Today at the FCC
The FCC internet policy working group held a roundtable discussion [pdf] today about international approaches to IP-enabled services.
Michael Binder, of the Canadian government, had some interesting things to say. (Binder's title: Assistant Deputy Minister, Spectrum, Information Technologies and Telecommunications Sector. Binder says he's “not a regulator” but is nevertheless part of the government.)
He said [paraphrasing]: “As a government official, I don't see what the urgency is here [to regulate IP-enabled services]. This is very very early in the game.. . . One can argue that we should wait to see how it unfolds. The notion of governments and bureaucrats and regulators actually designing a regulatory scheme for the future is hard for me to understand. How to go into a back room and figure out how industry will go forward — that's an interesting view. Maybe once there are bottlenecks, regulation will be needed.”
When Bob Pepper of the FCC asked what government policies could foster the development of VoIP, Binder responded (again paraphrasing): “Our regulator decided not to regulate the internet a few years back. This was a major proceeding at a time before VoIP emerged, and we've stuck to this decision. . . . Sprint and Vonage and others are all providing VoIP services. One might ask, if they're all coming in, what is it you [regulators] want to change? . . . I think the market will take care of itself. If it's not a good service, no one will subscribe to it. There should be regulation only if necessary. What's the necessity?”
Jeff Pulver made some very useful remarks, including (paraphrasing): “Around the world people have trouble believing things [some services] are really free. This is radical for people, and certainly for regulators. The real generation we need to think about is the IM generation. Presence plus voice plus social networking creates a new era of online communication. My role is to help protect the future, and make sure that innovation can happen. Don't think of these services as substitutes for telephony — think of the future.”
This was a complex and interesting morning; the UK and Japanese regulators take quite different approaches than Canada may be taking (UK looks at whether something is a telecommunications service, and appears to be in about the same position as the US — trying to figure out whether there is a market around which lines can be drawn; Japan has already decided that VoIP is a telecommunications service and is regulating accordingly), and several companies cried out for regulatory certainty.
Nortel, in particular, said balefully that if regulators didn't provide this certainty businesses would have no reason to invest in the vastly improved and increasingly secure broadband networks that Nortel apparently believes must eventually supersede the internet. Paraphrasing: “The internet is the wild wild west from a security standpoint . . . in order to scale, to make this a dependable, real-world network, companies need to come to commercial agreements about how to treat each other's traffic. This can happen without regulation, as it has with wireless carriers for treatment of roaming customers. . . . The empowerment of consumers to have control over how communications coming their way are treated and routed is key. The only way to make this scale — the internet is fun but we need to get to scale — is to create a network that is much more reliable and predictable than the internet will ever be.” I may be naive, but this seemed to me to be a pitch by Nortel.
The key tension here appears to be between BT's call for internationally consistent rules that allow companies to sell services, and Canada's point that it seems awfully early to be doing anything at all. There did not appear to be a clear call for emergency services, disabled access, privacy mandates, or any of the other policies discussed in the IP-enabled services NPRM, as far as I could tell — particularly for services that don't interconnect with the traditional telephone network. On the other hand, there wasn't a huge push against them, and CALEA didn't really come up at all (except for an oblique mention of “safety”-oriented policies that would be discussed by the FCC in the near future).
Net impression: Canada seems like a good place. Even though this summary comparing the Canadian and US proceedings suggests that Canada is both more focused and more likely to regulate than the US is, Binder left the impression that Canada won't do anything at all. But, again, he's not a (or “the”) regulator.
Waiting for the shoe to drop
I'm waiting for the FCC's NPRM on CALEA for VoIP to drop. I am in acronym heaven.
Ed Felten has a nice description of John Morris's presentation at the PFIR conference here. It's likely that FCC is going to try to thread the needle and describe some CALEA regime for VoIP that attempts to ensure that the regime doesn't apply to IM and email. But, still, it's a big step for the FCC to reach the services that are somewhere in between ATT (little bit of IP added in) and Pulver.com (all IP) with CALEA.
And The New York Times is certainly noticing. Today's story is worth reading. CALEA is only part of the story. The rest — the implementation of the “social policies” that I've been pointing to — is equally fascinating.
Have you downloaded Skype yet?
