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<p>I quite agree with you that "legitimacy" is important and can be
difficult to achieve.</p>
<p>I had not thought of how ICANN's perceived authority is weakened
as the world tends to de-globalize into competing fiefdoms. I'm
glad you brought that up. (My sense is that you have revealed to
us something that is going to be a growing issue in the coming
years.)<br>
</p>
<p>If we start to think of other jobs the Internet needs then there
is value in looking at what ICANN got right and what it got
wrong. (Among those potential jobs are some that are quite touchy
and sensitive, such as identification/authentication tokens, and
some that will irritate those who think in terms of trade secrets,
such as getting better handles on sources of damaging traffic.)<br>
</p>
<p>I've usually thought that any body - whether it be ICANN or the
Red Cross or whatever - achieves legitimacy as sort of an additive
process performed both by national governments (usually by treaty
or something similar) and by the body itself through doing its job
well for a long time.</p>
<p>ICANN has definitely done some things well for a quarter of a
century - but often in the realm of taking credit for the work of
root server operators. ICANN's imposition of business models and
its heavy cost burden on consumers (by my estimate this cost is in
the $billions) is not something that has been done well. (ICANN
[perhaps under the guise of IANA] also did valuable, yeoman work,
in conjunction with the IETF, with regard to multi-lingualization
and DNSSEC.)</p>
<p>Then there is the 25 year old fact that ICANN was designed (if
not intentionally than naively) to be captured by those who it
purports to regulate and has since become a pliable vehicle for
the trademark branch of my tribe, Intellectual Property
attorneys. These things do not contribute to the weight of
legitimacy as measured by others not so well situated, such as the
community of Internet users.</p>
<p>As anyone who knows me knows, I'm a strong believer that our
institutions ought to have clear and reasonably direct lines of
accountability to the living, breathing people who populate our
planet. Add to that that I reject the injection of bookkeeping
conveniences (we call them "corporations") into those lines of
accountability because they create means for multiplying of the
influence of some, block the influence of others, and create
opacity rather than transparency of the strings of accountability.</p>
<p>As such I have believed that ICANN ought to be under the sole
control of the public. And, further, that a wise exercise of that
public role ought to be to view those we call "stakeholders"
entirely through the lens of the individual people who hold those
interests and thus represent those interests merely as members of
the public, rather than through some elevated, privileged,
ordained role as "stakeholder". (Of course, any wise member of
the public ought to recognize that those we today call
"stakeholders" often have expertise and views we ought to hear and
consider.)</p>
<p>I've held myself apart from the ALAC system. Not because I
reject its value. But rather that I reject the Procrustean form
that was forced upon it. To my mind it was designed to be of weak
voice with weaker influence.<br>
</p>
<p>In balance, after 25 years, the name "ICANN" tends to elicit more
groans than lauds. That's not a path that leads to a solid,
enduring foundation of legitimacy.</p>
<p> --karl--<br>
</p>
<div class="moz-cite-prefix">On 9/14/23 2:59 PM, Evan Leibovitch
wrote:<br>
</div>
<blockquote type="cite"
cite="mid:CAMguqh2HrwCtkVpGhwHXi=o9TBOo_Auvq2iCsn92uQhWC_rRVw@mail.gmail.com">
<meta http-equiv="content-type" content="text/html; charset=UTF-8">
<div dir="ltr">
<div dir="ltr">On Thu, Sep 14, 2023 at 3:54 PM Karl Auerbach via
At-Large <<a href="mailto:at-large@atlarge-lists.icann.org"
moz-do-not-send="true" class="moz-txt-link-freetext">at-large@atlarge-lists.icann.org</a>>
wrote:</div>
<div dir="ltr"><br>
</div>
<div class="gmail_quote">
<blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0px 0px 0px
0.8ex;border-left:1px solid
rgb(204,204,204);padding-left:1ex">
<div bgcolor="#FFFFFF">Democracy Versus Stakeholderism
<p><a
href="https://www.cavebear.com/cavebear-blog/stakeholder_sock_puppet/"
target="_blank" moz-do-not-send="true"
class="moz-txt-link-freetext">https://www.cavebear.com/cavebear-blog/stakeholder_sock_puppet/</a></p>
</div>
</blockquote>
<div><span class="gmail_default"
style="font-family:tahoma,sans-serif;color:rgb(11,83,148)">There
are many forms of stakeholderism. Some, like Netmundial's,
have potential to be sustainable and adaptable for other
environments. Other models, developed in standards-making
environments, provide examples as diverse as the IETF's
and ISO's.<br>
</span></div>
<div><span class="gmail_default"
style="font-family:tahoma,sans-serif;color:rgb(11,83,148)"><br>
</span></div>
<div><span class="gmail_default"
style="font-family:tahoma,sans-serif;color:rgb(11,83,148)">And
then there's ICANN's inmates-running-the-asylum model, by
far worst of the bunch, in numerous ways explicitly
designed to serve industry at the expense of the public
interest. For all of its A&T noise the world has seen
that ICANN's only real external accountability is to the
California Attorney-General.<br>
</span></div>
<br>
</div>
<div class="gmail_quote">
<div><span class="gmail_default"
style="font-family:tahoma,sans-serif;color:rgb(11,83,148)">It
is no coincidence that for most international treaties,
the ICANN script is flipped; it is governments and
public-interest groups who set the agenda while industry
advises. Without the backing of such treaties, ICANN's
decisions survive only because of governmental tolerance
rather than validation. And as a result of said lack of
validation, we have issues arise such as we have in this
thread: "ICANN-approved" gTLDs which are ignored by
significant swaths of the Internet (and without anyone
realizing it for YEARS).<br>
</span></div>
<div><br>
</div>
<div>
<div
style="font-family:tahoma,sans-serif;color:rgb(11,83,148)"
class="gmail_default">How can anyone be surprised? It is
notable that even this shocking news was revealed by an
industry-insider website and has received no mainstream
coverage of which I'm aware. Nobody outside the ICANN
bubble cares.</div>
<div
style="font-family:tahoma,sans-serif;color:rgb(11,83,148)"
class="gmail_default"><br>
</div>
<div
style="font-family:tahoma,sans-serif;color:rgb(11,83,148)"
class="gmail_default">And this is ICANN at peak respect.
As globalization declines, ICANN's lack of treaty backing
is going to prove even more costly to international
connectivity as time passes. It's going to get worse, not
better.<br>
</div>
<br>
</div>
<div
style="font-family:tahoma,sans-serif;color:rgb(11,83,148)"
class="gmail_default">- Evan<br>
</div>
<br>
</div>
</div>
</blockquote>
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