ICANN and the Supreme Court
By
Dave Winer on Monday, June 25, 2012 at 1:09 PM.
 A quick note.  This morning at 10AM we all stood by waiting for the Supreme Court ruling on ObamaCare, which didn't come. Other rulings were announced, and the non-tech press is doing their jobs, reading every word in every opinion, trying to figure out what it means.
On the other hand, a huge amount of information, containing who-knows-what was released on the 13th by ICANN, about Google, Amazon, Apple and a bunch of other companies, some known and some unknown, that directly impacts the future of the Internet.
Also execs are leaving ICANN, including the CEO. Where are they going? Are they going to profit from the mess they're leaving behind?
ICANN is supposed to protect the integrity of the Internet, instead it looks like they may be selling it out, and there's at least a possibility that employees of ICANN are profiting from it.
You can't really say that this is tech and therefore someone else's responsibility, because the structure of the Internet is relevant to everything.
Thomas O'Toole, a trademark lawyer, wrote that getting a gTLD is the closest thing to getting a global trademark. And they are sold without anyone really watching. The tragedy is that you don't have to wait for a leak to get the info, it's all public, available to anyone.
Wouldn't it be great if there were a public effort to read every word in every application and share what's learned, much as every word in the Supreme Court rulings are being analyzed and studied by people who understand what's at stake?
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