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Netizens-Digest Volume 1 Number 289
Netizens-Digest Wednesday, March 17 1999 Volume 01 : Number 289
Netizens Association Discussion List Digest
In this issue:
[netz] Re: Does the fight against Hitler like tactic only belong in museums?
[netz] Suspect registrations of domain names are purged
[netz] Re: [IFWP] REFLECTIONS UPON THE .US MEETING (fwd)
[netz] Re: Of Spindoctors & Fairytale Tellers & Gore for President
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: Wed, 17 Mar 1999 01:02:56 -0004
From: kerryo@ns.sympatico.ca (Kerry Miller)
Subject: [netz] Re: Does the fight against Hitler like tactic only belong in museums?
Rick wrote,
> may I remind you that the horrifying
> images of the mid-20th century manifestation of the Fascist atrocities
> seem to benefit from a perverse effect that precludes semiotic references
> to it in any but the most iconographic contexts.
It might be an interesting experiment to bring up the fact that the
Nazi regime had already grasped the potential of television in 1936
(at the Berlin Olympics). 60 years later, the propagandistic effect
of mass media is now discussable in the West -- is that perhaps
because its purpose has been served?
kerry
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 17 Mar 1999 01:04:45
From: John Walker <jwalker@networx.on.ca>
Subject: [netz] Suspect registrations of domain names are purged
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- --------------------
Suspect registrations of domain names are purged
New York Times
http://www.mercurycenter.com/breaking/docs/081190.htm
Network Solutions, the company that assigns Internet addresses, is
again trying to curb what it terms abuses of the registration system
by speculators aiming to turn a quick profit.
The company recently purged 18,000 registrations that it suspected
were held by speculators. In most cases, the company says, the
domain names, as Internet addresses are known, were registered by
people or companies matching the basic profile of a speculator,
meaning they typically had registered thousands of names at once.
And in nearly every case where a name was purged, the registrant had
not paid for the name on time, giving Network Solutions the legal
right to reclaim it, the company said.
``These were well-known speculators that had registered thousands of
domains names,'' Christopher Clough, a spokesman for Network
Solutions in Herndon, Va., said. Clough said the company regularly
purged delinquent registrations and specifically targeted domain name
speculators.
In a separate attempt to curb domain name speculation last month,
the company announced a new policy of restricting access to ``root
zone'' files, which can alert speculators about when a domain name
will become available. Network Solutions said it would no longer make
the files freely available, but instead would license them for
specific purposes. As a result, many businesses that help companies
secure valuable domain name addresses suddenly found themselves
unable to do business.
Eric Woodward, president of Myinternet.com, a registration services
company, was one of them. Last month he discovered his company
suddenly was unable to access the zone files. After he threatened to
file a lawsuit charging the company with anticompetitive behavior,
his access was restored.
Network Solutions holds a government-backed monopoly in the
registration of the most popular domains. The market is to be opened
to competition later this year.
- --------------
Also in this issue:
- - Netscape Launches Publishing Program
Netscape Communications Corp. Monday launched My Netscape Network, a
program that will allow Web publishers to create channels of content
for the company's My Netscape personalized start pages.
- - Malaysia holds two over riot rumors on Internet
KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia (Reuters) - Malaysia has used a powerful
national security law to arrest a man and woman over suspicion of
spreading rumors of riots in the capital over the Internet last
week, police said Wednesday.
- - Project Oxygen May Blow Away Web Speeds
Neil Tagare is the Don Quixote of the Internet.
Crisscrossing the globe, the 37-year-old telecommunications expert
is proposing what many consider unfathomable: A $10 billion,
100,000-mile worldwide network that he claims will be up to 5.5
million times faster than the World Wide Web.
- - Senators Offer Colleagues, Staff a Crash Course in High-Tech Issues (US)
WASHINGTON (March 12) -- Congress needs a crash course in
technological literacy, say two senators, who are launching a series
of scholarly, nonpartisan, in-your-face forums designed to put
Washington -- the nation's capital, not Bill Gates' home state --
more in tune with Silicon Valley and its impact on Americans' lives.