Preventing the internet meltdown
I'm here, having finally (with Froomkin's help) found a way to get online. In exchange, I gave Froomkin a route map for the No.3 busline.
What's this conference about? It may be about network security — holding people liable for using legacy hardware and software that can be used to attack others. It may be about spam and whether or not anonymity continues to make sense. It may be about the glory of self-organizing systems and netizenship (it was for about 10 minutes, when I was talking.) It may be about ICANN (although several people have professed to not be interested in bashing ICANN). It may be about WSIS.
I can't tell what it's about. I've taken the mike a few times to ask the group to focus on a problem and build something. I said at one point that being here was like watching a big football team sort of wander aimlessly around the field. Someone responded — maybe it was Brad Templeton — that these guys are here because they sucked at football. (It's mostly guys here.) It's so hard to harness this energy and get it working on something concrete.
Karl Auerbach is here, and he's suggesting that some regulations are good — governments have legitimacy that others don't. He's focusing on the “dangerous software/hardware” problem, and also providing some ICANN criticism. He's concerned that users are being forced to pay at least $6 a domain name. Others pointed out that there are some registrars who charge less than $6, and make up the difference on services.
Wendy Selzer is here, and I wish I could stay to hear whatever remarks she's going to make. Ed Felten is wise in the hallways. I've been privileged to mutter with David Isenberg in the back of the room.
I'm noting that none of us bloggers have managed to encapsulate this conference yet. We're all just announcing that “we're here.” I think that's indicative: it's 4:15 and we're not quite sure where in topic-space “here” is.
I'm going to assert that this conference is about the rise of netizenship and the need for a lobby for netizens. Just as Larry L. has found a way to represent the public domain, we need to find a way to represent the end-user, and the power of that user to shape his/her own environment — given adequate tools.
PS: In case you were wondering, the internet hasn't melted down and isn't in danger of doing so.
Santa Monica and the internet meltdown
After the sultry days and nights in Kuala Lumpur, it's great to be in Southern California. I'm here for the PFIR conference tomorrow. The conference hotel is at the corner of Lincoln and Manchester, just north of the airport, and after I checked in I took the No. 3 bus up to my home town: Santa Monica.
The No.3 is a spectacular busline. It costs only .75 to go all the way from south of the airport to UCLA — fast. Along the way, you see a lot of Lincoln Boulevard (junky), ICANN's headquarters (anonymous), the high school I went to (huge), the pastel-colored stucco apartment buildings south of Montana, and a lot more — including a glimpse of the city fishing pier and momentary ocean views.
It's a great day here, and it's nice to be back, if only for 24 hours.
I'm not sure what to expect from tomorrow's meeting. I'm looking forward to seeing Neumann, Weinstein, Farber, Bradner, and whoever else is planning to come. The somewhat apocalyptic conference announcement (”A continuing and rapidly escalating series of alarming events suggest that immediate cooperative, specific planning is necessary if we are to have any chance of avoiding the meltdown“) makes me want to tell a few jokes.
Instead, I'll focus on netizenship. I'll talk about the glory of self-organizing networks (and the order that emerges from them), and I'll point out that someone is already in charge: us. “Governance” does not necessarily involve “governments.” And I'll tell a few stories about this past ICANN meeting, including what happened during my lengthy cab ride with the manager of Burundi's ccTLD, .bi.
Although I usually try to tie these posts up into a neat package, there really is no connection between the internet and the No.3 bus. Except that both work really well.
Translation
Downtown Kuala Lumpur has the aesthetic of Santa Monica Boulevard in West LA (”Build it! Build anything! Right now!”) and the street life of Times Square. Plus women veiled in black from head to toe, silently flitting by, their eye-slits sometimes covered by spectacles.
Last night, with two friends, I was the happy recipient of a foot massage. Both feet were well taken care of in a storefront place that also sold tea sets — and featured cheesy Chinese warrior films (”hi-YAHHH”). My feet slid back and forth in my sandals afterwards, and I could hardly walk down the crowded streets.
Today, I will take my feet and my laptop on a 36-hour journey to Los Angeles. I am a package from now on. I will try to follow the advice of a veteran traveler and take this trip without emotion. I have plenty of bottled water but not enough battery power to work on my latest article. So I may not make much progress, academic-wise, but I will be carried across many oceans.
