This has to be the most lopsided debate in history. Hard to believe that the polls show an equally divided electorate. This ought to be a landslide.

The ICANN Congressional hearings -- like most all Congressional hearings -- are typically dull. The testimony is scripted and well rehearsed, and little new information comes out. Today's hearing was no different. The interesting moments, all of which were unscripted in response to questions, came when:

• John Kneuer, NTIA, testified that ICANN staff and DOC/NTIA staff confer weekly, often daily, about ICANN's work and progress on the MOU. He also said that he and his staff meet regularly with ICANN stakeholders about ICANN's work.
• Mr. Kneuer and Paul Twomey suggested that the reason ICANN's strategic plan hadn't been released to the public yet (almost a year after the first draft circulated privately) might have something to do with confidentiality and trade secrets.
• Bill Manning, ISI, noted that the greatest threats to the stability of the Internet were the users.

Only two of the Senators asked questions, though the record will remain open for two weeks to allow written statements, questions and answers to be filed.

EDventure on ICANN: "One thing that seems clear is that it needs to figure out how to give up control of ICANN entirely. That's a hard thing to do, but I think it's necessary. When I was chairman - and after - I didn't think the USG role mattered that much. It certainly wasn't telling us what to do....But now I think that it's past time for the USG to have the courage to let go."

I agree, but with one caveat. If the U.S. government gives up control and ICANN becomes "a real boy" in the private sector at last, the U.S. should have some assurance that ICANN will remain private. In other words, a completely free ICANN could pick up and move out of the United States entirely, turn its authority over to some other government (or coalition of governments, like the UN or ITU), or increase the role of the GAC to the point where the private sector no longer mattered. I don't think that's likely, but I also don't think I'd feel comfortable giving up the last vestiges of control without assurances that a private ICANN would stay private.

What I would propose is that the U.S. government place the ICANN resources now under U.S. control in a trust of some sort to be managed exclusively by ICANN (and a certain kind of ICANN; one that met the elements of the White Paper, was private-sector led, with appropriate checks and balances, and bound to perform in the public interest). I would hold a contingent reversionary interest in the trust res so control would revert back to the U.S. if ICANN tried to place itself within the control of the GAC, the UN, the ITU or some other government entity.  

Request for Comments: 3912:  "This document updates the specification of the WHOIS protocol, thereby obsoleting RFC 954."  This doesn't appear to be a change -- just documentation of the current use.

Three things I would ask if I were Senator Burns...

1. If sole authority over the root servers is transferred to ICANN at the conclusion of the current MOU, what will be the effect on our national security and the operational stability of the Internet?
2. If the goal of privatization is achieved, what guarantees will we have that ICANN's resources will remain in the United States and/or not be placed under the jurisdiction or control of another nation (or the UN)?
3. If the goal of privatization is achieved, what checks will exist on ICANN's authority to ensure that its management of the ICANN resources will be guided by the public interest?

I think satisfactory answers to each of these questions exist, but no one ever talks about these things...in public. Let's put this debate out in the open.

US Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, & Transportation: ICANN Oversight and Security of Internet Root Servers and the Domain Name System (DNS) Communications Hearing, Thursday, September 30 2004 - 2:30 PM - SR - 253.

Last speaker, with the Senate-preferred spelling of the company name:

Mr. Ari Balough
Senior Vice President, VeriSigh Inc.

:-) Also here.

New York Times: "Dr. Vinton G. Cerf, one of the architects of the Internet in the 1960's and 1970's and current chairman of Icann, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, said, 'Science counts, and it has not counted sufficiently in this administration.'"

US Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, & Transportation: "Members will hear testimony examining the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), international cooperation in management and governance of the Domain Name Syatem (DNS), and the security of the Internet's root servers and the DNS."

Press release: Afilias Announces 3-Year Analysis of the .INFO Domain. Interesting reading. .INFO has been a real success.

Graeme Wearden, reporting in ZDNet UK: "Individual Internet users are being frozen out of a key debate on the future governance of the Internet, Web visionary Esther Dyson warned on Friday.... 'I feel the process is going off the rails,' Dyson told the audience at the debate organised by the Oxford Internet Institute and the Internet Society UK....According to Dyson, WGIG is not the right way to address the problems facing the Internet. 'When you concentrate power, whether it's the low-rent, measly power ICANN had, or full-blown global governmental power, that focus of power attracts the wrong people,' Dyson said. 'People who are self-appointed to represent other people are there, governments are there, the private sector is there, but the world at large isn't.'"

Yeah. What she said.

Computerweekly: "Reflecting Africa's expanding role in the internet, the International Corporation for the Assignment of Names and Numbers (Icann) is planning to establish an African presence, probably in South Africa."

ICANN: "ICANN has issued this advisory to make the community aware of certain changes in the marketplace concerning the rights to expired gTLD domain registrations."

To the best of my recollection, this is the first time that ICANN has issued a press release about registrar market conduct not regulated by ICANN. Is this a good thing or a bad thing? I don't know. To the extent that the press release was designed to answer questions raised by registrants or other registrars about whether the new NetSol and Tucows services violated ICANN rules, I suppose it's a helpful clarification. But if that's the case, I might have addressed those questions more directly. The problem with addressing market conduct is that the market for domain names -- in both services and price -- is always changing. Why did this development merit a press release by ICANN?

AllAfrica.com: "The establishment of market competition for the generic Top Level Domain (gTLD) by the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) is saving both users and business sector over $1 billion annually....General Manager, Communications and Public Participation at ICANN, Mr. Kieran Baker, disclosing this while speaking to newsmen in Grahamstown, venue of the 8th Highway Africa conference, said that establishment of gTLD has brought about 80 per cent reduction in cost of registration for domain names, globally." And that's only with competition at the registrar-level. Just think of where we might be if we had effective competition at the registry-level too!

Latest picture album. I really ought to figure out how to do these in Blogware.

Have you ever seen one of these before?

http://internet.law.pro

Am I the only person sporting once of these fancy new domain names? Pointers to others in the club appreciated.

In his blog, Jeff Pulver writes that his .tel application is dead because the ICANN review team "sees '.tel' creating conflict with 'e164.arpa.'" I certainly see the overlap between the activities in e164.arpa and the .TEL applications, but how exactly do the two conflict? I have no pony in this race, but it strikes me that you could have multiple sectors of the namespace working on telephony applications without creating "conflict." "You can celebrate anything you want..."

Perhaps the objection is simply that .TEL is a highly marketable string and a delegation bearing the imprimatur of ICANN might provide unwarranted market leadership to one specific player. I get that. Still, ICANN's in a bind. It wants to avoid the Network Solutions windfall and dominance that came with the .COM delegation while trying to create registry-level competition at the same time. With the way new TLDs are awarded now, those principles are at odds.  Eventually ICANN's going to have to award a TLD in a significant market (e.g., a .TEL or .WEB or .XXX), however, and it has to find a way to do so without making market winners and losers. I suppose an auction is one way to deal with that, but just what where would or should the proceeds go?

Jeff Pulver: ".tel REALLY IS .dead."  

I'll be interested in reading these reports when they're posted.

From the PR Newswire: "Domainsite.com, a leading ICANN accredited registrar, announced today that it will offer free domain name registration for .info domain names. This promotion is good from September 2nd through the 9th. “We believe this promotion is just a fantastic opportunity to show our customers how much we appreciate them,” Said Bill Mushkin, CEO of the web address company. Each registrant can register up to 25 domain names for free during this promotion. There are no strings attached. Clients desiring to register more than 25 .info names will be charged $3.99 per year per domain above the 25 name limit."