Honey, They Gave Away the Internet
America's potentially ominous sovereignty sellout.
You may have missed it, because there wasn’t much news coverage.
Yes, there have been a lot of competing stories, some of them indeed quite important. There’s the frightening erosion of our military position in Afghanistan (which withers, while our commander-in-chief dithers), the health care tug of war, and of course, the ongoing job-killing, deficit-exploding POR (Pelosi-Obama-Reid) economy, which the nation has endured since the summer of 2008.
But a few relatively and quite obviously unimportant stories have consumed way too much of the available oxygen. Yes, Chicago’s Olympic bid smackdown did expose Barack Obama and his handlers as over-proud, naive, or both. And yes, it was quite unusual for Saturday Night Live to openly mock a hard-left president after only eight months in office. Establishment media’s obsession with playing presidential defense in these two matters has exposed their hypocrisy to many casual news consumers who may finally understand that they can’t automatically trust what they see out of the big three networks, CNN, and others.
But meanwhile, you may not have noticed that our government gave away control of the Internet. Here’s how the UK Guardian reported it:
After complaints about American dominance of the Internet and growing disquiet in some parts of the world, Washington has said it will relinquish some control over the way the network is run and allow foreign governments more of a say in the future of the system.
ICANN — the official body that ultimately controls the development of the Internet thanks to its oversight of web addresses such as .com, .net, and .org — said today that it was ending its agreement with the U.S. government.
The deal, part of a contract negotiated with the U.S. Department of Commerce, effectively pushes California-based ICANN towards a new status as an international body with greater representation from companies and governments around the globe.
Given the controversy raised nearly four years ago when the idea of Commerce loosening its reins on ICANN first became a serious topic in advance of a UN-sponsored conference in Tunisia, and how roundly it was rejected at the time, it’s more than a little surprising that what occurred last week has generated relatively little coverage or comment.
The outcome is also an about-face from what might have been expected based on news from not very many weeks ago. In early August, a group of House lawmakers made it very clear that what has been a series of understandings renewed every few years needed to be replaced with “a permanent instrument to which ICANN and the Department of Commerce are co-signatories.” The signers of the letter requesting that action included House Committee on Energy and Commerce chairman Henry Waxman and that group’s Subcommittee on Communications, Technology, and the Internet chairman Rick Boucher. Both Waxman and Boucher are Democrats.
Clever wording, guys. Nothing was said about how things might change, giving readers a false sense of security that nothing would change. Heck, searchers trying to keep up with Waxman and Boucher’s doings probably wouldn’t have found the news in the first place, as their names don’t even appear in the article I linked in the previous paragraph and several others I found. You’d think from reading these reports that they were only trying to set into stone the U.S.-controlled situation that had been in place for over a decade.
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Tom Blumer owns a training and development company based in Mason, Ohio, outside of Cincinnati. He presents personal finance-related workshops and speeches at companies, and runs BizzyBlog.com.
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28 Comments
1. Matthew:The US still has complete control of the bit of the internet that’s actually in america. In practice, it has effective control over most of the rest no matter what happens through the implementation of standards via companies like Cisco.
Recent changes just reflect the reality that the value of the global network is the fact that it’s, you know, global. Getting upset over who gets to decide who assigns the root domains is ridiculous – that was farmed out years ago anyway. The root name servers aren’t (in practice) all in america now either. That bucket of milk was spilled a long time ago. You just didn’t notice
I don’t see what your problem is. If you’re going to get uppity about the TCP stack – then you can flamin’ well give the web back to CERN and go back to using MSN.
Oct 9, 2009 - 12:16 am 2. Rich Vail:Hey, its a great idea to let such cornerstones of free speach such as China, Cuba, North Korea and Saudi Arabia have control over the ‘net. Great idea, why haven’t we done this years ago?
Oct 9, 2009 - 1:58 am 3. Francis W. Porretto:ICANN, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, is not capable of ripping the Internet out from under its American users all by itself. The change that would effectuate the horrors projected here would be the transference of the root servers — the computers that actually hold the arbitration authority over top-level domains and the administration of the “backbone” — out of the United States. That’s the atrocity to watch for…but for it to happen, the owners of the root servers would have to cooperate or be dispossessed by eminent domain.
If the suppression of free communications really is the agenda — and I agree with Mr. Blumer that a healthy majority of the world’s governments would like to see that — then the next target will be the cellular telephone system and the satellites that support it. I hope someone is watching for developments in that area, as well.
