PFF Adjunct Fellow Mike Palage, who served on the ICANN board from 2003 to 2006, filed these comments (PDF) on the NTIA’s recent Notice of Inquiry regarding ICANN’s future. Mike’s four key points were as follows:
- ICANN’s Periodic Review of its internal operations and supporting organizations has failed, and has become nothing more than a “perpetual motion machine of public comments and documentation producing no meaningful results.” Only a second Evolution and Reform Process can solve ICANN’s current deficiencies;
- ICANN must hardcode into its policies and its contracts the principle that its policies cannot supersede national laws;
- ICANN must cease any operational role in technical infrastructure as required by its bylaws and focus instead on its mission as a technical coordinator; and
- Congress must avoid “kicking the JPA can down the road” and instead provide much-needed leadership by creating a solid foundation for ICANN 3.0 in legislation after proper consultation with the Government Accountability Office.
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Today, the U.S. Department of Commerce’s National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) announced the members of the new Online Safety and Technology Working Group (OSTWG). I am honored to be among those chosen to participate in this new task force and I look forward to continuing the work started last year with the Harvard Berkman Center’s Internet Safety Technical Task Force (ISTTF), which I also served on. I was very proud of the work done by the ISTTF and the impressive final report that Prof. John Palfrey crafted to reflect our findings. I am eager to investigate these issues further and take a look at the latest research and technologies that can help us better understand how to protect our kids online while also protecting the free speech and privacy rights of Netizens.
The new NTIA working group, which was established under the “Protecting Children in the 21st Century Act,” will report to the Assistant Secretary of Commerce for Communications and Information on industry-implemented online child safety tools and efforts. Within a year of convening its first meeting, the group will submit a report of its findings and make recommendations on how to increase online safety measures.
Below the fold I have listed the complete roster of OSTWG task force members. I very much looking forward to working with this outstanding group. And I’m happy to report that my TLF blogging colleague Braden Cox will be joining me on this task force!
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By Mike Palage, PFF Adjunct Fellow & former ICANN Board Member
TPI’s Tom Lenard and Larry White released a study yesterday entitled ICANN at a Crossroads: A Proposal for Better Governance and Performance (PDF). ICANN is, indeed, at a crossroads: A number of critical Internet governance issues will be decided over the next 6-12 months-such as:
- How to roll out new gTLDs like .BLOG, which I’ve discussed here and here (PDF).
- ICANN’s future as an increasingly independent organization, which I’ve discussed here.
There is an acute need to better educate the public and policymakers about these complex issues and about how ICANN works-something that will be addressed by my upcoming primer on ICANN. For that reason, I welcome TPI’s contribution to this important debate about the future of the Internet. I share TPI’s concerns about the inadequacy of mechanisms currently in place to ensure ICANN’s accountability and the absence of any checks on ICANN’s ever-expanding budget.
But I strongly disagree with TPI’s conclusion that:
ICANN should remain a nonprofit organization, but it should be governed by and accountable to its direct users: the registries and the registrars. The seats on ICANN’s board could be rotated among the major operators in a manner that would reflect the diversity of viewpoints among the registries and registrars.
Having worn many hats in the ICANN eco-system-as a consultant for
both registries and registrars and as a business user and IP attorney-I must say that adopting this model of direct-user control would be suicidal for ICANN. Filling the ICANN Board with registries and registrars would create at least the appearance of a cartel, allowing those opposed to ICANN’s underlying model of public/private-partnership to capture the organization. Neither capture by private interests opposed to the “public” part of the model nor a counter-attack by those who object to the “private” part of the model would be a good thing for Internet users or ICANN stakeholders.
Having invested over 10 years of my life in ICANN’s diverse and inclusive public/private partnership model, I speak from first-hand experience that ICANN is
far from perfect as an organization. I’ve often feared that ICANN is heading in the wrong direction and I’ve never hesitated to say so. But despite these shortcomings, the various stakeholders I work with in the seemingly byzantine “ICANN process” remain as committed as ever to the principles set forth in NTIA’s 1998 White Paper as the foundations of Internet governance. The staying-power of this shared belief in a common set of principles among all stakeholders reaffirms my faith in the public/private partnership-whatever other changes need to be made.
Lenard and White are right about one thing: We
do need a new model for ensuring ICANN’s accountability after the expiration of ICANN’s current relationship with the U.S. Government. But the model they suggest isn’t it—as Steve Delbianco has pointed out.
Commerce Secretary Carlos Gutierrez issued this statement on Friday:
The TV Converter Coupon Program opened as scheduled on January 1, and is off to a great start. Americans have begun requesting coupons that will help them get the converter boxes needed for when our television signals change on February 17, 2009. With these coupons, the federal government will defray $40 of the cost of an eligible converter, which is expected to cost between $50 and $70.
The demand for coupons is strong. We’ve taken requests from every state for nearly 1.9 million coupons from more than one million households.
The demand is strong? Really? For something that’s free? You’re kidding.
Let’s see, 1.9 million coupons requested at $40 a pop is $76 million of taxpayer money out the door in just four days. As Secretary Gutierrez says, “off to a great start” indeed. At this “great” pace it’s good to know the coupon fund totals $1 billion.
What are you waiting for? Get your piece of the American dream here.
The Technology Liberation Front is the tech policy blog dedicated to keeping politicians' hands off the 'net and everything else related to technology.