraction of Internet users. The whole idea is ridiculous, because Internet users can directly vote for who should have that power, just by entering some addresses into their computers. Just pick a root who has the best policies and point to it. We don't need government involvement at all in this.
And yeah, when you're making that decision, OpenNIC stands out as the one who has the right idea.
As copyright owner of this comment, I authorize everyone to defeat any technological measure which limits access to it.
said again. If you don't like ICANN, just point
your DNS client to OpenNIC instead. Democratic
name service the way it should be.
It's easy to find and easy to use -- from ICANN-space, try http://www.opennic.net
This is the same John Gilmore who we savaged for running an open mail relay and not backing down or compromising in any meaningful way.
Now, I fully support him in this endeavour, but let's not just slip into maudlin hero worship. Like an old fashioned preacher, Gilmore has gone from being representative, through conservative, until he's now an extreme fundamentalist, not because he's changed, but because the world has. Gilmore refuses to compromise his ideals one iota. Beyond a certain point that ceases to be admirable and just becomes stubborn and unrealistic.
Again: I agree with the issue, I think he's fighting the good fight, but I just have some reservations about his judgement. I've had the feeling for some time now that John Gilmore is living in the past, and he just won't let go.
If you were blocking sigs, you wouldn't have to read this.
I seems to me that Vint is pointing out that the decision was made by a subset of the Board of Directors, the "Audit Committee". It also points out that there is recourse available to Auerbach that he has not exercised, prior to filing the lawsuit
That may stop a judge saying "those crooks are hiding the records - throw them in jail", but I don't see how it would stop one saying "show him the damn records".
You can see an example of this at work at http://www.lloyds.io
They claim to have over 350,000 registered users, but I've never encountered a redirecting IO address in the wild, and it's not a very sexy implementation (imho). The other two examples they cite on their homepage, spicegirls.io and discman.io seem to tell the real story -- it may be fine if you're just redirecting to the index page of a domain, but when your IO redirector points at some page deep in the twisted hierarchy of your corporate website, well, that's just one more annoying (and unusual) thing for your admin to have to maintain.
When ICANN goes? The COURTS take over. Large corps with plans for domain name grabs are increasingly abandoning ICANN for resolutions because ICANN frequently sides with the current holders. When using the courts however. It's pretty easy to throw money at the problem and get your way. (It's ironic that this is being leveled at ICANN when it's already a known and oftenused practive in the legal system)ICANN at least provided a small hope that the name you registered would reamin yours... (I provide the resent "Easy* vs "Easi*" fiasco as proof)
The only part I agree with (And it's already been talked about) is that the US Gov. should take back control of ICANN (Or a global governmental body). For the reasons listed in the article. But even as it is, there had better be a MUCH BETTER plan in place before even talking about getting rid of ICANN. The alternative will be the ususal situation of being far worse off after the wolves have had their fun.
Contrary to popular belief, coding is not all free blow-jobs and beer. Those things cost MONEY!
I'm not usually given to conspiracy theories, but I think that this is exactly the point of the whole ICANN debacle. The DNS is one of, if not the only, chokepoint in the Internet, the rest of which is largely run in a decentralized, rational, and transparent manner. An open, uncontrolled and uncontrollable Internet is a threat to many established power groups.
The only theory I can come up with that fits all of the facts surrounding ICANN's behaviour is that some powerful group is behind ICANN and using the DNS to gain control over the Internet, for power and/or money. The way the management has given Auerbach the runaround makes it clear that the elected board members were intended to be powerless rubber stampers, which is why they're now dropping all pretenses of elections, since one of those elected directors is actually trying to do his job.
Kudos to Auerbach and Gilmore for standing up to these bullies. Meanwhile, I think that the technical Internet community should be building alternatives. Going up against the established powers on their own turf of the courts and political system is foolhardy. Even if we win this particular battle, the power nexus that the DNS roots imply will continue to attract the corrupt or corruptable. A technical solution that completely decentralizes the problem that DNS tries to solve is the best long term strategy, eliminating this particular threat forever.
This idea is completely in accord with one of Gilmore's maxims: "The net treats censorship as damage, and routes around it." The censorship and damage due to ICANN is clear, and we need to find a way around it.
Came up 404 for me. Maybe some sort of blocking software at work?
I have been pwned because my
IMO - I believe we know most of it:
"ICANN is secretive, slow, inefficient and, worst of all, firmly in the pocket of special interests."
From ICANN Forum: Vint has become crooked and does not answer emails any more.
ICANN wants more money to further increase their corrupt powers and for their Lawyers; JONES, DAY, REAVIS & POGUE.
Karl should be allowed to see the books, with gagging preconditions. ICANN are supposed to be OPEN, for flips sake.
ICANN use spin to say critics are just trying to tear down ICANN.
Personally, I have always said ICANN (or similar) is necessary - as John Gilmore says, "No, we're trying to make ICANN accountable to its public for its actions."
Those responsible should pay with time in jail for any illegal acts. Not fines like corrupt fat cats pay - money that will come from us - the consumer.
We learn some new things, like it cost less than 25 cents per year per name to run domain name registry - are we all being screwed or what?
It should cost should cost the huge NSI less than 1 cent per year to do the work. Screwing everybody harder still - car dealers would love that percentage markup.
Mr Mueller, Mr Gilmore and myself all agree on about trademark abuse of power by the greedy corporations:
Milton Mueller's account of Internet governance, portrays ICANN primarily as a tool for trademark protection.
John Gilmore says "I do agree that ICANN and domain name policy has been perverted from the start by the machinations of trademark interests. Actual trademark law gives zero power to cancel or seize domain names, prevent their issuance, etc. Actual trademark law lets hundreds of people use the same name, both in different jurisdictions, and for different kinds of trades (e.g., computers vs. soap vs. ships). Trademark owners only have power over others when the others misrepresent themselves as the trademark owner."
The authorities IGNORE National and Classification boundaries - this is unlawful - ask any (honest) Lawyer. These authorities know the solution to these trademark/domain problems - it is easier than using the telephone.
My fellow posters - these corrupt people in the US DoC, UN WIPO and ICANN are aiding and abetting this abuse. They prevent all registered trademarks from using their mark - an illegal act.
The Truth will win in the end - and the corrupt will be named and shamed.
Please visit World Intellectual Piracy Organization - Not associated with United Nations WIPO.org !
That's a pretty upbeat artical to have been posted on sept 11th...
autopr0n is like, down and stuff.