
Governments shouldn’t have a monopoly on Internet governance - michaelcgorman
http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2010/12/governments-shouldnt-have-monopoly-on.html
======
pierrefar
Before we get all up in arms about governments taking monopoly, we should
remind ourselves that the "bottom up" approach being championed here gave us
the Google-Verizon open internet proposal in August. As I understand it, the
proposal have implied net neutrality for wireline services but has an opt-out
for wireless internet. So the bottom up approach is not a guarantee that it
will produce better policies.

But on balance, the bottom up approach has certainly been good for the
internet. I just want to keep it in perspective.

References for the Google-Verizon deal:

[http://googlepublicpolicy.blogspot.com/2010/08/joint-
policy-...](http://googlepublicpolicy.blogspot.com/2010/08/joint-policy-
proposal-for-open-internet.html)

<http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-10920871>

~~~
iwwr
That's still _top down_ , but with different people at the top.

The Google-Verizon deal involved common framework for government regulation of
the internet. Calling it "open internet" was a deliberate misnomer.

~~~
Groxx
Multiple inheritance rears its ugly head yet again. Namespace collisions, oh
noes!

------
jellicle
I disagree. Google is completely wrong and self-serving here. Even evil.

It is important for people to realize the idea of "conservation of
government". There are many areas of life that will be governed by rules, like
it or not. If government does it, they will be rules set by government, and
therefore having some accountability to the people, in democratic societies.

If government declines to be the rule-setter, private industry usually takes
up the slack. Their rules have no accountability to individuals. But either
way, the amount of government is conserved, only the basis for it and
accountability of it change.

If the U.S. decided to abolish the FDA, for example, there would still be
rules governing food quality in the United States. They would be rules set by
consortiums of grocery store chains and meat packers and the like. "Walmart
will buy meat only of this quality and no worse", whatever that quality level
might be. The food protection rules didn't disappear, they just became
divorced from accountability to the public.

Libertarians (Vint Cerf certainly is one, and corporations generally are as
well) pronounce that shifting governance from government to corporations is
good. Certainly it is in the corporate interest. As for good, any given shift
could be good (in the sense that you could have a benevolent dictator, for a
time), but in the aggregate, divorcing accountability from governance
certainly results in worse governance (the average dictator is worse than the
average elected representative).

The unelected, unaccountable, responsive-only-to-money Chamber of Commerce is
not in fact the right entity to be deciding internet governance issues.
Elected governments are.

~~~
presidentender
You mention that governments are accountable to the people, probably because
the people can vote. I don't see why a vote with a dollar is inferior to a
vote on a ballot with respect to accountability.

~~~
dasil003
The concentration of wealth is the reason.

~~~
stretchwithme
And how does that negate people's ability to choose the products they will buy
or keep companies from catering to specific portions of the market and thus
caring very much how people vote with their dollars?

~~~
dasil003
Geez, do I really have to spell it out for you? Politicians have to somehow
get a majority vote. Voting with dollars would only requires one rich person
to support a company, it doesn't matter if no one else pays them a dime. It's
sort of the extreme inverse intention of most campaign finance laws.

~~~
grn
I still can't see a problem here. A business with a single customer exists in
an almost complete vacuum and doesn't influence the market. What's more it's
very risky as its revenues aren't diversified. It's completely dependent on
its only customer.

~~~
stretchwithme
that's right. consumers can have a monopoly over a business too. in fact, I
seem to recall there are a whole bunch of companies struggling to figure out
how to please the customers of a single niche and that live or die depending
on how well they do that.

------
jdp23
Wikileaks highlights how governments' interest can differ from the "citizens
of the Internet" (for lack of a better term). Of course governments do act as
an important counterweight to keep corporations from abusing their monopolies
on internet governments ....

From a governance perspective, who speaks for "Google users"?

~~~
shadowfox
Google themselves most likely

------
Locke1689
Maybe I'm in the minority here but I'd rather governments have control here.
At least I have a vote and rights in my government. I'm not a Google
shareholder so Google, not so much.

~~~
pjscott
I would prefer to keep control as decentralized as possible. To that end, I
support sending loads of corporations to the internet governance meeting, as
well as universities, non-profit groups, and random dudes with too much time
on their hands.

It's fine for them to discuss things like improving rural internet access.
That's legitimate. But if they get up to any authoritarian shenanigans, I want
those discussions to get bogged down in endless arguments.

------
iwwr
The _inter-networks_ are too important to be governed by anyone, be they
governments or companies. Government implies coercion and regulations,
regardless of where it comes from.

