a week of William New's articles from the ICANN meeting

[Harold Feld]

If there is interest, I can try posting Aramaic. :)

ICANN's continued insistence that it only does technical stability is
belied by its governing documents, which require it to consider things
like competition and intellectual property.

Consider the debate over WHOIS.  A requirement for an administrative
contact in case of some emergency makes sense from a technical
perspective, but does anything else?  The "thick registry" concept is
justified on a host of non-technical concerns.

This denial is not merely a matter of hypocracy.  it actively hinders
development of policy at ICANN.  ICANN should either seek to define a
valid public interest standard or abjure _any_ requirement that does not
directly speak to a demonstrated  technical issue of such importance
that it requires a global policy accross the namespace.

ICANN recapitulates the FCC, and does it badly.

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