The 100 million raised from sale of web domains should be used to wire africa

[Robin Gross]

Interesting proposal....

http://www.slate.com/articles/technology/future_tense/2012/11/ 
icann_s_gtld_auction_proceeds_should_be_used_to_bring_mesh_technologies. 
html

ICANN Make a Difference
The 100 million raised from sale of web domains should be used to  
wire africa
by Sascha Meinrath & Elliot Noss

The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers is little  
known, but it wields a tremendous amount of power: It controls all of  
the Web’s top-level domains (those letters after the “dot,” like .com  
and .org). Currently, ICANN is in the midst of creating hundreds (and  
possibly thousands) of new, generic top-level domains (gTLDs) that  
span a host of different ideas, from .web to .cars  
to .anything_else_you_can_imagine. These new gTLDs have the potential  
to dramatically affect the future of Internet browsing, and they’re  
already stirring up some serious discussion. (Saudi A	rabia, for one,  
doesn’t want .gay, .bible, or other dozens of other proposed domains  
to be approved.) But the auction process to distribute them also has  
the potential for even greater impact than currently envisioned.

ICANN’s new generic top-level domain process has been dragging on for  
years—basically since the organization’s inception in 1998. But this  
year, it is finally coming to fruition, and as early as April 2013 we  
are likely to see the first group of new gTLDS—in essence, ICANN will  
empower specific legal entities to control how to use and sell these  
domain names. This process means significant amounts of money may  
start rolling in soon: It already costs $185,000 to apply for a gTLD,  
but when there are multiple bidders for the same string—like .web  
or .app—they will be put up for auction.

For instance, the .web gTLD is widely desired by a number of  
different organizations, as it is the most likely contender to  
possibly challenge the king of all gTLDs: .com. There are currently  
eight applicants for .web, including Google, German Internet giant  
1&1, and incumbent registry operator Afilias (which manages .org  
and .info) among other bidders. We expect that the bidding for .web  
alone is likely to be in excess of $5 million and could potentially  
reach $10 million or more. For the .app gTLD, there are 11 applicants— 
and we may see a titanic bidding war between Google and Amazon. There  
are hundreds more contended strings that are likely to go to auction  
and raise tens of millions of additional dollars—even $100 million  
isn’t out of the question.
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All told, there are more than 1,900 applications for roughly 1,000  
unique strings in this first wave. The $185,000 application fee is  
intended to fund the ICANN process, but the proceeds from contention  
auctions are considered “excess funds” that are not already earmarked  
to cover costs. The challenge will be to use these proceeds in a way  
that best benefits the public interest and the global Internet. In  
talking with key stakeholders over the last couple of years, everyone  
agrees that allocating these funds will be a challenge and likely to  
be fraught with politics.

We've been involved in the ICANN process since its inception, and  
believe that these proceeds can and should be used to do something  
game-changing and truly visionary: build and maintain free wireless  
Internet infrastructure for huge swaths of the continent of Africa or  
an equally disconnected, high-poverty area of the planet. This is an  
audacious idea that many might originally dismiss as impractical—but  
that's because their thinking is stuck inside the box. We know that  
it can be done—and how. Providing free wireless Internet  
infrastructure for the continent of Africa would be a dream come true— 
the kind of outcome that would help bridge the digital divide and  
garner huge socioeconomic benefits for decades to come.

But would $100 million actually be enough to build useful,  
sustainable infrastructure? It would, if its creators use many of the  
newer “mesh” technologies that are now coming online. African's  
Internet penetration currently hovers around 15 percent—less than  
half the world average. And roughly half of African countries have  
single-digit broadband penetration rates. The digital divide looms  
large, in no small part because many Africans simply cannot afford  
current broadband prices.

To help solve this problem, we can use what are called mesh  
technologies, which are significantly cheaper than the systems we use  
in the developed world. More importantly, they can easily  
interconnect and extend existing infrastructure in remarkably cost- 
effective ways. Instead of connecting people through a central hub or  
tower, mesh architectures resemble more of a spider web, in which  
data can flow through a large number of routes to reach their  
destination. Because there's no single point of failure within a mesh  
network and because of the redundancy of pathways within these  
systems, they're often more resilient—harder for human intervention  
or natural disaster to take down as well as more difficult to  
surveille and censor.

Projects like CommotionWireless.net and OpenGarden.net have developed  
game-changing technologies that allow existing cellphones to connect  
with each other directly, for free. They can also share bandwidth  
from one cellphone throughout an entire network of devices, allowing  
people who don't have Internet connectivity to browse the Web or send  
email via someone else's connection. Now what's needed is a bold,  
widespread implementation of these technologies. There's no reason  
Africa shouldn’t take advantage of new technologies and new business  
models to provide a modest amount of connectivity each month for  
anyone who wants it.

In essence, what we're proposing is the widespread unlocking of  
existing technologies, the creation of hybrid networks that take  
advantage of recent advances in ad-hoc wireless networking, and the  
digital enfranchisement of the billions of people who cannot afford  
to participate in current business models. Providing basic  
connectivity is not expensive—more importantly, unlocking devices and  
allowing peer-to-peer connectivity costs absolutely nothing.

A $100 million intervention would enable a wide-ranging proof-of- 
concept of today's cutting-edge mesh wireless technologies. It would  
demonstrate the viability of new hybrid networking architectures that  
opportunistically used for-fee services when necessary and offload to  
free alternatives whenever possible. It would enable us to try out  
numerous innovative business models. And most importantly, it would  
point the way forward—helping solve the problem of how to grant  
access to the Internet's vast resources to the substantial majority  
of humanity who are not meaningfully online.

With the gTLD auctions now pending, ICANN has a once-in-a-generation  
opportunity to change the digital destinies of billions of people.  
With ICANN's help, we can realize a world where Africa rivals any  
country on the planet when it comes to online connectivity. And where  
African citizens can take it for granted that meaningful (online)  
civic participation is universally available. We've already seen how  
even modest resources like the mobile micropayment system M-Pesa have  
helped spur a new generation of entrepreneurship—imagine what's  
possible when free connectivity is available to all.






IP JUSTICE
Robin Gross, Executive Director
1192 Haight Street, San Francisco, CA  94117  USA
p: +1-415-553-6261    f: +1-415-462-6451
w: http://www.ipjustice.org     e: robin at ipjustice.org



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