Internet Power Struggle Reaching Climax 791
Fredden wrote to mention a BBC piece discussing the U.S.'s poor image when it comes to Internet management. From the article: "It has even lost the support of the European Union. It stands alone as the divisive battle over who runs the internet heads for a showdown at a key UN summit in Tunisia next month. The stakes are high, with the European Commissioner responsible for the net, Viviane Reding, warning of a potential web meltdown. " We've previously covered this story.
No new solutions, no new news (Score:5, Insightful)
Wasn't the point of the Internet....? (Score:5, Insightful)
The success of the Internet is that its peer-peer nature has allowed it to evolve and struggle past any sort of obstacles, most of them having been technical. Now we have a political obstacle. Why is it necessary that any one organization "control the Internet"? Isn't that exactly not the point of its design?
So what? (Score:3, Insightful)
It just seems to be a question of pride... (Score:4, Insightful)
What is their real complaint?! Please enlighten me!
suggestion! (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:It just seems to be a question of pride... (Score:2, Insightful)
They don't get to feed their overinflated sense of self-importance. That's the complaint. They're threatening to tank the internet - which runs fine right now - over their desire to play politics.
This is crap (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Wasn't the point of the Internet....? (Score:5, Insightful)
Yes, and then DNS was invented.
Who Cares?!! Slashdot need a flamewar! (Score:1, Insightful)
Watch as +5 posts slamming the US for wrongdoings from the past 200 years appear, and other people who blame the US for terrorism, environmental wrongs, rainy days and other ills will be come out of the woodwork.
This "politics" section is nothing but a giant troll site, or dailykos for nerds. Don't expect news or any intelligent discussion here.
Re:suggestion! (Score:5, Insightful)
Threaten The Worst (Score:5, Insightful)
It's like when one political group cuts funding in a certain area. The other group retaliates by threatening to adjust for the funding by cutting police, fire, and education services. They could just work to be more productive and cut things like gov. cars and employee cell phones, but instead will choose the most emotional service possible and threaten with that.
This is NOT going to affect us.
What's wrong now people? (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Yeah, let's turn it all over to China and Iran! (Score:5, Insightful)
longing for the good old days (Score:2, Insightful)
Remember back when the world respected the USA? A lot of that was because the USA also respected the world. Then the Texans took over...
Disruption? (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:So what? (Score:5, Insightful)
Because that's what politicians DO all day (Score:5, Insightful)
Unfortunately, the function of scientists and engineers is to have good ideas, make them work, and then watch the wealth obsessed and power mad take them over. It's a pity really. If we had the ability to organise, we could collectively hold the politicians to ransom - but it's not in our nature to do it, while it is in their nature to exploit.
Re:So what? (Score:3, Insightful)
From TFA...
In the face of opposition from countries such as China, Iran and Brazil, and several African nations, the US is now isolated ahead of November's UN summit.
The only reason I can see is that since Bush and Co. badly screwed up the reputaion of USA, many of our biggest detractors want to put our feet to the fire. They think our global dominance is in jepordy and they want to hasten our decline by any means necessary. I can see where the countries listed might want things changed, but as bad as USA is, do I want China to have more say over the Internet? Or some unnamed countries in Africa where solid, stable democratic countries are hard to find? Hell no... And Iran?? haven' they read the paper, they are next of Bush's world wide tour.. gads...
Thanks Bush for being such a dork that even Iran, China, and some African countries to be named later have more pull in the UN that us.....
Kids will be kids (Score:2, Insightful)
OK, so build your own. Really. What's that you say, you want to have access to the one run by the US? OK, fine. But we run the servers. We won't screw it up, honest.
It's like a bunch of kids came to a playground and found one kid playing with his basketball. He's really good at it, and showed them how to play, too. After a while some of the kids decided they didn't need the first kid controlling the ball any more, so they said he should give it to them. They took a vote, and sure enough, the kid with the ball lost.
Guess what: it's our ball. You want to play with our ball? Fine, we want that, too (basketball is not much fun one-on-none). Just don't go claiming it's yours.
Right... (Score:3, Insightful)
And if we decide to nuke Europe, there's no stopping us there, either. Of course, no one's afraid we're going to do that. So, why are they afraid we're going to do something abusive with the internet? I think you might have something with the Iraq issue, though. Kinda like, "Hello face, I'm going to cut off my nose!"
Seriously, as the GP asked, without resorting to general complaints, is there a reason to believe that we would do something abusive with the internet? Again, the problem with the general complaints, is that it seems that if we're as crazy as we're accused of being (and I'll admit that the foam at the mouth doesn't help), then why is the internet the object being protected? Wouldn't it make more sense for France to start building up their nuclear arsenal if they're really that frightened of what we might do?
(Before you get on a soap box about arms races, I'm not seriously suggesting France do that. I'm just pointing out that the internet doesn't seem as important as national security, even though it could be argued that it is a part of national security.
Not the Internet! (Score:2, Insightful)
2. As for the "America paid for the Internet" argument we hear often, they only paid for their own part of it. I'm quite sure they didn't nip over to England to lay cables, or Australia, or Japan.
3. As for "America invented the Internet", sure Americans came up with some key parts of the Internet. However a lot of it is International in nature. The WWW, arguably the most visible part of the Internet, is a European creation.
However, I don't think central control is a good idea. Wasn't the Internet built around the concept of redundancy? Why don't we have a root server in each major country? England, USA, Japan, China, Australia, Israel, Russia? And so on... Having one nation control most of the DNS roots seems a bad idea in the end, especially considering the slippery slope the USA is becoming in terms of privacy and control issues.
This is not a troll against the USA by any means though, I'm just saying that keeping control of a fundamental worldwide technology/system is a bit silly.
Re:It just seems to be a question of pride... (Score:5, Insightful)
So the EU would be a better overlord of DNS? I don't see how that works.
I dont see the US having any leverage here. If the rest of the world decides to establish an alternate route, then there's fuck all the US can do about it.
That's funny. You really think that would work. All the governments that matter in this discussion are all equally bound to corporate interests. Fragmenting DNS in the way you describe would not serve those interests. If the US doesn't want to hand it over, and this group of countries that feels they know better keeps pushing the issue, businesses are going to get involved to maintain the status quo.
Welcome to the real world, where you don't have enough money to matter in discussions like this.
Re:So what? (Score:3, Insightful)
Inflammatory article (Score:2, Insightful)
The first sentence of the BBC story is enough to discourage me from reading the rest of the article. Sheriff? So the USA polices the internet in some way? That is ridiculous. The only purpose of that article is to incite readers by scaring them into thinking the US has far more control of the internet than it actually does.
