[council] new string/re diversity

[Marilyn Cade]

I know that sometimes it is tempting to think that "we" have a unique view
of the world, and that the world resolves [no pun intended] around ICANN.

In fact, the Internet is much more complicated and complex, as is the WWW,
and the evolving world of the NGN and other forms of IP applications that
have nothing to do with ICANN, other than that they are reliant upon the
unique indicators and the reliability of the small percentage of the
Internet's infrastructure that ICANN influences. For instance, certainly,
the role of ICANN in its limited but critical role is a foundational aspect
of the Internet. However, it is the Internet industry that builds and
operates the Internet itself -- and of course, DNS registries and registrars
are part and a critical part of the make up of the larger world.

It concerned me when I attended the recent U.S. Congressional hearing on the
dot com agreement that some were portraying ICANN as in charge of security
of the Internet, or equating DNS with the entirety of the Internet. I saw a
little too much "enthusiasm" on several parties parts to portray how
important "their role" was. I think we all need to maintain perspective on
the need for all of us to understand that we co-exist in a larger Internet
world and that ICANN has a limited, albeit critical set of roles and
activities. 

Of course, we need to always encourage more companies and entities who have
relevant interest in what ICANN does to become engaged, while not seeking to
expand ICANN's scope or mission. That is a challenge, isn't it? To date, it
has been hard, given the lack of early agenda and programme information.
However, I'm pleased to see the very recent approach that the ICANN staff
has used in their last edit of the programme for this meeting. While the
agenda and the programme are very disappointingly late -- [and that is a
topic for improvement if companies are to get information early enough to
approve travel and participation] still the new approach with some bits of
information about who a workshop is designed for, etc. can help us to
outreach to the parts of companies who are indeed interested and engaged in
areas where ICANN is relevant to them.

Let me address one of the points below regarding who a web hoster is/may be:
I might suggest that it is easy to get baffled by terminology. Or if you are
more technical in nature or expertise, it may be easy, accidentally to
overlook the need to speak in laymanese. Just so we aren't arguing past each
other, let me suggest a flexible "general" resource that I find works well
in international settings as well -- wikipedia.  

Let me use it as a reference document for a minute. A quick glance through
the range of kinds of "hosting" and the different kinds of providers, and
the examples of different kinds of companies/businesses engaged in web
hosting that can be found in that easy to find resource may be informative.

Web hosters come in many sizes. The BC does have some members who offer web
hosting. I am aware that there are web hosters who are members of the ISPCP.

What I see in the "hosting" industry/sector is quite diverse, and that seems
to be what you are suggesting, Tom: no single model, no single kind of
company, large, gigantic, and micro-enterprises.  

I'd suggest that web hosters are welcome to join the BC, and if they meet
the ISPCP criteria, undoubtedly they might pursue membership/activity there;
I leave that in the able hands of Mr. Holmes to comment on as chair of the
constituency. And, Tom, you are suggesting, aren't you, that also web
hosters who are registrars are already members of the Registrar
constituency? Or that you would welcome them?   

As to the quite different kinds of industries -- I'm sitting in SG3, and
have  been discussing this topic with some service providers from Asian
island countries -- and they are describing the diversity to me as well,
including some very large, but distributed providers, and then some very
small local/regional providers that are new entrants in some cases. 

Must be the global Internet and open standards and innovation at work. :-) 

 -----Original Message-----
From: owner-council at gnso.icann.org [mailto:owner-council at gnso.icann.org] On
Behalf Of Thomas Keller
Sent: Thursday, June 22, 2006 3:45 AM
To: council at gnso.icann.org
Subject: Re: [council] Regarding Letter from American Intellectual Property
Law Association

Tony

Am 21.06.2006 schrieb Anthony Harris:
> And thus am rather surprised at your conclusion that:
> "The definition also seems to meet the needs
> of web host and ISP operators,"
> 
> If it does, I have yet to meet one...

With 1&1 and Godaddy as very large international webhosts 
supporting formulation 1 I would think that this conclusion
can be drawn. Which brings me to another point. Apparantly
webhosting companies are not represented in the current
constituency setup and hence not much is known about their
interessts. Since hosting is one of the real crucial services
of the net we might be advised well to think about incoperating
them somehow into our structure.

Best,

tom