Hi Geoff thanks for your email, yes indeed, some organisations may becoming irrelevant, some have actually disappeared but some remain amidst the new bodies, everyone doing a good job and the needing also to be educated. After all ITU has members that can be educated but it seems that many other issues needs answers. We are also seeing ITU as not the only player that has put in their agenda the issues of internet, indeed the Europe councils, APEC and others have done so with the internet, to quote KA in how internet has "revolutionalised how we do things and touched the very fabric of human communications and exchange.." and governance. Thanks Geoff, they are very good papers and needs to be given the proper justice in a formal hearing along with other arguments. I guess this is the process now being undertaken. We really should support your participations at the high level talks into these aspects One aspect in your paper particularly attracts attention from the small islands and developing countries from the Pacific, and I am sure also the rest of the countries like us, is the part of the unfair internet charging regimes, resulting with the small islands like in the Pacific, like other countries having to pay for internet all the way to the US even transit, in a way subsidizng the US traffic both ways and having the folks back in the islands, cut more coconuts for copra, or dive for more beech der mers to be able to access internet (or send their children to learn the ways of the world to become in par with the rest of the world), noting connectivity to these islands is solely through the costly satellite capacities But again this is not the question.. Many thanks again Geoff, maybe a matrix of pros and cons on the proposals is something we may want to propose, inviting the bottom up approach contributions, and giving everyone chance to put in their contribution, so that members can learn themselves in their arguments when presenting to the ITU Study Group meeting, or in their submissions through the various meetings. Of course in addition to the direct arguments, like by the RIRs. I am sure we have the support of the islands to coordinate for a learning session for the Pacific Islands, maybe during the various planned meetings? Cheers Fred -----Original Message----- From: Geoff Huston [mailto:gih@apnic.net] Sent: Monday, 1 March 2010 5:43 AM To: pita@connect.com.fj Cc: Franck Martin; Skeeve Stevens; AusNOG; apnic-talk@apnic.net; nznog; pacnog@pacnog.org Subject: Re: [AusNOG] [pacnog] RIPE NCC Position On The ITU IPv6 Group On 27/02/2010, at 6:51 PM, pita@connect.com.fj wrote:

Some folks just likeshooting down other organisations and missinmg the issues

Can the contribution be more on the issues otherwise take it elsewhere

Keep the minds open as there are some real valid and serious issues here.

So to start with,you can contribute on the issues raised or why the study is needed?

One of the commonly supported ideals is having competition.

Is this an issue if organised well?

How about security.. Can we all live it to system?

I would really like to hear good strong arguments for both sides

Hi Fred, In response to your request for some contributions to the topics of competition in address distribution, Paul Wilson and I wrote the following some years back: http://www.potaroo.net/ispcol/2005-04/compete.html I believe that you will find that this article directly addresses the issues relating to the potential effects of competing address distribution systems within the same protocol set. I note that nothing has changed in the intervening period. At the time I also wrote a broader look at the motivations of the ITU in this space, and you can find that at: http://www.potaroo.net/ispcol/2004-11/2004-11-isp.htm The ITU evolved over the 20th century to match the needs and desires of its constituents and as many, if not all, national regimes addressed the social needs for broad access to a single functional telephone network via national monopolies , the ITU assumed, in effect, the role of being the monopolists club. Since many of these monopolies were publically owned and operated enterprises the role of governments and the role of the monopoly actors were closely aligned. There were some chinks in this approach, chiefly relating to the use of inter-provider (all, to call it by its real name at the time "inter-government") payments for the increasingly lucrative area of international communications, and the opposition was mainly from the US, but on the whole the ITU was tolerated given the lack of any viable alternative. The Internet was not an isolated technological innovation - it rode upon the back of progressive deregulation of the telecommunications sector in the late 20th century. The Internet players have been firmly rooted in a vibrantly competitive and largely deregulated private sector, and the ITU has been supremely irrelevant to their business models. But the ITU still has a set of folk who feel that their interests are best articulated by this august body, even if their individual interests are possibly as simple as preserving their rather comfortable lifestyle in Geneva while living on permanent travel allowance! I must admit, however, that I find it ironic that the latest efforts by the ITU to regain some degree of relevance in this shifted world order of the largely deregulated competitive telecommunications environment that we live in today, have the ITU invoking the mantra of "competition!" From the supreme head of the former monopolist club that indeed is an ironic, and economically and politically speaking a naive and inept move on the part of the ITU, in my view. So I agree with you Fred in the assertion that these are indeed significant issues - to quote from the closing para of the second document I've referenced: "It is unlikely that James Watt would've looked at the governor he had invented for the steam engine and foreseen the fundamental way that the ensuing industrial revolution would change the lives of every human on the planet over the ensuing centuries. His was a simple problem of technology. At its outset the Internet was also a simple problem of technology. Today it is no longer just a question of technology, but also a more fundamental question of entering a process of social change, as we embrace a world of information, where the economic forces appear to be related to the capability of acquiring and exploiting information." Regards, Geoff Huston Usual Disclaimers - these are all my views.=