Not that the regulators won't try, they will be adamant about their "right" to
"bring order" over apparent chaos.

~~~
loumf
My understanding is that net-neutrality is only enforceable via government
regulation. Meaning, that without the government mandating neutrality, the
corporations would be free to break neutrality.

As is usual, to provide freedom to one group, one must limit the freedoms of
another, and we usually use government to do that.

~~~
liquidzoot
I agree with this sentiment, but have some reservations about government
ability to maintain neutrality. As things are, government doesn't understand
how the technology works, and are ill equipped to regulate something they know
so little about.

~~~
loumf
The government doesn't know about anything in that sense. They rely on
everyone else to make a stink. We decry lobbyists, but the EFF is a lobbying
organization. Joining them helps to pass the legislation. Nothing could help
them understand it.

------
siculars
Say what you want about Google but at least they have fight in them and don't
roll over at the onset.

------
mattmanser
The very premise of this article is totally ridiculous.

The beauty of the internet is that you can easily share vast amounts of
digitized information with anyone without having to be in the same place.

Not that it's governed by X or Y. And the IGF doesn't govern it anyway.

In the end this forum is a total joke anyway, a pointless waste of money, much
like many parts of the UN from which it stems. Any actual decisions are made
elsewhere.

And even if it did matter why should we support a bunch of companies and
academics taking part in this sort of thing? Who elected them? What if it were
Zynga sitting on this committee instead of Google? Would anyone be outraged at
their departure?

------
steadicat
"Governments shouldn't have a monopoly on governance."

Isn't governance what governments are for? Granted, governments are
dysfunctional in many ways, but suggesting governments let others govern seems
a bit silly. Who else is going to govern? Should we let corporations sit on
committees, next to officials, forgetting that officials were elected, and
corporations were not?

There is no guarantee that companies are going to take care of our interests
better than governments do. And let's not forget that governments are
dysfunctional largely because of the influence that corporations themselves
already exert on them.

~~~
ataggart
>Isn't governance what governments are for?

All As do B, but not everyone that does B is an A. I don't need an
organization with a geographic monopoly on police powers to run my son's
little league.

>There is no guarantee that companies are going to take care of our interests
better than governments do.

Straw-man. The argument isn't that companies are going to "take care of our
interests", it's that _both_ politicians _and_ CEOs respond to self-interest,
but at least firms have competition for our dollars, thus are incentivized on
a continual basis to meet our wants.

The problem with the preceding is that _government_ \-- either intentionally,
or as an unintended consequence -- helps to constrain the competitive market
pressures.

I would put a lot more stock in the "net neutrality" legislation advocates if
they even bothered to look at what extant legislation might be contributing to
the hypothetical problem before agitating for increased government
manipulation of the market.

Further:

\- Firms can operate in different markets; I can choose my barber
independently from my grocer. With governments there are often competing
factors in making electoral decisions, such that we are left with choosing the
lesser of the evil package-deals.

\- Multiple firms can service different sets of preferences. We don't need to
vote on what color tie to wear, and then have the minority yield to majority's
preference.

------
jayphelps
I've said it before...I'm fairly confident the government will subsidize a
nation-wide 5th generation wireless technology for free internet for all.
It'll likely be restricted to just 80/8080 traffic, be throttled, and of
course governed and monitored by the government. Since it's completely
voluntary to use this network, it breaks no laws since by using it, you will
grant them permission to snoop if they so choose.

Call me crazy, but I think it's inevitable...likely to go down 10-15 years
from now.

Just one man's opinion though, that's all.

~~~
ra
In Australia our government is rolling out a nationwide fibre to the home
network called, National Broadband Network or NBN.

It isn't free but the capital expenditure is 100% subsidised by the NBN
Corporation (A govt owned corporation that has a few very large corporate
shareholders).

------
locopati
Already posted using a direct link to ISOC story
<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2016379>

~~~
michaelcgorman
To me, this story was interesting to HN not because Google was commenting, but
because Vint Cerf was. When _he_ writes about Internet governance, I listen.
The UN forms committees and working groups all the time; I'm not going to sign
a petition to one of them unless someone I trust on the matter feels so
strongly about it.

------
vdm
"bottoms-up" is mentioned twice. Spellchecker?

~~~
RyanMcGreal
Freudian slip. Vint Cerf really wants a beer.

------
andre
Neither are big corporations, like Google.

------
foljs
Translated from corporate speak: "Entities voted for by the people, and
representing the people's interests shouldn't have a monopoly on Internet
governance. I.e, the people, shouldn't have a monopoly on Internet
governance".

Now, you could argue that the some/all governments represent the people badly.
But this is an argument/call to arms to demand BETTER representation, not for
giving up control to other, opaque, entities.