Dan East
Re:It just seems to be a question of pride... (Score:3, Insightful)
Perhaps their complaint is that no single country should be in sole charge of a major part of the Internet infrastructure? Seems like a reasonable complaint to me, regardless of how benevolent the rule of that one nation may be at this time. What if, say, the next US administration decided to completely censor all anti-American anti-Christian content passing through equipment within its borders? I know this is likely unconstitutional, and would probably never actually happen (shit, it might even be impossible, I don't know), but as a what-if it shows the kind of power the US wields over the Internet as a whole.
Frankly, I don't see what the big deal is on any side of this manufactured argument: the UN are making a big fuss about wanting to take control away from the US (even although it's not a major or intractable problem), the US are making a big fuss about not seeing what the problem is (although it's an entirely obvious and easily solved problem), and the EU for some reason are trying to pose themselves as a peacemaker while openly agreeing with the UN (god knows what's going on there).
There is no technical reason why other countries can't just do what they like. And maybe we should do exactly that, why depend on any other country more than you have to? Think of it like the fuss a while back about GPS, and how the Galileo system came about as a result. This is like that, but more politically noisy.
Re:Not the Internet! (Score:3, Insightful)
I have yet to seen anyone make this absurd claim to the extent you have taken it. America paid for the research that led to development of the protocols that are the foundation of the internet. Other countries are welcome to do whatever they like with their cabling, that is irrelevant to this argument- the internet would exist even if Britain developed their own protocols and created their own internet.
What we are talking about is control of the servers that govern the way the internet works, and I don't want some Chinese beaurocrat having the power to affect what web pages (for example) I can see in the US (which becomes a possibility as soon as they are running their own root server)
Re:It just seems to be a question of pride... (Score:2, Insightful)
Funny.. I thought it was more like...
UN, "You must let us in to check for WMD by X date or we'll use force."
US, "K, it's past X date... Let's do what we said we would so that people will take us seriously in the future."
UN, "Nah... You're on your own. We'd like to just continue to impotently make empty threats... Just give us a few years and we'll start making some about DNS servers."
Re:It just seems to be a question of pride... (Score:5, Insightful)
Its all about money, money, money; also about sex because the clamoring for this really only got loud after ICANN approved the
And its being cloaked in stories about the evil dictatorial "government control" that now exists. There is no government control of Internet. The US government certainly does not control the DNS system--perhaps it does nominally, but right now the entire system is based on voluntary consent. People around the world are voluntarily deciding to use the ICANN monitored servers as the root.
What is so disgusting here is that these governments (including the EU) are attempting to abolish a voluntary system to institute something based on involuntary compulsion so that they can collect rent payments.
They are trying to claim they are just transfering a "power" that already exists but that's simply untrue.
Further, their desire to depose the IETF and give the ITU control over internet standards is also suspicious. First we might ask why? Then we might notice that China chairs the ITU. Then we might notice that the ITU has stated they want to introduce stronger point-of-origin guarantees to make it easier to track down individuals. Its obvious why they want this: you just need to watch the Chinese efforts to crack-down on dissent via the Internet.
Re:It just seems to be a question of pride... (Score:2, Insightful)
Because people don't like the real solution (Score:5, Insightful)
Unless someone can find a good reason to give the US to make ICANN turn things over, there's not anything that can be done.
If I Can't Vote For 'Em, They're All Alike (Score:3, Insightful)
But, I am, in fact, an American, so I say pretty much the same thing: "Why should I let the UN or the EU run the Internet? I didn't vote for any of those people."
As a matter of fact, whoever you are, where ever you are, you didn't vote for anyone running the net today, and, no no matter who wins this spat, you won't be able to vote for them tomorrow.
Don't know about you, but if I don't get a chance to vote for 'em, I really don't see much difference between one undemocratic, unrepresentative functionary and the next.
Re:So what? (Score:1, Insightful)
No new solutions, no problem anyway (Score:5, Insightful)
Like many political problems, the description is a lie. These countries want to be able to control the Internet (at least within their borders) themselves. They want to engage in suppression of free speech, and create impediments to global commerce. You can love or hate the US and the current administration, but over the last two-plus centuries, pray tell what other major country has done more to promote free speech? If you had to trust one other country or organization in this matter, which one would it be? The UN, where every crackpot dictator and totalitarian asshole is given a voice alongside the democratically elected crackpots and assholes? The EU, which doesn't even have a constitution yet? Russia? China? Iran? Yeah, right!
Yes, in theory, no one organization should control DNS and we should all join hands around the campfire and sing 'Kumbaya', but the real world is a rather fucked up place, and the US is probably the least of all evils in this case.
Not surprised (Score:2, Insightful)
Given the way the US has acted the last few years, I think the world is entirely justified about beeing worried about the US being in control of the internet. In the last few years, the US has had a worse international relations track record than even notorious offenders like Libya, China, North korea, Russia, you name it.
In my opinion, the US first needs to get its act together and start acting like a responsible nation before it expect to be trusted.
Ah well, I got enough karma. Do your worst.
Let them build their own Internet then (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Kids will be kids (Score:3, Insightful)
They weren't the only one with that idea, just the ones with the right implementation at the right time.
The US did not build my home network, they did not build the broadband network its connected to, they did not build most off the networks that together make the internet.
The only reason the US has some control is because the protocol choosen had to have a single authority for distributing some numbers and registering some names.
That is ALL the US has control of. (Unless you consider preemptive missile strikes on foreign network nodes
Jeroen
Re:So what? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Bad journalism (Score:4, Insightful)
Of course Slashdot prints half-truths and fearmongering 26 times a day, but it is fascinating to watch the mainstream press get this story wrong so many times. This argument is about the contents of a *text file*, one which the USA does not even currently control. ICANN publishes the root DNS information, and the root operators, who are dozens of independent, international parties, can choose to accept or decline. If the UN, the EU, or the National Hockey League wants to publish their own root information, they are perfectly free to do so. Why don't they put their zone out and see if anyone adopts it?
So let's say that China and the EU decide to get together and do that? What will happen is that Americans will start to get different resolutions for domains than people in other countries will. This could cause massive disruption of e-commerce and Internet usage in general. Do you really think it would be better to cause the disruption and "see what happens" rather than try to negotiate a settlement? According to TFA, the EU wants other countries to have some kind of formalized "influence" over the process. It doesn't seem so unreasonable to me.
"We have no intention to regulate the internet," said Commissioner Reding, reassuring the US that the EU was not proposing setting up a new global body.
bassackwards. (Score:5, Insightful)
http://www.ibm.com/ [ibm.com]
to get to the German ibm.com site if you're in
http://www.ibm.com.de/ [ibm.com.de]
You leave off the country identifier to get to sites inside your country, but add it when going international.