Oct 9, 2009 - 2:43 am 4. whyamInotsurprised?:Alright. That does it for me. I’ve put up with this Clown-in-Chief’s BS until now. Socialists and perverts running the asylum. But this takes the cake.
Time to start impeachment proceedings before it is too late!
Impeach Barry Soetero Now!
Oct 9, 2009 - 2:44 am 5. CrumbleKid:Three words: Tim Berners Lee.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tim_Berners-Lee
Berners Lee invented the Web and then gave it away. Look and learn. And don’t slag off sharing. It’s the reason Pajamas Media can exist in the first place.
Oct 9, 2009 - 3:01 am 6. patrick sarsfield:perhaps this is how Western civilization ends…in a whimper as final victory of the Progressive ideology ushers in a new dark age…
Oct 9, 2009 - 5:29 am 7. Indiana Redneck:You’re surprised? Really? Obama and his ilk are desperately trying to make this country a socialized one and they can’t do that with unfettered access to the internet. But once the UN grabs hold of it, it won’t take long before places like Pajamas Media, Fox News, and World Net Daily are censored to the point that real news could no longer be found.
And once a government controls what’s considered news, it’s not long before the government controls everything else.
I guess I should go out back and start practicing my goose-stepping.
Oct 9, 2009 - 5:32 am 8. homero:..and they may shut down pages like these.
it is really reall scary what this administration is doing and has done. In such a short time they have brought the USA to it’s knees and the death blow is not far behind.
thank you for the the artical Tom Blumer, is there any way to stop this ?
Oct 9, 2009 - 5:58 am 9. Terry:Does anything this administration does surprise anyone anymore? There is seemingly no limit to the destructiveness of left-wing lunatics, their ill-intentions always buried under tons of BS liberal rhetoric with lots of pretty words that actually mean the very opposite. Allowing the most corrupt & inefficient organization on the planet, the U.N., anywhere near the internet is sheer stupidity.
Oct 9, 2009 - 6:00 am 10. Chris in Toronto:Thanks for the great article. I share your concerns. But I notice that you did not address the issue of the President being able to take control of the internet.
From Fox News, Aug 28, 2009:
Perhaps this move, seen from this perspective, isn’t such a bad thing? I’m not sure how this will unfold, but I can say that I was aghast at the idea of Obama having a kill switch on the internet.
Oct 9, 2009 - 6:04 am 11. HbG:crap.
Oct 9, 2009 - 6:11 am 12. Now and Then:By all means, turn the internet over to the conservatives who really understand its nature and potential . . . for profit. Net neutrality? Who needs it?
It’s not a big truck . . . It’s a series of tubes!
Oct 9, 2009 - 7:22 am 13. dumbfounded:#12 Now and then your really just a putz you would probably agree with the sterilization of your own mother if this administration said so. In fact thats something thing if they could do it retroactiovely we would all agree on
Oct 9, 2009 - 8:47 am 14. Gary Ogletree:The internet and cellphones are a major headache for Big Brother all over the world. Science fiction legend Frank Herbert wrote an essay in the early ’80s celebrating all the advantages to free people that would result from the State’s failure to restrict the spread of PCs to the general public. On the mark, as usual. We have tasted the fruits of cyberspace and won’t give them up, especially to the dirtbags of the UN.
Oct 9, 2009 - 8:58 am 15. sefton:Quite, you. We’re not supposed to talk about this lest the prols become aware. Back to reading Daily Kos and OMG DANCING WITH THE STARS IS ON!
Oct 9, 2009 - 9:04 am 16. Bob Miller:These wonderful people want the US itself under international domination; this Net thing is only an early baby step.
Oct 9, 2009 - 9:25 am 17. David S:Imagine – an international computer network actually being managed internationally. What crazy idea will they think of next?
Gotta love the pure BS quotient here. ICANN is not the internet. This article is a joke.
Peace.
DS
Oct 9, 2009 - 9:36 am 18. Conservative Mom:Yes, just like the UN Security Council with Libya in charge, the UN can make a council to say what happens with the internet, probably with Iran at the helm.
N&T – the only people who want to make money from the Internet are your buddies, Chavez, Castro, Ahmadinejad, all the great guys who want their people to know what’s going on and tell us what’s going on. Your best idea yet!
