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posted by Fnord666 on Wednesday November 27 2019, @02:49PM   Printer-friendly
from the don't-worry,-be-happy dept.

Arthur T Knackerbracket has found the following story:

One week after the news the non-profit .org internet registry was to be sold to a private equity firm, the board of the organization that has to approve the purchase met in private to discuss the situation.

Four days later, on November 21, that organization – ICANN – has yet to say a word about what it discussed or decided.

This past weekend, the board of the organization that is selling the rights to .org, and which will likely make $1bn or more from the sale, the Internet Society, met. On both the Saturday and Sunday, the proposed sale was a key topic of conversation. It has just to provide any details on what was discussed or decided.

The same cannot be said for those opposed to the deal.

One of the earliest indicators that the deal was going to meet a very different response from the internet community than the Internet Society (ISOC) expected came in the form of an article written by one person who has set up and run their own registry.

Co-founder of the .eco top-level domain Jacob Malthouse wrote an impassioned plea online that began, “I woke up this morning feeling a profound sense of loss.” An environmental campaigner as well as a former staffer of ICANN, Malthouse compared the sale of the .org registry to the paving over of forests.

The proudly non-profit .org registry, that had for years sold its domains for just $1 to non-profits in developing countries, is “our Yosemite,” Malthouse opined, referring to America's world-famous national park. In selling it to a for-profit private equity firm, he argued, “we’ve lost more than a digital Yosemite. We’ve lost our principles. We can do better. The millions of nonprofits who rely on .org deserve better.”

That sentiment was quickly echoed in the broader internet industry community, which, even in the era of Twitter, Facebook and Instagram, continues to rely on mailing lists as its main form of communication.


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  • (Score: 5, Interesting) by Bot on Wednesday November 27 2019, @07:41PM (4 children)

    by Bot (3902) on Wednesday November 27 2019, @07:41PM (#925434) Journal

    I have some issues though.

    Eliminating inheritance is denial of service attack to the unit called family. Sure the firstborn takes all was unfair, but it worked to prevent atomization and ultimately dissolution of wealth.

    Privacy: a fully transparent society is what technology would enable us to do. Most crimes unfeasible. Sure it would require a different mindset, but we already went through it. From hunt to agriculture to industry. Now to technocracy if you don't abhor the term already.
    The guys in charge did like the internet because it enabled control, but didn't like the free flow of information that would expose their deeds. So, what happens? the privacy OF THE COMMON MEN gets attacked daily. Strange huh? going for the powerful ones would yield immense profit but Nooo let's sell credit card info of people, for 1$ a pop. So, while I think one has to defend oneself keeping as much privacy as possibile, I fear we are being trolled into thinking privacy good transparency bad.

    Third, consider more the function of money, many pillars you describe follow simply from the desire of those ruling using money to make their weapon as strong as possible by making it scarce. How you subtract money? taxes, crooks, corruption, war on drugs, market speculation, printing money (diluting your hard earned one). This is why we have inefficient laws applied by inefficient bureaucracy.

    Personally, all is ultimately about control, so considering how much control you lose because of a new event is a good way to detect evil at work.

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  • (Score: 4, Interesting) by HiThere on Wednesday November 27 2019, @09:01PM (1 child)

    by HiThere (866) Subscriber Badge on Wednesday November 27 2019, @09:01PM (#925453) Journal

    A major problem is that power isn't evenly distributed. Even if it were, it would destabilize, if only due to random influences.

    When there are ways of leveraging power of any sort to achieve greater power, they will be used, and those who achieve greater power will be some fraction of those who used the power available to achieve greater power. Which means that greater power will be achieved by some of those who lust for greater power. This is a positive feedback loop. True, there are "frictional losses", i.e. some of those who strive to achieve greater power will lose at least some portion of the power that they have, but that is inherent in a system that facilitates the increased centralization of power.

    Since I, personally, generally disfavor the centralization of power, I'm all in favor of increasing friction applied to those who are increasing their control of power, as long as it's applied to, and preferably applied more strongly to, those who are gaining increased power. The nature of the friction is also important. If increased friction is applied to those wishing to benefit from those because they are less powerful (i.e. if the means of benefit depends on their being less powerful), then I am more strongly in favor of that increased friction.

    One example is the graduated income tax, though the current system is ridiculously complex. I favor a system where the income tax would be based around at minimum a linear relationship to the amount of income, and preferably something less than the square of the income. Say tax = rate*income^e - base, where base is a positive number and rate is a positive percentage, income reflects all sources of income whatsoever, and 1 e 2. Tentatively I'd suggest e = 1.25. This applies increased friction as the income increases, but it's important that ALL sources of income be counted. So if you have a long term investment that is not yielding income, even if it increases in value, then it doesn't affect you at all. Income only counts when it turns into cash (or accessible accounts).
    (Sorry, the details drifted off the point. But this is an example of what I mean by friction.)

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    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday November 28 2019, @02:11AM

      by Anonymous Coward on Thursday November 28 2019, @02:11AM (#925517)

      > I'm all in favor of increasing friction applied to those who are increasing their control of power,

      I think the friction (on people increasing their control of power) should be increased until they get stuck. Wouldn't it be funny to see rich fuckers lined up at the emergency room?

  • (Score: 2) by jmichaelhudsondotnet on Thursday November 28 2019, @05:01PM (1 child)

    by jmichaelhudsondotnet (8122) on Thursday November 28 2019, @05:01PM (#925680) Journal

    I do not support eliminating inheritance, I don't know where you got that.

    Privacy is a difficult balancing act, but we must make that effort, or we will get none.

    And with no privacy none of the other rights exist either, especially not to an inheritance, lol you prole.

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday November 29 2019, @02:09AM

      by Anonymous Coward on Friday November 29 2019, @02:09AM (#925855)

      JMH, I like you, but your logic is like, super weak.

      I do not support eliminating inheritance, I don't know where you got that.

      GP didn't say that. GP just provided a parallel example.

      Privacy is a difficult balancing act, but we must make that effort, or we will get none.

      Not true. There are many scenarios where privacy is legally and practically preserved, without any difficult balancing by the hoi polloi.

      And with no privacy none of the other rights exist either, especially not to an inheritance, lol you prole.

      Sigh. This claim is just stupid. Without privacy rights, there are no property or non-violence rights? I don't see how a city made purely of glass would legalize rape.

      In short - c'mon dude. Try harder. Drop the noise, up the signal. Otherwise you come across as a polluter of ideas and social spaces. You want us to take your website and ideas seriously? Then prune the not-true, and ideally the not-falsifyable.