That could be extended in a natural way by saying anyone inside, e.g., the ibm.com.us domain only need refer to "http://www" to get to http://www.ibm.com.us/ [ibm.com.us]". In other words, the parts of the URL that match your domain need not be supplied.
Re:No new solutions, no new news (Score:3, Insightful)
That doesn't work for protocols that don't use URLs, whereas the current system does.
Re:It just seems to be a question of pride... (Score:1, Insightful)
Which is a perfect argument for why it should stay in the U.S., even though it's run by ICANN and not the U.S. government directly. The U.S. has something no other country does -- a First Amendment protecting free speech, and the cultural assumptions that arise from having such. The U.S. does not have perfect free speech, no, but it comes closer to that ideal than anywhere.
Yes, even closer than the supposedly "enlightened" places of Europe, or Canada. Talk about certain combatants of World War II in certain ways in Europe, and say hello to your new cellmates. Say something that someone else considers "hateful" in Canada and not only will you be shouted down, you'll be charged for breaking the law.
Here in the U.S., almost everyone disagrees with the folks running www.nazi.org -- but note that www.nazi.org exists. If you're curious as to what they're about, or what they think -- even just to get a laugh on a boring day -- you can do so. Do you think such a URL will be permitted to exist if the Europeans make the DNS decisions?
The internet has a tradition of free and open exchange of information because it began in the U.S., which has it's own tradition of free and open exchange of information. No, not a perfect tradition. But it wasn't the U.S. government that's responsible for not being able to buy certain WWII artifacts on eBay or Yahoo auctions anymore.
The Europeans don't trust the U.S.? Well, we don't trust the Europeans, nor should we.
What to control? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:So what? (Score:2, Insightful)
If other countries have a problem with that, then they are more than free to develop their own world wide network and their own standards. No one, including the U.S., is stopping them. Countries who do not have the means to innovate would prefer to use the U.N. to force America's innovation away. America controls it because America built it.
Let's Hope the U.S. Wins This One (Score:1, Insightful)
The reason countries such as China and Iran want more censorship should be known to all Slashdot readers. But some may not know that European governments have a long history of trying to keep down unrest by controlling the mass media. That's why, unlike US, they and Canada set up broadcasting as a government monopoly. Our belief that it's better to let dissent have a free voice is foreign to them.
Europe, particularly France and Germany, face two serious problems that their governments wrongly think can be kept under control by keeping certain ideologies off the Internet.
1. The extremely high unemployment rates of poorly educated young men--fertile ground for racist, neo-Nazi groups. Ironically, this is unlike the original Nazism, which, as Who Voted for Hitler demonstrated, appealed most to the educated. The poor went Communist, although the Nazis and the Communist often worked in concert to destroy the middle.
2. Immigrants from Arab/Muslim countries who are also angry and unemployed. Europe has not yet learned how to handle immigrants. They send them off to ghettos and throw money at them. The two groups may even find a way to work in concert.
Europe isn't going to solve either problem by censorship. Both groups will find ways around whatever is done. Europe is simply going to have to learn from the U.S. how to have a vibrant economy and how to integrate diverse people into a society.
And that's the catch. All too many Western Europeans think they have nothing to learn from the U.S. culturally, socially or economically. And until that changes, matters will go from bad to worse.
And I might add that the childish European attitude, "We will hate you if you don't do things our way," is growing tiresome. Hate us, see if we care. You're obsessed about us. We regard you an oversized and aging Disneyland. Nations without children and without the courage to fight an evil as clear-cut as terrorism have no future.
And yes, there are Europeans and even European countries, particularly in the east, that aren't caught up in this folly. But the folly of Europeans that covered the world in blood in the twentieth century seems still evident in the twenty-first century.
--Mike Perry, Seattle
What's next, a takeover of the GPS satellites? (Score:3, Insightful)
Personally, I do not believe the UN has any business interfering in either technology, and it would seem to me power-grabbing actions like this are simply a disincentive for the military to openly share technology with our international friends in the future.
I for one would think a more appropriate reaction from the UN would be gratitude for sharing the technology in the first place and bearing the financial burden. Appearently that isn't the case, though.
Re:It just seems to be a question of pride... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:So what? (Score:2, Insightful)
I don't want to turn your post into political bickering. It's annoying and happens way too often on
Hate Bush and even America all you want (I don't have a problem with that), but the idea that ANY country has more "pull" in the UN than the US is absurd. The UN is an ineffectual, defunct organisation that couldn't tie it's own shoes if the US wasn't around. Financial strength? None. Military Strength? None. Ability to enforce any of its own policies without the US? None.
You don't have to like the US at all. But without it, the UN is nothing. And personally, that's fine with me. Its time of usefulness (if there ever was one) is long past.
Re:So what? (Score:2, Insightful)
Over all the US government is one of the most open, free, tolerant and least corrupt in the world.
Profit!!! (Score:3, Insightful)
2. gain political influence over IP addresses and DNS registration.
3. Create U.N. "user fee" i.e. tax for IP and DNS
4. Profit!!
This is about censorship and taxation plain and simple. Alot of countries don't like the "wild west" say anything, find anything, freedom available now.
The politicians see a very unregulated and untaxed power void....
Come back Bill Clinton! (Score:1, Insightful)
The Bush administration seems to have only one negotiating tactic in any situation. They say "We are bigshots. Who are you, Mr Nobodaddy?" expecting instant submission. Instead the whole thing blows up into an intractable mess six months down the line. Well, here's this one. The next one will probably follow the exact same script.
Re:It just seems to be a question of pride... (Score:4, Insightful)
Allright. Exactly how much money did the US (as in the US government) spent in my country's (Brazil) Internet physical infrastucture (I ask so we know exactly how much money we should "fork")? If you don't know yet, the answer is exactly zero dollars, give or take some cents. As for the protocols, I was under the impression they were all public domain knowledge, regardless of who developed it. The same goes for most infrastructure software. What are you demanding to paid for, the idea of an internetwork?
Re:Where do YOU point your DNS? (Score:5, Insightful)
That cuts both ways. How likely are you to switch your DNS over to a new, untested root server system?
I think it really comes down to the old question, "What if they held a war, and nobody came?", except that in this case, the question will be, "What if they propose a new set of root servers, and nobody used them?"
Re:No new solutions, no problem anyway (Score:3, Insightful)
I think they really want to be able to levy taxes. To quote the mayor from deadwood, "Taking peoples money is what makes an organization real, be it temporary, ad hoc, or otherwise."
This is a revenue grab pure and simple. Be prepared for domain taxes, ip taxes, email taxes, etc. They will take the money and claim its to help people in developing countries ... however, like the story we've all heard before, somehow, some rich guy will get even richer with the money and the people it was intended for ... nothing.
