[ncdnhc-discuss] What NCDNHC is "about"

[Milton Mueller]

Alejandro:
I don't recall dismissing George's concerns
about what the NCDNHC is about. What I do 
recall saying to him, perhaps not clearly 
enough, is that the NCDNHC's activities and 
agenda are defined by the people who work 
in it and for it. 

As for the NCDNHC's role, you have I think 
fundamentally underestimated our contribution 
and "value-added."

On the UDRP, Kathy Kleiman and Michael 
Froomkin played a major role in writing it!
Both myself and Michael Froomkin 
have contributed in a significant way to 
the scholarly understanding of its effects.
I was invited by the IP CONSTITUENCY REP,
no less, to co-chair the UDRP review committee
and both Michael and I will play a major role
in its improvement. I am therefore somewhat 
taken aback by your emphasis on the UDRP's 
significance. Most of our members understand 
that. 

The NCNDHC has taken a lead role in ORG 
divestiture. Which is as it should be, if
one believes that ORG is primarily a space 
for non commercial registrations. 

There are a number of areas in which we
have fought for losing positions. Perhaps
this is what you mean by questioning our
value; there is a presumption in certain
quarters, which seems to emanate from Joe
Sims and Mike Roberts, that any attempt to
actually influence domain name policy in 
ways they don't agree with is of 
questionable value. 

We have fought to make the DNSO more
representative. This is only indirectly 
related to noncommercial interests, but it
is essential: we cannot be effective in
pursuing our interests if we are always 
outnumbered. Many noncommercial organizations
don't participate in ICANN because of its
biased representative structue.

We have played a major role in defining 
alternative TLD policies. Our positions 
have not been the majority ones, but we 
have been proven correct again and again. 
Our resolution warned ICANN not to award
the first handful of new gTLDs to dominant 
industry players. ICANN's legitimacy has 
suffered from ignoring that advice, as it 
learned when it was hauled before the US
Congress and attacked on this score.

We have warned against artificial scarcity
and against turning the TLD selection 
process into a beauty contest. We were ignored,
but vindicated when one of the favored registries
(Afilias) fell over technically in its start-up
phase and didn't even match its proposal, and 
when ICANN was sued for approving what will
most likely be ruled an illegal lottery. 

We joined the majority of the
Names Council in forcing ICANN's Board to
renegotiate aspects of the new Verisign
agreements, and our positions were vindicated
when the competition policy experts in the
US Justice Department required earlier
divestitures, just as we recommended.

We have called more more new TLDs, faster,
and this is becoming majority opinion 
almost everywhere but within ICANN.
We have called for sponsored TLDs devoted
to noncommercial organizations.  

>>> "Alejandro Pisanty - CUAED y FQ, UNAM" <apisan at servidor.unam.mx> 10/27/01 02:26 AM >>>
Milton,

it would be inappropriate to dismiss George's fundamental questions on
what the NCDNHC is about. Even heading a significant non-commercial
organization now, he has not chosen to become a member again. It takes a
short memory not to figure why.

His challenge has been made before, by myself, by Dave Crocker, and in
part by David Wasley.

The main point to answer, and it is substantive, is what our interests and
stake as organizations are, regarding domain names.

Many significant non-commercial organizations have been, and still are,
victims of cybersquatting. The UDRP has been a significant advance for
them. An effect of the UDP is the abatement of such cases against
non-commercial organizations, eg universities. So one can interpret that
one interest of a large number of non-commercial organizations is well
served by the UDRP, and that weakening its ability to protect such
organizations would actually pit members of the NCC against each other.

Research (scientific, technical, legal, social, etc.) conducted by
academic and other research institutions, on domain-name matters, is
little affected by the NCC.

Activist and militant organizations in many countries find themselves
affected by the taking away of their domain name. As discussed several
times before, those organizations which are in particularly tight
political or labor situations are wise enough to use Internet tools far
less vulnerable (to filtering, etc.) than domain names. There is an
uncontested, growing, but to the eyes of many still quantitatively and
strategically marginal view of domain names as a form of expression which
has to be protected. This is one area of actual effect which the NCC has
tried to touch.

In the agenda of ICANN, there are outstanding issues, such as the ALSC
report, the DNSO review, the UDRP review, and new gTLDs. What actual value
can we add to them, that significantly improves ICANN action to the
general benefit and to the benefit of non-commercial organizations in the
broadest spectrum?

As we refocus our attention on critical, long-lasting, strategic issues,
such as the stability and security of the domain-name system (and other
ICANN areas of concern) I think that our thought can be embodied in the
draft resolution we have been working on, and which I have just reposted
in modified form to reflect what would appear to be emerging consensus in
our constituency.

Could you and all of us really reflect for a short while what value the
NCC can add that is specific to its character? We have accomplished some,
and we have failed to accomplish too. Let's work on a forward-looking,
proactive, rational agenda.

Alejandro Pisanty


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     Dr. Alejandro Pisanty
UNAM  -  Educacion Abierta y a Distancia
Av. Universidad 3000, 04510 Mexico DF Mexico
Tel. (+52-5) 622-8713, 622-8633 Fax 550-8405

http://www.cuaed.unam.mx
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