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Netizens-Digest Volume 1 Number 535
Netizens-Digest Tuesday, March 2 2004 Volume 01 : Number 535
Netizens Association Discussion List Digest
In this issue:
[netz] Re: What the net did next
[netz] 10th anniversary of the online publication of Netizens
[netz] On the 2004 election
[netz] New issue of the Amateur Computerist
[netz] ITU hears advocacy for role of netizens
Re: [netz] ITU hears advocacy for role of netizens
[netz] [IP] from icannwatch -- UN/ITU vs. ICANN
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: Sat, 3 Jan 2004 12:11:07 -0500 (EST)
From: Ronda Hauben <ronda@panix.com>
Subject: [netz] Re: What the net did next
The new year starts with the bbc (and Dave Farber's IP list) presenting
views of the internet that take us backwards. I sent this to him for
his list and it will be interesting to see if Dave is willing to present
a correction of the BBC nonsense that he sent out.
- ---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Sat, 3 Jan 2004 11:02:35 -0500 (EST)
From: Ronda Hauben <ronda@panix.com>
To: Dave Farber <dave@farber.net>
Cc: Ronda Hauben <ronda@panix.com>, dewayne@warpspeed.com, ronda@ais.org,
ip@v2.listbox.com, editor@bbc.co.uk
Subject: Re: [IP] What the net did next
Dave,
Is there some reason the BBC can't understand what the Internet is
about, or take the trouble to spread an accurate understanding of
it, rather than a mistaken conception that makes the Internet into
the one network APRAPANET?
Specifically the Internet is a network of networks - or a metaystem
of networks. It makes it possible for diverse networks to speak to
each other.
The ARPANET was a connection of different computers and operating systems,
not at all as the BBC story portrays it. See the following which is
the BBC version of the ARPANET and Internet. And below I have
included a quote from a paper where the creation of the Internet is
described:
On Thu, 1 Jan 2004, Dave Farber wrote:
>
> What the net did next
> By Mark Ward
> BBC News Online technology correspondent
>
(...)
>
> TCP/IP was key to turning the Arpanet into the internet.
>
> Small start
>
> The Arpanet came before the net and demanded that all computers that
> connect to it do so with the same hardware and software.
>
> By contrast, the net, thanks to TCP/IP, could let people on different sorts
> of computers running different software, swap information.
>
The real contrast is quite different, however.
>From a paper about the ARPANET and the Internet:
"The ARPANET solved the difficult problem of communication in
a network with dissimilar computers and dissimilar operating
systems. However, when the objective is to share resources across
the boundaries of dissimilar networks, the problems to be solved
are compounded. Different networks mean that there can be
different packet sizes to accommodate, different network
parameters such as different communication media rates, different
buffering and signaling strategies, different ways of routing
packets, and different propagation delays. Also dissimilar
networks can have different error control techniques and
different ways of determining the status of network components."
.... The challenge in accommodating dissimilar networks is at once
a conceptual and architectural problem. Kahn recognized the
need for a communications protocol to transmit packets from one
network, and reformat them as needed for transmission through
successive networks. This would require that there be black boxes
or gateway computers and software that would provide the interfaces
between the dissimilar networks and which would route the packets
to their destination. (18) Also there would need to be software
to carry out the functions required by the protocol. Appropriate
software modules, and perhaps other modifications to allow efficient
performance, would then have to be embedded in the operating systems
of the host computers in each of the participating networks and
gateways would have to be introduced between them. The design for such
a protocol would be a guide to create the specification standard
for the software and hardware that each network would agree to
implement to become part of an internetwork communications system.
The standards or agreements to cooperate would be set out in the
protocol."
(from The Birth of the Internet: An Architectural
Conception for Solving the Multiple Network Problem)
http://www.columbia.edu/~rh120/other/birth_internet.txt
We want the Internet to grow and flourish. It would seem important
than to start the new year off with accurate information about its
development.
Ronda
------------------------------
Date: Sun, 11 Jan 2004 17:11:56 -0500 (EST)
From: Ronda Hauben <ronda@panix.com>
Subject: [netz] 10th anniversary of the online publication of Netizens
This weekend is the 10th anniversary of the online publication of
"Netizens: On the History and Impact of Usenet and the Internet".
