At 05:58 PM 6/14/99 , Esther Dyson wrote:
>I thought it was a question of general interest, as (I hoped) were my own
>financial interests when I posted them some time ago.
>
>Esther
>
>At 01:48 AM 14/06/99 -0400, Richard J. Sexton wrote:
>>Esther did you mean to send that out to a couple of public mailing
>>lists or was that a late night slip of the finger that was supposed
>>to go to Jay only ?
>>
>>At 10:08 PM 6/13/99 -0400, Esther Dyson wrote:
>>>Jay -
>>>
>>>What made you stop consulting for NSI?
Hi Esther,
Sorry for the slow response.
Frankly, I like Richard, thought you must have
made a mistake when you posted your inquiry to
a public list. After all, there have been many,
many posting of much greater significance that
you have ignored, without so much as peep of a
response or acknowledgement!
One of the postings that you ignored was titled
"Everything you Never Wanted to Know about ICANN."
In it, I said . . .
At 01:57 AM 5/19/99 , Jay Fenello wrote:
>Over the course of the last couple of months, we have come to realize that
>ICANN has ignored it's own bylaws, ignored it's MoU with Commerce, and ignored
>the terms and goals of the White Paper. And when we have complained to
>Commerce, we have been ignored as well.
>
>In effect, ICANN has pursued an agenda completely synchronous with the
>gTLD-MoU which proceeded it. And while it continues to give the appearance
>that it is working towards the day when it is an open and transparent body,
>managed by and for the Internet community in a bottom-up way, their recent
>policy decisions are diametrically opposed to these ideals.
>
>If and when this utopian ICANN nirvana arrives, all of the major policy
>decisions will have already been made, and the process rules will have
>already been defined. It will take years and years to correct.
>
>And that assumes that the resulting organization can even function. Some are
>now suggesting that ICANN is deliberately creating a structure that will be
>unable to make even simple decisions, let alone reverse their current agenda.
>
>It is for these reasons that I hearby declare that ICANN has been captured,
>and the U.S. Government is obliged to intervene once again. If not Commerce,
>then Congress. And if not Congress, then this should be escalated to the
>presidential elections. After all, this travesty is occurring on Al Gore's
>watch.
>
>In closing, as this summary reveals, ICANN has historically shown nothing but
>contempt for the valuable contributions from ORSC, BWG and the rest of the
>Internet community. I refuse to waste my time further.
Your atrocious performance in Berlin confirmed
all of my worst fears. ICANN has been captured,
and nothing that I say or do will have any effect
on this Board or its agenda (except, perhaps, to
slow it down).
That being the case, I have decided to give up on
ICANN! I am no longer following ICANN, the DNSO,
nor any of its constituencies. And since I am no
longer following this fiasco, I no longer have
any views to offer NSI on this topic.
But that's not to say that I've given up. My
role will now escalate to the political realm,
where this fight really belongs. I will continue
to build Iperdome, and I will continue to fight
for a free and open Internet for all.
Respectfully,
Jay Fenello
President, Iperdome, Inc. 404-943-0524
-----------------------------------------------
What's your .per(sm)? http://www.iperdome.com
>>>Curiously,
>>>Esther Dyson
>>>
>>>At 06:25 PM 13/06/99 -0400, you wrote:
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>Hi Antony,
>>>>
>>>>For the most part, we agree.
>>>>
>>>>There are, however, a couple of points
>>>>I would like to comment on.
>>>>
>>>>Since you have addressed this email to me,
>>>>you seem to be implying that I am no longer
>>>>an independent voice. Nothing could be further
>>>>from the truth.
>>>>
>>>>Even when I was consulting for NSI (which ended
>>>>with the Berlin meeting), I was not paid to be a
>>>>"NSI Supporter." My role was to give NSI my views
>>>>on this fiasco, not the other way around!
>>>>
>>>>And while we agree that NSI has done some things
>>>>wrong, I don't persecute them for any original sin
>>>>(i.e. wild success with a competitive .com registry).
>>>>
>>>>Where we strongly disagree, however, is with the
>>>>cure. The real solution to this dilemma is a healthy
>>>>dose of competition for NSI, not top-heavy regulation.
>>>>For if you choose the latter, you subject everyone to
>>>>those powerful forces who would love to control this
>>>>wonderful thing we call the Internet.
>>>>
>>>>Respectfully,
>>>>
>>>>Jay Fenello
>>>>President, Iperdome, Inc. 404-943-0524
>>>>-----------------------------------------------
>>>>What's your .per(sm)? http://www.iperdome.com
>>>>
>>>>P.S. Please forward this to the DNSO list. I
>>>>believe that I have been involuntarily removed!
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>At 04:16 PM 6/13/99 , Antony Van Couvering wrote:
>>>>>Don, Jay,
>>>>>
>>>>>Given the breathtakingly brazen stunts that NSI has pulled at the expense of
>>>>>the Internet community, I never thought it would be possible for ICANN to
>>>>>make them look like the aggrieved party. But lo, it has come to pass.
>>>>>
>>>>>This is getting sickening. I've never seen so many people who were
>>>>>completely right and never wrong as I've seen on these lists. Are there any
>>>>>independent voices out there?
>>>>>
>>>>>Who can really feel sorry for NSI after all the crap they've pulled?
>>>>>Practically no-one, I should think, except their employees. But who can
>>>>>support ICANN when they start censoring people? Even fewer (since they have
>>>>>fewer employees).
