[At-Large] On a "consumer" agenda for ICANN

[John R. Levine]

> Stepping back to the rarely mentioned elephant in the room - under California 
> law ICANN exists for the purpose of promoting the public benefit.  And 
> everything it does must be measured by that standard. Yes, that's a standard 
> that is vague.  But although vague that standard does suggest a broad scope 
> rather than a limited one.

That is true, but the public benefit that ICANN claims to provide is 
"lessening the burdens of government" by doing a job that ARPA and the NSF 
had previously paid for.  (See their Form 990s.)

It would be nice if they did other public benefit stuff but they've never 
promised to do so.  More's the pity.

Regards,
John Levine, johnl at iecc.com, Primary Perpetrator of "The Internet for Dummies",
Please consider the environment before reading this e-mail. https://jl.ly