[Expression] [governance] ICANN Board Vote Signals Era of Censorship in Domain Names

[Carlos Afonso]

This is precisely the dilemma confronting ICANN. And makes me undecided
regarding the vote (if I voted, of course). However, I think there is a
lesson from this process (I understand ICANN learns from these
processes): the more criteria derived from public comments and other
inputs can become components of (or enrich) the standard "book of
procedures" the better.

I also think it has become crystal clear that TLDs which combination of
letters might confront resistance (of cultural, legal or similar nature)
in one or more countries or communities, should in principle be
discarded, thus avoiding the protracted and frustrating (and expensive!)
via crucis for both the Board and the applicants.

frt rgds

--c.a.

Robin Gross wrote:
> Hi Andrew,
> 
> I'm having a hard time understanding how you can say ICANN should keep
> the "top level content-neutral and strictly divorced from
> content-specific rules" while also arguing that ICANN should prevent
> .xxx because of its content.
> Do you agree that ICANN should be content-neutral or do you believe
> ICANN should make policies based on content?
> 
> Thanks,
> Robin
> 
> 
> 
> Andrew McLaughlin wrote:
> 
>> FWIW (i.e., not much), I agree with Vittorio.  To call this decision
>> "censorship" degrades the meaning of that term.  The fact that there
>> is no .abortion TLD doesn't in any way limit the ability of any
>> Internet speaker to voice an opinion about abortion.  To the extent
>> that DNS labeling is important, second- and third- and fourth level
>> labels -- abortion.example.com -- are always available.
>>
>> IMHO, free expression is much more threatened by content-specific TLD
>> labels, all of which ICANN would be smart to reject.  Rather than give
>> restrictive governments and ISPs new tools for censorship of the real
>> kind, ICANN should keep the DNS at the top level content-neutral and
>> strictly divorced from content-specific rules.
>>
>> Susan's dissent is unconvincing because it ignores the second-order
>> consequences of using the DNS as a designation of content.  It's the
>> wrong road to go down.
>>
>> --andrew
>>
>>
>> On 4/3/07, Vittorio Bertola <vb at bertola.eu> wrote:
>>
>>> Robin Gross ha scritto:
>>> > From my cyberlaw blog:
>>> > http://ipjustice.org/wp/2007/04/02/icann_board_votexxx
>>>
>>> Well, once in a lifetime, we disagree completely :-)
>>>
>>> I have had the luck to witness personally the last three months of
>>> discussions in the ICANN Board. So, believe it or not, your
>>> interpretation of the reasons and the value of this vote is IMHO quite
>>> wrong. Let me explain.
>>>
>>> First of all, ICANN had a process for TLD applications (which,
>>> incidentally, is quite a bad process, starting from the meaningless
>>> "sponsorship" idea, but that's what we had at the moment), and the vote
>>> was meant to judge whether the application meant the requirements. There
>>> was no discussion on whether "adult entertainment" is good or bad or
>>> whether it should be censored. There was, however, discussion on whether
>>> the criteria were met; some directors thought they were, most thought
>>> they weren't. That's how the vote went. Susan and another director - not
>>> even all the five who voted against rejection - apparently assumed that
>>> those who disagreed with them did so due to political pressure or desire
>>> for censorship. This was entirely their assumption and many of the
>>> others felt personally offended by it.
>>>
>>> Even if you forget about the process and think about the idea in itself,
>>> it looks like a bad idea. Adult entertainment sites do not want to be
>>> labelled, exactly because they are afraid of being censored; many of
>>> them - basically all, according to some's judgement; for example, there
>>> was no single adult webmaster speaking in support of .xxx in the entire
>>> meeting - made it clear that they'd not have used the new domain. So the
>>> only purpose for this domain would have been defensive registrations,
>>> e.g. transfering money from consumers to the company who would have run
>>> it. Personally - and especially given that I represent consumers on the
>>> ICANN Board - I think that this would have been publicly detrimental.
>>>
>>> Then, let's discuss about "censorship". I think that the statement that
>>> not approving .xxx is "content-related censorship" is impossible to take
>>> seriously. You write:
>>>
>>> > By voting to turn down the .XXX
>>> > application for public policy reasons, the Board indicated it will go
>>> > beyond its technical mission of DNS coordination and seek to decide
>>> what
>>> > ideas are allowed to be given a voice in the new domain name space.
>>>
>>> Do you seriously mean that since there is no .xxx there is no porn over
>>> the Internet?
>>>
>>> Actually, if .xxx had been approved, then many governments could have
>>> passed laws to force porn sites into it, thus actually making censorship
>>> easier. The only reply I got to this observation was "yes, but in the US
>>> we have the First Amendment that would make it impossible". And what
>>> about the rest of the world?
>>>
>>> All in all, of course there are sociopolitical aspects in some of the
>>> decisions that ICANN has to take. Even refusing to consider these
>>> aspects, and embracing the hyper-liberalistic, totally free market
>>> approach of approving each and every application for a new TLD no matter
>>> how controversial it is, which you and others seem to advocate, is a
>>> political choice. It's way too common to hide behind memes such as "it
>>> should be a technical decision only" or "let the market decide", but
>>> these are political choices as well, with lots of implications. I am
>>> surprised by how so many brilliant people from the liberal US
>>> environment seem unable to accept diversity on this issue, to the point
>>> of questioning the legitimacy or good faith of decisions when they go in
>>> a different direction.
>>>
>>> I'll stop here, pointing at the comment I left on Susan's blog -
>>> http://scrawford.blogware.com/blog/_archives/2007/3/30/2845638.html#882501
>>>
>>> - for further consideration about the "cultural diversity" issue.
>>>
>>> Ciao,
>>> -- 
>>> vb.                   Vittorio Bertola - vb [a] bertola.eu   <--------
>>> -------->  finally with a new website at http://bertola.eu/  <--------
>>>
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>>
>>
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-- 
Carlos A. Afonso
diretor de planejamento
Rits - Rede de Informações para o Terceiro Setor
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