The UN has *NO* credibility.
Free speech, global commerce and the "good" US (Score:3, Insightful)
Your description of the UN as [a place] where every crackpot dictator and totalitarian asshole is given a voice alongside the democratically elected crackpots and assholes may sound funny to neo-conservative Bush-loving ears, but it discounts all good the UN and its associate organizations did for decades and still do today. Obviously it is not fashionable to admit certain UN actions are not only good, they are essential where and when they occur (because there is no one else to perform them), but in fact they are. Without the UN the world, specially the worst and poorer parts of the world, would be a far worse place.
As it is, I am all for moving the top domain control to a supranational organization, if only to take it away from a country whose leaders has recently proved themselves to be war-mongering liars. At the moment, the only organization with such reach and resources is the UN, but I wouldn't mind if the "Techies Without Borders" took over.
DNS inherently centralized. (Score:5, Insightful)
This is about ICANN - the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers. It is in charge of the dissemination of domain names and IP addresses. Things have to have identifiers - you can't get information from another computer, unless you have some way of finding that computer and initiating communication. That is why every computer on the internet must have an address, and they must be unique (even NAT'd computers: IP + Port gives a unique address of how to reach the computer you want). To insure this uniqueness the process of assigning and publishing these addresses is centralized. People have suggested ways to change this but all the suggestions suck. So no, the internet is not this amorphous decentralized thing that people make it out to be. In fact most things about it are more hierarchical than web-like in distribution, but there is just enough redundancy that it is fairly fault proof.
On the the real issue. For years, this job has been done by the ICANN, which is an international private non-profit corporation, and save for a few annoyances, it has worked out fine and well. However, ICANN is operating under contract from the US government (I forget the exact department) with the knowledge that if ICANN misbehaves the government will slap them back into line. Thus far, the government has not had to do this, and has wisely been almost entirely hands off. Even when ICANN refused to give the IQ domain name to the provisional government in Iraq, the government did not use it's position over ICANN put any particular pressure on them.
The looming question though is what the US government considers misbehaving. This isn't spelled out anywhere for the most part. So far the government has played nice - but who's to say what they will do in the future. Many people therefore want a more international body to be the final say over ICANN (or its equivalent), but their proposals are all as equally vague as the US's policy.
So the world politicians are untrusting of the US, for fear that they may change their hands-off policy, especially with our increasingly unilateral behavior. Therefore, they want ultimate say over the internet, whatever that means. Likewise the US and a large portion of the technical community are untrusting of the UN, because some of them see the UN as incompentant or corrupt, and because European technical regulators are far more politicized on heavy-handed than their US counterparts, and also because more totalitarian governments are on the front line of the push. So we don't want to hand over control to a new party, when the current arrangement is working just fine.
In short, since neither side has managed to spell out what it actually wants, it has just turned into a big ideological mess. What they need to do is table the discussion on who will run the internet and start talking about how the internet should be run. Each side should think of all the things that they are worried about if the other has control, and then sit down and write policy that alleviates these concerns. But until it is determined what power the "Head of the Internet" has, and more importantly what powers it does not have, then nothing productive can happen. It will continue to generate a bunch of "we created it - we run it" and "you guys think you rule the world but you don't" gargbage - just like on slashdot.
US foreign policy made this inevitable (Score:4, Insightful)
Well, since this whole thread is going to be a trollfest from start to finish, we might as well get this one in early:
The problem with the above is that the rest of the world doesn't believe that any more. The current US administration has quite possibly done more to damage international relations for the US than any other in modern history, and this is probably among the first of many ways it's going to come back to bite them and the citizens they represent.
It's not the only one: I watched with great sadness as people whom I know to have given very generously to things like the tsunami appeal openly refused to donate anything in the aftermath of Katrina, such was their loathing for the current state of affairs across the pond. Outside the US, the tragedy that hundreds of people died and countless thousands were displaced isn't what registers with a lot of people any more; they just see the mighty US get what they thought it had coming.
I honestly don't think a lot of US citizens realise just how negative their nation's world image is right now. People outside hear claims about protecting human rights, and the first thing they think of is the images from Gitmo. Every time this thread comes up, half a million zealots start claiming the US created the Internet, and the rest of us don't know whether to laugh or cry at the ignorance and naivety. War for oil, the environment, refusing to submit political and military leaders for internationally-recognised war trials while prosecuting leaders of other nations claiming that same authority, using trade power as a way to force other countries to change their legal systems to benefit US corporations at the expense of their own population, supporting dubious regimes in other nations... the list goes on, and none of it's pretty. You have to wonder how any remotely smart US citizen thought their administration could do this and never face any consequences.
ALL Governments hate the internet... (Score:5, Insightful)
So the issued to be considered are:
1. China, North Korea, Cuba, Venezuala, and the other nations that have been pushing for U.N. governance of the internet, have openly said that the reason to do so is to better control it. This is not conspiracy theory, this is easily verifiable fact. They have openly said that the current way the internet works makes it too hard to fight spam, track criminals, protect people from pornography and hate speech, etc, and that the U.N. should take control so that the Internet can be better policed, taxed, and servers can be licenced. The explicit and open goals of U.N. control of the Internet is so that governments can completly control it.
2. With ICANN (which isn't the U.S. government by the way) "controlling" the Internet (which they don't really do), it is pretty clear that the Internet is still largely anarchy.
So, you have a choice. Turn over control of the Internet to the U.N., and absolutly, certainly, without question turn the internet into a government controlled medium like TV or radio. (remember, this is not speculation, this is the whole reason why countries are saying they want the U.N. to control the internet. This is what the U.N. is promising as the main benifit of the U.N. controlling the Internet).
Or, we can leave it how it is for now, and have the small chance that the U.S. government might do something disruptive (which it hasn't done yet, and currently legally does not have the power to do... and if it did, it could easily be worked around by nearly every other country). And we will have the option open to form some better system later in the future.
Inevitable Extreme Authoritarianism vs. the slight possibility of slight Authoritarianism which can then be easily corrected - I am going to choose the latter.
Perhaps it IS dangerous for any one organization (ICANN which is based in the United States) to have too much power over the internet. That is fine. That is a legit point. There are many ways to handle it other than giving absolute power to a different political body (The UN which is based in the United States). The internet could be made completly decentralized. Or perhaps the U.N. could be given control with a set of restrictions that makes sure the Internet always stays free. But none of these are being discussed, because the people advocating U.N. control find those ideas undesirable.
I think it is sad that the majority of people on Slashdot are willing to see the Internet becoming a controlled Authoritarian medium (as the U.N. openly and proudly promises to make it), in order to pursue their knee-jerk anti-American agenda.
Re:No new solutions, no new news (Score:4, Insightful)
It would only be a PITA for those few sites for which some nation decided to make their own version available.
