ICANN New gTLD Auctions - Apparently No Antitrust Concerns?
There has been much discussion in ICANN circles concerning auctions to resolve new gTLD contention sets. This article summarizes the discussion and events to date, and suggests there should be little...
View ArticlePlaying the Long Game at the Internet Governance Poker Table
Poker players say if you can't spot the fish within your first 15 minutes at the table, you're the fish. With that in mind, I'm tempted to ask ICANN President Fadi Chehade who's the fish in the...
View ArticleDownsizing Sao Paulo
On January 27th the Executive Multistakeholder Committee (EMC) held its first meeting to plan the "Global Multistakeholder Meeting on the Future of the Internet Governance" scheduled to be held in Sao...
View ArticleTurkish Parliament Approves Internet Bill, Lets Government Block Websites,...
Turkey’s Parliament has passed a bill that includes controversial arrangements concerning the protection of online privacy despite concerns raised by the European Union as well as Turkish NGOs and...
View ArticleLuddites of the 21St Century Unite?
In the past few weeks doom and gloom stories about the future were printed, discussed and opined in the press. The down and out of the message of futurists is that the middle class is going to be swept...
View ArticleCourt Says gTLDs Aren't 'Domain Names' for Cybersquatting Purposes, Declines...
A Swiss Del Monte entity that had a license to use the "DEL MONTE" mark applies to operate the .delmonte generic top level domain (gTLD). Another Del Monte entity, based in Delaware, filed a "legal...
View ArticleComcast-TWC: Why Compete and Innovate When You Can Buy Market Share?
Expect a charm offensive as Comcast and scores of sponsored researchers explain how acquiring Time Warner Cable will promote competition and enhance consumer welfare. You might not hear too much about...
View ArticleInternet Governance: Why Africa Should Take the Lead
Recently during an afternoon meeting with a friend of mine, Bob Ochieng, who happens to work for ICANN (Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers) Africa Operations, he lamented that at...
View ArticleBest Practices in the Global Internet
In an increasingly global environment, the Internet infrastructure industry faces a diverse set of serious issues that we as an industry need to address together. To look at these concerns, an area of...
View ArticlePermissionless Innovation: Why It Matters
We live in a world of information abundance and the proliferation of ideas. Through mobile devices, tablets, laptops and computers we can access and create any sort of data in a ubiquitous way. But, it...
View ArticleThe Illusion of Internet Governance
There's been a lot of controversy over the U.S. Government's proposal to give up their supervisory role over ICANN. This lead Karl Auerbach, one of the only people ever elected to represent end-users...
View ArticleA Civil Society Perspective on NETmundial Final Outcome: A Remarkable...
A few 'big picture' thoughts on the Netmundial meeting in Brazil this week and its final outcome document, adopted by its high level committee. Overall, there are some truly amazing and forward-looking...
View ArticleNETmundial Multistakeholder Statement Concludes Act One of 2014 Internet...
On April 24th the NETmundial "Global Multistakeholder Meeting on the Future of Internet Governance" concluded with the issuance of an eight-page statement. This non-binding document falls short of the...
View ArticleOutcome from NETMundial Meeting in Brazil Largely Seen as Positive for Business
Last Month at the NETMundial meeting in Brazil, representatives from governments, private sector, civil society, the technical community and academia met to debate the key principles on which the...
View ArticleYes, 3 Billion Net Users by End of Year, but What Will the Majority in...
The United Nations International Telecommunications Union (ITU) announcement that by end 2014, there will be nearly three billion Internet users — two-thirds of them from the developing world — with...
View ArticlePINGO: NETmundial Adopts Principles on INternet GOvernance
The Internet Governance Roadmap, which was adopted recently in Sao Paulo by the Global Multistakeholder Meeting on the Future of the Internet Governance Ecosystem (NETmundial) includes a lot of...
View ArticleNet Neutrality's Legal Binary: An Either/Or With No "Third Way"
People working on net neutrality wish for a "third way" — a clever compromise giving us both network neutrality and no blowback from AT&T;, Verizon, Comcast and others. That dream is delusional...
View ArticleHouse Committees Taking Aim at IANA Transition Proposal
In an unanticipated move a third Committee of the US House of Representatives has weighed in with concerns regarding the NTIA's proposed transition of the US role as counterparty to ICANN's IANA...
View ArticleDisclosing Unique User IDs in URLs Doesn't Violate ECPA - In re Zynga/Facebook
In separate lawsuits, plaintiffs alleged Facebook and Zynga violated the Stored Communications Act (in Zynga's case, also the Wiretap Act). The crux of plaintiffs' allegations was that when a Facebook...
View ArticleSecond House Amendment Ups the Stakes on IANA Transition
The House of Representatives has passed another measure related to the proposed IANA functions transition, and has again attached it to "must pass" legislation. This move ups the ante and may well be...
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