Re: [ifwp] Re: new iana draft bylaws

[Karl Auerbach <karl@cavebear.com>]

I read the first draft a few weeks ago and came up with a list of issues
(which I did not post as I had thought that the Geneva discussions had
essentially vitiated the proposal.)

The fundamental premise of the proposed structure is that there is to be a
nearly powerless, figurehead board of directors which exercises minimal
control over a set of highly autonomous "supporting organizations" in
which all substantive power is to be found.

And at least two of those "supporting organizations", which are in essence
trade associations, are themselves essentially closed, ungoverned,
unaccountable bodies.

The proposed bylaws institutionalize the power of the RIRs other elements
of the Supporting Organizations and places the exercise of those powers
beyond effective review of the board (See Article VII, Section 1,
paragraph C).

In other words, it creates an entity which is essentially subject to no
outside regulation and which is closed and self-perputating.

The 9 "At Large" directors are essentially powerless as they can exert no
significant control over the policies adopted by the Supporting
Organizations.

Indeed the board as a whole can exert no significant control over the
Supporting Organizations.

Article VII, Section 1, Paragraph C strips the board of all effective
oversight of the Supporting Organizations.

That provision mandates that the board shall approve all proposals of a
Supporting Organization unless a majority of the board can demonstrate
that the proposal falls short in certain limited aspects.

In other words, rather than ensuring that the Internet is run for the
public benefit, the proposed articles place the burden on the board to
find and demonstrate that a Supporting Organization's policies aren't
downright harmful to the Internet.

In addition, the Supporting Organizations collectively have enough
permanent seats on the board to prevent any such finding.

The proposed bylaws gives effective power to exactly those self-interested
bodies which would, one would hope, be subject to regulation by the new
entity.

In addition, the proposed entity, since it hands all effective policy over
to the "Supporting Organizations" and permits those organizations to set
their own membership policies, abandons even the pretense of
responsibility and hands it over to a to a group of closed,
self-perpetuating, unregulated bureaucracies.

I personally find that such an entity would not be the kind of open,
accountable, responsive entity which the NTIA White Paper envisions.

Rather, I find it a mechanism which would further concentrate the real
control of the Internet into the hands of private and closed bodies, even
profit-making bodies.

It is my feeling that if this proposal were adopted, within three years
the Internet would be in the hands of organizations which, by comparison,
would make "The Telephone Company" seem like an open, friendly,
philanthropic entity.

		--karl--