comments: by-laws

[Michael Sondow <msondow@ic.sunysb.edu>]

Comments on the IANA's proposed By-Laws (07-18-98) for the new Internet
authority:

1) How will the new "Internet corporation" be financed? No mention is
made of this important question. Those who pay for the Corporation will
have de facto power over it, and this power will accrue as it spends
money (operating expenses and salaries, technical studies, contracts, et
cetera). 

2) It would probably be better in the long run to have, within the new
organizational structure, a user Supporting Organization separate from
industry, perhaps along the lines that R.B. Hunter indicates in his
organizational proposals (sent to NTIA). Public service organizations
apparently did not respond to ISOC's call for attendance at INET98. The
international public sector will not want to be associated too directly
with industrial and commercial interests. A separate Supporting
Organization, at the very least, should exist for representatives of the
worldwide community of non-commercial Internet end-users. 

3) It may, as proposed, be best for the new central Internet authority,
or at least for the new organization replacing the IANA, to be based in
the U.S.A. However, it must be democratic and representative
internationally, and must be seen to be so. Otherwise, non-U.S. 
individuals and organizations will be alienated and will then look for
alternative network structures outside the DNS, causing a dissociation
of the Internet. This process is already under way (e.g. RSC) and can be
halted only by the rapid implementation of truly international Internet
organizational structures. In this context, the suggestions of Friedrick
Kister may not be far wide of the mark (see his e-mail to iana@isi.edu
on July 19).