[CWG-Stewardship] update on DT X Separation Process

[Milton L Mueller]

Martin,
> There are many things that might happen that could make it worthwhile to
> capture the PTI - including accumulation of cash or establishing a new regime
> for controlling the root.  

No. Neither is a credible threat scenario. 

The cash comes from ICANN, it is not spontaneously generated. And the legal aspects of a PBC shelter the corporation from being raided for money. If you are into money, there are a lot of things you can do that have a vastly bigger payoff than going after a PBC whose entire revenue stream is dependent on a contract with ICANN. Indeed, you'd probably target the ICANN regime itself not IANA. Hmm, there may already be people doing that....but never mind.

As for a new regime for controlling the root, IANA edits the root zone in line with contractual obligations to ICANN. It does not directly modify the RZF, which is published by Verisign. And if a conspiracy were hatched to create an alternate root I can't think of a more laughable way to do it than to "take over" an entity whose only connection to the root is via a contract with the status quo policy authority; If that happens the status quo policy authority simply cancels the contract and/or sues the renegade PTI. Indeed, the only way a "taken over" IANA could have any authority over root zone policy would be if lots of people hated ICANN so much that they wanted to fire it rather than IANA.

I would admit, however, that folks who believe that you get more accountability by creating more and more committees and bureaucratic review mechanisms have created a slow-responding system that may be too slow to respond to crises. The solution to that is to rely less on bureaucracy and more on contract, as some of us have been saying.