At 7:29 PM -0500 1/1/13, Phillip Hallam-Baker wrote:
On Tue, Jan 1, 2013 at 3:31 AM,
Brian E
Carpenter <brian.e.carpenter@xxxxxxxxx>
wrote:
I'v been hesitating to join in here because this
seems
distinctly OT
to me, but there are some basics that need to be understood:
On 31/12/2012 21:08, John Day wrote:
> At 1:05 PM -0500 12/31/12, Phillip Hallam-Baker wrote:
>> On Mon, Dec 31, 2012 at 9:51 AM, John Day
>> <<mailto:jeanjour@xxxxxxxxxxx>jeanjour@xxxxxxxxxxx>
wrote:
...
>> MPs and Congressmen are elected decision
makers.
ITU participants can
>> make decisions but they are not binding on anyone and
only
have effect
>> if people like me choose to implement them.
>
> This was my point. The standards part of ITU is just like
any
other
> standards organization. But there are other things it
does which
are not
> like this, e.g. spectrum allocation. There are other
aspects with
> respect to tariffs that are binding on signatories.
Not only tariffs. Historically, it was national
enforcement of international
regulations set by CCITT (now known as ITU-T) that prevented
interconnection
of leased lines**. This is an arcane point today, but if CERN
hadn't
been
able to use its status as an international organization to
bypass
that
restriction in the 1980s, it's unlikely that TBL and Robert
Cailliau
would
ever have been able to propagate the web. It's even unlikely
that
Phill
would have been able to access Usenet newsgroups while on
shift as a
grad
student on a CERN experiment.
I was never a grad student at
CERN, I was
a CERN Fellow. And I had access to USENET from DESY but we were
routing it through CERN at first.
Now it is an interesting question
as to
what might have happened if the Web had not expanded as it did
when it
did. But one of the reasons that it expanded was that there were
a lot
of parties involved who were actively wanting to blow up the
CITT
tariffs and establish a free market. That was HMG policy at any
rate.
I have heard tell (dropping into the vernacular) that to
many,
the web was just another application like Gopher until NCSA put
a
browser on it. The question is what would have happened had
they
put the browser on top of something else?
Also, it is exactly because ITU was in charge of
resource
allocations
such as radio spectrum and top-level POTS dialling codes that
it
was
a very plausible potential home for IANA in 1997-8, before
ICANN
was
created. Some of the ITU people who were active in that debate
were
just
as active in the preparation for WCIT in 2012.
When the big question facing DNS
admin
was legal liability in the various domain name disputes that
were
proliferating, having a treaty organization with diplomatic
immunity
actually had some advantages.
Agreed but the treaty organization was the WTO and another
one I
can't remember right now! ;-) As long as the problem was punted
to them one was okay. I just don't see how ITU has purview over
*uses* of the network. (Nor am I willing to easily cede that.)
This is why it is not a good idea to go along with the ITU
beads-on-a-string model. By doing so, it already clouds the
picture and gives up ground.
But that was a very different time
diplomatically. That was before Putin was ordering
assassinations on
the streets of London with Polonium laced teapots and before the
colour revolutions rolled back the Russian sphere of influence.
And
our side was hardly blameless, it was the US invasion of Iraq
that
poisoned the well in the first place.
True, but what effect does this have? The US did burn up a
lot of good will for no good reason and then botched the job on
top of
it.
** CCITT document D.1. The 1988 version includes the
restrictions on
use of leased lines:
http://www.itu.int/rec/dologin_pub.asp?lang=e&id=T-REC-D.1-198811-S!!PDF-E&type=items
The 1991 version is much less restrictive, but it remains the
case
that
interconnections are all "subject to national laws" and that
is the basis
for all national limitations on the Internet today.
Nevertheless, the
1991
revision of D.1 was absolutely essential for the Internet to
grow
internationally.
The idea of fixing the contract
terms in
an international treaty is utterly bizarre.
It would be foolish to imagine that the Internet is
in
some way immune
to ITU-T regulations, which is why the effort to defeat the
more
radical
WCIT proposals was so important.
While technically true, I think
your
wording is misleading.
Why is this technically true? Honest question.
ITU-T has absolutely no control
over the
Internet unless member governments decide to give it that power.
The
importance of the protests was that they prevented the US and EU
governments from agreeing to cede that power.
Agreed.
Within the US government there are
different factions. What was important was to ensure that the
pro-control faction did not get the chance to agree to give the
store
away.
My model here (for better or worse) is the origin of the US
Constitution. The Constitution does not create a hierarchical
structure. The States cede parts of their sovereignty to the
Federal government. Those things better done across States,
rather
than individually: Common currency, regulating interstate
commerce, defense, etc. The Federal government is
alongside the State governments. The EU is a
confederation
that is doing some of these as well. The UN is a very weak
confederation, so the question to consider is what aspects of
*telecommunication* (not defense or commerce or anything else)
does it make sense that there should be international regulation
(or
binding agreements)?
So far, my list is pretty short. In fact, there is wireless
spectrum and that is it. And even there, I would suggest only
above certain transmitter power levels.
Actually, I would have to apply the same criteria to the
FCC.
;-)