[chapter-delegates] FYI - in the coming discussion of the WGIG questionnaire

[Vittorio Bertola]

I'd like to provide the point of view of a WGIG member (speaking 
personally, of course) :-)

Fred Baker ha scritto:
> I generally agree with your thoughts on this article, Patrick. I don't 
> think the article serves ICANN very well, because of the obvious 
> rhetoric it contains, and because Tucows (an internet registrar) is an 
> interested party in the discussion.

More generally speaking, I think that our work is made incredibly 
difficult by the level of mistrust that has been developed by the 
different sides, with some people pointing fingers at the "nasty 
americans" and other people pointing fingers at the "corrupt bureaucrats".

This is not a new phenomenon - you can see this kind of approach 
everywhere - in "IPR holders vs free software", or in "the music 
industry vs users", for example. However, no solution can be found 
unless we all accept that other opinions are legitimate and that others 
have valid reasons (not just power grab) to support them.

> Now, suppose it did. Elliot's argument is not that ICANN is global 
> because it meets outside the US. He argues that it is global because its 
> directors are majority non-US and because a variety of stake-holders, 
> including non-US governments, have defined seats at the table,

I don't think it is a matter of passports of individuals in specific 
positions; it is more a matter of internal culture and influence. ICANN 
is making a lot of effort to become more international; at the same 
time, most of its participants are American, or from the developed 
world; even those who are not American, often work for or with American 
companies. In practice, a small number of well-known American lobbyists 
have a higher weight in ICANN than all the rest of the world. And, for 
example, forget about participating in ICANN if you don't speak English 
(while usual global governance efforts support at least three 
languages). That's not anyone's fault, but possibly is a result of the 
fact that the US was the leader in developing this technology; at the 
same time, this is not an acceptable situation to many other countries.

> ICANN is a global organization that happens to be incorporated in 
> California, much like ITU is a global organization that happens to have 
> a physical instantiation in Geneva? If not, why not? Is this simply 
> anti-US sentiment on your part, or is it based on something more solid?

There is one fundamental question: no single country of the world can 
give orders to the ITU, but the US government and parliament can still 
give orders to ICANN, by passing appropriate legislation. It is clear 
that key resources of the Internet cannot be subject to the power of a 
single government (especially, if I may, of a government that every 
couple of years declares war to someone else). Given the importance of 
the Internet for every economy, no country of the world can afford the 
risk that, as it becomes classified as a member of the "axis of evil", 
some US law is passed to remove its ccTLD from the root, for example.

At one of the last ICANN meetings, I spoke with a young Iranian guy who 
told me about their efforts to get domain names. He said, we want dot 
com names to promote our products to the world; we initially had them, 
but then they were cancelled because American registrars were legally 
forbidden to have business with us. Then we tried to apply and accredit 
our own registrar at ICANN, but we couldn't do it because Verisign was 
not allowed to sell us a certificate to authenticate connections. I 
expained them that they have other options, but at the same time you 
can't blame these people for raising the issue of why they should have 
all these problems just because they are not liked by one specific country.

However, it is not just a matter of legal status; it is also a matter of 
practical control. For example, ICANN has contributed a lot to protect 
and perpetuate Verisign's position of dominance in the registry market. 
The entire non-US world was negatively affected (ranging from 
"disappointed" to "sick" to "furious") when, a couple of months ago, 
ICANN reappointed Verisign as manager of the .net TLD, despite 
SiteFinder, despite the lawsuits, despite almost every reasonable 
consideration on increasing diversity, robustness and competition. 
Everyone interpreted that move as "ICANN is still taking orders from the 
US government" - and that impression is going to stay, no matter how 
many non-US passports you count among Board members. Couple that with 
some unfortunate "incident", such as Verisign, a few days after the 
start of the Iraqi war, overlooking a forged redelegation request that 
allowed an American hacker to put Al Jazeera (the primary communication 
channel from the Arab world) offline...

> You are correct that WSIS/WGIG is not directly an attack on ICANN. I 
> think it is fair to say, however, that the ITU would like to use WSIS to 
> unseat ICANN and get the functions ICANN performs awarded to it,

This is true (at least partly - I think they're not aiming at the entire 
range of the ICANN mandate).

> and 
> that there are factions in WGIG that would like to similarly move power 
> and control to the UN.

This is less true, because the UN does not directly control anything 
technical - it does so through their agencies (the ITU, for example). At 
most, there are discussions about creating a new forum under the UN 
auspices and under the direct authority of the Secretary General and/or 
the General Assembly, which is a different thing; in any case, it would 
not take over the functions of ICANN.

> The questionnaire that made the rounds not too 
> long ago, asking rhetorically whether the UN should form an oversight 
> body and then diving into all the details assuming that the answer was 
> "yes" was very symptomatic of that.

Actually, it is symptomatic of a widespread consensus in the WGIG, about 
the fact that there is a big hole in the map of Internet Governance. 
However, that does not directly include ICANN; it is more focused on the 
application level, where issues such as spam, network security, consumer 
protection, do not have any clear global forum for discussion. In any 
case, it would not be a binding law-making entity; we mostly see it as a 
place where common recommendations should be agreed. Actually, I see 
this "new thing" more like a policy version of the IETF.

For an extremely brief discussion of this, I'm pointing you at the 
proposal I made to this regard, kindly archived by the IGP:

http://dcc.syr.edu/miscarticles/igp-proposals/BertolaISCG-2.pdf

Of course other WGIG members have different views (for example, pushing 
for powers being given specifically to governments) but that will be 
part of the discussion.

> Something that would serve the discussion better, I think, would be a 
> requirements analysis. This would involve at least three parts - a 
> cessation of discussion of "Internet Governance" as a topic and 
> replacement of that discussion with several discussions of the questions 
> discussed under that title,

...which is the work that the WGIG has been extensively doing in the 
last months, by the way. There are plenty of issue papers on our website.

> a frank discussion of the money+power issues 
> (this is all about money and power)

Not really. I might be idealistic, but for me, the reason is really that 
I am fed up with spam, spyware, and other ailments that affect the 
Internet, and I want to ensure that there is an open place for everyone, 
specifically including users, to discuss it. Currently you can only 
choose between closed industry consortiums (that usually do their 
members' interest rather than the public one) or governmental meetings 
(where often people don't have any practical clue).

>, and a technical discussion of what 
> would best serve the Internet. If technically the best solution 

Well... we are not addressing technical problems (the IETF is there for 
that), we are addressing political ones. The Internet is not a technical 
thing any more, it is a vital element of society, of economy, even of 
military security: it is a politically significant resource.

This said, of course I do agree that you should not give vital technical 
jobs to some entity without ensuring that they can fulfill them. (At the 
same time, assuming that the ITU would be unable to manage a root server 
is ingenerous to them.)

Regards,
-- 
vb.             [Vittorio Bertola - v.bertola [a] bertola.eu.org]<-----
http://bertola.eu.org/  <- Prima o poi...