- - "E-mail is a real revolution" (Cambodia)
For a Cambodian opposition leader, the Net is a lifeline.
- - Suspect registrations of domain names are purged
Network Solutions, the company that assigns Internet addresses, is
again trying to curb what it terms abuses of the registration system
by speculators aiming to turn a quick profit.
- - The Digital Divide (US)
Small towns that lack high-speed Internet access find it harder to
attract new jobs
- - Is Red Hat A Black Hat Or White Knight?
As large technology corporations line up to support Linux vendor Red
Hat Software, some resellers are worried the company will set de
facto standards, as industry titan Microsoft did for the PC platform.
- - Janet Reno launches anti-hacking initiative (US)
A new public-private alliance to curb online crime will teach
children "that hacking is the same as breaking and entering,"
Attorney General Janet Reno said Monday.
- - Online Banking, Trading to Get Boost
Over 8 Million Likely to Bank Online
The use of the Internet for banking and trading is likely to
increase significantly in 1999, according to ZDNet's InternetTrak
survey.
- - Our decade: The 90s and cyberspace
How will the last decade of the millennium be remembered? As we
approach 2000, the focus has been fixed on looking back over the
past 100, even 1,000 years. E-cyclopedia, the guide to modern living,
is staying closer to home with a five-part series on "our decade".
- - Thumbs Down: Students Fed Up With Bad Teaching Start Web Reviews (US)
Want to know which California Polytechnic, San Luis Obispo,
professor "seems a few French fries short of a happy meal?" Which
one sometimes barks in class or drinks beer with students at a local
pub?
- - Week in Review
The Internet's top newsmakers of the week.
- - New Lists and Journals
* NEW: FamilyCarers
* NEW: Shyness -- Help and Info on Shyness
* NEW: listname-diary
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- -------------------------------
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- -------------------------------
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 17 Mar 1999 09:12:22 -0500 (EST)
From: Ronda Hauben <ronda@panix.com>
Subject: [netz] Re: [IFWP] REFLECTIONS UPON THE .US MEETING (fwd)
Greg Skinner <gds@best.com> wrote:
>Someone attempts to cut to the heart of the matter ...
>----- Forwarded message from Ed Gerck -----
>Reflecting on the presentations and discussions at the .us meeting, it
>appeared to me that the most profound problem in all DNS administrative
>models and structuring proposals is still wholly ignored.
>This basic problem can be phrased into some questions, in varying
>depths, as:
>o "What is a name?",
>o "What is a name in a communication system (hereafter, NCS)?",
>o "What is a NCS in any DNS naming system such as .us?",
The bigger problem, however, that is ignored whenever one starts
to talk about the commercial interests coming together to figure
out their interest in an issue, is that there is a public interest
that is a more long term interest and that is being totally ignored
and worse still when there is an effort to propose it, it is
said by the commercial interests to be irrelevant and not appropriate.
The domain names of the Internet were created were certain reasons.
The main one was to make communication possible.
Other functions have now been attached to the naming functions,
other functions that would better be served by a public directory
system.
However this whole effort to privatize the domain naming system
and other names and numbers and protocols functions of the Internet
is intended to serve the commercial entities, to deny there is
any public interest, and in the process to freeze the development
of the Internet, rather than being able to look at a long term
perspective and move in the direction of that long term perspective.
Thus this process is only inviting those with a conflict of
interest in the future development of the Internet to be
involved in freezing Internet development and interferring
with the scaling.
A totally different process than the ICANN process would be
needed if the U.S. government or other bodies charged with
serving the broader public interest of the society were functioning
in any healthy way.
However in the U.S. today, the U.S. government entities are given
demands by commercial entities and the U.S. government entities cave
into those demands.
The longer term and broader interests of the society get no attention.
And where is the computer science community in all this? Early on
they recognized that there would be the effort to seize the fruits
of their work by commercial entities who could only have short
term self interests. And they worked to establish broader goals
and objectives.
Today, however, it is hard to see any representation for such a
broader and more public interest perspective on the part of the
computer science community as well.
What is happening with the seizure of the names and numbers
and plans for protocol and other scaling functions by private
interests reflects a very serious commentary on the fact that
commercial entities see no public responsibility to a broader
society and to the future and thus are demonstrating that they
are not concerned with the public interest of the present or
the future.