And what's the advantage over my solution of abolishing the catch-all TLDs and forcing them to be country specific? The lines on those are already blurred -- .net being the most obvious. Kudos to some companies (Verizon) for using the domains properly (verizon.net == ISP, verizon.com == telephone business), boo to others (rr.com).
Each nation could set whatever policies they want on .uk, .us, or what have you. What's the difference between having to go to google.us, vs google.com (there's already google.uk, google.de, etc)?
Of course it's all a moot argument because neither of these things will happen. Nobody is going to split the internet over nationalistic pride and .com is way too deep into the popular culture to go anywhere.
Re:No new solutions, no new news (Score:3, Insightful)
And furthermore, DNS != "The Internet"
Chinese Taipei = Taiwan (Score:2, Insightful)
Get you own (Score:5, Insightful)
Well, then let them build their own network! No, being serious here - there is a way to solve all of this. Someone needs to develop their own DNS-like system and while they are at it develop a alternative to HTTP (because this is what we are really talking about here isn't it folks, "teh web"). When they get this new system up and running they can just go ahead and run it on our TCP/IP networks if they'd like (for a fee). By no means however is this going to take DNS control from us here in the states, ours would just exist along side "theirs".
It's possible, so these people should stop bitching.
Then again you would need to get American software companies like Microsoft to ship modified software to you specially because everything in it relies on DNS today (Active Directory can't work without it) and you would need to change a lot of other things, but it's possible.
You can love or hate the US and the current administration, but over the last two-plus centuries, pray tell what other major country has done more to promote free speech?
Well, I don't know about this part of the post. I hate the administration and I don't think they are doing a damn thing for free speech (remember the loyalty oath to see a Bush speech and USAPATRIOT) but I love America and what it stands for and I think only we should be in control for the reason you stated above - some regimes want to censor the Internet.
What scares me is that giving the UN control of the DNS servers will allow people from outside of America control an American's inherent right to free speech. If I put up a site that dishes on the Queen of England then she can petition the UN to revoke my domain name. If I wanted to put a site up called BRANDNAME-SUCKS.COM WIPO might close me down.
It isn't that I don't trust the UN - I just don't trust anyone I can't "see" in an American court.
Re:What's next, a takeover of the GPS satellites? (Score:3, Insightful)
No, it ain't.
It is the invention of DARPA, yes. But 99% of today's Internet was not created by them, it runs on commercial hard- and commercial or Free software, and largely outside the USA. It has become a global network, and it is not the DARPA's pet project anymore.
Funny thing is - the DARPA has acknowledged that for a decade or so. Only the current US administration is a little behind the times, as usual.
Re:Free speech, global commerce and the "good" US (Score:1, Insightful)
So, objectively speaking, the same can be said of the US, but I doubt we'll hear you or people who think like you agreeing to that any time soon. Who is the major funder of the UN? The US. Who has opened up its markets and technology to the world at the cost of losing its competitive edge? The US. Who make up the bulk of those who put their lives on the line when the UN takes military action? The US.
But I know, it isn't right or I'm just being a neo-conservative rah rah sis boom bah patriot for pointing this out. For some reason, it isn't enlightened to close your eyes to the bad the US has done and focus on the good it is done, but it is enlightened to do the same with the UN. I call that bullshit, but people in other countries, especially europe, call it enlightened. Go figure. One man's bullshit is another man's truth I suppose.
This whole "problem" with the TLD's is a textbook beureaucratic maneuver. Beaureaucrats can't fix real problems, but they are really good at "fixing" problems that don't exist. What a waste of EU taxpayer euros, but hey, that's how the "enlightened" europeans want to flush their euros down the toilet, that's their business. Go Europe! When you're done here, I think there are some windmills that need to be charged.
Re:Free speech, global commerce and the "good" US (Score:2, Insightful)
OK, wait, let me see if I got this right -- free speech (I assume we're excepting yelling "Fire" in a crewded theatre and such) is not necessarily a good thing? OK, I guess you can have that "different" view, but when you try to impose it on everyone else's internet, then that's when we have a problem
As for global unregulated commerce, it remains yet to be seem if it is good for developing and under-developed nations or just another tool to transfer resources from the poor countries to the rich.
The internet wasn't designed to be, nor should anyone try to mold it into, something that is "good for developing and under-developed nations." Oh, and how in the hell is the internet "just another tool to transfer resources from the poor countries to the rich?" That's so out there you've just got to back it up with something. Please.
Your description of the UN as [a place] where every crackpot dictator and totalitarian asshole is given a voice alongside the democratically elected crackpots and assholes may sound funny to neo-conservative Bush-loving ears, but it discounts all good the UN and its associate organizations did for decades and still do today.
Well, to these left-wing liberal Bush-hating ears it sounds right about spot on. And it doesn't discount any of the (few, but notable) good things that group of crackpots and assholes has done.
Obviously it is not fashionable to admit certain UN actions are not only good, they are essential where and when they occur (because there is no one else to perform them), but in fact they are. Without the UN the world, specially the worst and poorer parts of the world, would be a far worse place.
Right. Without the UN who would http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ART
As it is, I am all for moving the top domain control to a supranational organization, if only to take it away from a country whose leaders has recently proved themselves to be war-mongering liars. At the moment, the only organization with such reach and resources is the UN, but I wouldn't mind if the "Techies Without Borders" took over.
Good for you. And good luck with that totally cool rage-against-the-US thing and your very clever and fore-thinking effort to punish the US for being "a country whose leaders has recently proved themselves to be war-mongering liars" by making your own internet (because you're not getting control of this one, I can assure you of that.) Enjoy your web censored by China and Syria. We'll be here having fun here on the web as it was meant to be. Free.
Re:US foreign policy made this inevitable (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:US foreign policy made this inevitable (Score:1, Insightful)
The good news is I never did care what the rest of the world thought, and I still don't.
I watched with great sadness as people whom I know to have given very generously to things like the tsunami appeal openly refused to donate anything in the aftermath of Katrina, such was their loathing for the current state of affairs across the pond.
And yet in spite of it all we still send billions in aid to other nations. In fact when the day comes that their country is in need of aid, chances are good that it will largely be US dollars providing it (and people will still be clamouring that we aren'g spending enough). That's OK, though, they can keep their money. We can make do without them.
I honestly don't think a lot of US citizens realise just how negative their nation's world image is right now.
I honestly don't think you realize how many of us know, but don't care. It's all about America's interests first. Everyone thought "Greed is Good" went out with the '80s.
AC
Re:US foreign policy made this inevitable (Score:2, Insightful)
Since Bush got re-elected, that implies that the majority of Americans are either corrupt or stupid.
