[discuss] we need to fix what may be broken

Thu Apr 17 14:48:58 UTC 2014

+1

Nathalie 

________________________________
 From: Avri Doria <avri at acm.org>
To: discuss at 1net.org 
Sent: Thursday, April 17, 2014 10:05 AM
Subject: Re: [discuss] we need to fix what may be broken

Hi,

Well said George.

It has taken me a while to undeerstand the implications of Bertrand de
la Chapelle model that  ‘lets us  "differentiate between governance of
the Internet and governance on the Internet.'

While I think there are border areas where the differentiation will be
fuzzy, and there are interactions between 'governance of' and
'governance on', I think this is a very useful methodology to apply in
any analysis.

avri

On 17-Apr-14 09:38, George Sadowsky wrote:
> Hi, Carlos,
> 
> I think that we may be talking across each other.  I am still sort of
> a techie, although my skills are more of the 20th century than of the
> 21st.  But I ally myself with both the technical community and civil
> society; I’ve worked in both fields, and I see the merits of both.
> 
> I consider freedom of expression very important.  I don’t argue for
> complete freedom of expression; neither do the Europeans, and the
> Americans do not permit you to yell “fire!” in a crowded theater.
> However, nearly complete freedom of expression, if aI can label it
> that, is a precious freedom, and I support it.
> 
> In your example, of a blogger murdered by order of a politician, how
> would your stand on free expression be different if it were a
> newspaper reporter, murdered by a politician, for exactly the same
> content.  I think that you would be equally angry, and so would I.
> the point is that the Internet is not implicated in your example,
> just as the newspaper  is not implicate in my rewrite of your
> example.
> 
> Bertrand de la Chapelle said it best at the NCUC meeting in
> Singapore.  He said, ‘let’s differentiate between governance of the
> Internet and governance on the Internet."  It’s my belief that the
> vast majority of the technical community is in signifiant agreement
> with most members of civil society with respect to issues regarding
> governance on the Internet.  After all, we are all inhabitants of the
> planet, and we want common freedoms and liberties.
> 
> Where I think we cross paths is that the technical community sees
> these concerns crossing over into governance of the Internet, hoping
> that we subject the governance to increased control of some sort,
> problems of society on the Internet will be ameliorated. If so, we
> should be equally concerned about governance of the newspaper
> industry, governance of the content of school textbooks, and
> governance of the industry that publishes books — clearly a dangerous
> medium of communication.
> 
> We are concerned because we have something that works as a technical
> instrument to distribute information from anyone to anyone.  Barring
> the interference of governments that are sovereign in their space
> (conveniently forgetting Ukraine for the moment), this distributed
> architecture and the hundreds of thousands of technical people that
> support it operationally — in the small and in the large — has scaled
> massively and works as well or better than any other knowledge
> distribution channel that the world has ever seen.  We do not want it
> compromised by having it managed by people who do not understand it,
> and we do not want it blamed for societal issues that mistakenly
> imply that the basic management of the Internet is culpable for the
> problems of society.
> 
> The technical community is responsive to the needs of society.
> Improvements in research and education were one of the primary
> motivators to build and extend the network. The technical community
> was in large part responsible for organizational innovations such as
> the meritocracy-based standards approach pioneered in the IETF, which
> has been extraordinarily successful.  Members of the technical
> community are generally supportive of much of what representatives of
> civil society causes are espousing at Net Mundial.  I believe that we
> are generally very much in favor of your calls for free expression
> and human rights; we would like to see those calls succeed.  And, to
> the extent that they are consistent with the security, stability, and
> resiliency of the Internet, with your help we can improve the
> services that the Internet provides.
> 
> Bet, let’s not create, even in our minds, artificial barriers to
> understanding, in both directions, even in our minds.
> 
> George (speaking solely on my own behalf, as always in this
> discussion spar)

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