<div dir="ltr"><div class="gmail_extra"><div class="gmail_quote">On 7 May 2014 00:58, michael gurstein <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:gurstein@gmail.com" target="_blank">gurstein@gmail.com</a>></span> wrote:</div><div class="gmail_quote">
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<div><div><div><div><div class=""><div><p class="MsoNormal"><u></u></p></div><div><p class="MsoNormal">No, but the comment speaks to the company's long-standing grudge against Google. So when you appeal to the gravitas of Springer as somehow being relevant to the authenticity (let alone relevance) of its claims, Springer's backstory with Google -- and this its subjective motivations -- also becomes relevant.<u></u><u></u></p>
</div></div><div><p class="MsoNormal"><b><i><span style="font-size:11pt;font-family:Calibri,sans-serif;color:rgb(31,73,125)">[MG>] So what… as someone said because the canary in the mine shaft is wearing a company jacket doesn’t make it any less of a canary (perhaps even more useful because of their special knowledge</span></i></b></p>
</div></div></div></div></div></div></blockquote><div><br></div><div>More Chicken Little than canary.</div><div><br></div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0px 0px 0px 0.8ex;border-left-width:1px;border-left-color:rgb(204,204,204);border-left-style:solid;padding-left:1ex">
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<p class="MsoNormal">I have no idea why you speak of this in the future tense. This is already happening. Or are the "great firewall of China", recent moves by Turkey to throttle Twitter, or even screwing with the DNS to implement DMCA "takedowns" in the US just myth?<br>
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<b><i><span style="font-size:11pt;font-family:Calibri,sans-serif;color:rgb(31,73,125)">[MG>] As I’m sure you know these above are rather different instances with different motivations and different desired outcomes</span></i></b></p>
</div></div></blockquote><div><br></div><div><br></div><div>Actually, I don't know that. The motivations are actually quite similar, IMO. In all cases the free flow of information of the Internet has been impeded to suit a local government initiative based on values that are not globally shared.</div>
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<div><p class="MsoNormal"><b><i><span style="font-size:11pt;font-family:Calibri,sans-serif;color:rgb(31,73,125)"> and I share your concern with them but responding to them either nationally or globally requires a rather different strategy and policy/decision making mechanisms… I see little value except the attempt to score rhetorical (ideological) points in conflating them…</span></i></b></p>
</div></div></blockquote><div><br></div><div><br></div><div>My intent is to identify the use of the Springer article to justify attack on multi-stakeholderism in the name of alarmist Google-bashing. If that calls for objective rebuttals which, in the absence of rebuttal, are arbitrarily dismissed and name-called as "rhetorical points", then so be it.</div>
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<div><p class="MsoNormal"><b><i><span style="font-size:11pt;font-family:Calibri,sans-serif;color:rgb(31,73,125)">[MG>] The original question that I posed was--should Google be a “stakeholder” in a “multistakeholder” process of regulation of the industry in which it is a dominant player… If the answer is yes then we seem to have a different perspective on the likely behavior of foxes in hen houses.</span></i></b></p>
</div></div></blockquote><div><br></div><div><br></div><div>Guilty as charged.</div><div><br></div><div>Until Google is found guilty of criminal activity or to be demonstrably hostile to the public interest, it is a legitimate part of the discussion. Many developed countries have anti-monopoly regulators; and while Google's sheer size has attracted their attention (as it should), it has not to my knowledge been ordered to break-up, divest or otherwise go away. It has a self-interested point of view and hard bargaining tactics, but that's hardly unique.</div>
<div><br></div><div>I don't trust Springer, or you, or me, to alone be sufficient judge of whether Google is guilty of activity that denies it a legitimate place at the table at which policy is debated. It is not justified to dominate, but it is certainly entitled to participate.</div>
<div><br></div><div>I prefer the evidence of actual existing (and possibly future) regulatory regimes, over the doomsday scenario painted by interests fearful of having their business models disrupted.</div><div><br></div>
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<div><p class="MsoNormal"><b><i><span style="font-size:11pt;font-family:Calibri,sans-serif;color:rgb(31,73,125)">[MG>] One of the more interesting elements of the Springer (and Zuboff) arguments was the way in which Google was choking off precisely the type of innovation which would allow for a monopoly such as itself to come under extraordinary technology competition. Certainly it is possible but blind, naïve, mystical, faith in the power of technologists to save us all is not something that I (or I would imagine most people in the world) are ready to easily subscribe to…</span></i></b></p>
</div></div></blockquote><div><br></div><div><br></div><div>Just the contrary, I would argue that it is your PoV that is emotional and based on unfounded belief, On my side is the historical reality that companies such as IBM and Microsoft, which during their peaks were also thought to be immortal dynasties (and worked hard to maintain their respective advantages), have all met their match.</div>
<div><br></div><div>As a front-line open source advocate in the 90s and early 00s I saw first-hand Microsoft activity that I believed to be anti-competitive, anti-standards and manipulative. Despite this, Microsoft didn't prevent Google (and, in a different way, Apple) from overtaking in significant markets in which it had both more money and first-mover advantage.</div>
<div><br></div><div>If Google is working to stifle innovation, such moves need to be explicitly (not theoretically) identified and challenged. I invite such revelations, but the fear-mongering presented so far is insufficient. IMO, we need better app-level standards to go alongside the existing infrastructure work; that work (such as standardizing file formats) is currently in the realm of bodies such as ISO rather than IETF, and needs to be harmonized better. (Indeed, the ISO/JTC1 shares many of the same multilateral characteristics that many are right to loathe about the ITU, but we still need awareness and a relationship.)</div>
<div><br></div><div>That is why the push for openness and standards is so important. (I would add to that a clear and present need for reform of intellectual property regimes, but that's a different thread.) Open standards, multistakeholder governance and transparent processes prevent entities such as Google crossing the line from innovating to stifling innovation. Protocols on surveillance and data abuse must not just be targeted towards governments, but also at private companies interests.</div>
<div><br></div><div> <b><i><span style="font-size:11pt;font-family:Calibri,sans-serif;color:rgb(31,73,125)"> </span></i></b></div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0px 0px 0px 0.8ex;border-left-width:1px;border-left-color:rgb(204,204,204);border-left-style:solid;padding-left:1ex">
<div lang="EN-US" link="blue" vlink="purple"><p class="MsoNormal"><b><i><span style="font-size:11pt;font-family:Calibri,sans-serif;color:rgb(31,73,125)">If the words “free and open” actually mean anything other than as a PR driven slogan then it is worth thinking quite seriously about what a “free and open” Internet might mean to a rather wider range of folks than those currently deriving extraordinary benefits from its current configurations.</span></i></b></p>
</div></blockquote><div><br></div><div> </div><div>Last week I was in a moving car, showing family members real-time video of my newborn granddaughter from a location on the other side of the continent. At times like that I am aware that *I* am one of those folks "deriving extraordinary benefits from [] current configurations". So are you. So are the other readers of this mail. This is not a zero-sum game.</div>
<div><br></div><div><br></div><div>- Evan</div><div><br></div><div><br></div><div>PS: As for "thinking quite seriously about what a 'free and open' Internet might mean", I would think that most of the participants here, by their very presence and consumed time, are already engaging in that very effort, Accusing those who disagree with you of not being serious is poor debating style. Just my opinion.<br>
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