>Any formal body has to have some jurisdiction in which it is constituted. One can argue whether California non-profit law is better or worse than being a UN entity. I believe there are arguments against the latter as much as there may arguments against the former. >>The IETF is about as close as we've got as an "authority" on the Internet that is not bounded by geographic boundaries, governmental control or commercial contract. You can make a reasonable argument that we should be running the show here, not ICANN. >>The UNITC meeting needed to happen several years ago, but now we're there, realistically there is only one option left for a single, cohesive Internet to remain whilst taking into account ALL the World's population: ICANN needs to become a UN body. >nonsense - as constituted today, ICANN is a better forum for interested constituencies to debate policy FOR THOSE AREAS THAT ARE IN ICANN'S PURVIEW (not shouting, just emphasis on limited purview of ICANN). Interesting. Everybody on the sidelines of this; (like me), not Vint or the other "Internet Founding father's", pretty well assume a drift towards rational processes in the world winning over a long time frame. How long? Seems based on the drift rate, pretty darn long. So ICANN is definitely one of the clearest entities which has a completely, totally non-geographicly defined constituency. There are others, like International Civil Aviation Organization for commercial air traffic and WHO for health. DNS, biological viruses, and jet aircraft all by there nature challenge rule by dotted lines on the ground, made by chance, desceased power mad old guys, where rivers flow; (now, that's a reason for a boundry; Wow. its RUNNING WATER. Lets have a war right here), etc. So an somewhat negative example is air transit. The whole structure makes air travel a detail of world war I. Anybody smart enough to read should realize, no matter how horrific a (set) of wars are, they aren't forever, and the structure of such a thing should look beyond the present. So, here is a reasonably understandable negative example. A thought experiment would be if DNS wars happened after the twin towers attack. All questions would be framed as security issues, no matter how farfetched the reasoning. Fortunately for the DNS, this isn't the case. But with Voice over IP inevitable to abolish PSTN telephony, the DNS also becomes the world directory of electronically reachable persons; (with WWW and LDAP hanging off of it). SO civil libritarians, anarchists, and conspiracy theorists are poking around in a domain of reality that is truly, wired to everything else, and everyone else, longterm. So, as said above: "One can argue whether California non-profit law is better or worse than being a UN entity". I guess your right. But there should be, and probably will, (see the LONG DRIFT theory above). A completely tracable process much like representative political processes which has no geographic hooks whatsoever. Oddly though, since the material world is where things are changed by the acts of humans; this is problematic, I guess. If even a NGO structured ICANN tells a named person to change a RR, there are two(+) geographic named places. One where the person ordered happens to be, and the second where the computer(s) happen to be. Third is the place(s) where the descision occurred. Some of these can be completely masked by technology; for instance, the ICANN type descision maker could have some PGP style exculsive permission to Telnet into the DNS, no matter where it is; (any they might be enjoined from knowing it), and change it. What this simulates is techno-omnipotence, to avoid political meddling / incomptence. I think considering how new in jurisprudence terms the DNS conflicts are, ICANN has done a reasonable job. I read many judgements from Montreal and Geneva (WIPO) and only thought one was grossly wrong. And I think WIPO effectively censored that arbitrator; ( only used once after. He's overboard for life, probably for the two mistake's) [HEY like California... three strike, you know]. (TATA group of company's versus Bodacious TATA's is, I believe, clearly in error). Another thing that is somewhat comical (and sad) is WIPO is still based on licking the pavement of geography based power. (sad). They organize these named persons by national origin. This is an insult to them, and to the parties in disputes. We all know this is to prove some obscure non-reality of fairness. But, there background professionally, etc is more likely a bias than national origin anyway. All references to national origins should be minimized, and almost inaccessable. I think the arbitrators, likely with or without "I'm so legit I even SMELL ethical", paper trails probably mean well. A DNS battle is a winner take all dispute with non-trivial consequences. So its an acid test generally. Generally, for the accountability and major structural decisions for ICANN, Maybe the Kennedy school of goverment should make a REALLY big matrix of possibilities, and someone should throw a dart and do what it hits. If that DOESN'T work, repeat it excluding that option. Can't possibly work worse than electing politicians; (look around). I like the Delphic oracle system; (decisions made by stoned teenage girls on tripods). Worked great until they ran out of toxic vapours. We have a reasonably supply of stoned teenage girls here when the weathers compliant. So we could do this decisionmaking here (Canada) for 6 months/year, then move it to Brazil. See? I can be just as international as WIPO, (with less, well, no... overhead!). For DNS decisions: I conclude unfortunately with the suggestion the best thing is a benevolent dictator with infinite wisdom, and who is immortal. Three things: 1) Wisdom 2) Benevolent 3) Immortal But Jon Postel only managed two of three. Regs, Dan Original (incorrect decision in my opinion): http://arbiter.wipo.int/domains/decisions/html/2000/d2000-0479.html http://www.zafars.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/VOnes/ About ICAO: http://www.icao.int/cgi/goto.pl?icao/en/history.htm