What started out as an issue of domain names and trademarks
has blossomed into the wholesale seizure of the scaling
mechanisms of the Internet by a very small set of people
who have appeared by some secret process and are funded
by s few large corporate entities.
And the U.S. NTIA is administering this seizure of public
assets and property by private entities and the U.S. Congress
hasn't followed up on the letters to investigate what is
happening issued by House Commerce Chairman Bliley last Fall.
And the U.S. press is basically silent on the seriousness
of the problem that this all represents, after writing several
helpful articles in Nov. 1998 documenting for the first time
the serious problems this U.S. government activity represents
for the Internet and the millions of people and computers
that are part of the Internet.
The Internet is made of up many networks around the world.
Those networks are diverse and are willing to cooperate
with each other via the glue that tcp/ip makes possible.
This internetworking is based on a cooperative process that
had developed and expanded via first the Network Working
Group and then the IETF in the process of developing
the protocols that would be utilized for the Internet.
The creation of ICANN as a dictatorial body of a few people
appointed by some secret process of U.S. government and
private corporate entities, and excluding the participation
of people around the world, is a sharp change in nature
and function of how the Internet has been administered.
A few people people, in secret processes are now making
decisions that will affect all the users to the Internet,
present and future. And yet those users in general have
no knowledge that this is happening, nor do they have
any way to participate in what is going on even if they
did have knowledge. This is a high stakes power grab
by those on the inside who know what is happening and
have the means to shoot for their piece of the high
stakes pie.
And what is actually at stake is totally lost in the
process. What is actually at stake is the fact that
there is a vision of an Internet that will make it
possible for all around the world who want to to be
able to communicate with others around the world
in a way that continues to grow and spread.
This is what is being bartered away by the barrons
of today in the name of their "stakeholder" interest.
They will have their noose around the neck of those
who have worked to contribute to the building of
the Internet so that it would represent a continually
scaling means of people to people communication.
That is what is at stake. And the public relations
firm of ICANN is doing its dardest to make sure
no one really knows what ICANN is up to or who
has created it or why it is moving so quickly to
seize all it can get away with and distribute.
The ICANN is supposed to be functioning under a
design and test 50% ICANN/ 50% NTIA Memorandum
of Agreement. However, there is NO sign of the
U.S. government oversight of anything ICANN does.
There is no design and test going on, only grabbing
and determining and announcing their acquisitions.
And though there are decisions within the U.S.
government forbiding the U.S. government from creating
such a creature, the U.S. government has created ICANN
and is functioning behind the scenes to send it out
into the world.
Last November the Chairman of the Commerce Committee
of the U.S. House of Representatives sent a letter
to the Chairman of the U.S. Commerce Dept and to
the Senior Advisor to the U.S. President who was
in charge of Internet activity asking for documents
about how the ICANN interim board of directors was
chosen, what role the U.S. government had had in
setting up ICANN, and several other important questions.
No word has been heard about whether these questions were
ever answered or what information the Chairman of
the Commerce Committee received.
This is a grave matter. The whole process is functioning
outside of any means of asserting the public interest
of all those people and businesses and libraries and
schools and universities, and governments that depend
on the ability of the Internet to function and to
be able to scale.
There needs to be an appropriate investigation into
how this has all come to pass, and into what is the
real social and public need that this activity of
ICANN is preventing from being addressed in an
appropriate way that will make it possible to
have the long term interests of all those dependent
on the Internet considered.
Ronda
ronda@panix.com
http://www.columbia.edu/~rh120/other/testimony_107.txt
Netizens: On the History and Impact
of Usenet and the Internet
http://www.columbia.edu/~hauben/netbook/
in print edition ISBN 0-8186-7706-6
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 17 Mar 1999 12:27:01 -0500
From: "P.A. Gantt" <pgantt@icx.net>
Subject: [netz] Re: Of Spindoctors & Fairytale Tellers & Gore for President
Pardon in advance to the Netizens on UPFORGRABS
too. This goes rather nicely with Jay and Robin's
ideas... ICANN and FCC the overseers of stopping
the conversation.
