Dear participants of this
forum: I want you to pay
attention to an important fact, which has not been mentioned:
When I joined my
first "official" forum concerning the future of the Internet years ago, there where
some dozens of comments and, if I remember well, about one dozen participants.
At
that time it was obvious, that the forum could not reflect the opinion of the rest
of the world, even though the internet community was still quite small compared to
now.
Comments in the newspaper were not in favour of the Internet at all and in
meetings CEOs of major companies were still convinced that this new technique would
never play any role for them ...
A little later the commentaries in the official
forums extended to about 200 - 300, then 500. More recently it reached the 1000-line
and it started to become difficult to follow it in detail.
But even then, about
half a year ago, it was a comparably small group of pro's against a comparably small
group of contras. Both of them might not have thoroughly represented the internet
and accused each other of acting out of self-interest.
This forum now is showing
what may soon happen: There will be thousands of comments!
Without interpreting
those comments, we all have to admit, that a new area has just started. It will be
impossible to accuse all of the participants of self-interest, except you accuse
EVERYBODY of self-interest, who participates actively in politics.
I know that
ICANN is proud of that rather unexpected success, given the fact that no publicity
took place from their side.
And ICANN is well conscious of the fact that this public
opinion will increase, say continue to explode.
With this much of participation
it is unlikely that "one group" can ever influence the general picture of this forum
anymore.
Therefore every opinion is important and respected.
ICANN should start
finding ways for handling an even more extensive participation before the next forum
starts. I pesonally think that it must then be possible to view new contributions
separately following to pre-defined subjects given in a scroll-up menue.
Otherwise
it shall become impossible to follow the thread.
This may be the first really "democratic"
forum but it also shows us the limits.
ICANN now has the difficult task not to
neglect these massive contributions from all the world.
The Internet has started
to walk, it's no longer crawling!
Thanks to all of you, no matter what your opinion
may be!