And that's pretty much how the rest of the world views America.
Re:Yeah, let's turn it all over to China and Iran! (Score:5, Insightful)
What you don't know is that a lot of rightish, centerish and otherwiseish Euros, Africans, Asians, South-Americans, Australians and pretty much everyone else in the world also has a very dim view of America. Some other comment explained quite well why, the point here is that absolutely everyone outside your borders doesn't know whether to laugh or cry anymore when you run around claiming that whoever doesn't totally love you must be a communist, a terrorist or just plain crazy. In fact, aside from the communist part the rest of the world thinks that pretty much describes you.
Why should the US care? (Score:0, Insightful)
And most rational US citizens laugh at this mock criticism. Why should we, especially from nations implicated in slavery, corruption, tyranny, empire, racism, genocide and overall total moral lapse? You can't imagine how hard normal Americans laugh at the pathetic G7 protestors when we see countless dirty, angry, unemployed European perpetual college student anarchists screaming paranoid messages at the cameras. It's clear the message is consistent with the messenger: one does not expect reasoned thought from dirty minds and bodies.
Truly, if our billions in foreign aid, international economic development, continual bailing out of the World Bank and defaulting nations, support for 1/5 of the UN's budget, etc. isn't enough for you, then let's put an end to it and hear your plans for a change. It's really very difficult to have any respect or empathy when you haven't walked in our shoes, and particularly absurd when you realize these US haters completely disregard both history and reason. (If I hear another French citizen complain about US colonialism, I'm going to personally buy him/her one-way ticket to French Guiana, die their skin black and ship them off to where they can discover how "equal and enlightened" they really are). No Japanese, German, Brit, Frenchman, Italian, Chinese or Russian can ever speak as a legitimate peer to an American on issues of empire and principal.
Regarding the UN Internet control racket and how people that matter view the situation, the reality is that the international business community tends to work well with US business, and from what I've read on the UN Internet power grab, international businesses overwhelmingly prefer the status quo. Most are aware that the UN's motive is not to establish some administrative harmony (if there is such a thing, and if so, it certainly isn't found at the UN), but rather as a financial control mechanism to extract money from Western businesses for the redistribution to the UN international elite.
Consider Oil for Food, which implicates many of Western Europe's governments in the world's largest corruption scheme. Internet for Money is its sequal. Want to keep your domain name and have it registered in the US? A $1,000 annual UN domain permit may be necessary. Better yet, a progressive scheme that allows the UN to confiscate millions from the Western world's largest corporations.
Many regard the Internet move as a logical response from the UN once the Oil for Food money has dried up. Understand that these corrupt officials and their community still have expenses to satisfy and a lifestyle to continue. Lacking a US-subsidized construction project to skim, another racket needs to be employed.
Re:Get you own (Score:3, Insightful)
The necessary protocols tend to be open and free of licensing issues. Setting up an alternative network involves getting the wiring up (and it's there already - that's how these nations have net connections in the first place) and organizing national DNS systems.
It's not that this cannot be done, it's rather that going for a unilateral approach like this is likely to result in massive disruptions and chaos and this isn't a desirable outcome. It would be the internet equivalent of breaking off diplomatic relations, and no-one starts off negotiations by using their strongest weapon right off the bat. In stead, they start by trying to seek a diplomatic solution with compromises that everyone can live with.
From a US viewpoint, if "everyone else" is dead set on getting more international control over the net, then this is most certainly going to happen. The only question is how, exactly, it will happen. If the US play along, they might be able to effect a smooth transition in which many of their own interests are maintained. If they do not, then "everyone else" is likely to get together and build a network that works for them, then start using that. The US will necessarily follow, since it is completely unacceptable for a large number of US businesses to be locked out of the rest of the world, but when this happens, it will be entirely on the terms of those who built this new network.
Of course, the US may be gambling that the rest of the world isn't quite _that_ insistent and that they'll cave once they realize the US aren't interested in playing. And perhaps they're right - this rebellion has all the hallmarks of posturing for now.
Reading Comprehension 101 (Score:3, Insightful)
I haven't said that - I have said there are a whole scale between a contitutional mandate free speech right and a dictatorial information control. Many important European countries (UK, France, Germany, for instance) don't have this absolute right and they are, in some aspects, more democratic the the USA.
The internet wasn't designed to be, nor should anyone try to mold it into, something that is "good for developing and under-developed nations." Oh, and how in the hell is the internet "just another tool to transfer resources from the poor countries to the rich?" That's so out there you've just got to back it up with something. Please.
Now that is just cute - under what logical falacy you change "global unregulated commerce" (what I said) to "the internet" (what you said) and pretend to make any valid conclusions about anything? I was clearly answering to the top poster, I quoted the text I was answering to, and yet you choose to leave the reference out and just make up something that wasn't there. Cute, indeed.
Well, to these left-wing liberal Bush-hating ears it sounds right about spot on. And it doesn't discount any of the (few, but notable) good things that group of crackpots and assholes has done. Right. Without the UN who would http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ART
Exactly what and how I was saying - you concentrate on your government (very small, very petty) marketing hotspots and forget the UNESCO, the UNICEF, the Peace Corps and a miriad of other actions that do not interest you. Because they are geared toward giving a better life and a better chance to very poor people in coutries you don't even know exist. But, hey, the agenda says "The UN is bad" so all of it must be bad.
Enjoy your web censored by China and Syria. We'll be here having fun here on the web as it was meant to be. Free.
Is your web free? Interesting, mine is too. But I don't think I have to thank the USA for it. I also happen to live in a democracy, with regularly elected leaders and its own approved laws. That was one of my points: if all you can say is "Syria will control the Internet!!" you are largely off-base. Syria won't control the Internet. Neither will China. But the USA won't either.
Re:US foreign policy made this inevitable (Score:3, Insightful)
If you're using "voting for Bush" as your guage for intelligence, just keep in mind that there are still a hefty chunk in this country who didn't wake up fucking retarded last November. You may have a poor view of America still, but I still think it's worth remembering that a sizeable amount of people aren't as stupid as you think they are. Or...not for the reason mentioned.
(As an aside, I don't buy the idea that 50%+ of Americans are stupid or corrupt. No. I just think they're fucking pricks who can't stand the thought of their neighbor having sex with someone of the same sex, praying to a different God, or respecting the rights of others.)
Re:US foreign policy made this inevitable (Score:3, Insightful)
I suspect many Americans are unaware of quite how much damage the current US administration has done to the reputation of their country.
For a long time, there's been a bit of a debate about whether the USA should be the "world's policeman", sorting out major world conflicts, because they're the only ones both strong enough and (to Europe's shame) willing enough to do so.
