more on A battle for the soul of the Internet

[David Farber <dave () farber net>]

Begin forwarded message:

From: Suresh Ramasubramanian <suresh () hserus net>
Date: June 7, 2005 8:47:47 AM EDT
To: dave () farber net
Cc: ian.peter () ianpeter com
Subject: Re: [IP] more on A battle for the soul of the Internet


David Farber wrote:

> From: Ian Peter <ian.peter () ianpeter com>
>
> The characterisation in the article "A battle for the soul of the
> Internet"  of what is going on with WSIS is a long way from the
> debate which is going on at present. Few people involved in this
> see it as a UN vs ICANN battle any more.

Ian

Thank you very much for pointing out a few flaws in what, so far, has
been vociferous and unbalanced criticism of both ICANN and the WSIS,
from people who have quite strong opinions on the issue, but are
allowing their personal dislikes to overcome logical thinking.

This article by Geoff Huston and Paul Wilson of APNIC is an interesting
read on this issue - http://www.circleid.com/article/1045_0_1_0_C/ as
are the other articles at http://www.circleid.com/channel/index/C0_8_1/
[particularly those by Geoff, Paul and Tom Vest]

Two of my comments [one in response to yet another tirade by Karl
Auerbach on icann, as it happens] in that thread would be relevant to
this IP discussion -

regards
srs

-----------------


> I read the session transcripts of that WGIG meeting that have been  
> posted on www.wgig.org, and am gratified to know that Leichtenstein  
> (on behalf of the presidency of the EU), Australia et al do  
> understand the issues involved.
>
> Most of the people making those comments (especially the  
> representatives from India and China, both of whom I have had the  
> pleasure of meeting at various other conferences) are, with all due  
> respect, not aware of the true technical or even social / economic  
> complexity of the issues being discussed, and nor are they really  
> aware of the true nature and governance of the RIRs. Oh, I am glad  
> to see that the delegate from Syria was in full form. He is, how  
> shall I put it, quite well known for his frequent contributions at  
> other ITU meetings :)
>
> Here is my perspective on a few issues raised there ..
>
> APNIC, for example, is governed by its AC / EC, and members from  
> any APNIC region can, and regularly do, stand for election to these  
> committees. This, and other RIRs, are a cooperative undertaking by  
> ISPs from around the region of coverage of the RIRs, asiapac in the  
> case of APNIC.
>
> ICANN, both the board and its At Large component, is fully open to  
> people from any country, anywhere, standing for election and making  
> their opinions known as well, besides helping them gaining some  
> better understanding of the underlying processes.
>
> So, raising the "other" invisible hand - the invisible hand of US  
> Government remote control - is not going to be productive or useful.
>
> Nor are the usual claims that "China is short of IP addresses" -  
> China has been receiving ever increasingly larger blocks of IP  
> space in the recent past, and all IPs there are allocated by the  
> LIR, CNNIC - which shares the apnic common pool of addresses, but  
> is responsible for allocating it locally.. so any shortfall of IP  
> space that China raises in future should result in them being  
> referred right back to CNNIC, which is a quasi governmental agency,  
> I believe.
>
> Then there is the "holders of international bandwidth are at an  
> advantage" theme that gets harped on - this time by India. Some  
> people in India, and others active in the asiapac network operators  
> conferences, have been advocating the need for an internet exchange  
> long before NIXI was formed. However, the way NIXI took shape and  
> is being run is far below potential, and improving this (plus  
> adding an Akamai cluster, and mirrors of popular download sites,  
> colocated at the datacenter of any of the ISPs that peer at nixi)  
> will go a long way towards improving this situation. Oh, I almost  
> forgot. India's input to the WGIG said something about root servers  
> all being located in developed countries. I am sure now that  
> they've retained Afilias for the .in ccTLD they'll have some  
> slightly better knowledge of anycast. Put it to them that the root  
> nameservers are anycast, and mirrors of (say) I Root or F Root  
> would be an excellent thing to have at the NIXI [or at an isp that  
> fully peers,
 advertises all its routes, at nixi]

> I could say more, but these issues have been pointed out in the  
> past, and right now, I am concerned that the effort to promote  
> internet governance is being superseded by an effort to wrest  
> control of the existing structures from their incumbent operators,  
> who hold these in trust for the international internet community  
> and operate it as directed by the community.
>
> This is not a war of independence against a colonial power, though  
> it appears to be projected as such.
>
> If governments wish to participate in the governance of the  
> internet, the existing framework is extremely accomodating and can  
> fit them in quite easily. Government owned telecom and internet  
> providers (BSNL / MTNL in India, China Telecom in China etc) can,  
> and should, play a larger role in this, by standing for election to  
> the APNIC AC for example, and actively involving themselves and  
> contributing their expertise in other ways at APNIC.


and --


> Karl
>
> I wont comment on ICANN here. But in response to this -
>
> On another point, you mention the lack of technical expertise on  
> the part of some WGIG participants.
>
>
> > It is easy to dismiss the people who are working on the WGIG issues
> > because they lack technical credentials. But one must realize
>
> I rather agree, that is a valid point. In response to this I'll  
> just repeat what I said at an igovernance panel organized by apdip/ 
> undp during apricot kyoto ..
>
> http://www.apnic.net/meetings/19/docs/transcripts/igov.txt
>
> The ideas are mine. The words are mine. The english as transcribed  
> in that link sure doesnt sound like mine though, I guess I can put  
> it down to transcription error :) Anyway, here goes.
>
> I have filled in one or two blanks left in transcription, from my  
> memory of what I said there. And corrected some of the english as  
> well.
>
> ---------
>
> So here what we have is technologists pointing to poor misguided  
> regulation saying that isn't going to work or pointing out that the  
> Internet has no national boundaries so traditional regulation is  
> not going to work. On the other hand we have governments insisting  
> we do need a route because we have substantial interests that are  
> being affected by this. For whatever motive. To preserve a national  
> monopoly that is bringing substantial money to the government for  
> example an income in telco. Or for other even more mercenary  
> reasons such as a plain desire for control - or from a sincere  
> desire to do good and ensure good for the people by good  
> governance. So where and how do we channel
> the energies of governments towards good governance where they can  
> do the best.
>
> For example, you have a lot of issues that depend on international  
> cooperation between governments, and between governments and  
> industry. Cyber crime, for example, and anti-spam regulations -  
> wherever there is a crossover between the online world and the  
> offline world, and where participation and cooperation between law  
> enforcement / judiciary / governments / ISPs around the world is  
> essential in order to get the job done.
>
> In the course of my job I work with a whole lot of governments,  
> besides working together with other ISPs and businesses. And I keep  
> wishing there was already a framework in place instead of trying to  
> build it from scratch at ITU/OECD meetings, as well as at network  
> operator meetings like the ones I help organize at apcauce.org
>
> In the case of the telecom sector and inequitable pricing of  
> telephony and bandwidth in developing economies, governments could  
> help localise the industry [by helping set up internet exchanges],  
> arrange / broker appropriately equitable prices with other providers.
>
> That's what I was trying to say. How do we get governments to  
> participate in the current governance process, without undermining  
> the foundations of the existing process, and without  
> unintentionally making their participation intrusive or harmful?



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