Fwd: Proposal for Discussion
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RB Hunter
rb_hunter at hotmail.com
Thu Jul 2 06:32:04 CEST 1998
Transitional Framework from a Business and User Perspective
Scope: Discuss the U.S. Government's appeal for Internet "consensus"
in Internet governance and propose organizational structures for the
"new organization". Also, comment on the current IANA activity and
international meetings initiated by the Internet community.
Overview
For the past 10 years or so, the IANA, an unofficial organization, was
responsible for many of the duties outlined in the NTIA's White
Paper. However, as the Internet has become more commercial, it was
realized by the IANA, U.S. government, and many other members of the
Internet community, that the time has come for a more formal, official
and established organization transition these responsibilities in
addition to other responsibilities into an new non-profit
organization. The establishment of this new organization will only
benefit the Internet community, as long as the transition from the
current IANA is smooth and the process for creating this new
organization continues to establish the stability needed for the
operations of the global Internet.
with the Internet from the small academic network to the commercial
superhighway that it is today. Whether you think you could of done a
better job, who will ever know? The important focus of the present
situation is how this old organization will transition to the new one.
The old IANA, headed by Jon Postel, has done an admirable job in a
very difficult situation. While many strong voices are advocating
their own agenda, the old IANA has tried its best to maintain
stability of the global Internet without having adequate power and
authority from the U.S. government or the Internet community to
effectively evolve into the organization we all hoped it would be.
Many people claim that Jon Postel has his own agenda, but those are
only the ones that don't know him. Jon has done more for the Internet
than anyone gives him credit for, whether you want to believe it or
not. While I am an advocate in his defense, it is obvious that his
role in this new organization should be significantly smaller - a role
which he would much rather have, I might add.
The people of the old organization need to be intimately involved in
this transition. They have just as much stake as anyone else, and
quite frankly, including Jon Postel, who has worked extremely hard, in
vain, to try to make everyone satisfied with Internet governance. How
can we ask Jon to step down from all of his duties when he has given
so much of his life to the Internet? It is clear that this new
organization will not be someone's single agenda, and it would be wise
to have Jon's expertise in certain matters available to the new IANA.
While many think they know what is best for the Internet, there are
many secret agendas in the participants of this process. The Internet
community needs to create an open process where these agendas will be
checked and balanced. So many people are concerned with what the
Internet can do for them, they miss the fact that this new
organization is being created for the good of the Internet as a
whole.
Domain names are the big issue here. No one cares about protocols or
even addresses (for the most part). However, these are currently the
main activities of the old IANA. Without these essential parts of the
machine, domain names wouldn't matter. One thing about domain names
is pretty certain: there will be many more top level domains when this
new organization gets a chance to actually work. Sure, there are a
few people who don't want any more TLDs, but the vast majority are
advocating many more TLDs, including Jon Postel, who initially
requested to add 150+ TLDs to the root. All in all, domain names
should not be that big of an issue. No matter who is the "CEO" or on
a "Board of Directors", they will advocate the creation of many TLDs,
maybe an unlimited number of TLDs (which would let the market
determine which ones were best).
Transition
Regardless of this speculation, the process of creating this new
organization needs to be WIDE open. From corporations, ISPs, academia
and end users from around the world, the new organization needs
consensus. We are not going to get anywhere if we leave 1 person out.
Understandably, however, not everyone will have their opinion turn
into policy. That is not consensus. Consensus is the expression of
opinions in an open forum, and the approval of some of them by the
majority of the participants.
Initially, while the end user might not be thoroughly represented, the
stakeholders are the key participants. All stakeholders in the
process must work together in order to get the organization running by
September 30, 1998. While the International Forums are a good start,
I would hope that the result of those forums is to have the old IANA
sponsor the proposals that are created in the forums. Sponsoring
would entail creating compromise among the proposals, submitting it to
the stakeholders of the Internet community (participants of these
International Forums) for "consensus", and then working with the final
proposal to establish this new organization. There will obviously be
many proposals, and it is the role of the Internet community to
discuss each proposal and work on finding a few good organizational
structures which could elect and Interim Board of Directors for the
new organization. Once this Board of Directors is elected, the
organization has started, and policies will result, including an
official organizational structure, which will have the consensus of
the Internet community behind it.
Proposal
As an informed user, my opinion will probably be disregarded, and that
is unfortunate. Simply because I am not an ISP or huge stakeholder in
the game shouldn't mean that my business sense and organizational
ideas should be discounted. There are many of use who are much more
talented organizationally than some of the stakeholders, and in turn,
there are many more stakeholders who know a lot more about the process
than I do. In any case, because I will not be able to participate in
any of the International Forums, my proposal for the new organization
will be given here. I have no agenda. I want to see the Internet
work. I want the Internet to remain and grow as the commercial
machine that it is, and at the same time, I want people involved in
the Internet governance game to be sane, effective, aware and adhering
to their constituents, and doing what they feel is best for the
Internet.
Personally, I believe that the election of and Interim Board of
Directors to start up the organization should be a bottom-up process,
starting with the Internet community [A], which is primarily the
stakeholders. These stakeholders, in effect, represent the Internet
community and can achieve "consensus". A stakeholder should be
representatives attending the International Forums as well as anyone
else who feels they have a valuable stake in Internet governance. For
the most part, this will not include the end user, who is not all that
aware of the situation, and as long as stability of the Internet and
day to day operations have integrity, they would rather not be
involved (except me, of course).