Were some countries unhappy about the USA's power and the way they used it ? Of course - often justifiably. The USA certainly got involved in (or started) wars they shouldn't have. But many countries were quite happy, or at least not seriously concerned, with America fulfilling the "world policeman" role. The USA was seen as pushy, occasionally arrogant, putting their own interests first, but on many occasions, in many parts of the world, they were seen as doing things with good intentions. Broadly, they were trusted.
No longer.
I wish more people in the USA could see just how much damage this administration has done to their country. Damage that will take at least a generation to fix, possibly much longer.
Slightly off-topic: Too many Americans seem to take the criticism of their administration too personally. Too easily it descends into a defensive slanging match about the part of the world of the person making the criticism. That said, too many people criticise the USA as a whole, when their criticisms are mainly to do with just the country's (current) administration.
Back on-topic: This whole DNS power struggle sounds like a hissy fit by the EU (and maybe others). Of all the things over which the USA has de-facto control, their handling of the internet architecture has been very fair. But like the parent poster pointed out, the USA no longer has the trust of a large part of the rest of the world. Amazing how it has come to this, after the worldwide sympathy felt for it in the immediate aftermath of 9/11.
Re:US foreign policy made this inevitable (Score:3, Insightful)
I'd say that makes them stupid AND corrupt, not to mention spineless, insecure, and weak-minded if their worldview is so fragile that someone else's behavior towards a third party that doesn't involve them in the slightest can shake them up so much.
Bring on the down-mods, fundies. I'll still mock you fools to my grave!
Re:Because people don't like the real solution (Score:3, Insightful)
Yes, and that good reason could be: "We are taking control of all DNS (no need to actually design something else) outside the US. Feel free to join us". I don't see that happening in the short term, but I wouldn't be surprised if it came to that eventually (or the US backing down under the threat of this happening).
Stupid American decisions (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:US foreign policy made this inevitable (Score:4, Insightful)
Anti-American people are going to probably dismiss me as a dumb American for saying this, but I really do NOT get why people think that the war in Iraq is war for oil.
Let me explain. Many years ago, Bush was in the oil business. He then became Governor of Texas, and then President of the United States. After that, there was there were the September 11, 2001 terror attacks, and then we went to war in Iraq.
Since we went to war in Iraq, retail gas prices in the United States have gone through the roof. The prices were affected by Hurricane Katrina and also by Hurricane Rita, yes, but even before those things happened, the prices had virtually doubled in just a few years. Prices hit $2.00/gallon over a year ago, which is quite high considering that prices were under $1.00/gallon 6 or 7 years ago. And the majority of the increase has been since the war in Iraq started.
So, let's analyze this in terms of supply and demand. If we went to war for oil, wouldn't you expect that this would have improved gas prices? In fact, it has had the exact opposite effect. Analysts have said that the reason for high gas prices is the uncertainty that war creates in the market. And high gas prices have been hurting the US economy as well. For a long time, we were starting to have an economic recovery (after the dot-bomb crash), but worries over the price of fuel kept killing the momentum of the recovery.
Now combine this with the fact that we were already getting oil out of Iraq through the UN oil-for-food program. Then the war itself disrupted oil production, and it has been been disrupted after "major hostilities" were over, because there has been sabotage.
Basically, my question is this: if this is "war for oil", then why does everything seem to indicate that we have less oil now than we did before the war started, and why does it seem we are having more trouble getting the oil we do get? Bush is not the brightest guy ever, but I don't see how it's plausible that even he is dumb enough to go to war over oil and end up making things worse than they'd be if he did nothing.
Instead, I'd like to offer a different explanation for the war in Iraq. You may think the US's actions in going to war are extralegal, and you may be right (depending on how you view the role of the UN), but in my opinion, the US went to war in Iraq for a simple reason: it wants to protect its interests. Bush is a Texan, and I'm a Texan too, so let me tell you, although I don't agree with it, I know the attitude that many people around here take towards foreign policy. The idea is that the US needs to get out there and do whatever is in our own best interest, period. Yes, we should cooperate with others, but that's not the main focus. It seems pretty clear to me that this war has a very simple purpose.
And what is that purpose? It's not oil. It's not even fighting terrorists, directly. It's something very simple. It's a way of sending a message. The message is really simple: "You fuck with us, we'll find a way to fuck you over 10 times as bad." That is the real reason the US is in Iraq. It is there to make an example of someone, so that terrorists will not think we'll sit around and take terrorist attacks without responding.
Of course, that doesn't jibe with the official line either. The official line is that we're there to liberate people from an oppressive ruler. That's not entirely false. We do hope to accomplish that, and we have mostly done so. But the administration tries to give the impression that it's our primary motivation, and that's a lie.
Now, I don't mind if you disagree with the US going in against UN wishes to invade a country as a show of force. I don't entirely agree with it either, and experience has shown it was probably a bad idea. But if you are going to criticize the US for invading Iraq, please try to be accurate about why the US has done it. It's not that different from France's nuclear tests in 1995 and 1996 that the world opposed, or the more recent nuclear tests in Pakistan and India. Those were also shows of force.
Re:Because people don't like the real solution (Score:1, Insightful)
Now, maybe you could convince all of the ISPs outside the US (maybe some inside too) to use the alternate root servers and count on lazy users to not change the DNS settings on their browsers, PCs, etc.
Of course the
Go for it. Let's just have a nice little "pissing contest" (which is all this really is).
Re:Get you own (Score:3, Insightful)
The thing is, other countries *have* built their own networks. Or did you think the US was running around the world installing fiber and cable for everyone??
Re:bassackwards. (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Free speech, global commerce and the "good" US (Score:4, Insightful)
The neo-cons are putting their chips down for killing free speech too, you know(q.v. "free speech zones", "war on pornography")
If you beleive in free speech, you need to lose the partisan bullshit. We're getting attacked by dipshits on BOTH sides.
Re:US foreign policy made this inevitable (Score:2, Insightful)
Also, regarding those who voted for Bush, I know of at least a few who did so simply because they thought Kerry would've been even worse. While I personally agreed with that sentiment (at the time), I didn't vote for either one -- the lesser of two evils is still evil. I only hope our next president can begin to undo the damage done by GWB.
(As an aside, I don't buy the idea that 50%+ of Americans are stupid or corrupt. No. I just think they're fucking pricks who can't stand the thought of their neighbor having sex with someone of the same sex, praying to a different God, or respecting the rights of others.)
You really should qualify that as "50%+ of Americans who voted". IIRC, barely half of the country's eligable voters (citizens of age and non-felons) showed up at the polls. Also please note that not everyone who believes in God thinks it's OK to persecute someone just because they're gay, or follow a different religion. And brace yourself here... some religious folks actually believe quite fervently in respecting the rights of others; it's called the Golden Rule, or in modern vernacular, "live and let live". You don't have to be the slightest bit religious to realize what a great concept that is.
