[At-Large] [lac-discuss-en] Vistaprint is abandoning .vista

Kan Kaili kankaili at gmail.com
Mon Jul 16 21:20:44 UTC 2018


Hi, Karl and Roberto, 

As I understand, even democracy itself is only a "least bad" system.  Thus, no matter it is one-man-one-vote, or it is a multi-stakeholder structure, neither could be perfect.  Furthermore, I do not suppose a better answer could be found any time soon.

However, as I see it, ICANN's beggest problem is (as Karl put it): certain "stakeholder" groups have become rather more powerful than others to the degree that one can fairly argue that ICANN is a regulatory/governance body that has been captured by those who it purports to regulate.

Again, as I see it, this is the reason that so many things could go wrong with ICANN.  Therefore, if this is the case, what should and could we do about it?

Kaili



  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: Roberto Gaetano 
  To: Karl Auerbach 
  Cc: At Large 
  Sent: Tuesday, July 17, 2018 4:21 AM
  Subject: Re: [At-Large] [lac-discuss-en] Vistaprint is abandoning .vista


  Karl, 
  My personal opinion is that the thorough explanation that you give about an individual carrying different hats is exactly the explanation why the individual vote will not work. That will oblige the individual to make a synthesis of the different needs, opinions and contributions he/she has and summarise this into one single vote, reducing the multiplicity of shades, colors and sounds to one single statement. We will lose the palette to reduce this to one single position or opinion that will summarise what is a variety of interest into what is the major factor.
  Time has passed but some might remember the change from the constituency-based GNSO structure to the stakeholder-group-based one. My argument, times and again, was that even one large company like IBM (I use this example because I happen to have worked there for quite a long time) cannot synthesise opinions and contributions to the policy development in one single statement or vote. The legal department might have some ideas, the marketing others, the developers others again, and so on. We are missing the opportunity to take advantage of this plurality of contributions if we remain stuck in the “old” constituency system that is resistant to change because it is prisoner of the liturgy of the vote.
  This is the essence of the problem, and if I understand correctly the essence of our disagreement. I reject a system by which everything is reduced to a vote, obliging the synthesis to be made at a local level by what would be a variety of contributions that will be prevented from having room for discussion.
  I am a participant to the ICANN world with at least two hats: one as Chair of the Board of a DNS Registry and one as long standing champion for user participation (I am also a registrant, an occasional participant to protocol definition, and more, but all this to a minor extent). I have perfectly clear what is the interest of PIR and what is in the interest of an individual user, and I want to be able to have a structure where, being member of two different stakeholder group, I can participate and contribute in both and not be obliged to make a choice or a vote silencing one part of my complex personal ecosystem. Personally, I believe that (as I said at the moment of the GNSO Review) if we want to change we need to transition from a state of mind that is hostage to the obsession of the power of the vote into a state of mind where what is important is the force of the ideas and the value of the contributions - even contradictory. A global, equal, multi-stakeholder (GEMS) system is, in my opinion, the only way to achieve that. If there are other new systems, I am ready to discuss the matter, but the return to the old way of reducing everything to a vote is not an alternative that is appealing to me.
  Cheers,
  Roberto




    On 16.07.2018, at 21:18, Karl Auerbach <karl at cavebear.com> wrote:


    Roberto: As you know I've been in opposition to the "stakeholder" model of governance since before ICANN was created.  And as many foresaw way back then, certain "stakeholder" groups have become rather more powerful than others to the degree that one can fairly argue that ICANN is a regulatory/governance body that has been captured by those who it purports to regulate.

    Let us not forget that when ICANN was created promises were made that a majority of the seats on the board of directors would be chosen by the public.  That promise remains unfulfilled.  The community of internet users ought to have a loud and commanding voice in ICANN yet the stakeholder model has left the community of internet users with little more than an easily ignored whisper.


    One of the things that amuses me, or concerns me, is that stakeholder thinking tend to pre-conceive what a given person or thing might be interested in - in other words, it ordains, without ever consulting the person involved, where a person's "stake" lays.  That kind of top-down-imposition is, well, not very bottom-up.

    Let's look at my own case.  Which "stakeholder" pigeon hole box should I be stuffed into?  Or, should I be allowed to operated as several "stakeholders" and thus (unfairly) multiply my voice?


      - I am an individual

      - I own for profit business corporations (both as a founder or as a shareholder.)


      - I am a member of public-interest groups.

      - I live in a country (and citizen of two.)


      - I and my corporations register domain names.

      - I and my corporations have trademarks, copyrights, patents and other intellectual property.

      - I and my corporations have public IP address space (allocated from Jon Postel, not by the RIRs.)

      - I am an attorney who is involved in intellectual property matters.


      - I have written full internet standards that continue wide use on a daily basis.

      - I have property (partial ownership) interests in domain name registries and registrars of ICANN granted TLDs.


