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World Summit On The Internet And IT
eegad writes "The Seattle PI reports on the upcoming first phase of the World Summit on the Information Society to be held in Geneva on December 10-12. 192 nations are involved in the effort to set some ground rules for the Internet (a little late, eh?) including ways to deal with spam, a possible "digital solidarity fund" to help developing nations, and discussion of UN regulation. The goal of this phase is to adopt a "Declaration of Principles" and "Plan of Action". Some countries plan on asking for a UN commission to study new ways of running the Internet aimed at the 2005 phase. The official website will provide coverage of the event. How come I wasn't invited?" The Washington Times also has a piece on it, as well. We had covered this a bit before.
Check out the NYTimes article, it points out a bit of the criticism of the whole process.
Link (reigstration req'd, blah blah)
I know others ahve already commented about this, but honestly what good can come from this? I don't want any part of the internet under UN control. Right now the internet is mostly apolitical and thats the way it should stay. I cannot believe this could lead to anything good.
Well.. maybe. Or Maybe not. But Definitely not sort of.
I'm a programmer working at the W.H.O., which is just down the road from the exibition hall, so I've been looking at the schedule to see what events might be interesting or useful to attend.
Looks like a lot of local linux users (see G.U.L.L) are planning to attend at least the panel with Larry Lessig and RMS on Wednesday. RMS is also speaking on Thursday.
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This summit is a betrayal of it's original ideals, and especially of the World's poor. Various groups are intending to strongly oppose this travesty; there is more information and here.
WSIS might sound like a boring bureaucratic exercise, but there's a strong chance that governments are going to walk away from it with new international agreements in their pockets to pass laws in their own countries restricting the free flow of information.
Quoting the "WSIS? We Seize!" press release:
'While the official agenda of this UN/ITU Summit talks about "free access to information", "the digital divide" and "equality of opportunities", in reality its doors are closed, its discussions exclusive and the agendas of those who attend it concealed. What's more, the right to demonstrate and protest has been suspended in Geneva at this time, as the usual parade of despots and tyrants fly in to Switzerland to define policy for their own citizens, and the rest of the world, based on the agendas of corporate multinationals, media conglomerates and infrastructure owners.
Geneva03 is a temporary network of groups and individuals set up to carry out agitational, educational and communications work during both the G8 and the WSIS. Geneva03 considers it critical to show, during such a display of media power and control, that independent groups and people have the ability to create their own media, to share media, self publish, build networks and communicate freely and autonomously. That's why we've titled our events during this time WSIS? WE SEIZE! We do not consider that negotiation and supplication before the altar of the UN will produce information autonomy for all. Instead, we are taking our autonomy now, using the means and technologies at our disposal: the Internet, peer to peer networks, Free and Open Source Software, community wireless infrastructures, pirate television and radio and streamed media. Beyond questions of communications technology, We Seize! seeks to open a wide-ranging discussion on the new social conditions that constitute today's world about which the WSIS has little or nothing to say: media concentration, expansive intellectual property regimes, casualised and immaterial labour and migration.
We insist that this urge to speak, to hear and be heard, is irrepressible. The Geneva03 group returns to Geneva following major attempts at repression during the G8 this year, in which the group were targetted by police whilst running an independent media centre. No charges were brought against the group, because - whatever the establishment would like us to believe - it is still lawful to freely express ourselves. We must, however, continue to exercise this ability, to expand and test it in diverse situations, if we are not to lose the freedom and potential that defines us as people.
Communication, language and information are essential to understanding both control and liberation in this new millenium. They are simultaneously the site of the most repressive and totalitarian suppression and disciplining we have seen since the 1950s and, we believe, the basis of a powerful, growing autonomous movement. Ultimately this movement must cut to the very heart of communication: for what we are able to articulate, we are able to create. We must speak of a new world without fear, and with all the creativity, energy and commitment we can find.'
(end quote)
If you want to know more, here are some useful links:
Good background article on Indymedia Global
WSIS? We Seize!
The World Forum on Communication Rights
Polimedia Lab
Civil Society news centre for the WSIS
Indymedia UK WSIS 2003 section
Heise.de has an article about the interetaccess on this conference: http://www.heise.de/newsticker/data/jk-08.12.03-00 6/ (in german). The main info: Internetaccess for participants on this conference will cost about 128Euro. Participants from the third world, already having problems to bring up the money to attend, might not be able to afford the Internetaccess on the "World Summit on the Information Society". An attendee from Bulgaria mentioned that in Bulgaria this is about the amount of money you have to live from ... for two months.
Nils