The book was put online in January 1994 at an ftp site.
In honor of that anniversary I have written an article online at
http://www.columbia.edu/~hauben/netizens2004.doc
The book has been reviewed in a number of publications. And other
publications present divergent viewspoints, like the book "Politics
As Usual" by Margolis and Resnick.
Netizens has been mentioned in books and articles in many languages.
I was fortunate to get a copy of the Roumanian book "Sisteme Intelligente
Orientate Spre Agent" by Boldur-Eugen Barbat. Boldur write in the
book " To Ronda and Michael, the first humans who realised that we
are not just humans, but netizens too. Without your ideas this book would
have been much poorer." Boldur
It is an honor to have such a dedication in a book influenced by Netizens.
I welcome comments on the article I wrote in honor of this special
anniversary.
with best wishes
Ronda
------------------------------
Date: Sun, 25 Jan 2004 21:45:26 -0500 (EST)
From: Jay Hauben <hauben@columbia.edu>
Subject: [netz] On the 2004 election
The following article appeared in Korean and English at the OhmyNews
web site:
http://www.ohmynews.com/articleview/article_view.asp?menu=c10400&no=148854&rel_no=1&adcheck=1&index=1
Will the Internet and Netizens Impact the 2004 US Presidential
Election?
by Ronda Hauben
For a while Howard Dean's campaign for the Democratic Party nomination
in the US seemed to startle political observers.(1) His use of the
Internet and his volunteer campaign staff of netizens were succeeding
in unexpected ways to change campaigning procedures and practices.
Many of his volunteers have been recruited via the Meetup.org online
web site, and his campaign staff sponsors a "Deanblog for America" web
site that allows readers to comment on his campaign articles.(2) There
are other web sites like blogforamerica.com which provide both
articles from the Dean campaign and comments by supporters.(3) Dean's
campaign also surprised other contenders for the nomination by raising
significant campaign funds online.
As the campaign for the Iowa caucus votes and then the New Hampshire
primary gathered steam, the news media in the US is focusing less on
the potential of the Internet to help candidates gain the Democratic
Party nomination. Instead the conservative media organizations are
encouraging the old means of campaigning that has led the Democratic
Party to become increasingly harder to distinguish from the Republican
Party. Negative or positive campaign ads on television, leaflets in
mailboxes, newspaper and television editorials, and televised debates
are forms of campaigning that bring the old guard of the major
political parties back on the political stage they have dominated for
so long. This is the kind of politics that led to the situation in the
2000 Presidential election where the distinction between the major
party candidates was so slim that the Supreme Court was allowed to
decide the election.
Can the Internet help overcome the barriers to defeating an incumbent
in the 2004 US Presidential election? Observers of the role played in
the South Korean Presidential election by netizens and the Internet
are wondering if the success of their efforts are a phenomena that can
be repeated in the upcoming US Presidential election. In 2002, a South
Korean netizens movement was able to effectively challenge the
political old guard by waging an Internet campaign first to nominate
and then elect Roh Moo-hyun as the South Korean President.(4)
Netizens challenged the previous forms of campaign strategy. Critical
to the success of the South Korean netizens was an online press that
welcomed discussion of its articles by online users. Even more
important, however, was the way it promoted the practice of "Every
citizen a reporter."(5) The most notable of these is the media
organization "OhmyNews." This organization started online in February,
2000 with little money and four full time reporters. The publisher,
Yeon-ho Oh welcomed articles from volunteer reporters he called
"citizen reporters". The online newspaper soon had contributions from
737 citizen reporters and the interest of a growing number of readers.
By September 2003, the number of professional journalists working for
OhmyNews had climbed to 53, and there were 26,700 citizen reporters
contributing articles. Citizen reporters are paid a small fee for
their articles. They contribute their articles to make OhmyNews a
force to challenge the conservative news organizations that had
previously monopolized Korean politics.
There is not a similar kind of news media organization in the US,
though the different Democratic candidate campaigns, especially the
Dean campaign, are using webblogs to promote communication among their
supporters.