Back on-topic, yes it is quite clear that this administration's heavy-handed (to put it mildly) foreign policy bears most of the blame for the current world opinion of the U.S., and consequently the resultant struggle to control the Internet. But I don't think this will turn out so bad if everyone just keeps a cool head, for one simple reason: Next election, we are nearly guaranteed to have someone who's very different than Bush, probably diametrically opposite in many views, and the subsequent change in policy will, hopefully, ease the fears of those who currently mistrust the U.S.
Re:No new solutions, no problem anyway (Score:3, Insightful)
According to your quotes, the idea of "taxing people even when they're away from home" is an idea implemented BY THE UNITED STATES ALREADY. The UN, thought the ITO, thinks it would be a good idea to establish a consistent taxing regime where such differences in taxation aren't used as a means for creating "brain drains" from poorer countries which are trying to establish themselves. The idea of taxing expats is an idea the US ALREADY USES.
Also note the keywords "technical assitance" and "ITO to help with enforcement". The ITO would be a means for helping navigate the mess of taxation rules that exist globally. Developing countries just don't have the resources to sort out the tax system of every bloody country their citizens may choose to go, and setup schemes to continue taxing their expats.
Anyway, your concern was about "the UN raising revenue for itself", whereas that item refers to "helping countries raise revenue from their expats, who took their skills (learned at home) out of the country". Oh, and the other taxes you mentioned were those that impact everyone in the world negatively. Pollution, etc. The concept that the UN would say "hey we need more money, where's something we can tax" is stupid, and harks back to the middle ages.
Not to mention that the UN has *no* enforcement powers (and with good bloody reason!). Implementation needs voluntary participation of nations. The UN is a body to *assist* *cooperation* between people. One way to view the UN building in NY is "a set of meeting rooms rented out foreign diplomats". Why is the concept of cooperation so foreign to you?
Ok, and what's that? (Score:5, Insightful)
DNS is all just a set of conventions and trusts remember. The roots trust ICANN. Nobody makes them, any root could go and trust any other authoriy, or become their own. DNS servers trust the roots. They can trust one or all of them, or none. You can set your DNS server to be it's own root and not listen to ICANN, or listen to an alternate root like OpenNIC.
So sure, maybe the EU has or can get the legal authority to force K to stop listening to ICANN, but they can't force any of the rest of them. So unless they decide to go all George Orwell and force private citizens and companies to stop listening to the roots, they are sunk. The only alternative, is to create their own roots and try and convince people, including Americans, it's in their best intrest to use those as well as or instead of the ICANN roots.
That's the real problem here is the Internet is by and large the US's toy. When everyone else came along to play, they could have setup their own thing. They could have decided to reuse the entire IP space internally. Then, we would have had to develop a way for those spaces to communicate, and a way would have been developed. Or, even had they gone along with that, it would have been very easy for each country to setup their own root as they went along. Then all the roots could run their own zone and copy each other's zone, and they could all vote about adding new domains and who would administer those.
But nobody did.
People would just in and just use what the US had provided. The countries setup nothing, and individual orginizations would just setup DNS using UC Berkely's (now ISC, also US based) BIND which used the US roots. As need for DNS grew the US kept adding more roots, and nobody else bothered. Finally with the 11th root one was created outside the US, but even that chose to just join on the US system.
Well guess what? All this has lead to de facto US control. Everyone chose to join their network and play by their rules, it means they have a degree of control. Now since it's all just due to conventions, it can be changed by people deciding to use a new convention, but it can't be forced. The EU can't force the US to give up control of the US roots or ICANN.
Re:No new solutions, no problem anyway (Score:3, Insightful)
The US taxes US citizens working overseas. It does not tax emigrants (those who move permanently to another country) as the UN suggests it would like to do itself. Please read more carefully and look up the big words like "emigrant" and "expatriate" when necessary.
Also note the keywords "technical assitance" and "ITO to help with enforcement". The ITO would be a means for helping navigate the mess of taxation rules that exist globally. Developing countries just don't have the resources to sort out the tax system of every bloody country their citizens may choose to go, and setup schemes to continue taxing their expats.
That's just silly. When the US taxes expats (not emigrants!), it taxes them under US tax law. Not under the tax laws of the host country. There's no need for the US or any other country to "sort out the tax system of every bloody country their citizens may choose to go, and setup schemes to continue taxing their expats." No, the UN wants to help collect taxes on people who leave one country to go seek a better life in another country (read: tax those who move to America or Europe from 3rd world countries.) This is about emigration, not expat foreign workers.
Anyway, your concern was about "the UN raising revenue for itself", whereas that item refers to "helping countries raise revenue from their expats, who took their skills (learned at home) out of the country". Oh, and the other taxes you mentioned were those that impact everyone in the world negatively. Pollution, etc. The concept that the UN would say "hey we need more money, where's something we can tax" is stupid, and harks back to the middle ages.
Read closely: In 1994, the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) called for a "New World Social Charter where the world will redistribute wealth, as it cannot survive, one-quarter rich and three-quarters poor, and where the U.N. must become the principal custodian of global human security, and help with basic education, healthcare, immunization, and family planning." To meet these goals, they put forth the concept of global taxation.
Whether or not they go it under the guise of "redistributing wealth" (which is a horrible idea) is irrelevant. The UN will take a cut for "administration costs" and that benefits the UN. So the proposed taxes will benefit the UN by financing it. And, like all taxing bodies and organizations, the UN will have an incentive (profit motive / lifestyle maintenance of the head honchos) to continue to tax more, and never reduce taxes. The member nation's taxes^W dies aren't enough for what they want to do, and they want more.
Re:US foreign policy made this inevitable (Score:3, Insightful)
26,000 dead civilians amist billions in profit, support of Saddam and evil countries like Saudi and Israel (who you illegally gave nukes, BTW), largest funder of global terrorism (until 2001), continual meddling in other countries democratic elections, and the routine toppling of governments. All while presenting an image of the worlds righteous saviour.
Yeah, it's jealosy alright. Those who don't like the US's actions just have a better knowledge of history. Hollywood history not withstanding of course, but that's the image you have of your country and who am I to get in the way of your facism?
Sure, some don't like you because they are small-minded and have been brought up do to so, in the same way that you hate at least six nations due to your educational programming. However, some, like me, used to like the USA. Then 9/11 happened, we started asking questions, reading history books. And you know what? Half the world has a perfectly valid reason to dispise you. And that my friend is your biggest problem. If you fuel the hate with more profitable wars, more of your citizens will suffer from terrorism. But it's not going to affect anyone in DC, anyone that matters, so who cares, right?