[A] --------------------
|Internet Community|
--------------------
>From the bottom up, the Internet community would participate in
various commissions [B]. I will propose 5 commissions: Domain,
Address, Protocol, User, and Nominating. The commissions will be
responsible for nominating Interim "Councils" which would represent
their interests. The Domain commission would be responsible, in the
interim, for domain name issues (once the Interim Board of Directors
is elected). The Address commission would be responsible for Address
issues and development. The Protocol commission would be responsible
for Protocol issues. The User commission would be responsible to
represent the end user and various issues. The Nominating commission
would be responsible for nominating interim Board members outside in
addition to the elections which take place in the various
commissions.Any participant may be involved in each of these
commissions, but many not be elected to more than 1 council.
------------ ------------ ------------ ------------ ------------
| Domain | | Address | | Protocol | | User | |Nominating|
|Commission| |Commission| |Commission| |Commission| |Commission|
------------ ------------ ------------ ------------ ------------
| | | | |
----------------------------------------------------------
[B] |
--------------------
|Internet Community|
--------------------
>From these commissions, the councils would be elected. These councils
would represent their commission and have a vote on the Interim Board
of Directors. Another idea is for each council to be represented on
the Board with 2 seats (with the exception of the nominating
commission). The nominating commission would independently nominate
people for the Board of Directors who are not involved in the other
councils. No council for this commission is needed. This results in
diagram [C]:
------------ ------------ ------------ ------------ ------------
| Domain | | Address | | Protocol | | User | |Independent|
| Council | | Council | | Council | | Council | | Board |
| | | | | | | | |Nominations|
------------ ------------ ------------ ------------ ------------
| | | | |
------------ ------------ ------------ ------------ ------------
| Domain | | Address | | Protocol | | User | |Nominating|
|Commission| |Commission| |Commission| |Commission| |Commission|
------------ ------------ ------------ ------------ ------------
| | | | |
----------------------------------------------------------
[C] |
--------------------
|Internet Community|
--------------------
Thus, representatives from each council would be voted in to the
interim Board of Directors, and the councils as a whole would vote to
approve the Independent Board Nominations, who would serve on the
Board with equal status. Diagram [D]:
------------- -------------
|Board Reps | + |Board Reps |
| (Councils)| |(Ind. Nom.)|
------------- -------------
| |
| |
----------------------------------------------------------
| | | | |
------------ ------------ ------------ ------------ ------------
| Domain | | Address | | Protocol | | User | |Independent|
| Council | | Council | | Council | | Council | | Board |
| | | | | | | | |Nominations|
------------ ------------ ------------ ------------ ------------
| | | | |
------------ ------------ ------------ ------------ ------------
| Domain | | Address | | Protocol | | User | |Nominating|
|Commission| |Commission| |Commission| |Commission| |Commission|
------------ ------------ ------------ ------------ ------------
| | | | |
----------------------------------------------------------
[D] |
--------------------
|Internet Community|
--------------------
Combined, these elected representatives would constitute the interim
Board of Directors. The Council members would remain in their
respective positions until the interim Board of Directors establishes
the legal organization and framework for the election of the Board of
Directors and the participation of the Internet community as a whole.
The end result would be diagram [E]:
--------------
| Interim |
| Board of |
| Directors |
--------------
|
---------------------------
| |
------------- -------------
|Board Reps | + |Board Reps |
| (Councils)| |(Ind. Nom.)|
------------- -------------
| |
| |
----------------------------------------------------------
| | | | |
------------ ------------ ------------ ------------ ------------
| Domain | | Address | | Protocol | | User | |Independent|
| Council | | Council | | Council | | Council | | Board |
| | | | | | | | |Nominations|
------------ ------------ ------------ ------------ ------------
| | | | |
------------ ------------ ------------ ------------ ------------
| Domain | | Address | | Protocol | | User | |Nominating|
|Commission| |Commission| |Commission| |Commission| |Commission|
------------ ------------ ------------ ------------ ------------
| | | | |
----------------------------------------------------------
[D] |
--------------------
|Internet Community|
--------------------
Of course, this is only a proposal for discussion. This organization
structure was only created as the short-term process for establishing
the Interim Board of Directors. While it may contain some ideas as to
how the final organizational structure is configured, it was created
to start discussion as to how this new non-profit organization should
be created.
Conclusion
While September 30, 1998 may seem like quite a long time away, there
is much work needed on this issue. I hope that this proposal can
result in some constructive cooperation and criticism for how the new
organization should be created.
We must all actively participate in this process. Criticism of any
proposal should include new ideas and suggestions. Negative reaction
without the wisdom to suggest specific reforms will not create
cooperation within the community, but will merely divide it.
My challenge to all of the stakeholders is to be as agenda-less as
possible. It is in your best interest to do so. With competing
agendas and self-interest dominating the discussion, no consensus will
ever be achieved.
If you took the time to read this, thanks for you time and efforts.
***********************************
D. Elliott
International Consultant & Mediator
Concerned Internet User
***********************************
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