Re: [ga] Karl's comments at the 2003 Senate hearings on allocation systems

[Jeff Williams <jwkckid1@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Chris and all former DNSO GA members or other interested stakeholders/users,

The DNS/internet is many things to many different and diverse groups.
Indeed the commercial interests have most of the clout these days,
and are likely to get their way most of the time on most issues.  But
ICANN's GNSO once known as the DNSO, with the constituency
structure, which in my and our members opinion is skewed, is supposed
to provide for balance amongst the many and varied interested
stakeholders/registrants.  It failed long ago now but the ICANN BoD
is unwilling to admit to that failure, hence leaving big business commercial
stakeholders an open field to take advantage of what they want, and
how they want it.  Hence the need for sTLD's and gTLD's so as to
at least provide havens for non-commercial activity on the internet to
exercise their interests unfettered.  This is why when the USPTO with
pressure from large IP interest i.e. commercial stakeholders, made
a huge mistake in creating new classes of TM's for Domain Names,
leading to sunrise provisions in registrations for any new LTD's so
large IP interests could have first option to protect their marks.

To me and many of our members this whole approach was backwards.
Instead of sunrise provisions to address the USPTO's error in judgment,
ICANN registries should be responsible for checking against TESS
for potential TM conflicts at the time of a Domain Name registration
is requested, and before it is granted or allowed.  No money for any
registration at the time of a registration request should change hands
until such a search has been compleated.  This would be in concert
with TM law.  Yet potential interested parties for becoming registries
and/or registrars, strongly opposed such, as such would increase their
business ongoing cost, which would or could be passed on to
the potential further registrants.  Yet many law firms ect., specialize
in selling this service to the public for such searches and could be a
viable answer to potential interested Registry or registrar industry.

So now we have a ongoing quandary in which solutions abound, but
agreed upon solutions are scarce if existent at all.  Hence the
conundrum...

And so the saga continues...

kidsearch wrote:

> Sotiris said "The DNS is not simply a commercial affair, Karl, stop treating
> it as one." and "The Internet's wild west days have come and gone."
>
> Unfortunately, the days when the Internet was not a commercial affair have
> come and gone. The ideal of an instrument to exchange ideas freely and to
> promote causes that were educational and not for profit is barely visible
> anymore. What we have here is a new media, like when radio was new, then
> television. Except, the Internet doesn't have the same defined boundaries.
>
> There are still people who use the Internet as it was conceived, but they
> are far in the minority. The majority of interest in the Internet is toward
> sex, shopping, sex, listening to music, sex, and advertising. If those are
> not commercial affairs, then you need to explain it to me.
>
> Notice, I run a nonprofit, but yet I am advertising my websites in my sig
> line. My commercial websites get advertised that way all the time. Almost
> everyone has a commercial interest in the Internet. I don't see how treating
> it any other way will help when ICANN, WIPO, and all the big corporations
> are treating it that way. It's run by the Department of "Commerce", which by
> it's very nature means the primary concern is commercial.
>
> Chris McElroy, President,
> Kidsearch Network
> http://www.KidsearchNetwork.org
> http://www.MissingChildrenBlog.com
> http://www.RunawayTeens.org
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Sotiris Sotiropoulos" <sotiris@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
> To: <ga@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
> Sent: Thursday, December 22, 2005 1:33 AM
> Subject: Re: [ga] Karl's comments at the 2003 Senate hearings on allocation
> systems
>
> > Karl Auerbach wrote:
> >
> > >"I have *always* held the position that there should be no
> > >arbitrary, and particularly that there should be no
> > >non-technical barriers, denying anyone the ability to go out
> > >there into the domain name business, spend his/her money,
> > >and make either a ton of money or loose his/her shirt. I
> > >said it in my campaign platform back in 2000 -
> > > http://www.cavebear.com/icann-board/platform.htm#dnspol-tldpol
> >
> > Well, there had to be some reason as to why I did not vote for
> > you... though I do agree with you on certain things there are
> > others which I cannot accept at this time.
> >
> > >I live in that Wild West - it was pretty wild around here
> > >(California in general and the Monterey bay in particular)
> > >in 1846. And that wildness resulted in a pretty good place.
> >
> > The reason it resulted in a "pretty good place" is because at
> > some point, a centralized authority stepped in and applied
> > order and rules.  The mining towns and cattle villes were
> > quite lawless until the state and then federal governments
> > started to apply laws by sending in marshals and, if
> > necessary, the Army.  The Internet's wild west days have come
> > and gone.
> >
> > >But getting back to the point - People are not harmed by
> > >choice.
> >
> > That would be a pretty hard statement to make at a drug rehab
> > centre to a bunch of cocaine/crack addicts.  But hey, they
> > were free to choose right?  Sometimes people *are* harmed, or
> > more to the point, sometimes society as a whole is harmed.
> >
> > >By-the-way, DNS simply is not a taxonomic system. Period. The
> > >fact >that it has been used by many to be one does not make
> > >it one nor >does that use mean that it should be locked away
> > >and that others >should be forbidden to try to make new uses
> > >of DNS.
> >
> > Taxonomies effect a consistent, shared language used to
> > organize unstructured information from multiple locations.
> > Taxonomy is essentially systematization: a division into
> > ordered groups or categories.  I'd say the DNS qualifies as a
> > taxonomic system in every sense because each and every suffix
> > proposed to date qualifies as taxonomic by its very nature,
> > including your .ewe.
> >
> > >Your argument sounds to me like one that said that telephone
> > > wires, because they have been used to carry voice in the
> > >past, can not be used to carry data/DSL because that would
> > >confuse telephone users.
> >
> > Not at all.  I am saying that the Internet (and dns in
> > particular) are much more than simply a telephone exchange
> > system and ought not to be treated or viewed as one.  When
> > language itself became a technology, we were no longer dealing
> > with commodities like coal, oil, gas or electricity.
> > Language, by its very nature is an ontological construct.
> > When DNS was invented a whole new manner of interacting with
> > technology was made available.  The DNS is not simply a
> > commercial affair, Karl, stop treating it as one.
> >
> > >And if those standards go beyond the simple technical ability
> > >to run >a TLD according to internet standards then you are
> > >imposing an >economic and social policy regime that amounts
> > >to the making of a >law. And as a general matter, at least
> > >here in the US, that's >something for the legislatures to do,
> > >else it is simply restraint of >trade which may itself be
> > >unlawful.
> >
> > Karl, we both know ICANN was never simply a technical
> > oversight body, in fact, that's what the rest of the world is
> > upset about and what the WSIS discussions were all about.  We
> > cannot turn back the clock and the USDOC doesn't appear to be
> > inclined to do so either, I'm afraid.  So, unless you plan to
> > effect some change in USDOC policy vis a vis the Internet and
> > ICANN, I suggest you join the rest of us in the present day
> > realities of the situation.
> >
> > Sotiris Sotiropoulos
> >
> >

Regards,

--
Jeffrey A. Williams
Spokesman for INEGroup LLA. - (Over 134k members/stakeholders strong!)
"Obedience of the law is the greatest freedom" -
   Abraham Lincoln

"Credit should go with the performance of duty and not with what is
very often the accident of glory" - Theodore Roosevelt

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liability depends upon whether B is less than L multiplied by
P: i.e., whether B is less than PL."
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