Bellhead/Nethead
If I ever get out of Kuala Lumpur, I look forward to pressing forward on Bellhead/Nethead. I was so pleased to run across this post from David Isenberg today. Thanks, David!
For me, what's going on in the interim FCC proceedings on implementing the broadcast flag has links to my overall “black helicopter” concerns about this pivotal moment in internet history.
As Jonathan Krim of the Post reports today (it must be today somewhere):
Hollywood studios and the National Football League are seeking to block the maker of the popular TiVo television recorder from expanding its service so that users could watch copies of shows and movies on devices outside their homes.
In filings with the Federal Communications Commission, the organizations say the new technology could compromise the copyrights of shows that broadcasters send over the airwaves in digital form, which offers much higher sound and video quality than what viewers typically get today.
The flag was supposed to be about indiscriminate online distribution. TiVo is trying to provide a device that allows 10 people within a personal network to copy TiVo-ed shows onto their PCs. It's perfectly secure. It's just not quite constrained enough for the studios.
And Hollywood is asking [pdf] the FCC to make sure that this TiVo functionality never reaches consumers.
This desperate quest for control, using the FCC as an apparently willing tool, will end its first stage next week. The rumor is that Real and MSN have already caved in to the studios. Only TiVo is still fighting.
The flag proceeding has convinced me that FCC is capable of almost anything. That's why it seems important to let FCC know just how hard making rules about IP-enabled services will be.
Today in the life of the internet
We seem to be at a very interesting point in history. We may be battling for the heart of the internet. That's purple language, but that's what's going on.
Telecom agencies all over the world and the UN would like to see some form of “internet governance” in place. Their statutes or organizing principles are certainly broad enough to include the internet — they look at IP addresses and say, “That's us! We should be in charge!”
And, in the US at any rate, there's an unholy alliance between law enforcement and Hollywood that would like to help this regulatory development along. There are some big companies that would like to sell authentication services. Add this all together, and there is, right now, real pressure to change the way all of us look at this network of networks.
It's going to be hard to make this shift to regulation happen — after all, there really aren't many chokepoints in the system, and it's very difficult to say that citizens can use only particular IP addresses. My hope is that it's already too late to cause this change. The genie is out of the bottle.
But every time anyone says that “governance” necessarily involves “governments,” a tiny link in the chain is forged — and a telecom regulator, somewhere, looks up and smiles.
Kuala Lumpur on Wednesday
Today is IDN Day. John Kleinsin is up talking about just how hard IDNs are.
In the back of the room, there is muttering about the budget. It looks to me as if it's likely to go through at $15 million.
My view on the budget has changed over time. I've talked to several board members who assure me that ICANN has no interest in broadening its mission. They're focused on limiting what ICANN does. I've talked to registries who are frustrated with the communications problems with ICANN staff. It seems to me that staff is trying, and that they're … swamped.
Given all of this, I'd suggest not focusing on the $15 million number, and talking about structural approaches to future budgets that will help with these two problems: risk of mission creep and staff non-responsiveness.
Let's not allow ICANN to spend, immediately, money it makes from auctioning TLDs (a likely step) or charging registrars. People are talking about foundation approaches — putting the money beyond ICANN's immediate reach. People are talking about task force examination of ICANN's spending habits.
Let's constantly back up the frame on ICANN's mission. My sense is that organizations hardly ever do this. It would be a good idea for ICANN to articulate its job description in a way that avoids the generalities (hinting at things much greater) of the 2002 mission discussions. Let's be specific. Let's not just describe — let's have a watchdog group (that has resources) take a hard look at how ICANN is or may be straying.
If ICANN means what it says — if it's not actually interested in becoming an attractive chokepoint for the desires of governments — then let's hold them to that promise through structures that constrain future budgets.
ICANN moment
This morning Markus Kummer was here to address ICANN about the Working Group on Internet Governance within the UN. He said at several points that it was still not clear what “internet governance” means, and proposed that answering this question would be the work of his Working Group. Nor is it clear what “multi-stakeholder group” means. But there's a process and he is right now (with one other person, and without funding) the Secretariat for that process. The goal is produce a paper by June 2005.
