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From: "Craig McTaggart" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
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Subject: Re: [IFWP] Internet stability
Date: Mon, 2 Aug 1999 12:07:50 -0400
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"Craig McTaggart" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
A.M. Rutkowski wrote:
> At 06:24 PM 8/1/99 , Dan Steinberg wrote:
>> >Can you confirm that these events did occur, and if so,
>> >why the requests to make changes that would enhance the
>> >stablity of the internet were denied?
>
>> I would go one further and ask why and under what
>> authority the US Dept of Commerce is involved in
>> details of name server operations for an enhanced
>> information service on private computer networks.
There isn't any basis for commerce to give this away.
And the Internet isn't "private computer networks".
That's the trouble with the effort of both the Commerce
Dept trying to give this away and with the whole way
that the give-away started.
It was under this same set of terms.
There Office of Inspector General of the NSF in their Feb. 7 1997
report which the NSF and the Commerce Dept ignored, explained
what the authority and obligation of the U.S. government was to
protect the large public investment and development that has
built the Internet to see that the public purposes and needs
be served, rather than that these public resources are seized
by illegitimate private entities for their private purposes.
The Internet is an internetworking of networks -- that is
something that requires coordination and oversight and support
to continue its scientific development.
The Commerce Dept cannot understand this nor has any business
with any of it.
When I read the Dept of Commerce response to the early letter
that Bliley sent, it said that the NSF could cooperate with
the Dept of Commerce to write contracts, *but* not that the
NSF had the authority to give anything to the Dept of Commerce
to give away.
>By what authority did NSF give NSI's its monopoly? Why does NASA run root
>servers? I'm a little confused about the USG's involvement in this network
>too, but I think it has something to do with its funding and direction of
>the management of ARPANET and NSFNET. No, the Internet is not ARPANET nor
>NSFNET, and hasn't been for some time -- the physical infrastructure and
>content elements have changed completely. Yet we are still using the same
>technical infrastructure, the same restrictive root zone, and the same root
>server system. To the extent that I'm wrong, and it's not the same stuff,
>the difference is one of scale, of quantity, not quality.
The problem was that NSF allowed NSI to charge amounts on a government
contract that weren't appropriate. The NSF had the authority as
it has been part of the structure in the U.S. government to develop
the Internet (which still needs to be developed). But the NSF doesn't
have the authority to be privatizing public property, and thus
its allowing NSI to run the contract in a way that leads to privatizing
all this is the problem, *not* that it had the contract, and basically
it seemed from the letter of the Commerce Dept the NSF should still
have the contract.
ICANN had and will have no authority.
The U.S. government did have and does have the authority to continue
to support and oversee and even run the aspects of the Internet that
are necessary for the public to have the benefit of this scientific
development built with public funds and public cooperation.
If the U.S. government is not responsible in carrying out its
authority and responsibility, which is what is happening with its
trying to give these controlling resources of the Internet to
ICANN, then it is exceed and going outside of its authority.
>How private are the entities which operate the root servers? Why are they
>involved in the details of name server operations for an enhanced
>information service on private computer networks? They should just walk
>away and let a new root server system self-organize, since it sounds so
>easy. Commerce should just walk away and let the Internet community deal
>with NSI on its own. That would be a good way to make sure there is never
>any meaningful competition in TLD registration, especially if NSI were still
>in control of the root. The legacy root, mind you, and there's no reason
>there can't be others. Unfortunately, the legacy root (or more precisely
>.com) is the VHS tape, the 3.5" floppy, the Windows of the Internet. NSI
>should scare the hell out of multiple root supporters, but instead it has
>emerged as something of a hero in the battle against top-down regulation. I
>don't think Commerce has any authority here whatsoever, but I prefer them to
>NSI.
The essential functions of the Internet aren't "private" at all.
They are part of a public medium, *not* a private entity.
The Internet is a communication medium and its *not* something private.
That's the problem with what is happening.
Instead of endeavoring to understand the Internet and its nature
there are efforts to claim it is "private" and control over
it can be seized by the most powerful.
No it is built and maintained as a public entity though there
may be private companies who participate in particular aspects
of it.
It is the public nature of it that is crucial for it to function.
And the public nature is what has made it possible to develop it
and for it to grow and flourish. That public nature is what
makes possible the collaboration that it represents.
Get rid of the public nature and ownership and control of the
essential and scaling functions, and the world is left with
a fight among the AOL's and other such private entities who
run their private networks and can't internetwork.
>
>> Does the Commerce Department intend to begin managing
>> the operations of even more critical network functions
>> of the Internet?
>If the Internet isn't a network, how could it possibly have 'critical
>network functions'?
The Internet is just that an internetworking of networks
so they can communicate.
And the critical functions are critical for the internetworking
and communication.
>Craig McTaggart
Ronda
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
