Will the U.N. run the Internet?
Yes, let us give Islamic countries and the Chinese Communist Party even more possibilities to strangle our freedom of speech. Sounds like a great idea:Will the U.N. run the Internet?
An international political spat is brewing over whether the United Nations will seize control of the heart of the Internet. U.N. bureaucrats and telecommunications ministers from many less-developed nations claim the U.S. government has undue influence over how things run online. Now they want to be the ones in charge. While the formal proposal from a U.N. working group will be released July 18, it's already clear what it will contain. A preliminary summary of governmental views claims there's a "convergence of views" supporting a new organization to oversee crucial Internet functions, most likely under the aegis of the United Nations or the International Telecommunications Union. Beyond the usual levers of diplomatic pressure and public kvetching, Brazil and China could choose what amounts to the nuclear option: a fragmented root. At issue is who decides key questions like adding new top-level domains, assigning chunks of numeric Internet addresses, and operating the root servers that keep the Net humming.
posted by Unknown @ 3:07 AM
5 Comments:
Politicians of all stripes can pontificate and propose all they want about "controlling" the internet, but it ain't going to happen. Being the technical illiterates that they are, they never seem to realize their limitations. They might as well try to legislate which sexual positions are legal and illegal!
I disagree. Freedom squelching legislation can be enacted to have ISPs block any and all "inappropriate" content. I'm sure they will not care if the occasional "legitimate" content is blocked as well. This is a real and frightening proposal and would take away the ONLY form of information transfer that we, the peons, have left to educate ourselves outside the reach of prying eyes.
No one "runs" the internet. There are groups and organizations (public and private) that contribute to the internet architecture and use, develop technical standards, oversee protocols and procedures, coordinate protocol numbers, etc., etc. ethnocentrist is right that legislation can be enacted to block content at ISPs (e.g. China). But being like any other system, there will be ways around repressive regulation.
Lucky we have the brains on our side and can sic the nerds on governmental installations. They better watch their step and leave well enough alone.
ik, fjordman was kind enough to teach me how to link and I'll pass on the favor.
I tried to do it step by step here in the comments box, but all the pieces of code confused the program, so if you email me at erp617@yahoo.com, I'll send the code to you in an email. Anyone else who what's to know, pls. email me. Put in the subject line of the email. From fjordman's blog, so I'll know it isn't spam.
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ik's link
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