Bill Lovell <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: >At 15:48 15/02/99 +0000, Dr Nii Quaynor wrote: >>>Can we realistically have an ICANN without corporate sponsorship? Why is >>>corporate sponsorship considered harmful in this case? How can the perceived >>>dangers of corporate sponsorship be contained? >> Isn't this question posed backwards? Isn't it can we realistically take IANA which has existed under a U.S. Government/DARPA contract and which is the controlling point of the Internet and give it to any private entity? Or to thing that is under corporate sponsorship? Look at what is involved: The ownership/control and allocation of the IP numbers of the Internet The ownership/control and allocation of the DNS of the Internet including the root server system The ownership/control and allocation of the port numbers etc. The ownership/control and allocation of the RFC's including keeping them open and available to all. The protocol process also. Also the scaling of these systems Isn't this all too important and too controlling of too many people and computers and networks around the world and in the U.S. etc that it can't be given to something that is under any kind of private control and ownership? My proposal to Magaziner and the NTIA created a means of beginning to have scientific and cooperative government protection for these systems. There is plenty of history of the Internet and Usenet that show that it is through such processes that these systems were created and developed in various countries. (Usenet for example, though developed in its early days in the U.S. in universities at at Bell Labs and through support of people at Bell Labs got some its needed support.) In other countries like Holland it was cwi (then mc) which was government, in France folks at INRIA played an important role.) Similarly in the development of the Internet there were joint activities among computer scientists in different countries. The Internet still needs the support and work of computer scientists for the IANA systems to continue to grow and evolve and to have the proper non commercial environment to continue to grow and flourish. My proposal provided for a means of creating a prototype for the kind of cooperative international support and protection for these systems that is needed. My proposal is at the NTIA web site and also at http://www.columbia.edu/~rh120/other/dns_proposal.txt Ronda [EMAIL PROTECTED] Netizens: On the History and Impact of Usenet and the Internet http://www.columbia.edu/~hauben/netbook/ in print edition ISBN 0-8186-7706-6