A recent event in China, however, demonstrates the power of
participation online. Recently the Chinese online press described the
death of a Chinese peasant and the injury of several others in Harbin,
the capital of the Heilongjiang Province in Northeast China. The
woman, Liu Zhongxia, was killed after a BMW driven by Su Xiuwen hit
her. The BMW had had its rearview mirror slightly damaged after Liu's
husband Dai Yiquan, who was driving a tractor, swerved slightly to
avoid hitting a vehicle that was coming into him on the narrow
road.(6)
The driver of the BMW got out of her car and reportedly threatened Dia
and his wife. Then Su got back into her BMW, and instead of backing
away from the accident, drove the car forward killing Liu and injuring
several of the bystanders. The case went to court and the BMW driver
was given a suspended sentence. The fact that none of those injured,
or who had been bystanders testified at the trial, however, was part
of the troubling circumstances that led to a public outcry over the
events of this case. Dai and the others injured received cash
settlements from the BMW driver's husband. In exchange, they agreed
not to speak about the case.
Chinese netizens learned of the case, and the court verdict and began
posting to Internet forums. Soon there were 70,000 comments on the
news web site Sina.com, a famous Chinese web portal.(7) By the second
week in January, 2004, the Washington Post reports that there had been
over 310,000 messages posted at the Sina portal, when the Chinese
government had the site delete 20% of the messages as being too
critical of the government. By Thursday, January 15, 2004, the 250,000
messages that remained were deleted as well.(8) By this time, the case
had achieved international attention. It had become a symbol of the
growing gap between rich and poor in China and of the frustration
among the Chinese population with the corruption in government
accompanying the government's pro business policy.
Even in a country censoring Internet use, like China, netizens have
demonstrated the power that online discussion forums can provide for
the grassroots. Those discussing the BMW incident online, have been
able to bring the case to the attention of the national and
international media and are seeking to have the case retried.
Can the Dean campaign or the campaigns of other democratic candidates
vying for the nomination tap this power of the Internet and of
netizens to achieve what seems unachievable? An online press welcoming
and encouraging citizen contributions of articles and discussion of
those articles would help. In China, netizens are finding ways to
counter the censorship of online discussion. In South Korea, netizens
were able to create a vibrant online netizens movement to elect the
candidate they supported to the South Korean Presidency. The upcoming
election in the US is a challenge to US netizens to learn from the
experience of others around the world and in the US to be able to tap
the power of the Internet to make a significant impact on the 2004
Presidential election.(9)
(1) http://www.heise.de/tp/deutsch/inhalt/co/16503/1.html
(2) http://www.deanforamerica.com/
(3) http://www.blogforamerica.com/
(4) http://www.seoprise.com/technote/read.cgi?board=min&y_number=106&nnew=2
(5) http://www.japanmediareview.com/japan/internet/1063672919p.php
(6) http://www1.chinadaily.com.cn/en/doc/2004-01/18/content_300105.htm
(7) http://bbs.chinadaily.com.cn/forumpost.shtml?toppid=39672
(8) http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A21197-2004Jan15.html
(9) http://www.columbia.edu/~hauben/netizens2004.txt
- ---------------------------------------------------------------
------------------------------
Date: Sun, 15 Feb 2004 23:11:07 -0500 (EST)
From: Ronda Hauben <ronda@panix.com>
Subject: [netz] New issue of the Amateur Computerist
The 15 year anniversary issue of the Amateur Computerist is now online at:
http://www.ais.org/~jrh/acn/ACn12-1.pdf
Along with articles from the past 15 years of issues are several articles
on the potential of the Internet to support participatory democracy.
The articles include
"Doing Democracy", "The Reality behind E-democracy" "OhmyNews: A Case
Study".
Following is an article from the first issue of the Amateur Computerist.
This was written the Floyd Hoke-Miller, who was a pioneer of the 1937
Flint Sit Down strike and who continued publishing in the Flint labor
press and the IWW Press for many years.