===================================================
Subject: Re: Of Spindoctors & Fairytale Tellers & Gore for President
Date: Wed, 17 Mar 1999 09:09:39 -0500
From: "P.A. Gantt" <pgantt@icx.net>
Organization: Electronic Media Design and Support
To: The Up for Grabs Discussion List <UPFORGRABS-L@CDINET.COM>
References: 1
Here is the problem that all this credit taking has
opened up. So perhaps this is a good time to address
it. With or without one person or even a small group
the conversation and use of the Net by the people
who actually paid the bill needs to be addressed.
I am *still* seeking the answer...
how much access for how long?
Will the bottomline be as it is now...
$15.95 connection via whatever tel/cable/satellite
and no more than approx. $19.95 unlimited connection
to see that universal access is assured to all
Americans.
Give us a figure. We are waiting...
The Net is all the people who now use it and
the people to come. The conversation amongst
citizen-to-citizen paramount to protect.
It is bigger than any cloister'd elitist
of either party, credit takers raising their
hands to get elected to whatever office.
The middle class is taxed to the max,
we simply *cannot* afford anymore. We see
precious little of our 3/4s of total taxes
being sent off to D.C. returning to us
with little or no benefits to our daily living.
We baby boomers know that
despite the fake cooing that we simply
by sheer numbers will not get SS or what
we will receive will be totally unlivable.
So we are helping our children as best we
can get their education, pay our mortgages,
have a vehicle to get to work, and put
food on the table.
We are tired of the elitism of all D.C.
politicians both parties who promise
much but deliver little. Tired of working
until May every year to support a bloated
unresponsive fed. that is full of career
politicians worrying about buying enough
votes to perpetuate their D.C. careers.
We think that this is like throwing our
money and work into a bottomless pit of
corruption with no return on our labors.
Both parties need to understand this.
You cannot stop the conversation. The people
speaking person to person, country to country
to get the message to the unresponsive
central gov'ts. of this world.
So do *not* make the Net a CHASM between
the elitism that those who can afford the
connection to information and oversight.
Control of information and its countries' peoples.
The credit takers fail to realize the sheer
power of the Net. The people will *not* be
amused if they are once again priced out
of the power that this new information age
has created.
The Net is all the people not
one person, not some small elitist group,
not some monopoly/corp./conglomerate but
the innovation and creative use of this fine
new media that goes unfiltered from the spin
doctors and the credit takers.
Stuffing the genie back the bottle will cause
the CHASM of D.C./rich elitism and the people
who now have an unfiltered voice. Oversight.
Think very carefully before overcharging
a perceived group that clearly does not have
the money to pay the bill. Better yet put
the dollars into schools, parents, students,
and community hands. DEcentralize by realigning
the power back to the people that paid for
this new *exciting* media.
Do not stop this conversation. It is bigger
than any one entity it is indeed the entity
of people to people reaching out to one
another.
I am *not* new to the Net. Know its history
full well. I understand its power very
much. It is the positive power to do good
by increasing the *listening* and global
representation of all the people.
I am pleased to see the people embracing the
Net one person at a time, a delight
versus what the Net was first established for
many, many years ago when Al and I were in college.
Something *positive* coming out of the contention
of the Cold War.
So rather than be worried about election or reelection let's
put the emphasis on community, the larger concerns of
all the individuals everywhere. The people grew
the Net. No one person has the right to claim otherwise.
> <<
> It is *very* apparent your partisan support is showing... namely
> Gore for President. I am non-partisan, but a full advocate for
> reasonable,affordable access. I am against whole heartedly anyone
> wishing to kill the global conversation and control information to
> citizens of all countries.
- --
P.A. Gantt, Computer Science Technology Instructor
Electronic Media Design and Support Homepage
http://user.icx.net/~pgantt/
mailto:pagantt@technologist.com?Subject=etech
http://horizon.unc.edu/TS/vision/1998-11.asp
Common sense is not common, and conventional wisdom is not
wisdom. But at least you can have conventional sense. ~~ Daily Whale
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End of Netizens-Digest V1 #289
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