Wolfgang Kleinwachter made an argument that “basic services” — like infrastructure and the DNS — don't require governmental involvement, but “enhanced services” — like applications — require a great deal of government involvement. He's trying to use the telecom structure, flip it upside down, and then have it ensure that the DNS doesn't get touched by this group. I'm not convinced that this makes sense — particularly because the government view of this issue would insist that basic services need regulation too — perhaps even more so.
Another comment: “What ICANN is doing is very much philosophical, not really technological. . . We intend to compete with you. . You're not improving. . . We would like to compete.” This was an individual speaking.
Network security, IP rights, data protection, spam, and multilingualism — that's the list that Kummer gave for internet governance. Cerf comes up and says that ICANN is focused on low levels, enabling components of the internet. [paraphrasing] “The part that stimulates interest in governance lies at the edge of the net. So — spam is a consequence of email. It has little to do with the underlying network. It strikes me that a great deal of the governance debate has to do with the edge. This is outside ICANN's purview. We could help explain technical things to you. Eg, with multilingualism — internet can carry any form of script — so we'll help explain that to you.”
Twomey then says that these issues link back to technology and also to geopolitical issues. [paraphrasing] “So even if ICANN wished it could do something simple in the multilingual or country-name arena, the reality is that there's a treaty that we have to look to. Even if it would be nice to have a one-stop place to fix all problems, you still have to go out and look at the rule of law and go to other organizations — complex web over last hundreds of years.”
Paul Wilson says that MOU now in place is the last one. Question is whether before the end of WSIS there could be some clear statement of relationship between ICANN and USG. It seems to Wilson that if ICANN needs to overcome WSIS concerns it should clarify this relationship.
Twomey responds: [paraphrasing] “Kofi Annan told me that you can't wish away history. This MOU represents a policy statement that USG wishes to transition out of a 30-year history of their role. As was made clear in December in 2003, the countries that will most lose if this technology stops working are those that are least likely to support a government-only solution to this problem. So the MOU is a due-diligence document — checking to make sure that multistakeholder work actually happening. We are ahead of timetable on our milesones, but I can't say whether we'll be able to pass the test for the transition. USG now saying that they're satisfied with us and committed to the transition. MOU is not some sort of charter/legislative something — it's due diligence. You'll find that as ICANN becomes more businesslike we're making contingency planning for failure (we showed this plan to the GAC), and the USG plays no special role on failure in taking functions forward. Govts, cctlds, RIRs, techies will do that.”
Peter Dengate-Thrush reinforces what Vint said about layers — ccTLDs can handle their own local policies. Govts should not necessarily be managing ccTLDs unless there's a relationship that already exists.
Izumi Aizu says [paraphrase] “there are many issues inside ICANN that are relevant to the working group – new gTLDs, whois privacy, multilingualism. Users are difficult to self-organize, and we need money in order to be part of ICANN meetings.”
KL — limited ICANN impressions
“While escaping war-torn China, a group of Europeans crash in the Himalayas, where they are rescued and taken to the mysterious Valley of the Blue Moon, Shangri-La. Hidden from the rest of the world, Shangri-La is a haven of peace and tranquility for world-weary diplomat Hugh/Richard Conway. His ambitious brother, George, sees it as a prison from which he must escape, even if it means risking his life and bringing destruction to the ancient culture of Shangri-La.”
Shangri-La.
That's where the ICANN team is today, in the Shangri-La Hotel in downtown Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. It's a very nice hotel.
The big item on ICANN's plate right now is the budget. I've heard that at least one large registrar hasn't signed on yet. I've also heard that ICANN has several backup plans in mind that may involve looking to the registries for funding. Or may not. This will be a hot item of discussion over the next few days.
I saw a plaintive email from Elisabeth Porteneuve that said ICANN had deleted all of the old wwwtld records for the ccTLD organizations from its website. From what I can gather, there remains some concern and confusion about the ccNSO's legitimacy and standing in the ccTLD community. Their meeting here will be dedicated to process. I'm sure there will be bloggers in the ccTLD meetings to tell us more.
Other substantial issues to be discussed include the .net contract, IDNs, ongoing WSIS issues, and how to approve new registry services for registries under contract with ICANN. VeriSign may or may not have something to say about the Sitefinder report [pdf] of July 9. At the moment, the GAC is meeting behind closed doors, and the rest of the crowd is touring the city or chatting in the capacious lobby.