[atlarge-discuss] Response to a Student Inquiry

["Richard Henderson" <richardhenderson@ntlworld.com>]

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Response to the request for information from the student, Ivette Cordova:

Dear Ivette

The situation with ICANN and the At Large can be summed up in the phrase "power".

According to the terms of its original establishment, the US government required ICANN to involve the user-community in the decision-making processes of Internet governance.

However, as ICANN has evolved, it has become more and more obvious that a powerful elite at the heart of ICANN are primarily interested in the opinions and interests of the big corporations, the intellectual property rights constituency, the registrars, and basically all those who are on the "supply side" of the Internet.

The interests of the ordinary internet user and consumer have been largely sidelined. And the US Government (through its overseeing body, the DoC) has been content to preside over this state of affairs and has extended ICANN's period of governance.

This abandonment of the ordinary user is most clearly dramatised in the way the At Large directors (voted for by users) have been written out of ICANN's constitution, to be replaced by nominees with a bias in favour of the bigger interest groups, and no "At Large" directors specified at all.

Meanwhile, the lack of accountability of ICANN's power clique has been typified in the way it handled issues like the new TLDs, which saw widespread abuses by registrars etc, and gave rise to powerful and convincing complaints. ICANN's response in matters like these was to reject any kind of accountability, and largely ignore those areas of criticism which called their power clique to account.

The one pressure group which has been vociferous in expressing any kind of alternative viewpoint has been the membership of the At Large movement of ordinary users. This is the "voice of honesty" which ICANN cannot afford to accommodate (thus it has largely removed the At Large from power).

For the sake of appearances it has taken steps to develop its own internally-controlled At Large committee process (although to date it retains the right to choose who will sit on it). This committee structure is an attempt at a top-down control of the At Large, cornering into a powerless corridor of ICANN, in order to be able to "claim" that the At Large movement of ordinary users is given a role inside ICANN. But it is a powerless and disenfranchised role. This is all about power.

Consequently, the At Large movement has been forced to mobilise externally of ICANN and is represented by individuals in a number of organisations. In terms of continuity from the old At Large membership, the 1000-strong IcannAtLarge.org (with membership in over 70 countries) is probably the clearest "opposition" the ICANN power-clique faces.

IcannAtLarge.org has its own website, its own executive panel, its own working groups, and continues to express its independent position both at ICANN meetings and in public.

The key issue is: should the Internet be run by a minority of wealthy individuals on behalf of commercial vested interests, or should the vast majority of users - the hundreds of millions of ordinary internet users - have the right to a significant if not decisive say in the way the Internet is run.

At present it suits the US government to "protect" ICANN (which is its own creation) and in return, ICANN acts as a front and a preferred mechanism to the possible alternative - an Internet of the world, run outside the US.

So the status quo is a Board and staff who seem accountable to no-one but their USG "protectors" - who have ignored the recommendations of their own study group (the ALSG) when it embarrassingly found in favour of extending the election of At Large directors. Not only ignored it, but gone in the opposite direction by abolishing elected At Large directors altogether.

This Board has failed to respond to a whole range of serious complaints from users and consumers. It has power but no accountability.

The At Large movement is now aiming to grow into a worldwide "umbrella" group of internet users, demanding a fair say for ordinary people. It is trying to communicate the importance of ordinary people participating and seeking a claim to "their" internet : because the Internet does not just belong to a few wealthy groups - it belongs to the people of the whole world.

With kind regards

Richard Henderson