Re: [ga] Casting stones

[Thomas Roessler <roessler@does-not-exist.org>]

On 2002-08-06 18:20:21 -0400, Michael Froomkin wrote:

>Just about very US-based NGO person I know thinks time spent 
>inside ICANN's hall of mirrors is now wasted time.  I can't blame
>them.

And what's your perspective for the future?  Replacing ICANN?  By  
what?  Direct government oversight over Verisign?  How realistic is  
that?

All this talk about a re-bid, or about working around ICANN,  
ultimately boils down to the suggestion to replace the lobbyist  
battleground called ICANN by the lobbyist battleground called  
Capitol Hill.  Same players, different coast.  How's that an  
improvement?

Bad enough, you don't seem to have any plans for the event that the  
battleground remains at the West Coast.  What's the NGO community  
going to do when ICANN reform actually happens, and the DoC renews  
the MoU?  Still continue to lobby for a "re-bid", focus on the meta  
level, and let Intellectual Property interests dominate part of the  
debate down on the detail levels where policy and architecture (*)  
are made?  (Yes, I know that things are more complicated.)

As I wrote you earlier today: The argument that people don't listen
is a hell of a lot more credible when you have said something. Not 
in year 1, but now.

(*) Used like Lessig does it. Think, for instance, about thick vs.   
thin registry.  Thick registry does, in particular, mean that you  
can do some jurisdiction shopping as far as privacy of registrants  
is concerned.  That's much more difficult with a thin registry.
-- 
Thomas Roessler                          http://log.does-not-exist.org/
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