RE: [faoc] Re: xTLD BoF and mailing list

[Barry Raveendran Greene <bgreene@cisco.com>]

Hi Don,

That seemed really productive. Thanks for the brain dump. It very useful. 

Barry

On Thursday, February 12, 1998 4:35 AM, Don Heath [SMTP:heath@isoc.org] wrote:
> At 11:50 AM 2/11/98 -0500, Milton Mueller wrote:
> >You made some reasonable points, but please note the following:
> >
> >Patrik Faltstrom wrote:
> >
> >> [gTLD-MoU] was formed by the IAHC committee, and signed by IANA and ISOC,
> >> 
> >> not ITU and WIPO.
> >
> >The IAHC committee was a political coalition of ISOC, IANA,ITU, and WIPO.
> >Please don't be disingenuous about this.
> 
> I am sorry to weigh in on this  -  I'm not apologizing, I'm just sorry
> to get involved in this by and large unfruitful thread.  However, I
> was there.  I put the IAHC together and I know how it was done and
> with what motivation.  This is said without ego, it's just the way 
> it was.
> 
> Postel wrote a proposal. In it, he described an ad hoc committee to
> select the registrars, define the TLDs, assign them, set up procedures
> for doing this process, and disband.
> 
> He gave it to ISOC to implement.  In June 1996, the ISOC BoT voted to
> accept the proposal, with a proviso that it be fleshed out with a
> business plan.
> 
> At that point, I was involved in email discussions on the topic, and 
> in forums around the world as well.  It was clear to me that the
> proposal could never work as defined.  There was significant 
> international resistance to what looked like a very US-centric plan,
> controlled by US-thinking.
> 
> So, I sought to pull together a group of people, geographically dispersed,
> with knowledge on the subject, who could also offer some clout (thus,
> the ITU - with their telco and worldwide reach, WIPO - for similar
> reasons, but with the IP and legal reach, INTA - again, worldwide
> reach representing many many business, corporations, and the trademark
> issues), plus the US government in the form of the Federal Networking
> Council.  I then took the opportunity to use the idea from the Postel
> plan to get members appointed from the international "Internet
> Community" from the IAB, IANA, and of course, ISOC.  As an aside, the
> IAB and IANA appointees came into the group thinking they were doing
> the Postel plan.  It was a little awkward, but quickly resolved.  I 
> originally wanted to include members from CIX, NSI, APNIC, and RIPE.  
> Ultimately I gave in to the argument that the group would get too big; 
> some interested groups would have to be excluded from direct IAHC 
> "membership"; a smaller group could react better and more efficiently; 
> it could look like conflict of interest if NSI et al were in it; etc.
> 
> The idea was, is, and always has been, to develop a wide spread view
> of what should be done  -  but not to implement the Postel plan, unless,
> if by coincidence, that happened to be the result of the process.  It
> was not.  It should be noted that at the very beginning, Jon Postel
> agreed with what I wanted to do.  Jon has always refrained from any
> attempt to dictate what should be done; rather, deferring to the
> will of the Internet stakeholders.  As a result, IANA fully got
> behind the new approach to be worked by the IAHC.  I have copied
> Jon and a few others on this note.
> 
> No one else interfered with what I put together.  I personally went
> to Pekka Tarjanne (ITU), Arpad Bogsch (WIPO), and INTA.  INTA, because
> David Maher was there at the time, and I wanted him on the IAHC.  It
> turned out that he resigned his spot at INTA, and INTA appointed another.
> As a result, David became an ISOC appointee.
> 
> There just wasn't any political stuff going on; there were no meetings
> thinking about composition (other that when I wanted to expand the
> IAHC within the 1st week of it's inception  -  and those discussions
> were a few emails, and phone conversations as I report above).  In
> fact, both Tarjanne and Bogsch, independently, wrote me notes saying 
> they would provide an individual, but in no way were ITU, or WIPO
> endorsing what we were doing and that they would not and could not
> officially participate.  Later, of course, ITU agreed to handle
> some minor administrative duties, and we brought WIPO in, also in
> an administrative role only, regarding the dispute policy processes.
> 
> All the speculation about conspiracy, sinister motives, attempting
