The bloggers' silence as a metaphor
It seems that I am not the only one that is being confused with the silence of the online community about the issue of internet governance. Here is an nice summarizing article about bloggers' (absence of) coverage of WSIS and internet governance. I have no idea what "National Journal" is and the article's title takes a firm stand on the issue ("The U.N. As A Threat To Online Speech"), I think it can be treated as a nice resource on the issue. Moreover, it seems that the bloggers' silence is just one example of online silence.
Another good resource about the issue may be the ISOC's internet governance page. It has lots of links to documents and websites dealing with the issue, however they are very technical in my eyes.
More resources are welcome...
1 comment:
A comment by ss on the Beltway blogroll post on the issue goes:
"...bloggers on the right don't take the U.N. seriously and trust that ... the U.N.'s only recourse to obtain authority over the internet is to 'come and get it'....
Bloggers on the left are conflicted, so they stay off the topic. Their visceral rejection of American authority have them tending toward international governance of the internet. But the practical consequences of U.N. authority are too noxious to risk promoting them..."
I tend to agree that it's this lack of widespread understanding about how or what an effective and useful alternative to current ICANN domination would be that keeps the bloggers quiet.
People will generally prefer to write on issues where they can see a clear line of thinking rather than one that includes conflicting shades of grey.
And even though you make the point that blog posts about this topic are generally technical (as opposed to political I guess you mean) I think that it is first of all a technical question not a political one. The political one will come later on when some technical ideas for the revolutionisation of the Internet gain currency.
For an example of what I am talking about you can see Eric's post.
"Now the question is by centralizing and or controlling the approach to IG do we address those unaddressed issues or we actually create a platform for them to be totally ignored?"
And I really see this point. While I really feel like regulation of the ugly thing on the net like spam and child porn might be more effectively killed off if the regulation was global, what happens if UN-control of the Internet simply makes it harder to regulate at the international level and easier to regulate and the local level (thus enhancing the great firewall of China, etc, etc)?
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