    I am hardly unique in this way.  Every person is a bundle of interests that are often at odds with one another.  It ought to be up to each individual to reconcile these interests, to formulate a vote based on a self-made evaluation of which personal interest is more important and ought to prevail.  Stakeholderism deprives people of the right to reconcile their interests; stakeholderism imposes an externally pre-made decision onto that person about what are that person's most important concerns.


    Stuffing me into one stakeholder box or another the organization (or whoever is creating that taxonomy) is a Procrustean act that arbitrarily pre-decides which of my interests best express my views.

    Stakeholderism, like Procrustes, chops off our arms and stretches our legs in order to make each of us fit onto whatever iron bed the organization feels is most appropriate.


    (For those of you who wonder about "Procrustean" - here's the wikipedia page https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Procrustes )


    I suggest that the atomic unit of interest is the individual human being.   And as a consequence, the only thing that should have a countable vote in matters of internet governance are individual human beings.  Anything else, corporations, domain name owners, intellectual property warriors, etc ought to have no voting authority - but will, of course, retain the power to articulate arguments to try to convince individual people to use their vote in certain ways.

        --karl--






    On 7/16/18 8:28 AM, Roberto Gaetano wrote:

      It is of course a risk that the multi-stakeholder model be tilted towards the interests of one part of the stakeholders - this is why, incidentally, Fadi was talking about *global* *equal* multi-stakeholder (“GEMS") model. 
      That there is a potential corruption of the model is no good reason for rejecting it, in particular in lack of a better system. So I would argue that the way to go is to make sure that the voice of the different stakeholders compose with the requirement of being “global” (meaning all have a chance to get to the table) and “equal” (meaning all have the same voice).
      In practice, civil society, because of the inherent limitations about financial power, should be subsidised to participate, and civil society itself has to make sure that it avoids infiltration of lobbyists among its rank and file.
      Cheers,
      R




        On 16.07.2018, at 00:05, bzs at theworld.com wrote:



        On July 16, 2018 at 01:48 6.Internet at gmail.com(Sivasubramanian M) wrote:



          On Mon, Jul 16, 2018, 12:16 AM <bzs at theworld.com> wrote:


             Multistakeholderism is open to all -- like the Ritz Hotel.


          ( Understand that it is an anology that isn't perfect). Going by this anology,
          it merely requires a simple, very simple fix:  Reserve a third of the hotel by
          unconditional funding to the stakeholder group that can't afford it, and to
          anyone relatively less privileges even from within even the wealthier
          stakeholder groups. Then we will find the elusive balance.


        I was thinking of how it exists, specifically ICANN, rather than some
        hypothetical implementation.

        The problem is that there is no tie-in (GAC possibly excepted but they
        are advisory) between those who participate and those who are affected
        by the various policy development processes.

        Yes in theory anyone, even the poorest internet user, could simply buy
        themselves plane tickets and hotel rooms etc and participate in the
        meetings.

        Given the actual way it's organized one would likely have to do that
        three times per year for a few years to rise to any level of
        participation beyond open mikes.

        But it's open to anyone! Much like the Ritz Hotel.

        It's no accident that multistakeholderism has been referred to as
        system which is "of, by, and for the lobbyists"*.

        In a nutshell get rid of anything remotely resembling popularly
        elected voting members (even indirectly) and just let the big
        registries, registrars, and others with financial interests be the
        stakeholders and do all the policy development and approval.

        Yes one can identify the occasional exception to that.

        * That point was essentially on the wikipedia page for
        multistakeholderism under "Criticisms" but disappeared about a year or
        so ago.

          https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Multistakeholder_governance_model&diff=768793583&oldid=750897618

           Criticism of multistakeholderism comes from Paul R. Lehto,
           J.D.{{Citation needed|date=March 2014}}, who fears that in
           multistakeholderism, those who would be lobbyists become
           legislators, and nobody else has a vote. Lehto states that "In a
           democracy, it is a scandal when lobbyists have so much influence
           that they write the drafts of laws. But in multistakeholder
           situations they take that scandal to a whole new level: those who
           would be lobbyists in a democracy (corporations, experts, civil
           society) become the legislators themselves, and dispense with all
           public elections and not only write the laws but pass them,
           enforce them, and in some cases even set up courts of arbitration
           that are usually conditioned on waiving the right to go to the
           court system set up by democracies. A vote is just a minimum
           requirement of justice. Without a vote, law is just force
           inflicted by the wealthy and powerful. Multistakeholderism is a
           coup d’etat against democracy by those who would merely be
           lobbyists in a democratic system."{{Citation needed|date=March
           2014}}
        -- 
               -Barry Shein

        Software Tool & Die    | bzs at TheWorld.com             | http://www.TheWorld.com
        Purveyors to the Trade | Voice: +1 617-STD-WRLD       | 800-THE-WRLD
        The World: Since 1989  | A Public Information Utility | *oo*
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