Subject: EFF is first to name new IANA Board Member but perverts the white paper process as it does so

From: Gordon Cook <[email-masked]>
Date: Fri, 25 Sep 1998 01:07:16 -0400

This morning (Thursday Sept 24) EFF put out a press release critical of the
Postel/IANA draft.  This was no surprise because the press release, more
than anything else, complains about NSI's continued existence -- something
that for many many months has been a hobby horse of EFF Board member John
Gilmore.

What is the real shocker is the press release's last paragraph:

"EFF has been tracking the DNS governance issue for the past several
years. One of EFF's Board members is on the IANA Transition Advisory
Group; another has agreed to join the Initial Board; a third was
instrumental in the CORE effort to provide a capable competitor in
global domain registration.  In addition, EFF's legal staff has
tracked and commented on numerous proposed policies and drafts, while
our activists have closely followed the controversies online and in
the press."

The IANA ITAG member is Dave Farber.  The "third" is John Gilmore who
played a very significant role last January in encouraging his friend Jon
Postel to "redirect" the root-servers in the terminology of Jon's friends
or hi-jack them in the terminology of Jon's critic's.  I stood in a hallway
in London on January 27, mid morning with 3 additional prominent witnesses
to the conversation between a representative of the US Government and a
represenative of the IETF as the first person explained his grave concern
about what Jon Postel's friends were urging him to do.  Some months later I
had further direct confirmation from another of Postel's friends.  Although
Gilmore is a board member of EFF, it seems strange to me seeing it, as a
public interest group, tout him in this press release in view of the highly
controversial role that he has played in these events.

But while Gilmore is not the major issue here, he does need mention as a
close friend of Postel and a highly prominent player in the DNS wars and
someone that has not played a role that EFF should be pround of. Still what
is most offensive is that it looks very likely that EFF is blithly
announcing its own PERVERSION of the White Paper process.

Quote:  "another has agreed to join the Initial Board".  Ira Magaziner in
his Monday (9/21) interview with me made it very clear that he wanted to
see the **NAMES** of proposed board members floated in public and discussed
before the end of the week so that we would know whether there was any
degree of consensus behind the choices.

In this critical context lets look at what does EFF to contribute to the
open white paper process.  It appears to cooperate with Jon Postel's
continued imperial reign of making his own private decisions behind closed
doors. It does so by not floating the specific name of the nominee but
merely stating that one has been made and accepted. At least this is the
most obvious interpretation.  It is difficult not to believe, in view of
Jon's behavior this summer, that this act does not have Jon's blessing.

Harvard law professor Lawrence Lessig has captured Jon Postel's modus
operandi quite well: "Jon Postel, sometime "God of the Internet," through
his organization, the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority - backed by
attorneys, and in cooperation with a number of the largest corporate
interests at stake - began drafting his own bylaws for this new corporate
structure. He presented these bylaws to the various IFWP working groups and
asked that they be accepted as the basis for future work. The working
groups declined his offer, so Postel and his lawyers went their own way.
Over the months, they have produced three drafts. Each draft has been
posted on the Net and is open for comments - but each draft was kept solely
under IANA control."

http://www.thestandard.com/articles/opinion_display/0,1266,1718-0,00.html

Now while it certainly looks as though we have the continuing imperious
forward march of Jon chosing board members and presenting them as
**anonymous** fait accompli's, there are two other possibilities.  (1).
Conceivably NSI might feel it had the stature to invite and EFF board
member to serve.  Doubtful in the extreme however inview of Gilmore's well
know abhorence of NSI.  (2).  More possible is that this could have been
Jon Gilmore acting on his own in convincing the EFF board to agree to have
one of its members indicate a willingness to serve *if nominated*.  Still
the language and the context of the press release leaves the most logical
conclusion that (3). a board member (who? Esther Dyson?  Perry Barlow?) was
asked and has agreed to serve.  If the invitation was actually issued, it
is difficult to see how it could be credible coming from anyone else than
Postel.

Remarkably Magaziner has kept his credibility up to the closing hours of
this Hatfield McCoy civil war.  Jon tested Ira in January when he grabbed
the root servers.  That redirect was already underway when I was a witness
to the London conversation at roughly 10:30 AM London time on January 27.
the fact of the grab was not yet public.  The US government however only
found out about it at about 1 am London time on January 29.

It seems likely that Jon Postel and his EFF ALLIES are initiating a second
test of Ira's will right now.  If Ira is to maintain any credibility as an
honest broker, he has no choice but to put his foot down, now and put it
down HARD.

He had better get Jon and his probono Jones and Day attornies in a room
with NSI and the Boston group this weekend and not let them out until they
are prepared to float a list of nominees on Monday as well as a new draft
that Ira called for this past Monday.  It seems most likely Jon is
blatantly urging IRA to put up or shut up.  Therefore Ira better spend the
weekend in the room with the three groups with a real audio broadcast to
the net.  Now if this was some how a GROSS miscommunication on the part EFF
and Jon Postel was not a party to this, it is incumbent of Jon to let the
community know immediately.

Things are on the verge of falling totally apart.  The POC (perhaps with a
green light from Jon Postel? ) has set itself up as the names council.
http://www.dnso.org.  The EU and EC are furious -- feeling cheated by Ira
because the NSI "monopoly" is still in place.  (This information in an
interview with a reporter for a major European paper this evening.)  And
the central premise of the white paper that things must be done but open
processes is being completely ignored.

Ira Magaziner will either win lasting respect or lasting derision depending
on what he does during the next few days.

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