DAWN OF A NEW ERA
From the Age of Darkness to the Age of Enlightenment -- from
the Machine Age to the Mind Age, here we are. Let not any force or
forces keep it under wraps. Let it be free to circulate in the
Public Domain. Let us base it upon principle, not on price, like
Truth or Love. From the Great Wall to the Great Pyramid, from the
hieroglyphics to the screen of the computer, mankind is still
progressing. So make the new born science, that has given us the
computer for the amateur and not as a prerogative of the pro-
fessional to be shrouded in secrecy from humanity, the choice of
the individual, not an election of a minority. From the falling
star to the falling apple, from the minute to the multitudinous,
from secrets to disclosure, I am pleased to endorse the amateur
method. Therefore I implore all to plan and to participate even
though I have been on disability for 26 years and have not had
the opportunity to participate in the great sea of knowledge that
has flowed over the Dam of Secrecy since I was inactivated
physically and mentally -- in my advanced years and state of
general debility I still see the mind of man the greatest
computer of all -- So Let Us Continue to Make Use of It to the
Advantage of the Masses - Come, Let Us Reason Together. With an
open mind and a free spirit, let me reiterate, there is so much
more to know, that what we do know, is still insignificant. It
gives me great pleasure to endorse this free-for-all program of a
restless mind.
Floyd Hoke-Miller, UAW Retiree and Flint Sit Down Striker
------------------------------
Date: Mon, 1 Mar 2004 23:47:39 -0500 (EST)
From: Jay Hauben <jrh@umcc.ais.org>
Subject: [netz] ITU hears advocacy for role of netizens
Hi,
We just learned that at an ITU workshop in Geneva on Friday, Feb. 27,
2004, one of the speakers Izumi Aizu of Japan advocated that successful
the governance of the Internet's required participation of the Netizens.
He said the word was coined by his friend the late Michael Hauben. He went
on to quote Michael and to say why Netizens were crucial to the solution
of the Internet problems of the future. You can see his talk at:
http://www.itu.int/osg/spu/forum/intgov04/contributions/izumi-contribution.pdf
The panel Izumi spoke as part of was chaired by Robert Kahn. Its title was
Public Policy Issues in Internet Governance. It is Session 5 and the audio
can be heard by clicking on audio at the far right of Session 5 on:
http://www.itu.int/ibs/sg/spu/index.html
It is a positive event that the ITU was made aware of the importance
of Netizens. The ITU is making a bid to bring the UN into Internet
governance.
I think readers of this the netizens list will find this advocacy of the
importnace of the netizens in Internet governance ecourageing.
Take care.
Jay
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 2 Mar 2004 00:07:53 -0500 (EST)
From: Jay Hauben <jrh@umcc.ais.org>
Subject: Re: [netz] ITU hears advocacy for role of netizens
Here is the URL for the ITU workshop webpage:
http://www.itu.int/osg/spu/forum/intgov04/
On Mon, 1 Mar 2004, Jay Hauben wrote:
> Hi,
>
> We just learned that at an ITU workshop in Geneva on Friday, Feb. 27,
> 2004, one of the speakers Izumi Aizu of Japan advocated that successful
> governance of the Internet required participation of the Netizens.
> He said the word was coined by his friend the late Michael Hauben. He went
> on to quote Michael and to say why Netizens were crucial to the solution
> of the Internet problems of the future. You can see his talk at:
>
> http://www.itu.int/osg/spu/forum/intgov04/contributions/izumi-contribution.pdf
>
> The panel Izumi was part of was chaired by Robert Kahn. Its title was
> Public Policy Issues in Internet Governance. It is Session 5 and the audio
> can be heard by clicking on audio at the far right of Session 5 on:
>
> http://www.itu.int/ibs/sg/spu/index.html
>
> It is a positive event that the ITU was made aware of the importance
> of Netizens. The ITU is making a bid to bring the UN into Internet
> governance.
>
> I think readers of this the netizens list will find this advocacy of the
> importance of the netizens in Internet governance ecourageing.
>
> Take care.
>
> Jay
>
>
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 2 Mar 2004 16:02:55 -0500 (EST)
From: Jay Hauben <jrh@umcc.ais.org>
Subject: [netz] [IP] from icannwatch -- UN/ITU vs. ICANN
The following is forwarded from the IP mailing list.