>>>>>
>>>>>Will the people from the IAHC/gTLD-MoU (and remember, I was founding Chair
>>>>>of PAB and spent a lot of time and effort to make that effort succeed), who
>>>>>now seem to all think that ICANN is a conclave of the purest wisest Solomons
>>>>>ever assembled, presumably because they are at present bashing NSI, never
>>>>>realize that:
>>>>>
>>>>>*The POC was a closed shop, a black box, unreadable and unknowable from the
>>>>>outside, intransigent against efforts to open it up and see the
>>>>>decision-making process
>>>>>
>>>>>*Making everyone sign the gTLD-MoU before they got to play was an horrific
>>>>>miscue and an affront to Internet stakeholders (hence my attempt to
>>>>>introduce a very watered-down "gTLD-MoU lite", consisting of a few
>>>>>unobjectionable principles - alas, to no effect).
>>>>>
>>>>>*If the POC hadn't forced CORE to charge $10K to anyone who wanted to become
>>>>>a registrar, which was done just to make sure that "unstable" people didn't
>>>>>join, but instead had charged, say, $500, like Nominet does in the UK, we
>>>>>wouldn't have had the Green Paper, the White Paper, or the ICANN, which is
>>>>>starting to act just like POC, but with less excuse since they have already
>>>>>seen that kind of thing fail.
>>>>>
>>>>>*Basically, NSI did try to torpedo the gTLD-MoU, but that's not why it
>>>>>failed. It failed because it was so bloody-mindedly stupid, and so paranoid
>>>>>about NSI that it started to act like NSI: paranoid, unaccountable,
>>>>
>>>>>mealy-mouthed.
>>>>>
>>>>>*That it's just possible that NSI doesn't realize how horribly they've
>>>>>treated everyone, that they actually think they're the good guys, and that
>>>>>therefore they should be encouraged to become part of the community and stop
>>>>>playing the spoiler.
>>>>>
>>>>>*That the POC has mostly itself to blame for the Green Paper and the White
>>>>>Paper and the plodding interference of the U.S. Government. Do you think
>>>>>Magaziner *wanted* to step into this minefield? All you had to do was let a
>>>>>few other people play with the ball, but you couldn't let yourself do it.
>>>>>
>>>>>AND ON THE OTHER SIDE
>>>>>
>>>>>Will the people who are NSI supporters - and most of them now admit they are
>>>>>paid - stop acting the fool and admit that:
>>>>>
>>>>>*Of course NSI did all it could to torpedo the gTLD-MoU, just as it is now
>>>>>dragging its heels to fullest possible extent with ICANN.
>>>>>
>>>>>*The only reason NSI plays at all in this sandbox is because the only
>>>>>gorilla larger than it, the US Govt., is standing over it with a big stick.
>>>>>
>>>>>*That having secret lists of names they won't register, that not following
>>>>>the RFCs, that greeting every domain-name dispute with an army of lawyers,
>>>>>that charging the equivalent of a new registration to transfer a name to new
>>>>>registrar, that attempting to claim the whois database as their property,
>>>>>that replacing the InterNIC site without any warning, that crippling whois
>>>>>listings without any warning, and so on ad nauseum until we're all so sick
>>>>>of it we can hardly breathe, IS NOT ACCEPTABLE BEHAVIOR.
>>>>>
>>>>>*That NSI has mostly itself to blame for the Green Paper and the White Paper
>>>>>and the plodding interference of the U.S. Govt. Again, do you think that
>>>>>Magaziner wanted to get in the middle of this thing? I know, because I was
>>>>>there, that almost any movement toward an accommodation with the gTLD-MoU
>>>>>would have led to negotiations that might have got us somewhere. But no.
>>>>>Given .com years ago, in a different universe far far away, NSI has latched
>>>>>on to it as if they actually earned it, which is truly laughable.
>>>>>
>>>>>And so Adult Supervision was definitely indicated. Hence the involvement of
>>>>>the U.S. Government. Unfortunately for all of us, the supervision, in the
>>>>>form of ICANN, is proving to be as puerile and short-sighted as their
>>>>>charges.
>>>>>
>>>>>This was the Internet, this beautiful gift to us all, and just look at the
>>>>>preposterous games these fools are playing with it, all these fools who are
>>>>>always right, all the time.
>>>>>
>>>>>PASS THE SICK BAG.
>>>>>
>>>>
>>>>Respectfully,
>>>>
>>>>Jay Fenello
>>>>President, Iperdome, Inc. 404-943-0524
>>>>-----------------------------------------------
>>>>What's your .per(sm)? http://www.iperdome.com
>>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>Esther Dyson Always make new mistakes!
>>>chairman, EDventure Holdings
>>>interim chairman, Internet Corp. for Assigned Names & Numbers
>>>[EMAIL PROTECTED]
>>>1 (212) 924-8800
>>>1 (212) 924-0240 fax
>>>104 Fifth Avenue (between 15th and 16th Streets; 20th floor)
>>>New York, NY 10011 USA
>>>http://www.edventure.com http://www.icann.org
>>>
>>>High-Tech Forum in Europe: 24 to 26 October 1999, Budapest
>>>PC Forum: March 12 to 15, 2000, Scottsdale (Phoenix), Arizona
>>>Book: "Release 2.0: A design for living in the digital age"
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>--
>>[EMAIL PROTECTED] [EMAIL PROTECTED]
>>Remember, amateurs built the Ark. Professionals built the Titanic.
>>
>>
>
>
>Esther Dyson Always make new mistakes!
>chairman, EDventure Holdings
>interim chairman, Internet Corp. for Assigned Names & Numbers
>[EMAIL PROTECTED]
>1 (212) 924-8800
>1 (212) 924-0240 fax
>104 Fifth Avenue (between 15th and 16th Streets; 20th floor)
>New York, NY 10011 USA
>http://www.edventure.com http://www.icann.org
>
>High-Tech Forum in Europe: 24 to 26 October 1999, Budapest
>PC Forum: March 12 to 15, 2000, Scottsdale (Phoenix), Arizona
>Book: "Release 2.0: A design for living in the digital age"
>
