IP: ICANN/NSI and The End of Net As We Know It

[Dave Farber <farber () cis upenn edu>]

> Date: Thu, 29 Jul 1999 17:30:52 -0500
> To: farber () cis upenn edu
> From: Randy Sparkman <rsparkman () att net>
> Subject: ICANN/NSI and The End of Net As We Know It
>
> I'm not sure that Clay Shirky says anything particularly new about ICANN
> and Network Solutions in today's Feed Magazine "Daily". But his statement
> that "the internet is being inexorably privatized, and ... invites death by
> nostalgia" does provide a cause to pause. Ten years from now, will the end
> of the century be  viewed nostalgically as a digital golden age of (mostly)
> unregulated, unlimited, egalitarian and open Internet access and content
> provision?
>
> He writes:
>
> "What makes the situation even worse is that the mythic indestructibility
> of the internet has lulled net users into a sense of complacency. We still
> can't grasp that a network which could survive a nuclear attack may yet be
> crippled by politics."
>
> It's at:
>
> http://www.feedmag.com/daily/dy072999_master.html
>
>
> -- Randy Sparkman
>
> www.serigamy.com/sparkman