>
> The vehicle of law vs. who shouts loudest seems to me a tough question.
>
> If ICANN made simple rules and hewed to them in a vacuum it'd be
> criticized for "ignoring community consensus" and acting
> unaccountably--you've been one of the strongest proponents of
> ICANN (or anything serving its function) deriving legitimacy
> through how well it represents that consensus. If ICANN purports
> to represent consensus--and change a policy as a result--it can be
> criticized for "caving in to whomever shouts loudest" and changing
> course from its prior rules.
I never saw a consensus yet that fit within (arbitrarily) pre-
determined timelines. If amendments or budgets or draft proposals
are 'posted' for public comment from which a sense of consensus
is to be drawn, ICANNs present methodology, explicitly imposing
deadlines to 'encourage' production (see FAQ #5 if its still on the
icann.org site), is squarely opposed to legitimate outcomes,
regardless of the issue.
> All this said, I'm curious: how do we measure that elusive thing
> called consensus?
Thats been the standing question since 9/98, when 9 people
decided to form a corporation that would have public 'members.'
That ICANN now appear to be slouching towards 2000 before any
membership whatsoever is acknowledged may reflect how easily
'simple rules' betray good intentions, but doesnt it also risk its
status as a 501-c-3 'public' corporation?
Ken Freed may be correct to say,
> Creating consensus is a relatively new phenom for humanity,
> *as a formal process*
-- but so is time-keeping. If the two are not commensurate, isnt it
appropriate to return to the age-old phenomenon of consensus *as
a real-life human process for getting along*?
and to recite what everyone knows,
> The central problem with consensus-building ... is that there's no
> defining moment of cusp, no finite final measure... In an ideally
> functioning democratic system, there's a prolonged period of
> discussion and debate toward building a consensus, but critical
> maters must be put to a vote, settled definitively, so the talk
> can abate and the work can begin.
But this is the Internet, remember? Talk *never abates, and the
work goes on forever. There is no 'critical' need for finality; on the
contrary, there is a need for remaining continuously open to
change. To argue that its governance must be formalised for the
sake of formalism (and the most simplistic kind of formalism at
that) merely attests to the power of a 6th-grade civics class to stifle
the imagination.
I have said it before, but it never hurts (on this list!) to say it again:
a truly *interactive voting machine operating 24/7 should not be
beyond the capabilities of the 153 souls assembled here -- once
we get past the atavisms of centralization and indirect
representation that have been imposed on forms of government by
time and space. There is nothing that ICANN can or will do that
cannot be done better, in terms of customer satisfaction, by
software (something like the CETI screensaver, I would guess,
would be sufficient). And there is nothing at all it can do if the
customers arent satisfied.
(As far as the 'registrars' constituency is concerned, dont we
already have 50+ (board-picked) registrars? IOW, isnt the issue
moot? Whyever is Roberts talking about amending the bylaws at
this point?)
kerry