- ---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Mon, 01 Mar 2004 12:06:01 -0700
From: Dave Farber <dave@farber.net>
To: ip@v2.listbox.com
Subject: [IP] from icannwatch -- UN/ITU vs. ICANN
http://icannwatch.com/print.pl?sid=04/02/29/1711228
ITU Workshop: ICANN's "we don't do governance" line falls flat
Date: Sunday February 29 2004, @07:01AM
Topic:
<http://icannwatch.com/print.pl?sid=04/02/29///www.icannwatch.org/search.pl?topic=28>ITU
February 27 might be marked as the date ICANN officially lost control of
public discourse on Internet governance. On those dates an
<http://www.itu.int/osg/spu/forum/intgov04/>ITU workshop brought the
Internet folks (root server operators, RIRs, ICANN staff, ISOC, W3C, former
ICANN Board members, ccTLD representatives and Robert Kahn), and the
academic policy analysts following WSIS and Internet governance into direct
contact with the traditionalist national government representatives of
China, Brazil, and Syria and some of the political leaders of the WSIS
process, notably Swiss "e-Envoy"
<http://www.itu.int/osg/spu/forum/intgov04/bios/kummer-bio.html>Markus
Kummer.*
If the workshop had any lasting effect, it was to lay to rest the ICANN-
promulgated myth that the Internet is currently free of governance and thus
any discussion of it needs to be avoided or short-circuited.
As <http://www.itu.int/osg/spu/forum/intgov04/contributions.html>speaker
after speaker called attention to the policy implications not only of the
ICANN regime but also of several other Internet-related international rules
(e.g., Council of Europe Cybercrime Treaty), it became clear that the
intergovernmental system is not going to obligingly go away if ignored.
Participants largely dismissed ICANNs (now halfheartedly made) claim that
it only does technical coordination, and directly confronted the issue of
how technical issues and policy issues can be interrelated. The eerie
coincidence of the VeriSign lawsuit only reinforced the point. ICANN is now
legally and officially accused of being a rogue economic regulator.
Politically, the meeting reinforced the momentum created by the World
Summit on the Information Society, which succeeded in inserting
"traditional" intergovernmental institutions back into the Internet
governance debate. It did this by coopting an energized civil society, a
nontraditional factor in the international system. WSIS attracted hundreds
of active NGOs and freelance communication-information policy activists,
many of them, like Izumi Aizu, people who had become active first around
ICANN. These actors seem to feel that they are getting more political
traction through their WSIS related activities than through participating
in ICANN. (My cynical take on this is that many cyber-activists prefer the
WSIS and ITU forums because they can talk about euphonious terms like
"participation" or "the peer production of governance" and avoid the tough,
tedious, mud-wrestles over policy that happen when they actually are
included as participants.)
ITU staff members Richard Hill and Robert Shaw successfully courted civil
society participants by giving them a platform and showing that, if nothing
else, the ITU can give them access to governments and IGOs and treat them
as equals. More broadly, ITU showed that it can succeed in bringing
together parties that normally talk past each other for a dialogue. Serious
questions can still be raised about the superiority of the
intergovernmental system over the ICANN-self governance regime, however.
This type of workshop is not typical of how governments make real treaties
or policy decisions. And as the interventions of the Chinese delegate
proved, many governments still don't welcome civil society participation.
China, (apparently disturbed by a snowballing discussion of "netizens" and
online democracy) opposed allowing any of the workshop materials to be
included in the official report, seeing it as merely an information session
that could be utilized (or not) in a future meeting of member states.
Interestingly, some European governments, notably the Danish, took the same
line, although for different reasons (they want EU, not ITU, to take the
lead).
The ITU is now rather overtly positioning itself to inherit or take control
of certain Internet governance functions that seem to require multilateral
agreements among governments. However, this positioning is coming more from
corridor discussions and over-beer ruminations - there was no discernable
manipulation of the program (indeed, the author of this piece complained to
Shaw and Hill that the ICANN panel contained only pro-ICANN speakers).
*Kummer surprised many in the audience when he noted that he had been
approached about chairing the yet-to-be-created UN Working Group on
Internet Governance.
- -------------------------------------
Archives at: http://www.interesting-people.org/archives/interesting-people/
------------------------------
End of Netizens-Digest V1 #535
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