> to take control, etc., are just plain hogwash.  The IAHC was formed
> only to work in the way the Internet was developed and is flourishing.
> That is by grass roots, bottom up consensus building and self-
> determination.  That's what we tried to do.
> 
> The incredible effort to derail, stall, mischaracterize the motivation
> and the work of the IAHC, to discredit it, etc., has been personally
> frustrating and disappointing; but, it did a good job.  No one nor
> any group has remotely come up with anything that comes close to what
> the IAHC/POC/CORE/PAB has done.
> 
> The changes that have been made and continue to be made in this thing
> are proof that it is open to all and that anyone can influence its
> outcome, providing there is wide enough acceptance.  The group does
> not sit in private and decide what to do; it gets its direction from
> you.  Still, as the saying goes, "you can't please everybody."
> 
> We had no massive PR machine and lobbying effort to drum up support;
> we simply did it the way it has been done  -  the way that has produced
> one of the most profound entities ever - the Internet.  The forces who
> had a self interest to protect, on the other hand, were and are, very
> effective in conjuring up misinformation and obfuscating the real
> issues.  There has been an incredible amount of work, thought, and
> brilliant synthesis to get where we are.  This has involved thousands
> of people from all over the world  -  the single most publicly scrutinized
> effort ever introduced into the Internet.  It should not be discarded
> lightly.
> 
> >
> >> So, if one want to start a discussion on how/if/when gTLDs have to be
> >> created, one have to discuss things like IF we should have gTLDs, and
> >> more
> >> important (as we can say that removing .com is not possible) how the
> >> registries are to exist.
> >
> >This discussion is taking place. That is what the Notice of Inquiryand the
> >Green Paper are about. It is more than obvious that the gTLD
> >did NOT establish a consensus about this. Otherwise the gTLD-MoU
> >would have been implemented with no objection.
> >
> >> The only way of solving these things, IAHC and POC found after
> >> discussing
> >> this for some 1.5 years, that one have to limit the number of registries,
> >> 
> >> to probably one or two, and also that things work best if the registries
> >> together form the registry, like in the UK and Sweden -- especially the
> >> UK
> >> which have a system that works!
> >
> >Bureaucratic agencies always seem to believe that limiting marketplacesto
> >one
> >or two easily regulated players is the answer to any problems
> >and conflicts. Certainly this makes life easier for the established,
> >vested
> >interests, such as the trademark holders. And it m,akes life easier
> >for the regulators. But it is not the path toward an open, thriving,
> >diverse
> >and innovative market.
> >The Internet reached its current glorious state of development precisely
> >because it was structured to allow private organizations and players the
> >freedom to jump on it and minimized administrative overhead. We need
> >to keep thinking along those lines.
> >
> >> gTLD -- which in turn says that we should have many registries, which
> >> the
> >> trade mark community says definitely no to because disputes will be so
> >> difficult to handle.
> >
> >The trademark community is just wrong. Domain names are not trademarksand
> >infringement that takes place on the Web can be rememdied without
> >giving trademark holders prior review of every domain name handed out
> >in the world. The trademark/copyright interests have a long history of
> >making outrageous and unreasonable claims. They wanted to ban videotape
> >recorders in the United States. They were wrong about that, and they
> >are wrong about domain names. Privately, many trademark lawyers
> >agree with me. But they recognize that it is in the economic self-interest
> >of large multinational trademark holders to extend their property rights
> >as far as possible. If we let "big trademark" run rampant over the
> >Internet, they will do it. Therefore, we must stand up to them.
> >Learn how to say "NO!"
> >
> >> There are hundreds of nasty dragons hidden in the GP paper which you
> >> will
> >> encounter not until you start writing down the details.
> >
> >Bring on the dragons!
> >Milton Mueller
> >
> >
> >
> 
> 
> 
> See you at INET'98, Geneva 21-24, July 98 
> <http://www.isoc.org/inet98/>