[address-policy-wg] Legal counsel on 2008-08 (Initial Certification Policy in the RIPE NCC Service Region)

Randy,

On Sat, May 28, 2011 at 4:52 AM, Randy Bush <randy at psg.com> wrote:
>> As soon as laws don't allow 'your network, your rules' anymore then
>> anything can happen...
>
> if you think that laws have allowed 'your network, your rules' any time
> in the last couple of decades, you should share what you are smoking.

This is certainly true.  The internet is part of our society much like
a public square is (borrowed expression).

It's important to point out that the recent eG8 debates[1] on strict
Internet regulation and a "civilized Internet", championed by Nicolas
Sarkozy, is a view not shared by all governments, and any take-away
from that get-together *must not* assume so. (It's not clear exactly
what was proposed anyway, and consensus was not really there.)
Certainly, a lot of people, as evident in the debate, do not wish to
see more of the Sarkozy regulation.
It's noteworthy that at the same time Sarkozy and a few other speak of
decreasing Internet freedoms, Iran is moving forward with its
closed-off Halal Internet (where are the, morally just, trade
embargoes on selling Internet censorship equipment to certain
countries, I wonder?).

The Swedish foreign minister, Carl Bildt, had this opening
announcement to the session "Internet for Democracy, a tool, a trap,
or what?" at the EuroDIG 2011 which opened today:
http://www.youtube.com/patrikhson#p/a/u/0/GLLpW4s7WTo

Additionally, the Special Rapporteur to the UN on Freedom of
Expression, Frank la Rue has this to say recently [2]:

      D.  Disconnecting users from Internet access, including on the
          basis of violations of intellectual property rights law

      49.  While blocking and filtering measures deny access to certain
           content on the Internet, States have also taken measures to
           cut off access to the Internet entirely. The Special
           Rapporteur is deeply concerned by discussions regarding a
           centralized “on/off” control over Internet traffic.

All is not lost.  And right now is a *particularly* bad time to make
any hasted moves in the wrong direction, I would say.

Regards,
Martin

[1] http://stupid.domain.name/node/1348
[2] http://stupid.domain.name/node/1341