Oct 9, 2009 - 10:12 am 19. Professor Guvinoff:I have always seen the Internet as an American gift to the world, a ray from the shining city, a technological tentacle of the concept of individual freedom of expression, which we easily fail to appreciate is in vigorous dispute over most of the world.
But freedom comes with responsibility (another concept in dispute over most of the world), so the ICANN has so far published the identity of those who claim a domain name, in effect, providing traceability through a public link between real identity and its virtual digital counterpart, an indelebile “Joe blog” footnote behind “clariondude.com”.
If you live in those societies where the concepts of individual liberty and personal responsibility do not prevail (that is, most of the planet), you may see the openness of ICANN as an aberration to be corrected, because it is a real obstacle on the path to mischief.
The US conceding exclusive control over ICANN shows a willfull defenselessness, enabling an act of thievery of the practitioners of information laundering, a.k.a. the UN & its United Tyranny consort.
The Internet is the electronic manifestation of the idea of individual freedom of expression. Ben Franklin deserves more credit than Al Gore for it. I hope and pray that the net is already too omnipotent for total usurpation.
Information is like a fluid. It is even known for its ability to leak! The global digital network has turned information into a low viscosity fluid, even more capable of circumventing the seals and gaskets of censhorship.
This is analogous to the concept of capillarity in physics: the ability of a fluid to propel itself through narrow interstices. If the easy flow of information comes to you as a threat, you may attempt to block the spigot, but in doing so you also forego the benefits that easy information flow can bring to yourself.
If it was not so, the Iranian propesters would not be able to tweet each other. The mullahs can handicap the internet, but they cannot stop it completely, because it would paralyze them as well.
If you are curious about the open software technology of Internet censorship circumvention, you can get a flavor at http://en.flossmanuals.net/CircumventionTools and take it from there.
Oct 9, 2009 - 10:14 am 20. arthur:this has been in the works for a couple years and will really have no effect on my or most anyone’s life at all.
Oct 9, 2009 - 11:26 am 21. Delia:Internet Jihad made easier.
Time to bone up on the new book ‘Dhimmitude for Dummies™’ now on sale in stores for $19.99.
Oct 9, 2009 - 12:22 pm 22. Poor Citizen:Radio, T.V. the Internet. The internet is just the last one that will be conquered by governments, profit, criminals and greed. Its not a question of if…nor when or how…its an answer.. of now. Many wish it wasn’t so, but it is and that is a shame. However, someone has to pay and those that pay will be … all of us.
Oct 9, 2009 - 12:33 pm 23. AST:I’m not enough of a techie to even know what the TCP stack is, but I started wondering which other President in my lifetime had given away something of immense national interest. Oh, now I remember. Jimmy Carter. The Panama Canal. Whenever we leave a vacuum somebody who doesn’t share our sense of fairness or our interests will move in to fill it.
Oct 9, 2009 - 6:22 pm 24. Rob:Crumblekid, The internet was in use by the US military long before that bloke came onto the scene. The technology was released to the private sector and then they took it and ran.From your linked article: “However, the general ideas for the Internet were outlined, also the technological aspect, earlier than Berner-Lee’s technological proposal”
He is credited with the World Wide Web, in other words, he took this already available technology and applied it on a larger scale.If you are going to credit him, do it properly. It is better said that he developed the use of hypertext language that is used to create the websites that we enjoy today.
Oct 10, 2009 - 12:12 am 25. Phil:I heard,just like when the stupid peanut farmer gave the Panama canal back. Libs will get us all killed in the end.Remember when he got attacked by a rabbit. Even little fuzzy bunnies don’t fear liberals. Why do we?
Oct 10, 2009 - 2:31 am 26. SteveOfTheNorth:So?
The i-net is nice,but I don’t NEED it.
I can “hook” my computer to others without using wires(I’m not talking about phone line BBS,but before that) or fiber-optics,no not wi-fi but the other side of the world.
*sigh* no one remembers it?
Oct 10, 2009 - 6:07 am 27. Now and Then:25. Phil:
Oct 10, 2009 - 8:03 am 28. alex:Remember when Bush got attacked by a pretzel?
The USA is several years behind much of the world in regards to communications; 3G, blanket wireless access, repeater technologies, etc. I live in China and can watch mainstream television, download movies and have live video conferencing on my Cell.
It sounds about right, if the USA cannot keep up with latest technologies then it should have its position diluted.
Oct 10, 2009 - 9:31 am